Reflections on Internet Safety

I decided on beautiful orange font colour today, since it is so close to Halloween! Enjoy!!

The internet is a dangerous place. It is also the future, so we must learn how to navigate it safely. Students are being introduced to the internet at a young age, so we should start this introduction with a 'internet safety demo'. If students are taking shop class, they must have a shop demo that goes over all the safety procedures and there is usually a booklet to read and a test to take before shop access is allowed. Why is it then, that we allow children access to the internet without such a demo? I feel that this type of demo for internet safety should be given at the beginning of each school, with age-related, relevant subjects updated frequently.

For teachers the WebQuest option is really great. With this program teachers are able to write up an internet, research-related lesson plan that includes links to websites of their choosing. Teachers can then take the time to screen these websites before allowing their students to access them. This is a good option for students that are just learning how to navigate the internet. It also cuts back on the navigation time, as the relevant websites are easily accessed.

Spreadsheets in the Classroom

I was very impressed with what spreadsheets could do! I had never used a spreadsheet before my assignment and loved the ease with which I could calculate data. While using Microsoft Excel it was very obvious that spreadsheets would be used to calculate grades in the classroom. Another way to use them would be to keep ongoing attendance records. Lates and absences could be calculated at the end of each term to add to the report cards and children with perfect attendance and/or no lates could be rewarded for their efforts.

I thought that introducing spreadsheets into a grade two classroom would be a challenge, but looking back at the language arts lesson that my TA taught this past Thursday, I was inspired! She was teaching the class about nouns, verbs, and adjectives. She had created columns on the board, with the noun, verb, and adjective headings and the class brainstormed many Halloween-related words to fill the columns. If the technology was available, then this lesson could be transfered to a spreadsheet...whether it be through a smart board in the classroom, individual computer time or a projector connected to the classroom computer. It's a simple concept for a spreadsheet, but it could be made into a chart to see what the class liked the most as noun, verb and adjective and those words could be used in a Halloween poem.

Discussion Boards

Using discussion boards in the classroom could be a nice way for children to learn critical thinking and writing skills. They will also be able to learn how to participate in an online discussion while learning about the subject on the discussion board. I do feel that discussion boards are probably only good for middle school and up, unless there is a LOT of teacher participation and this would be a time management issue then.

Five ways that discussion boards could enhance classroom interactions are...

1) The teacher could start a thread for discussion, therefore leading a discussion online.
2) The students could possibly interact with other classes around the city, province or country!
3) The students could gain valuable knowledge about discussion board topics.
4) The students would have a safe place to express themselves and even shy students would be able to participate in classroom discussions.

5) The students would learn proper discussion etiquette, plus grammar and spelling, by the teacher being the moderator.

Concept Mapping Natural Disasters

This concept map of natural disasters would work well in a science unit. It will help students classify and organize data after gathering and identifying information. These are two of the ICT outcomes that fit very nicely into this lesson. Foundational operations, knowledge and concepts are another ICT outcome that this science concept map relates to.

I believe that seeing the concept map will help students classify in their minds and memory map. Not all students learn this particular way, but for those that do learn visually, the natural disasters concept map will be a great help and visual aid in their learning.