Science on the WEB!

Today class had to take an unexpected route, just like science there are things that are going to happen that are very unexpected. We had to have class the new and improved way, through the web. I think this gave Dr. Smirnova  an opportunity to show us as growing educators and scientists that we need to explore new and improved ways of using the web. It was an overwhelming experience because this was my first online class, but what i found was if i never tried it then i would never feel comfortable doing it. This is important when going into my own classroom, it is going to be extremely important for me to explore new things so that i can bring that knowledge to my students.
Dr. Smirnova used a few different teaching techniques that i found to be very important when you are working with your students. For one she had the 3 pluses and a wish, this form of peer feedback is important for students to be engaged in. It allows students to critic and help other students, but they are also actually helping themselves by seeing things on their peers work that they can use to improve their own. Along with the peer feedback, during class we created our E-folio profiles. Dr. Smirnova allowed us to be hands on and do it ourselves, this is important for all teachers to do within the classroom. It can be for math, science, even reading, simply allowing the students to discover and be given the ability to discover new things on their own with the teachers support is very beneficial. Dr. Smirnova gave us enough support and direction when it came to the site, but she also wanted us to try and do it on our own so that we can become more comfortable moving around this site and the web in general. Overall this classroom experience made me feel a lot more comfortable on the web and showed me some of the tools the web offers to make a classroom more engaging and educational.
Unfortunately I was not able to experience this online class opportunity to the full extent to which i would have liked because my microphone did not work. I was not able to give as much input as i would have liked, but in general it opened my eyes to a world on the web that I did not know existed.

Science blog #1

Today in class we did an experiment that got me thinking as a science teacher, when I looked at the beakers and was asked to make observations it is clear to me that I did not look at all aspects of the situation. As a teacher I want to encourage my students to not just look at the experiment in one way, which is in fact what I had done. Once we started to communicate as a class I realized I only looked at the beakers in one dimension, which was the amount of liquid in each opposed to what the liquid was. I made an assumption that it was water inside the beakers, this is something that I never want my students to do. I want my students to be scientists and approach any situation that I give them as a time to make discoveries.

After the first part of the experiment was done and we went on to the second half I started to keep an open mind about the experiment and pay close attention to details that I had not done the first time around. This is part of being a scientist, making clear and concise observations. If a scientist only looks at a situation in one dimension then they are not seeing the world of opportunities. When I observed this time I didn’t focus my attention on one part, I saw all aspects of the situation and watched not just if a specific item floated in the liquid, but instead how it floated? How it reacted? Did the liquid increase? Was there a chemical reaction that occurred within the liquid? The questions were endless because this time I did not want to inhibit myself as a scientist.

This class made me want to learn how I can encourage my students to be scientists and to think and observe like scientists. It also made me see the world of opportunity within technology, I saw things today that I have never seen before and I am curious to find out more about it. Then find out how to implement it into my classroom for my students so they can get the education they deserve.