Week 4-summary

During this week, I found that I was becoming overwhelmed with the various sites I had to upgrade for my assignments. My Facebook account is utilized daily. I often sign on to my Facebook account to keep up with my friends and family daily postings. I also enjoy the various applications such as Quiz Monster and playing the various games. As for educational applications, I have to admit not until this class, I had not realized how many there are on this social bookmarking site. I plan on reviewing several of them more.
I wasn't impressed with Ning. It turned me away immediately when it required a credit/debit card.  After I gave in to signing up a trial account, I reviewed some of the applications it offered. I did like the ability to add videos differently than Facebook. I also found some good educational tools. However, both sites are blocked in my school. So it is needless for me to use with my students or further investigate applications that will help my students' learning.
PBworks impressed me with its various pages to add. I can see this being a great site for me to continue to use with my students. Wikis are definitely an educational tool that I feel will benefit student learning.
After reading the article, Minds on Fire, I thought about how a car drives off a lot and depreciates its value. Educators need to be up to par when it comes to providing the learning and skills needed for our todays' students. Multitasking is everywhere. When I was younger, I never thought I could work on an assignmnet on the computer using the internet as a reference, answer the cell phone, watch television, and still bounce back and forth to Facebook chatting with my friends. Today, as a 48 year old woman, I am learning to become successful in doing these tasks somewhat. Such places as Second Life, allow for social learning for individuals without ever leaving their living room. Times have changed. Evolving into the future means willing to accept the changes and adapt to them. As an effective teacher, I must be better prepared to do this and most importantly willing to do this as well.