reading response

title: 50 365 bokey

author: spudballoo

text form- picture

URL: http://www.flickr.com/photos/shaun/5458523221/

This reading response is going to be a little different then most because this week of the many texts I've read I felt like doing it on a photo. This is the part where, usually I would give a summary, but since I'm doing a photo I'll describe it. The photo is of a piano keyboard, it was taken around the centre of the keyboard because there are keys all the way along the shot. The middle section of the picture is in focus while on either side the keys are blurry. The keys were shot at an angle, the colour of this is black and white and there is clearly a good bit of dust on the keys.

My interpretation of this photo is that it shows milestones of our lives. I think this because it seems like the key in focus is the present, the keys in the very front are the past and the back is the future. The black keys also look like marks on a time line that could represent milestones in your life. Also it seems like you can faintly see the past and not at all the future. For my last point the keys are dusty as if they have been left alone or left in the past.

I like the solitude in the photo, in fact when I take photos I look for solitude. I like it because it is confining and focuses your attention to the subject matter.

I also took a look at some of the photographer's work and a good part seems to be solitary or a single thing. I like their work!

I cannot cannot connect this work to anything of mine as I do not focus on macro shots ( I also can't with my lens). Also not many people take pictures of things I could associate this with, I'm sure there are people who do take them I just haven't been looking enough to find that group.

I would like to see how other people interpret this response and give me their thoughts on it. Plus I think that anyone who does would have some fun.

P.S. don't worry I'm not slacking off with my reading I just wanted to try something new!

Using PID's in the Classroom

Over the last month or so our class has had the privilege of using PID's (personnel Internet devices) in the classroom. We are one of the first classes in the world to experience this. I think that if you were to ask any kid in the world on a scale of 1-10 how much they'd want to use PID's in the class, %90 would say 10.


People often ask what we do to ensure Internet safety. Being to a lot of leadership conferences I can tell you the same answer I tell them. The truth is that the sites we use are very secure, we do not like to use sites that are often hacked. We have a system that we use (actually we don't use it but the person we get the sites from does)it is called the three A's of Internet safety(not to be confused with the 3 A's of awesome by Neil Pasricha). The first A is for advertisement, we don't use sites that have multiple, or any ads for that matter. The next A is for authorship, if the author's name isn't shown we can't trust the information(this mostly applies to information resources). And finally aesthetics, if the site looks cheaply made and flimsy we shouldn't be trusting them with much. After the three A's it's up to the students to to decide if what they are doing is appropriate or not. You see if there is no trust between the teacher and the student then the student may not have the privilege to use PID's anymore and their limitations are broadened.


Another point often brought up is how do you manage what the kids do and if they use their time wisely. What I find is that you don't even have to address this problem but remind them that it directly effects their grade and more importantly how the teachers see you. Students can always slack off and do other things. At one point students brought cellphones in without teachers knowing, now if we let students bring them in suddenly we find no mischief. It's like when your little sister is trying to annoy you, as soon as you ignore her she stops out of boredom.when you evaluate the situation of the non-electronic equivalent, if your worried about students texting each other in class think of the alternative, passing notes?


Bullying is something that happens everywhere. If your worried about your student or child being cyber bullied, once again you must think of the alternative which would be being bullied on the playground. However, I find that the students who are most susceptible to bullying are often helped by using PID's. This happens because the kids who are shy are the ones who get bullied, but when you give them a social network suddenly they feel like their in another universe, like they can talk. Because of this they become more confident and as a result aren't bullied.


If your considering how students don't get left out, it's partially because of one of the bet things in the world; collaboration. No, students don't always have access to these devices, but there are school devices and we can always share. To get back to my first point, if you have never seen Apollo 11 I strongly suggest you do. And if you have, that one scene where they are fixing the air filtration unit, that was collaboration. Collaboration, in case you've never heard the term before is well, you know I'm just going to pull it out of the dictionary. "Collaborate-1 work together: Two authors collaborated on that book. 2 aid or co-operation traitorously: to collaborate with the enemy."


I think that the two points of how your using the technology to learn and what you are using the technology to do can have a relatively similar answer. A major way that it helps is that it gives kids the ability to productively use the Internet. We are ABLE to use technology for everything but with the whole class quite new to this concept it wouldn't be appropriate. Because of how good kids are with technology there can be a reciprocal learning environment between the teacher and students. As one of my mentors once said, "Ti's not the tool but the pedagogy behind it."


One of the number one concerns with parents and teachers is the things students become a custom to, for example, grammar. We actually got a complaint from what I assume to be a university professor saying that we had better get used to 2000 word essays handed in as comics, well look at me, I was supposed to to 1 paged and I write 3! Things like emoticons and purposely misspelled words are just a way of displaying emotion. Kids know that they are misspelling words, I mean do you actually believe that kids think hey is spelt heyy?! And it's even good at helping with homework, for example if you have a major homework problem you can just send an email to your teacher and work it out!


XD

Reading response

Title: why the iPad is destroying the future of journalism
Author: Bradford
Genre: blog
URL: http://measuringmeasures.com/blog/2010/12/31/why-the-ipad-is-destroying-the-future-of-journalism.html

This blog was written on how one person sees the business of journalism and how the new release of the iPad effects it. I find this to be a horribly written article that I would never read again. I see this Bradford as an attention hog, trying to look smart by stating what we already know. I find that throughout the text he constantly repeats the same information if you were to sum it up. His main points are that the journalism industry can not adapt to the new forms of technology fast enough for it to survive, that the industry isn't seeing potential and keeps shutting doors on themselves, also that some how journalism being "dead" is the producers of technology's fault. 

The way I see journalism now is not the end but it is infect just adapting. Bradford is obviously just used to traditional media and although he says that he thinks it should change he suggests that we keep using large sites to distribute the text. What he doesn't notice is that by giving your writing away free or selling your work through your own site, in the end you will probably be making money. And yes there is a probably because all business is risky but it can be very rewarding. Another problem with that is that publishing companies pay you very little because they take most of the profit from the sales and leave you with virtually nothing.   

I also question how good of a blogger he is because there are many, many negative comments on his blog that he hasn't responded to, which also gives you the feeling that he doesn't stand by his thoughts.

Because of these reasons I do not think that anyone should have to read this post and therefor I do not recommend it to anyone.  

The wooden pencil

reading response

title: Cooling on Warming
author: Hendrick Hertzberg
Genre/Text Form: news
Book/URL: Cooling on Warming


This article published in The New Yorker magazine focuses on promises made in the U.S. to stop or slow climate change that were never followed. It talks of the cap and trade bill, the climate bill, and the state of union meeting. It brings up promises made by Obama, Bush, and many other high authority figures that were not followed or remembered. However now some reporters and politicians are trying to convince congress to focus on this topic and live up to your word. They also have a very convincing argument saying that the economy and other hot topics should  be put on the back burner considering that in a critical situation we can all live off of each other but we cannot stop climate change in an instant.


I really enjoyed reading this but it did make me quite angry at the way the U.S. is run, it might be better with the country having no government and have us run ourselves for a change instead of these bogus promises and bills. I think that this article should be read by as many people as possible and talked about to encourage collaborative solutions to fix these problems. As it doesn't only take a rocket scientist to figure it out, combining all of our information and thoughts we can solve any problem a million times faster than the government.


In case you were wondering I really like debating these sorts of topics, there is really a lot to talk about.


Sometimes I wonder how government stays afloat, the people are popular for a short amount of time then
are hated, but they always  come back, one apology and the public seems to be all for even though most people still don't like them.


I've noticed a pattern in government and that is that every time a new bill comes up regardless of what it represents republicans will simply say no to bring down the democrats. The same happens the other way around from time to time as well, it just seems to be an endless circle with no point.


While reading this I made the connection of this and ageism with ever body always saying no, or that's a great idea and then leaving it to disappear. All that happens is we are locking out valuable ideas and help for what reason? To look like you won? Not worth it.


I would as I said before recommend this to everyone for the simple reason that it could save us.

historical fiction

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