Internet Safety Discussion

For this assignment I talked with my mom a little bit about internet safety.  My two little brothers are are 14 and 16 and still living in the home.  We first discussed what is being done now to make internet use safe in my home.  She talked about keeping the computer where everyone can see.  My parents have also installed a K9 filter that helps monitor what kinds of things are being accessed.  It seemed to go well because my mom is really open to learning new things and doing what she can to protect her kids.  We talked a lot about what I learned about cyber bullying.  She was surprised at how often it goes on.  We talked about some of the things she can do to protect my brothers: talking with them, installing a special filter etc.  We also discussed how to make good passwords.  She said she was going to change some of the passwords she is using on some of her accounts.

Internet Safety Assignment

1.  What were the most important things I learned from the readings?
- I guess the most important thing I learned was that there is more of a risk with internet safety now more than ever and it will continually change.  I am naive to what can happen and what is happening.  As a future parent and teacher I need to be committed to learning what I can to keep my kids and students safe.
2.  How will what I have read influence my actions as a parent and/or teacher of children and youth?
-  As mentioned above I want to be constantly aware of the dangerous of the internet and what the risks are with not only how I am using the internet but how my students and children are using the internet.  I will also be more aware of how my students are using the internet and how I can protect them from some of the dangers.
3.  How can I use what I have learned from the reading to have a positive influence on family and friends?
-  I think that if I share some of the simple tools I have learned it can help those within my sphere of influence greatly.  Like one of my favorite things I learned is how to make a secure password you better believe I am going to go home and tell my roommates about it tonight.
4.  Am I aware of the benefits and dangers children face when online with cyber bullying and online predators?  Do I know how to prevent cyberbullying?
-  Before I did the reading I did not realize that these types of things go on more often than we assume they do.  One article even mentioned that most of the myspace activity happened around 3 in the morning and some parents didn't even know that their children were on myspace.  I have learned that there are many dangers but things we can do to protect ourselves.
5.  Where can I go for information and resources that can be used to teach internet safety?
-  The articles and materials I accessed were bookmarked on our class diigo account.  I found that there were many really great articles that could be used to teach students and children as well as many great websites that could be a really great tool.  Also, this summer I taught scouts and there is a really great lesson on internet safety found in the boy scout manuel.  But it is important to find up to date information as the age of the internet is a face paced world indeed.
6.  What internet safety issues am I like to face as a teacher and how will I address them?
-  I could very well face inappropriate pop-ups while my students are using the computers at the school.  I would notify the proper authorities as well as make sure that the student was talked to as well as the parents.  I am likely to face purposeful misuse of the internet.  It will be important to set rules and consequences for inappropriate behavior before any activity using the computers so students are aware of the severity of it.
7.  How can I leverage the power of the Internet so students can learn, but in a safe way?
-  The internet has countless tools that can greatly enhance our teaching.  We must make sure we are doing the things we can to make this teaching tool safe.  Make sure we are always checking links before making them available to students, install the necessary filters, and discuss with the students what is appropriate and what is not.  Keeping an open discussion with students is always vital to being aware of what is going on in our classroom.

Articles and links used:

http://sites.google.com/site/technologyinahouseoflearning/learn-to-protect/learn-about-internet-safety

http://www.diigo.com/bookmark/http%3A%2F%2Fonline.wsj.com%2Farticle%2FSB10001424053111904888304576472202967281480.html?gname=teaching-with-technology

Five safety tips every Facebooker should consider | Deseret News
The Usability of Passwords (by @baekdal) #tips
Poll: Young people say online meanness pervasive | Deseret News

Understanding cyberbullying from the inside out | NetFamilyNews.org

Cyber Bullying and Harassment | STAYSAFEONLINE.org

Movie Storyboard

Click Here to see my Storyboard     Thank you

Pictures for Celestia

This is what Earth looked like the night I was born.

This is what the night sky looked like the night I was born.  

2nd Technology Project

For my second technology project I decided to learn Celestia

1.  What did you learn about Celestia?

I learned go to a particular planet by entering in the complete name in the menu or clicking in the sky to investigate.  I learned how to orbit the planet to view it from all sides.  I learned how to look from different perspectives (e.g. looking from a planet into the night sky).  I learned how to zoom in on certain viewpoints.  I also learned how to change the time you are looking at.  You can change the date and view the sky from different plants or where certain planets are in their orbit during a certain time.

2.What instructional problems could you use this technology for?


One obvious problem is the fact that during school hours you cannot view the night sky.  If I would like talk about different constellations  I can pull up this program to discuss their form and stories.  Another benefit is that constellation doesn't even have to be visible that time of the year because I can look up any time and then view the night sky.  This will help the students visualize the differences in how the night sky looks from different continents.  One of the important things for them to realize is the vastness of the universe so seeing the data for light years and how far apart all of the stars and planets are will help them see this.  


3.  What are some activities I could do matched with their standard?


1- These objectives are in the "Earth Systems" Core for Utah

1. Compare Earth’s atmosphere, solar energy, and water to those of other planets and moons in the solar system. 
2. Compare the conditions that currently support life on Earth to the conditions that exist on other planets in the solar system. 

Using Celestia I would have the students compare Earth's distance from the sun as well as Earth's orbit with at least 2 other planets.  This will help the students visualize why the Earth has the conditions it does.

2- The standard for the objective below includes students really grasping the solar system how it looks, works and why

Relate the structure of the solar system to the forces acting upon it.

For this objective I would have students analyze all of the orbits of the planet and make predictions and explanations for why it acts the way it does.  

Personal Technology Project #2 (second part of logger pro)

For the extra points on the logger pro project I went through the other tutorials located on the program (numbers 6-12.)  These focused a lot on the statistics and different things you could do with the data you collected.  I learned quite a bit about the tools on this program that could help you interpret the data right on the computer.  This analysis is an essential skill for all science students.  There are a few specific things I want to discuss on this post that I could incorporate into my classroom using this program.
1.  One of the tutorials was about customizing your data to look the way  you want.  I would use this in all experiments.  Data only says what you want it to say if you put it in the right format.  Statistics can lie if units are not correct or if you are looking at graphs from a skewed perspective.
2.  The next few tutorials demonstrated how different statistics could be used to interpret what you got.  This would be really great to use as an extending questions on their experiment.  By putting in best fit lines or viewing the area underneath the curve you can tell a lot about data you collect.
3.  I also learned how to import a movie into the computer and analyze it using your own data.  I love this.  I would love to have inquiry based projects where students come up with their own data and a cool way to do that would be a movie.

Personal Technology Project #1

For my first 5 points I chose to learn some of the sensors involved in the program Logger Pro.  I went through the first 5 user guides and then designed 2 experiments using 3 sensors.  I worked with a partner with these probes but we were both running the experiments.

Experiment #1

Objective
A key point in understanding many physiological processes is understanding conductivity in different chemicals.

SWBAT: explain the different effects that solutions and temperature have on conductivity.  This will then help them apply this knowledge to different processes.

Description 
I am a biology teaching major so the first experiment we designed was to measure the different things that can have an effect on conductivity.  We decided to use the conductivity probe and the temperature probe to measure different solutions.  First you measure the effect salt has on conductivity.  We did this by taking points of data at different salt concentrations.  Then we measured the conductivity of water and salt with different temperatures.  The graph of salt concentrations vs. conductivity.

Experiment #2

Objective

SWBAT measure the physiological changes that take place in the body while you exercise and then explain those changes in the light of respiration.  

Description

For this experiment we used the temperature probe and the blood pressure probe.  We didn't have the stethoscope that we would need in the classroom.  We measured our body temperature as we increased our physical activity.  We also took our blood pressure before and after our physical activity.  

• What did you learn about probes and sensors?

1. I learned a lot about how you take data with the probes and sensors.  I learned how to set them up in the computer as well as what kinds of things they could be used to collect.  

• What did you learn about Logger Pro? How would you use this technology in the classroom?

1. Logger Pro is an extremely useful tool.  I learned a little bit about how you can modify data into the graph or table you wanted it represented.  I learned how to take different types of data.  I learned how to name the graphs and table as well as enter in manually any data I needed to.  There are a lot of concepts that are very theoretical in biology and it would be useful to allow the students to see evidence of what is happening even though they cannot see it.  I will use it labs to teach many different concepts it will also be helpful in teaching correct data collecting as well as the proper way to interpret data.  

• Which probes and sensors did you feel would be most valuable to you? Why?

1. I thought that the oxygen sensor would be really useful so that students could actually see the activity that is going on in plants and other reactions.  The same is true for the conductivity probe.  It will be really useful for students to measure the conductivity involved in certain experiments.  The barometer and force probes would be really useful to combat some of the student's misconceptions.