Davidson,+Laura

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One of the copyright and fair use policies I was already familiar with is the fact that teachers are allowed to make copies of printed material (as long as it is within the right length) for student learning purposes. I also knew that teachers could use pieces of art in their teaching. One copyright and fair use policy that was new to me after doing some research is the fact that teachers cannot use movies for non-instructional purposes (ie: for a reward or for a movie club). This is news to me, because in French Club in High School we watched movies for fun, just in French subtitles. In Spanish class, we watched at least 7 movies that had nothing to do with learning just to hear the Spanish dubbed over. I think this might have been crossing the with the fair use policy. Another copyright and fair use policy that was new to me is the fact that librarians can make copies of software for archival purposes and to replace lost/damaged/stolen copies. I thought that making any copies would be illegal, so this came as a surprise to me. While I have been in the schools, I have come across the fair use policy once. One teacher who was teaching a GT World Cultures unit on ancient Rome had gone to the library and printed out articles from various encyclopedias and books in order to give the students extra reading material. While teachers do have the right to make copies from original texts for students, I believe that this particular teacher went over the copy-limit and used the phrase ‘fair use’ to get around a copyright infringement.
 * Journal #4 **

I use a couple of Web 2.0 tools. The first one that I use on a regular basis is Facebook. This is a social website, but it has made my life more efficient because it is easier to get in contact with group members for projects. It has also made my life less efficient because I spent a copious amount of time on Facebook. I also use Wikipedia on a daily basis. It has made researching for papers a lot easier because you can use Wikipedia as a jumping off point, especially through the external links and references at the bottom of the page. Through this class I have also begun to use Delicious, which is an amazing social bookmarking site. As a future educator, I want to use wikis to encourage group projects as well as creativity. However, as a whole in education, I believe that it will be awhile – if ever – if Web 2.0 tools will be used in the classroom. Baltimore County is designing a new curriculum for Social Studies right now, and as a sneak peak they have students just looking at pictures on the internet. This is Web 1.0 – and to the County it is revolutionary. Furthermore, I believe that education in general is very wary of the internet because of its ambiguity. While technology will continue to grow in the classroom, I believe that it will be in the form of software rather than Web 2.0.
 * Journal #3 **

At the college-level, there is little to no technology integration. College (for the most part) is still about giving students readings and then the teacher stands in the front of the classroom and lectures. As you move into the public school system there are some teachers that still do this. However, most teachers realize that a student-centered approach to learning is the best kind. This does not always equate to technology integration, though. My mentor teacher at my internship does not use any technology. He says that he does not understand it and that it scares him. Even where teachers do use computers at the public school level, it is few and far between and mostly used for web quest, one-time deals. I want my future students to use technology. It makes no sense for a student to use technology everywhere in their world but not in the school building. I will encourage students to use computers through the creation of a website. I will encourage students to use presentation software for projects and eliminate posters. I would encourage collaboration through the use of a wiki. Students learn best from each other, and technology allows us to connect with other people better than ever.
 * Journal #2 **

I believe that technology should be used in the classroom. It does students and children no good to go through school without learning skills that deal with technology. Even if we do not know what programs will be developed, teaching students a skill set will help them in the future. One class that did this for me was ISTC 201 here at Towson. I originally signed up for the class as a Gen Ed credit, but quickly learned a lot. Wikispaces was used in that class and as a small group we had to design a page on year-round schooling. It was challenging to figure out how to edit the website at the same time as my group-mates, but it also made the project go a lot faster. Collaboration was effortless through the use of a wiki. I was skeptical of using this method at first, but I quickly saw its value in future classrooms.
 * Journal #1 **

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