DEJ #10

Quote: 

"Success is based not only on what you know or how much you know, but on your ability to think and act creatively. In short, we are now living in the Creative Society.

Unfortunately, few of today’s classrooms focus on helping students develop as creative thinkers. Even students who perform well in school are often unprepared for the challenges that they encounter after graduation, in their work lives as well as their personal lives."

 Reflection:
I chose this quote because the idea behind it is something I agree with 100 percent.Students today are becoming less creative because they know that all they have to do is look in a book to get an answer, and if they put it off long enough, the teacher will do it for them. They aren't being challenged properly to find their own solutions. Students need more access to creative outputs in order to broaden their perceptions of the world and what they're learning.

Related Post:
Extra Credits: Gamifying Education
This is a video I saw about a year ago by the same group (Extra Credits) who did the video we saw in class. It takes the idea of games and applies it to the classroom, giving creative ways to get students learning outside of the classroom, along with encouraging them to do more while they work.

Citation:
Resnick, Mitchel. "Sowing." Learning & Leading with Technology. ISTE (International Society for Technology in Education), 2007. Web. 1 Apr 2012.http://web.media.mit.edu/~mres/papers/Learning-Leading-final.pdf.

My scratch project.

I used the concepts of Glide, Animation, and Talking.

My magazine cover

Double Entry Journal #8 Wikipedia

a. What is Wikipedia?

An online encyclopedia that can be edited by anyone.

b. How would you answer the question posed in this piece “How reliable can a source be when anyone can edit it?”?

I think that you should always be skeptical of what is on the web. However, I think Wikipedia is a great place to start when trying to research something, and if an article has credible sources, then I think you're fine with using it. However, if there are no sources, then I would check another site afterwards.

c. Who do the creators of Wikipedia place their trust in when it comes to weeding out misinformation?


The people reading Wikipedia. They believe that if someone reads something that is false, if will be fixed .


d. Why did founder Larry Sanger leave Wikipedia?

He believed that experts should be the ones giving information. Not random people on the web.


e. What would abuse or vandalism look like on a Wikipedia page?


People editing pages for their own gain(such as businesses editing their own page to make themselves look good) People changing facts on a page because they do not like the subject, or people editing pages, attempting to be funny.


f. What do the statistics quoted in the third paragraph of this piece reveal?


That Wikipedia is quickly becoming a social norm for checking information. If people do not know something, they quickly jump on Wikipedia and look it up, allowing it to grow and become more popular.


g. Why do you think Wikipedia is so successful?


Because it is easy to access. Anyone can find anything that they need on it. Also, the pages of Wikipedia are set up to be as helpful as possible. Each article has a table of contents under a summary of the subject. Not to mention anything searched on Google normally results in a Wikipedia article being within the top five results.


h. Why might Wikipedia’s creators not want to accept advertising?


Advertising may create bias. If they're advertising a product, that gets bashed on their site, that makes Wikipedia look bad, and may get them in trouble with the company that paid for advertisements.


i. How does Wikiscanner help increase the reliability of Wikipedia entries?


It shows when private companies go onto their own page and edit things to make themselves look good, or cover up information they don't want the public to know.

My teaching philosophy.

Double Entry Journal #7 Teaching Media Literacy

The difference in media literacy skills and traditional literacy skills are vast. media literacy requires the reader to be more involved in the reading, whereas in a textbook, students have only but to read what's in front of them and turn the page.

U.S. students may learn something about evaluating sources in research paper assignments and learn to recognize propaganda in social studies, but that's often the extent of their media literacy instruction.

I agree completely with this quote. I know that when I was in high school, we barely learned how to evaluate sources. We learned much about propaganda, but I can only speak for my school, and I was in higher level classes. Students should have access to classes that teach them more about online tools and how to use the internet in general.

Related Source: 
 http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2011/12/how-to-use-google-search-more-effectively/

According to studies done, 3 out of 4 students can't perform effective Google searches. Students aren't taught how to use Google to their advantage, and suffer because of it.

Citation:
Ritholtz, B. (2011, December 03). How to use google search more effectively [Web log message]. Retrieved from http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2011/12/how-to-use-google-search-more-effectively/


David, Jane. "Educational Leadership." . ASCD, 003/2009. Web. 4 Mar 2012. <http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/mar09/vol66/num06/Teaching-Media-Literacy.asp&xgt;.

My photo story.