If anything, this class has helped open my eyes to just how important technology is to ehancing students' educational opportunities. Please let me know if you feel this way as well. To speak on the collaborative and communicable components of technology, in my opinion, is to be speaking on the MOST IMPORTANT ASPECT OF TECHNOLOGY in reference to its educational purposes. I feel as though the interactive and collaborative components of certain technologies, such as blogs, livejournals, video chats, even email, can be highly educational, effective, and beneficial to ones learning experience.
As stated in the following article ( http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ERM0450.pdf ) blogging is considered one of the most beautiful tools in the world beacsue it provides us with and allows us to have the "most magical thing", communication with others. When you think about it, if we were not able to communicate with one another, no one would be able to learn ANYTHING. The technological advances of our time have allowed for an endless amount of communicable opportunities, both near and far. Now that these opportunities are being brought into the classroom, students will be able to use their knowledge of technology to explore concepts, state opinions, discuss ideas and further their education with their peers.
When I think back to my own educational experience, there was little inclusion of technology, with an even lesser emphasis on cooperative learning and communication. I believe that this has hindered me somewhat because I am not as tech savvy as I should be. Also, I feel as though I was out of the loop for quite sometimes with certain social networking sites. I also may go as far as to say that I never got a lot of practice with typing, and thus my words per minute score could use some work. Therefore, I think that technology should always try to be included in the classroom. This class has made me realize the imprtant factors that technology has to offer in an ecucational context. Using blogging as a way for students to reflect on a lesson, or as a mode of cooperative learning will most definitely be used in my classroom, and should be included in ALL classrooms. With all that technology has to offer, there is no reason that a capable educator should NOT be able to find a way to incorporate it into a majority of his or her lessons.
Check out these links for a laugh or two:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GIiZ6_yGm6M
http://cyn-thenutshell.blogspot.com/2011/05/blog-funnies.html
And check this out for an awesome blogging lesson plan idea that I have actually used in a classroom and the kids love it!:
http://langwitches.org/blog/2008/12/27/blogging-lesson-plan-writing/
