Digital Blog #F - Ch 8

Picture by: Pixbay

Chapter 8 focuses on ways to communicate and collaborating with social media. I think that knowing how to communicate with your students and for them to feel comfortable asking questions and approaching one as a teacher is one of the most vital things when one is an educator. Being a teacher means so much more than providing them with knowledge. It is what you do after you give the lecture, do you make sure the student understood the concept? How do you make sure? How well are you communicating? Do they have sufficient time to learn the material? All these questions can have solutions when one communicates. I feel like the most important concepts from chapter 8 are teaching beyond the school day, email and text messaging and lastly the importance of knowing the difference of a website and blog to see what fits your students better.

Teaching beyond the school day is a concept that i value very much. This concept is saying that whatever the teacher did not have enough time for in class the student can access it online outside of school. Not only is it things that teachers did not have time for but for homework assignments or in class work that she assigned that as a student you did not finish. All these thing can become available online and accessed. As a teacher one can feel confident about time and flexibility and students usually feel the same since there is no pressure of having to finish it in class. For example as a high school and college student there is nothing better than being able to access things outside of school. There are many programs that allow us to do these things such as Canvas our school website where most things are posted.Assignments, Homework, Or another one such as Mylabsplus or in high school there are programs such as Edmodo. Let me tell you there is nothing better than having that extra time to do your work. Especially because it is as one's pace so I tend to learn more, Also I do things when I feel most inspired which is at three in the morning, With the concept of teaching beyond the school day this is possible. I can access the directions how many times I want, the minute I finish I can turn it in. This concept is truly the best things. When doing things at home or outside of school as a student I as well have the opportunity to realize if I actually understood the material. The flexibility of this concept is something I love and will forever value.

A second concept I think is important using email and text messaging. These form of communication are amazing. It makes things efficient and nowadays efficiency is what we like. According to the text 92% of adults are using the computer for email, and text messaging for people 55 years and older is increasing. Texting to kids and adolescents is the main form of communication. The text reveals that 3,339 text are sent a month. With technology increasing these two things as form of communication are convenient and an educator can take advantage of these things. I feel like this connects a little with the concept of teaching outside of school because let's say that for example a student is home doing the homework and they feel like they do not understand they can easily shoot a text and or an email to the teacher and can can get their question answered within seconds. Also as an educator one wants to make sure that a student has all the resources to be successful and finish their work at their full potential. Another thing that text brings up when it talks about texting that is important is the grammar and if texting is really helping the situation. Many times when texting students will abbreviate things like your to ur and some belief it impedes them from using them from using the correct grammar in school. One thing that a teacher can do is instead of banning cellphone use and texting in class they can encourage and encourage them to use better spelling and grammar. The book puts it as creating meaningful experiences and a more cooperative environment.

Lastly another way that teachers and student can communicate is using websites and blogs. I feel that as a student it increases writing skills and keeps them up to date with the teacher and what the expectations or any announcement and or discussions. What is the difference between Websites and blogs? I think this concept is something worth discussing because before getting into this class I never really knew the difference and my view on things have changed a little. The difference between a blog and website is that a blog is more personal and is more informal such as thin one. It speaks more about the individual's opinion. A website is more formal and doesn't have as much as an informal tone, or is as opinionated. Although they do share many features a website can be used for something like having class schedules it is more likely that in a blog there would be discussions going on and responses it can sometime be considered a bit more social.I think knowing the difference is important because as an educator one must know how to connect best with the kids. There are many types of communication but a teacher has to see which one works best.

Free Image on Pixabay - Texting, Icon, Talking, Text, Box. (n.d.). Retrieved October 8, 2015.

Gonzalez, I. (2015, October 8). Communication By: IlianaG97. Retrieved October 8, 2015.Maloy, 

Robert, Verock-O’Loughlin,Ruth-Ellen, Edwards, Sharon A., and Woolf, Beverly Park (2013). Transforming Learning with New Technologies. 2nd Edition. Boston, MA: Pearson Education,

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