Matthew Mikos Blog #5 Final Reflection

TPTE 486 was a great class that I will recommend to teachers and students.  I learned many

important technologies that can be incorporated into my classroom.  The class helped me realize the

importance of adding the technological aspect to my classroom.  Children in this time have grown up

with technologies that are distant from what I was offered a child.

It is important to keep up with the times and the children.  I have been in close contact with teachers 

that stay away from technology because of the fact that they are not accustomed to the products.  

They choose to use old methods of teaching that do work, but that may require more effort and 

provide less excitement and interaction for the students.  I feel that it is important for teachers to 

practice using technology so that it doesn't become out of reach for them.  I was concerned at the 

beginning of the class that I may not be able to retain some of the information from the class as I 

realized that the information would be important to have in my resources.  I know now that retaining 

the material is not what is important, but that the constant practicing with technologies is what will 

make a person familiar with it and it as it changes.  Technology will always be updated and changed 

with attempts at making it better.  Technology is made to help us as humans so we should embrace it

and take advantage of it.  

TPTE 486 provided me with a vision to stay active with the technologies available.  I learned that 

student engagement and motivation can be enhanced by its use.  At the end of the course I feel as if 

the class was valuable and important.  I will be using the information from the class throughout my 

life and my work as a teacher.  This will make me a better teacher and make me able to understand 

when technologies are being used.  The class met all of my expectations and more.  I have already 

mentioned to some of my teachers that they should take the class and that they would benefit from it.

I look forward to the end of class but am thankful for the information that I have acquired.

Matthew Mikos - Blog #4

I went to www.teachersfirst.com/content/wiki/ and took the wiki walk through.  This was an

informative site that informed me more about what a wiki can be used for in the K - 12 classroom.  It

told me that a wiki is a website that lets any visitor become a participant, anyone can edit, its always

under revision, and it is a living collaboration with the purpose of sharing the creative process and

product of many people.  In class we used wiki's as a way to share informative websites that we had

found useful and necessary for us in the teaching world.  It worked well as we quickly had access to

a large number of websites.  Wikis are being used by K - 12 educators to conduct or follow up on

professional development workshops or as a communication tool with parents.

The greatest potential use for a wiki lies in student participation in the on going creation and 

evolution of the process or product.  The difference between a blog and a wiki is that a blog serves 

more as a space for individual opinions that are untouched.  A wiki allows others to change what one

person has written.  

Some uses in K - 12 education are study guides made by students, vocabulary lists contributed by 

students, organizational and intellectual epicenters for classrooms, products of research projects 

(collaborative group projects), annotated collections of examples (like our resource wiki), "what I 

think is best on the test" wiki - students add throughout the year, travelogues, and information for 

students who miss school.  For younger students, wikis can be used for annotated virtual libraries, 

collaborative book reviews or author studies, elementary class encyclopedias, Family Twaditionwikis 

and Where's Wanda wiki's (Like Flat Stanley)

Wikis can be used for connections that build greater new and old knowledge.  Wikis can build on the 

Best of Bloom's Taxonomy for students as well.  Students can learn new ways of thinking and 

interacting with fellow students.  Wikis can build creative skills, especially, elaboration and fluency, 

flexibility in accepting other's edits, encouraging hitch hiking on ideas, and they introduce and 

reinforce the idea that a creative process is never "done".  Wikis can increase students' engagement, 

their responsiveness can change and improve, and culminating projects never have to end.  Wikis 

help students develop interpersonal and communication skills, especially with consensus building and

compromise.  

The Wiki walk through also helped in guiding teachers on what to do before or as they make a Wiki

for their classroom.  It tells teachers to ask how you first envision the wiki, who will be able to see the 

Wiki, the specifications for the Wiki, like number of people, and publicity, and it advises you to get 

your administrator opinion.  Teachers using Wikis need to be sure that it is permissible to post student 

work on the web.  Wikis are great tools that can link the students and the parents to the classroom.  

They will add an element of technology to the classroom and keep the students interested in the 

on going subject matter.  Wikis will allow for an interaction between students and a passage into the 

classroom for parents who can monitor the learning environment of their children.

Matthew Mikos - TPTE Blog #3 Evaluating University of Houston Digital Story Website

The University of Houston's Digital Story Website is a website about Digital Stories.  A Digital Story is

the practice of using computer-based tools to tell stories.  A Digital Story can also be called a Digital

Documentary, a Computer-Based Narrative, a Digital Essay, and Electronic Memoirs, or an Interactive

Storytelling Method.  The website tells its viewers about the website.  The website was created in 2004

by Faculty Members and Graduate Students from the University of Houston College of Education.

The website is updated and maintained presently.  The University of Houston is the publishing body of

the site and there is no bias that is needed or found for a site such as this. The site mentions an

Educational Fair Use policy that states that the site stresses to their students that when making Digital

Stories that they should create their own original materials.  The site says that this is the policy however

that some of the images and videos that are used on the site do come from some internet sources and

electronic databases that are not owned by the University of Houston.  The site also has a statement that

gives educators the permission to use any and all of the material on the site including text, images,

digital stories, and other resources, for personal, educational, and/or non-commercial purposes.  The

only requirement is that an appropriate citation is used, (Robin, B (2013) The Educational Uses of

Digital Storytelling Website. http://digitalstorytelling.coe.uh.edu ).

The Website is an accurate site because it is basically instructing people on how to make and use

Digital Storytelling.  The act of making a Digital Story and the included information can be inaccurate,

but this is up to the author and is not reflective of this site.

The website offers a background on Digital Storytelling and gives a list of the 7 elements that make up

a Digital Story.

The Website provides links to Web 2.0 Resources such as Blogs, Podcasts, and Wikis all based on 

Digital Storytelling.  It gives great insight to teachers for using Digital Storytelling their classrooms 

under Educational Uses.

The website provides example stories for visitors that range from subjects like Art all the way to 

Health and Science.  The site has a "how to" section on how to actually make a Digital Story of your 

own.  This site is a great resource for teachers when they are looking for a fresh way to present 

material.  The site helps with ideas, building, and background knowledge about the ways teachers can 

use Digital Storytelling in their classrooms.  I would rate this website as a positive site and recommend 

to fellow students and teachers. 

Matthew Mikos - Blog #2 Reflection on OBannon article

The article was interesting as it was a summary on the effectiveness of Interactive White Boards in

the classrooms of today's education system.  The article begins with stating that the new

generation technology provides functionality in certain areas of an academic curriculum.  The

effective use of an Interactive White Board is highlighting, coloring, annotating, and zooming.  It can

hide and reveal text or photos, drag and drop information, import pictures for instruction and

brainstorming.  Interactive White Boards can be used for collaborative writing, shared reading, peer

teaching, and collaborative problem solving.  Interactive White Boards have instructional benefits as

well.  IWBs can promote active learning, classroom management, lesson organization and flow, and

flexability in handling lesson material.  For students the IWBs can increase attention, motivation,

participation, and collaboration.  IWBs and increase efficiency, versatility, and multimodal

presentation interactivity.  Student achievement has been mapped up until this point, however the

length of time that these Interactive White Boards have been in schools is too short to have an

accurate measurement of success.  What we are finding are inconsistent results and conclusions.  The

article gives a number of reasons for the inconsistent factors that may be related to the findings.  The

main point is that teachers are not using the IWBs correctly or to the best or the IWB's abilities.  It

is assumed that teachers are primarily using the boards, simply as a projector screen and not using the

various interactive teaching abilities that the boards offer.  In school a lot of teachers are probably not

trained for the use of an IWB.  Teachers find themselves getting frustrated when attempting to use

them in their classroom and this in turn affect the demeanor of the students.  So in the end it is easier

for a teacher to go about their teaching methods in the old manner.  This affects the outcome of the

measuring of the effectiveness of the IWBs.  I believe that there is a great potential for IWBs in the

classroom.  Again, I feel that the reason for the lack of use of IWBs is the uninformed teacher.  There

is an amazing ability for interactive lessons, however I do believe that it takes a lot of time for

students to get out of their seat, walk to the whiteboard and interact with it.  This is difficult for

teachers and probably makes them feel as if it is wasting time.  If these boards had remote controls

that students could use, then this may eliminate some of the time wasting.  I look forward to learning

more about the IWBs so that I can put one to full use in my future classroom.  I look forward to the

new technologies that amount in the next few years and the ability I will have to gain different and

effective ways to reach my students.

Mid Term Test Blog

The test was very informative and studying for it made me more informed and better able to organize the material in my head.  I scored well and look forward to the remainder of the class!

Matthew Mikos - Blogger Review (original descriptive)

• Elementary Music Methods: Real Life Edition (music) http://cbutler10.blogspot.com/

I reviewed the Blog about the Elementary Music Methods class.  This is an elementary general music class that is working on playing the recorder, understanding rhythms, rest, and basic music vocabulary.  The teacher named, Cassandra has been teaching for 2 years now and has grades Kindergarten to Seventh.  The blog focuses primarily on the elementary students. Dealing with elementary kids is complicated in that they are energetic and need to be active.  Cassandra has made a unique game and activity for the students to participate in to cover the unit on world music.  The game is called, "The Amazing Race".

The Amazing Race is used to teach students a song in a game format that is relative to a specific song of a country that is being examined.  When playing the game students will come to questions known

as "Detour and Roadblock Challenges".  These are question panels that have mental or physical challenges that the students must perform when they come to them. 

This game is an interesting way to get students motivated and involved in the Music learning process.  Cassandra posted a website on her blog that will lead teachers to a great source for songs, activities, games and assessments.  The website is Jamie's World Music Bundle -  http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Accessible-World-Music-Set-1-and-2-Combination-1022818 

This Music Bundle is for sale on the website and caters to 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th grades.  Along with the songs are pronunciations and visible lyrics.  This helps for the students to follow along when the words are in a different language.  

Cassandra's blog also has music samples that the visitor is able to interact with by clicking on it and having playback ability.  For example, 

Next Cassandra has General Music to Win it Games which are rhythm games to help the students get back on track after their winter break.  Cassandra made this post very up to date being that she makes the activities specific to the students' schedule.  

Some of the games are The Rest Sculpting (play-doh), A Bit Dicey (dice rolling), Rhythm Sorter (cups and ping-pong sorting for notes and rests comprehension), and Staff Spelling (spelling of musical vocabulary).  These games help students learn and have fun while doing it.

Cassandra also teaches Choir and was very complimentary of her Choir Group so she gave out chocolate bars with thank you messages attached.  She makes the cards printable and available to people if they want to use them.

Cassandra had the students perform a recorder piece and do some acting to make a video of the performance.  The video was for Halloween and the students made up all of the acting by themselves.

Activities such as these allow the students to work collaboratively and to interact with the finished product in the end.  Students were able to share their performance with their parents and friends.  Cassandra also had other activities that motivated the students to learn the recorder.  She called it Recorder Karate.  In this she would attach small Karate Belts of either Black, Yellow, Pink or Sparkle to the students' recorders as they would improve their playing.

Cassandra's class is an interactive place where students can enjoy themselves while learning about music.  Cassandra is determined to engage the students as well as inform them of the curriculum material.  Cassandra's blog is an ongoing process that can be adjusted and updated with the times and the learning levels of the specific classes.  This blog will allow parents of the students to know what is going on in their music class.  This allows teachers and administrators the ability to see as well.  I believe that this blog is an effective way of showcasing what Cassandra has going on in her classroom.  

Matthew Mikos - website evaluation

The process of evaluating a website was extremely helpful in making me aware of the things to look

for when trying to decide if a website is a reliable source.  I am in the Art field so it was natural for

me to choose the website based on the Art Museum of Modern Art in New York City.  First I looked

at the Author to decide whether or not he or she was mentioned.  This website was created by many

people and all who contributed were found.  The authors and contributors had their names and their

credentials.  The credentials made me believe that all of the authors were experts in their field.

MoMA is a highly reputable museum and I do not believe that the website affiliated would have

unreliable authors contributing information.  There was a contact link to the museum's website if

a person had a question pertaining to the authors.  The publishing body was not exactly mentioned on

the MoMA interactive website, however the links to find the publishing body took you directly to the

main MoMA page.  The affiliates to the website were education based and interested in providing a

learning source.  I was not able to find and biased information on the site as it was a informative

and interactive site.  The main writing was based on historical data and events.  The website was

current and updated in 2014, which means a little over a month ago.  The design of the website was

unique in that it has the visitor actually moving through the museum and choosing the points of

interest.  The links on the website were clear and concise as to lead the visitors, young and old to the

places that they wanted and intended to go.  The site can be used by educators in grades K -12

because of the layout and accessibility.  I would recommend this site to anyone interested in art

history and modern art museums.  My experience in evaluating this site provided me with a

confidence when looking for internet information for my classes.  I found the process of evaluation

to be simple as long as the steps are followed.  The learning objectives were met because of the

complete overview of how to evaluate a website.  I now know what to look for when I am

researching a topic and if the source I am using is reliable.  In the future my classroom and the

students in it are going to benefit from the evaluated information that I will be using and they will be

learning from.