Blog Post #2

Mr.Dancealot

In the video Mr. Dancealot, the professor is trying to teach his students how to dance by taking notes. The professor gets angry when the students attempt to practice the dance moves he is telling them about. He also did not approve of the students asking question. The central message of the video is that students do not learn very well if you just tell him what to do. You have to demonstrate what to do and let them practice. In the end of the video, when it was time for the final exam none of the students were able to demonstrate the dances and most of them had the textbook in their hands while trying to dance.This is how the author makes his case for his conclusion that students have to practice to learn. I agree that students need to be taught but also let practice so that they better understand.

Teaching in the 21st Century

In the video, Roberts feels that technology is the main teacher for students. The position described in the video is that as teachers we have to keep our teaching interesting. As an educator, It is important for me to know that my students have many other sources other than me. If Roberts is right, as teachers we will use more technology in the classroom and we will become more like an aid to guide them in the right direction but ultimately they will be teaching themselves.

The Networked Student

In this video written and directed by Wendy Drexler you are given an example of a student going into college. The student starts to build his network. The students learns to blog, and share information using sites like Google docs. The student starts out not very motivated. The video ends with the student being connected to a top professor at the University of California Berkeley. The networked student needs a teacher because they need to learn the proper procedures on how to create their networks. The student will may be able to figure it out but they may not do it correctly. The teacher would help improve the students success rate in widening their network. The video is very informative about creating and continuing to build your network. The video talks about the importance of going through the process of creating a network, how to develop that network, and understanding how to properly build your network.

Harness Your Students’ Digital Smarts

In this video Vicki Davis uses technology to encourage her students to learn for themselves and to be more self sufficient when using technology. The students are able to teach themselves and other students how to use different programs on the computer. Davis when in her classroom acted more like a guide rather than a teacher. This approach of teaching can be good in letting the students become more technology literate on their own but is not appropriate for all students because all students have a different skill level. Students who do not use technology as consistently as others may fall behind because they are not as familiar with the software.

Flipping the Classroom
In the video, they talk about giving the students the lesson the night before to go over at home to save class time. I have had to read things for "homework" then we took a quiz to make sure we read it the next day. But if you didn't read it, you just didn't do well on the quiz and the teacher never went back over it so they just didn't learn about it. I see the advantages becaue it saves classtime but I feel some things need to be taught in the classroom so that the teacher knows that the students understand.