Reflection for the week of 9/08/09

This week in class, I walked in thinking I knew a lot about Google, so its just going to be a review. I had no idea just how awesome Google really was. I wish I would have know about the documents a week earlier, because I just went out and bought Microsoft Office. I was so interested in everything we learned in class, and just kept thinking how useful this stuff will really be once I start teaching. Can you imagine how much more Google will have in 4 years?
The assignments are really helping me see just how useful the products are. I can now use my iGoogle as my home page, and really be able to just open up FireFox and see my email, and know whats going on without having to go to a million different websites. The letter that we have to do is helping me really see how Google Documents really works. I like that I can work as a group to get stuff done without having to set a meeting time and place. That can get really hard with school schedules and I live in Sandy so its not very easy to meet places for me.
Now I will be able to use these tools in my own classroom in a couple years. I can't wait to see the looks on my students faces when I pull up cool power points, and print out worksheets that are fun, with pictures and different fonts. I will not have to worry about losing my flash drive, or remember to print things off at my house, it will always be where I have access to the computer.
The video this week was really inspiring. I think that all teachers should watch this video. I was one of the high school students who felt that the work I was doing was just busy work, and there was no way I could make anything unique because the teacher had already assigned it for the past 20 years. I couldn't compete with that. If my teacher told me to go home and find a pod cast about our next topic, and bring it to share with the class, or write a summary about it, I would have been so much more interested in the assignment. A text pop quiz would have really been interesting, and I would have to know the information to get a good grade on it. It is hard when a teacher is doing a presentation and cant even work the computer. How is that going to be any fun? I find it more interesting to look at power points with pictures and different fonts, not just white background with black Times text. I really plan on showing the teachers that are in my family this video and maybe they can use some of these ideas in their own classrooms. I really can't wait to see what other videos are coming in the next weeks.