Blog Post #8

This is How We Dream

In the two parts of this video, Richard Miller discusses the evolution of human communication. He starts out by saying he grew up with a love of books, and decided that one of his goals when reaching adulthood would be to publish his own book. He succeeded at this goal, and now his book can be published on Amazon for 59 cents. He goes on to discuss how we are moving from a book bound culture to a digital culture. Now we can "check out" books from a vast digital library without ever exhausting the supply of books. You never have to wait for someone to return a book before you can get a copy. Not only are we publishing our ideas in words, but we can also use picture, video, and audio.

One of my favorite parts of this video was when Miller said "the only limits are those we place on ourselves." The way we get information is steadily changing, constantly updating yet we can always find history and older information. I also enjoyed the point Miller made about his lecture. Without the internet, it could have taken years to get his message out there, but because he has unlimited access to this tool, it was published within a matter of minutes AND reached a global audience.

Carly Pugh's Blog Post #12

I absolutely loved Carly's post. The assignment she came up with makes me want to go and create my own version. The idea of incorporating an assortment of videos to meld together in my own teaching philosophy is exciting to me. In reading various things I find a sentence here or a song lyric there that portrays a thought I might have had in a way I hadn't thought of expressing it. Using videos from various sources to do this same thing really exemplifies what Richard Miller was talking about when he spoke of using multimedia in writing. The variation between videos breaks up the monotony of text and allows readers to stay more engaged in your post.

The Chipper Series and EDM310 For Dummies

Both of these videos were helpful to watch at the beginning of this class when I really had no idea what I was getting myself into. :-) The Chipper Series, while a bit long and exaggerated, was helpful because it reinforced the message that you get what you put in to something. If you work hard, the benefits are well worth it. If you put minimal effort in, you are just wasting time. As far as a video I would like to create, I think it would be helpful to have a video which thoroughly explains basic functions on a Mac. When I first came in to the lab, I had only used my iPod and my iPhone. I had never used a Mac and I had no idea how to do the simplest things on one. I couldn't even figure out how to close a window because the functions were so different than what I was used to on the PCs I have used growing up. Once I figured out the basics, I enjoy the simplicity but I was like a deer in headlights at first.

Learn to Change, Change to Learn

Overall, I agree with the majority of things said in this video. I agree that the way we currently approach school needs to change dramatically, and I think we are on track to do this. We do need to place the student in the center of the motivation for the classroom, and understand that they do have experiences and opinions that they can bring to the table. They are not there for us to simply fill them with information and send them on their way. I think we can do this by creating more interesting assignments and teaching students to use a variety of tools and technologies aside from just pen and paper to do this.

One thing I did NOT agree with in the video was the lady who claims that if she were to redesign a school she is not sure she would use the traditional bricks and mortar school. I am assuming she means that she would go to using a strictly internet based learning system rather than a real classroom. I agree that we should be using technology in our classrooms, but I do not think that technology should replace our classrooms. There will always be, in my opinion, a value in coming together in person to discuss things face-to-face, and we can't let ourselves get carried away with social networking to the point that we no longer know how to interact with an actual person standing in a room with us. As much as schools are meant to teach facts and information, they are also there to help teach appropriate social behaviors.