Google Earth Virtual Tour Challenge

Location	Activity Description	Google Earth Content
1. Goblin Valley	Take a look at at least 5 pictures of Goblin Valley. Also watch the you tube video found at the link included. Think about how these rocks formed in such a strange way. Use clay to create a "Goblin Valley" of your own. How was your valley formed?	http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2nTsgljYM_M
2. Utah Lake	Look at Utah Lake on Google Earth. Use the ruler tool to measure how long and how wide the lake is. For each measurement convert it to miles, feet, and inches. Which measurement has the biggest number? Why is this?	Google Earth view of Utah Lake
3. Antelope Island	Look at the picture Antelope Island Beach Great Salt Lake Utah, on the West shore of the Island. Write a paragraph telling why no plants are growing in this beach habitat.	Look at the Google Earth picture of Antelope Island Beach Great Salt Lake Utah
4. Kings Peak	Explore Kings Peak from many different angles and views. Zoom in, zoom out, observe the geography of the land and what it looks like. Now look at the photos of the Wasatch and Uintah Mountains found at the attached links. Compare and contrast the growing on each mountain. How are they similar and different? Why? (Hint: Think elevation)	Wasatch Mountains: http://www.rockiesguide.com/guide/uploads/images/239/Albion_Basin_-_Wasatch_Mountains.jpg http://people.westminstercollege.edu/faculty/mrubinfeld/photos/Westminster%20framed% 20by%20the%20Wasatch.jpg Uintah Mountains: http://travel.utah.gov/photos/images/Uinta_Mountains.jpg

4th Grade, Social Studies, Standard 1, Objective 1a

I chose to do this activity for my students because it is an multimodal, dynamic representation of a few different geographic regions in Utah. It is multimodal because it uses visual, textual, and auditory learning for the students. It is dynamic because they get to interact with the technology. I did this because I love Utah and I believe it is important for students to know about the land around them. This activity will allow students to become more acquainted with the Utah geography while exploring neat features on Google Earth.

Meeting My Perf...a digital story fairy tale

This is the digital story I created. I chose to do this because it will help demonstrate the fairy tale genre which is part of the core curriculum for second graders. This is a fairy tale about how I met my wonderful fiance...

Digital Storytelling in the Classroom

Why might incorporating digital storytelling into an elementary school classroom be difficult? Well to start off with, I am majoring in Early Childhood Education. Young children are not typically able to do too much on a computer such as creating digital stories of their own. I guess in my case I would be the one creating digital stories to help in my teaching. Something that may be difficult will be to make sure that the media that I use is not distracting from the lesson that I am teaching to the children. It will have to have a clear purpose that is made known to the students. I think that digital storytelling could easily be a distraction if not used for a clear purpose.

Digital Story Creation

I am going to be making a digital story! It is going to be a fairy tale telling a fabricated rendition of how I met my fiance. I think that doing a digital story of this will be fun because it is a new way of presenting a story to a class. I am doing this as part of instruction to a third grade class about different genres of writing. In the Utah Core Curriculum, 3rd Grade, Language Arts, Standard 7, Objective 3b there is a requirement that states genre identification is important. This digital story will demonstrate one of these genres; it will demonstrate a fairy tale. I will be teaching this using multimodal representation. This means that the children will be learning the information in a variety of ways; this digital story includes visual, auditory and textual learning. Attached is my storyboard outline.

TPACK knowledge! Week 3...

This week we learned a bit about TPACK. This stands for Technological Pedagogical and Content Knowledge and is something that I need to incorporate into my teaching. The main thing that I gleaned from this week's reading is that teaching TPACK style takes preparation and teachers must know how to use specific types of technology in their teaching to best support student learning.

Preparation is something that I've been thinking about in all of my classes this semester. In order to incorporate TPACK into my teaching, I must (a) know how to use technology, (b) know content in the subject area, and (c) be able to apply my pedagogical ideas into my teaching. Application is definitely the hardest part. I guess another thing I learned is that I need to become more technologically aware...yep. If I'm going to teach the kids while using technology, I better know how to use it myself. This will take preparation...

Skype experimentation

Yay...my print screen. As you can see, it took a bit of assistance. Who would have guessed that you have to press apple-shift-3 to do a print screen on a mac? Katie was my skype buddy :)

Second Week of Class

The most useful thing I learned this week is that I need to learn more about technology. I've always felt fairly technologically savvy. I've been able to make my way through classes without a hitch. But putting together my Wiki this week was a new challenge; it was quite difficult. Another thing I learned is that following directions is very important. I am glad that there are step-by-step instructions to help me set up my Wiki because if there weren't I would be very lost. It is important that proper steps are followed when using technology or else things can easily be messed up. Yep, that's my second week :) A little overwhelming, but I guess it will just take time to figure out.

A.B.'s technology background

I am so excited to learn more about technology and to create my very first blog! I have not have much experience in technology. Besides the regular Word, PowerPoint, Excel, and Internet instruction I had in grade school, my technological ability is not too far advanced. Although I have not had too much formal training, I feel that being exposed to technology in school has forced me to advance to a certain level. As such, I feel comfortable (but not advanced) when using technology. I use email regularly and Facebook on occasion. Computers are a daily part of my college career. I am lucky because my wonderful fiance is very computer savvy and can help me in times of need :) Maybe after this class I will be more technologically independent! Okay...here it goes...