Adulting Level 5: Masters

As the world of technology has expanded, along with the amount information accessible on the internet, digital literacy is an important topic to discuss with students, parents, and teachers. Digital literacy can be defined as the capability to use digital technology and knowing when and how to use it.   Literacy is no longer just what you read from a book, news paper, or magazine. Today, we include anything that can be accessible via the internet. I have never been a big reader, and once I got a kindle I began reading more. I was able to access new things to read, and expand my literacy. Credit: http://pomo.com.au/blog/digital-literacy/ What comes along with these advances in the idea that everyone needs to know how to use these skills and be able to operate them effectively. I included the graphic to the left as it breaks down the different areas that need to be explored for digital literacy. Digital literacy isn't learning how to use multi-media, or typing a pa...

What does the research have to say anyways? I found this weeks topic interesting. There is a lot of research that is out there that is geared toward education. Sometimes it isn't that easy to know what you are looking at and how that information applies.  Project Tomorrow :  This site was pretty neat to explore. One of the first things that I looked at was the list of top schools. One of the over all top school districts was Brevard County in Florida. Why would this be something to stand out to me? Well, my family lived in Brevard County. Many of the middle and elementary schools that responded to this research were in the same city that my mom lives in, Titusville. I didn't think I would see them on the list of top participates, as most of the people I have seen in the town itself have been older people.  The Mindset List:  I really liked this list! There are so many things on it that I don't even know where to begin. There were a couple different ones on the cl...

What the heck is a digital spaces map?           And really, why do we care about it?  I had not heard of the digital spaces map until recently. I thought that it was kind of interesting of a concept to look at the way I use different digital apps/programs/web pages. The map itself is lied out into 4 quadrants. Right up my math brain alley! The vertical axis shows the span of personal versus professional. While the horizontal axis shows the span between visitor and resident. The basic idea between personal and professional wasn't that hard to grasp, but the idea of visitor versus resident was what made a difference to adding items to the list. Some basic thoughts I had before I started were of the following: What types of things do I include? How do I know how big to make the space for each item? How do I know when I have crossed over from visitor to resident?  Should all the colors be different or should they be based on the item itself? I...

I took part in my first Twitter Chat, or so I thought that I did. Thursday night I got everything set up for using my twitter account I set up AGES ago, got logged into tweetdeck , searched for a hashtag or two to get started with the chat. Briana and  I decided we would both go on with the #EdTechMath, since we teach math and all. So I set it up, and waited, and waited, and waited some more. Looked like that one wasn't going to be happening. So then we switched over to #ICEilchat. When it started, I quickly jumped in. I answered every question, and even responded to some great tweets. It wasn't until the next morning that I had some idea that my tweets weren't seen. Briana told me she didn't see my post anything to the chat and just assumed I joined a different one. Hmm. What was I doing wrong? I saw them on tweetdeck, why couldn't she see them? I went back onto twitter today to take a look at the chat feed and come up with a reason Bri didn't see me. I saw a...

This week I wanted to take a look at the article  Beyond the Three Rs Voter Attitudes toward 21st Century Skills . Over the last few years I have started taking more interest in the voting for school board members for the district I live and also happen to teach in. This is what sparked me to look into what some of the research says about the voter attitudes toward these skills. Boy was this article full of stats! I feel like every other sentence had a new number or percentage attached to it. On page three of the article, there was a graphic that shows the different gaps between the skills that the voter valued and how well they thought the school teach those skills. I've included a screenshot of the bar graph for you to see right away. Screen Clipping from article, pg 3 I found it interesting how reading comprehension was voted low in how it was being taught compared to the level of computer and technology skills. One would think that while teaching computer and technol...

Active learning: what is it, how is it different then learning, and why should we know about it? I had read a blog post today about the use of QR codes within a classroom . Now you might be wondering, what this even has to do with my topic of active learning. Don't worry, I'll link them in a few moments. QR codes are a newer "app" that has found its way into many classrooms. If you have a device with a camera and a QR code reader app of some kind, the world has now just opened new doors for you to explore!  QR codes are a simple box of random blocks that when scanned direct you to a specific location like a website, a video, or some kind of document. If you want to check out QR codes or even create one of your own, you can check them out here . This particular post was how students could use the codes to be able to fill in the blanks of famous quotes during Black History month. The students had access to the iPad and were able to walk around the room with a part...

Source Name: Karen Perry Alias: Ms. Perry, Ms. P, KP, or Tete Occupation: High School Math teacher Life is just a game, and every new adventure takes you to the next level. At this moment, I feel like I am playing through Adulting Level 5: Masters Program. I have made it through the other levels of turning 18, choosing a college, leveling up when I received my BA in Secondary Education - Mathematics. Add in the level up for moving into my own apartment, followed by level 4 landing my first teaching job! Which brings us no to level 5: Masters program. I am very excited to be working on my masters. I am just finishing up my 5th year of teaching high school mathematics at Waukegan High school. My goal was to finish or start my masters degree by my 5th year of teaching, and with the motivation of a fellow co-worker and friend I applied and started in the fall of 2016. I am a techie at heart. I may not know a lot of things, but I sure do enjoy exploring new aspects of technology...