Copyright

The article Copyright and Fair Use in the UMUC Online or Face-To-Face Classroom was beneficial for me as a teacher.  The article was informative in that it provided very specific guidelines for how to use different copyrighted materials.  It also explicitly defined what exactly copyright is – “copyright is a legal device that provides the creator of a work of art or literature, or a work that conveys information or ideas, the right to control how the work is used”.

As a teacher, I use many different forms of media.  The article clearly defined permissible amounts of material that may be copyrighted. With my area of teaching being Pre-K/K it is unlikely that I will be copying large quantities of text material to use with my students.  If I were to find it necessary to copy text over the limit of “fair use” the article explains when permission is required – “when you intend to use the material for commercial purposes, when you want to use the materials repeatedly, and when you want to use a work in its entirety, especially when it’s longer than 2,500 words."http://sites.umuc.edu/library/libhow/copyright.cfm

To obtain permission to use copyrighted material the article offers assistance if you are UMUC faculty as well as providing a sample letter as a guide if you are not faculty at UMUC.  I found the sample letter to be very simple however it is geared toward college/university level use.  Additionally, the article goes on to explain Open Educational Resources and T.E.A.C.H {Technology, Education, and Copyright Harmonization Act). OER’s are “teaching, learning, and research resources that reside in the public domain or have been released under intellectual property license that permits their free use or re-purposing by others."  I found the information in this article to be useful in my career as a teacher.

To obtain permission to use copyrighted material the article offers assistance if you are UMUC faculty as well as providing a sample letter as a guide if you are not faculty at UMUC.  I found the sample letter to be very simple however it is geared toward college/university level use.  Additionally, the article goes on to explain Open Educational Resources and T.E.A.C.H {Technology, Education, and Copyright Harmonization Act). OER’s are “teaching, learning, and research resources that reside in the public domain or have been released under intellectual property license that permits their free use or re-purposing by others” (Atkins, Brown, and Hammond, 2007, p.4).  I found the information in this article to be useful in my career as a teacher.

Wiki's

Providing a central location for meaningful information makes referring or gaining information easy.  Wiki’s work by including members of a group with similar interests.  The members of the group then find resources or information they believe would benefit the group or are of interest to themselves.  The member of the wiki group then copies the web link and write a short, informative paragraph describing the information and their name.  This allows the other members to look over the description to decide of the information provided would be in their interest and consider the website further or rather, more specifically.

Wiki's are a central place for placing and using information about information that the users have in common.  In the case of our class we are compiling information important to teaching to share with other educators (http://etec486classresources.pbworks.com/w/page/115499239/ETEC%20486%20Resource%20Wiki).  Wiki's organize information and material in a central location, including links to websites and articles.  

This is a very interesting way of sharing information that I had not known about previously.  The benefits of using a wiki would be that similar minded people could share information that is relevant to others in the group, making looking for specific and reliable articles or websites quicker and easier.  The drawback to wiki’s is that the creator of the wiki must know the recipients to share the wiki with or invite them to use the wiki, otherwise wikis would be something that was searched for over a vast internet of information.  Another challenge is that only one wiki participant can be on the site at the same time, making the sharing of information challenging if another has the same idea at the same time.  I could see a grade level of teachers creating a wiki or a school having a common area for the wiki, thus making it a school community resource.

Wikis are an new way of sharing information for me and I will be interested in how the use of the wiki in our class will play out.

Interactive White Boards

White boards are a new instrument in my teaching.  Through the exploration of the book, Engaging Learners with Interactive Whiteboards by Blanche O'Bannon, I have realized that "Interactive whiteboards have great potential as a tool to enhance pedagogical practices".  I can see first hand the potential to really get the children up from their tables or desk and involved in experiences rather than static sitting and listening in my internship in a kindergarten classroom.

I myself have needed hands on teacher training to use the whiteboard in my classroom.  My mentor teacher uses it fluidly and the children are experts at knowing the potential of the the whiteboards capabilities.  I picked up a few cues from watching her demonstrate the features of the SMART board, but as stated by the author, continued professional development, including webinars and sharing with peers about tips or tricks they have used in their classrooms.  As a teacher, using peer resources can sometimes be the best professional development to learn about how teachers choose to use technology or even be able to step into their classroom to see the teacher using the whiteboard with the children present to see new engaging ideas and get inspiration.  I can completely see if that if a teacher was only taught to use the interactive white board in certain ways and certain times then the "technical proficiency" for anything more than a projector.

I was surprised to learn about using student response systems in classrooms.  My focus is on early childhood education and I have only been exposed to student response systems in my college classes.  I had never even considered student response systems in a primary or secondary classrooms.  The evidence does exist that confirms the gains of children in classrooms that include this technology.

Technology definitely has it's place in the current classroom and even more so in future classrooms, but teachers need to be equipped with the tools to get the most use out of the technology at their fingertips.