In chapter 3 of Untangling the Web, it presents us other presentation tools other then PowerPoint. PowerPoint is used majority of the time for teachers and students to present projects. While some are okay, many can put you to sleep. It starts by telling us about Slideshare; a website that lets you upload your presentation to share with other educators around the world. Poll Everywhere lets you ask your classroom a question and they can respond via text message. Voicethread allows you to share pictures and videos and you are able to comment on them. While all of these sites are very easy, the more you go in depth, the more features you will find out about them. One of the last ones the book goes over is Prezi. Prezi is an awesome presentation site that is similar, but better than powerpoint. Instead of clicking to another slide, the Prezi zooms over to another piece of content.
Neil Pasricha had been going through a rough patch. His wife told him she didn't love him anymore and soon after, he lost his best friend. One night he came home and came up with the idea of making a blog, 1000 awesome things. The blog included the little things that make your day that you never really think about too often. He was soon given a Webby award for best blog. After that, he put his thoughts into a book, The book of Awesome, which was the #1 International bestseller for 142 weeks! The book focuses on the three A’s: Attitude, Awareness and Authenticity. Having a great attitude no matter what pain you have and moving forward is a good start. Being aware is knowing that you have seen everything for your first time once before. Authenticity is just all about being you. You should put yourself in situations that fulfill your heart. Neil concludes his TED talk with telling us how we only have 100 years to enjoy all of these little things in life. He stated a quote that really stuck out to me, “You will never be as young as you are right now”. This really hit home with me and made me realize that I need to truly live every day to the fullest because you don't know what tomorrow will bring.
Rita Pierson has been an educator for over 40 years. Because of this, she states how she has seen basically all school reforms. There are many students who suffer from poverty, negative peer influences, and lack of support from family. One thing that she stresses will help teaching students with these things are relationships. Valuing and the importance of human relationships are needed to educate. Teachers need to want to have a healthy relationship with their students in order to successfully teach them. The significance of leaving a legacy is also very important. For a teacher to touch a student's life, is truly when you know you have had a successful educator.
This week in class we had a google hangout with Adam Taylor. He is the founder of SciStuChat and a high school science teacher in Tennessee. He educated us on how he started #Scistuchat. Scistuchat is a twitter chat with high school students and scientists. It all started Mr. Taylor's second semester in 2011. They had an online chat with a scientist outside of the classroom, while the students were at home. Later on, another teacher wanted to join in on it, and they started doing this once a month. Taylor first found out these scientists were on twitter from a magazine. He then found twitter lists of these scientists and started contacting many of them. He also told us about one of his most memorable chats which was talking with the US Department of Energy. We also spent a portion of class making a LinkedIn account. Luckily, I made one last year so I know a lot about the website. However, I did not know that you can join groups. I joined a few Social Media and Media Marketing groups. In these groups you can connect with others, post and view jobs, and make business contacts. It is really very helpful and I'm happy I learned that this is available on the site.
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