Wk 2 Blog Post 3, Comment to Brian Thomas

Taken from Book Cover

I was taken aback at first by the text, thinking it was going to be like a self help book, looking at greatness, but pleasantly, found it just the opposite! Chapter 4, Being a Contribution, probably had the biggest impact on me. I am always looking for ways I can grow. One area I can grow is through being a contribution and also recognizing everyone has the ability to be a contribution as well. By recognizing not only my own ideas, but also the ideas of others and their importance, I feel I can live my life in a better way by making a contribution a priority as a teacher, and as a Christian.

I also found this chapter to shift my thinking in the classroom. My students often reflect on their learning each day. This chapter forced me to go another direction and examine what might happen if I get students and myself more interested in contribution. That might mean contribution to class work, contribution to our class as a community, or contribution to the world at large. This takes pressure off students to be right, and allows them to take risks and be involved, to contribute.

I am glad to see that after you made it through the first few chapters of the book you were able to make a connection in chapter 3 and to the video. Sometimes I think just being open to other people’s point of view can change our perception of the world and of them even if it does not change our mind about how we feel.

Brian’s Blog Post:

I think the thing that I learned most from the first two chapters of this book was something about myself. This “thing” is something that I’ve had to deal with throughout this course and upon reflection, throughout my entire life. I’m talking about the types of books that speak to me and the type that I really cannot in any way relate to. Unfortunately, this book seems to be of the latter. I would classify it as more of a philosophical get-in-touch-with-your-inner-self type book. After finished up the first couple chapters, I felt a rush of all the books I’d read come back to me – those I enjoyed and those I did not (regardless of the genre or content). As an individual with a severe case of concrete logical-mathematical thinking, I realize that my brain has a particularly hard time processing text that is deeply philosophical, yet reading a physics, chemistry, or calculus text is relatively easy. As is reading any manual on whatever the topic. And I find some of the statements in the book particularly hard for my brain to accept. Take this passage on p.20 for example: “The pie is enormous, and if you take a slice, the pie is whole again.” (Zander, 2000) Now, as we all know, if you subtract a part from the whole, as long as the part is > 0, you no longer have the whole, as is insinuated by the authors.

Poor mathematics aside, the awareness of my own strengths and weaknesses in reading opened my eyes to the difficulties that some student may have in reading such texts as I enjoy, and quite truthfully, this was my greatest take-away from the first couple chapters.

So, that aside, I do see the value of thinking outside the box, as explained in the text. Another part of the text that resonated with me was the part about scarcity thinking. I believe as Americans, we have really fallen into that mind-set and try to accumulate as much as we possibly can, without much regard for those that have little to nothing.

Moving into chapter three was fearful (because it was much longer than the infinitely long previous two chapters combined) but I was pleasantly surprised. I enjoyed the authors take on “giving an A” and thought at length about what kind of effect that would have on a student population I might be working with next year.

Ironically, I didn’t really start to get into the text myself until I watched the TED talk (which I had seen a couple years ago) and remembered how much I enjoyed watching Ben Zander. And at that point, I decided to give the book an A, and have enjoyed it much more ever since.

(image from the cover of The Art of Possibility by Rosamund Stone Zander and Benjamin Zander)

Posted by Brian Thomas

Wk 2 Blog Post 2, Comment to Josh Tolar

I love your example of the box. In our world today, we are inundated with worry for the future. Our financial security, job security, getting richer, being better, everyone looking only at tomorrow. I too, love the way our readings make us reflect on perspective and its importance on the here and now. If we truly open ourselves up to today and create a positive existence doing what we can for others, our tomorrows will take care of themselves. We do need to remove ourselves from the box and live a life that matters by affecting others in positive ways. Nothing makes me feel better than when I do something for someone else without their knowing. If we look at contributions, both others, and ours I agree we can be the difference.

In regard to our journey with Full Sail, I too, think it will be significantly different without all of our time spent growing and learning. It shows me, I am definitely a person who is a lifelong learner. I do intend to keep going with technology in education one small step at a time, and hopefully end up making a contribution.

You are gifted with music and I love that you can begin to see the contribution that can have for the world. Keep making music and doing what you do!

Image by flickr user: trixnbooze

Josh's post:
I keep thinking about the current situation about my job and how it happened so fast.  While I was hastily updating my resume to look for a new job to cure my unhappiness with my current one, an opportunity came out from no where and basically slapped me in the face.  I’m now in a new position with the same company, but I don’t know for how long.  I have this hidden fear that one day this position will be over and I will have to go back where I used to work and fall into an unhappy lifestyle again where my expertise is nothing but a title on a sheet of paper.  It is here that I have enclosed myself into a box and never stopped to think about the opportunity I have right now and how it might actually affect my future; An opportunity to seize the moment.

By reading the first 4 chapters of “Art of Possibility”, I realized the potentials I have as well as the weaknesses I have had and still have.  When thinking about giving an A to someone, it somehow calms my nerves from expecting too much and allows me to focus on how to contribute to someone else’s life or a project.  This IS a realization, but NOT THE END of realizations.  While giving an A to someone might make it easier for two people to work together in a more harmonious fashion, there is still the realization of giving yourself an A.  For so many years I have been controlled by a never-ending urge to please everyone.  It has caused me to go above and beyond to the extent that my body shuts down and causes many problems like stress or an occasional illness.  This is from my past of always having to live up to an A or suffer the consequences or living up to the expectations of a parent and it never stopped.  It never stopped because I never allowed it to stop.  I have always given in to the persistent calculations and measurements in my head.  I have always been afraid that if I don’t do the best possible work then I would fail or cause someone to feel disappointed.  I have always been in the realm of self-doubt despite of what others say.  This is just like what Ben Zander was describing about his students and how giving an A would open up the possibilities of being creative and not focusing on the measurements in their head.  If I give myself an A first, then I feel I can start handing out A’s to other people and I can then start a successful domino effect of contribution.

Life is constantly changing and the past year at Full Sail has not only given me strength and trust in myself, but has shown me that when you work with others and recognize their contributions as well as your own, amazing things start to happen.  I have always been told, “If you put your mind to it, anything can happen”.  This is so true in so many ways, but you have to first realize that if you give in to self-doubt and the measurements that we are so conditioned with, you start to focus on the negative instead of the positive.  You become enclosed in a box.  I think that by realizing our contributions and the contributions of other people, we can start to open the lid of the box and slowly come out.

“Think Outside The Box (Evidence & Metaphor)” by Flickr user trixnbooze used under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 license.
Website Address: http://www.flickr.com/photos/martyportier/4656059096/

Posted by Josh Tolar at 4:15 PM 0

Wk 2 Readings Blog 1

My Contribution

I love Zander’s idea that a leader does not doubt peoples’ abilities to do what it is they are to do. As I look at education I ask, What if all teachers believed in the abilities of all of their students? How would education change? Stop thinking about everything along the way, and see the big picture. Have a vision, a long line, and see it through! How would education change?

Zander’s video on Ted was moving and showed the connection possible for classical music through Zander’s determination and perception.  His connection to the conductor as a person to make others powerful, and make others feel it is possible. I loved his question: Who am I being if my children’s eyes are not shining?  I hope to take this and use it in the classroom. I want a classroom with children’s eyes shining.

The idea of enhancing our quality of life and the quality of life for those around us as we have the power is really meaningful to me. I think this year has been eye opening for me as I look and understand perception and the big part it plays in each of our version of reality. I have looked at this through my Masters courses, my own Bible study, through the students I teach, and now this book. It is amazing how life opens something up to us, and we see it all around. I see this as the power of God.  In this book, I feel the importance of perception and I love thinking about how our brains constructs our reality, and how that reality is just ours, we can not know if it is the reality that is real, or created, because our brain constructs our own thoughts. The idea of it all being a story we tell, can change our own thoughts about every situation. For me, the closer I become to God, the more I want his will, this leads me try to be a better person, think about others feelings, and desire good. I love the idea in the book of setting the context and letting life unfold

I loved the thoughts on giving an A, not just in the classroom but also in the everyday world. It is so true that we measure everyone according to a standard measure. When we can believe everyone has a unique gift to share, and that not all of us have the same gift, we can begin to accept and love people for who they are, learn from their gifts, and accept their differences, as well. I love the idea of giving A’s, looking at what is great about this person I meet that I can learn from, rather than comparing them to a standard measure I set.

I love the question, what did you achieve today becoming, how did I contribute today? So now I ask this of myself…How did I contribute today?

Wk1 Blog Post 4, New Media

Wanted: New Media in the Classroom

Ron Smith Interview- Use Any Method to Reach Students

In the interview I watched, Ron Smith discusses animation use by high school students. He explains how he uses anything to get students interested in what is happening in the classroom. He integrates new technology and students express themselves in their own way.

I feel there is a real need for teachers to be aware of the new ways of expression in the classroom, which students use, everyday outside of the classroom. Students need to be as connected to the world inside the classroom as they are outside the classroom.

Ron Smith explains that a teacher who uses a PowerPoint thinks he is really techno-savvy. Teachers do not see the full benefits of digital teaching because this requires a new type of planning by teachers. Ron Smith explains how he builds the semester before the class even begins when using new technology. Most teachers work day by day, the new culture is preparation before class with more freedom during the day to aid student creation.

This article was interesting to me, but since it was an interview with a teacher of high school students, I need to adapt his ideas for the upper-elementary classroom. How: First, I love the idea of showing students a bit about several web 2.0 tools and then encouraging students to experiment with those tools to create a project, letting students choose the tool they wish to use for the project. For upper elementary students, I would begin with applications like Wordle, Glogster, StoryJumper, and ToonDoo. Once students are comfortable and familiar with these applications and how they are used, I would add more web tools for project presentation. I do try to create media for use in the classroom when I have free time that can be used in later classes to increase interest. I include a Prezi I created to use with students to share information about myself at the beginning of the school year. I encourage you to do the same. The more media we create and save, the more engaging our classrooms become!

I know students would love to have control over how they demonstrate their knowledge, and would likewise enjoy the presentation of final projects because they are all unique. Students would learn from each other’s final products! Final products can also be shown and shared with a larger audience, and perhaps used by many other teachers in their own classrooms! I know this type of learning would interest students and engage them in the learning as well!

New Media in the classroom? I’m sold!

Wk1 Blog Post 3, Comments to Michael Wood

Kristi's comments to Michael Wood's video

Michael

First of all, I loved the copyright glasses on your blog site. Very creative!

Comic inspiration by Kristi Swartz

I enjoyed your reflection on the comic strips you drew as a young person and how that led to a job for you later in life. (You inspired my photo using a comic strip theme in photo booth!) Anyway,

our students in contrast will use creative remixing to land jobs in communications or advertising in much the same way in the future. I know My 3 sons spend a lot of time drawing and creating on paper but spend just as much time altering and adapting works on the computer. Do they have a clue about copyright issues or infringement? Absolutely not!

Interesting to hear about your experience with high school students using and remixing images in your classroom. The fact that high students do not know copyright laws and are not held to strict standards in image use, does show our need as 21^st century teachers to change with the times and begin to spread the word about freeware and sites like Creative Commons. . In the elementary and upper elementary classrooms, students are just excited to find images they like, much less worry about their copyright. I feel it is important for students to be taught to use sites like Creative Commons, perhaps by making it easily accessible for students. Students must be taught early to credit sources in their works if our

Culture is ever to change.

Costly images are not the way of the future, perhaps what we need to do is have students begin to create more images to place on Creative Commons for use in new media. No time, of course no time, but perhaps A high school photography class could be a great place to begin to show students how to copyright their own images and share those images through sites like Creative Commons. Imagine how many creative high school students would be interested in taking interesting images. No question that times are changing, I remember spending a whole semester in high school learning to develop our own pictures! Not so today!! Not so today!  

Michael's blog post: 

  

Wk1 Blog Post 2, Comment to David Remillard's Blog Post

Image from Creative Commons

By Andreanna Moya Photography

David-

I love your statement about teachers understanding and leading students to understand copyright. In younger grades, students are aware of plagiarism in books to some degree, but do not see the need to credit sources for image use, or Internet sources. Students need to have information technology taught in a way that they learn how to locate sources, use them correctly, and practice with this in the classroom. With so much confusion and uncertainty dealing with copyright, I think it is critical that our students understand copyright and respect the law as it is until it changes. The problem seems to be the grey area of what is and is not legal for use from digital sources! Without teacher understanding, our students will not understand copyright infringement in media either.  It is great to bring this issue to light in this time of picture and video exchange. I am looking forward to some clear answers in the future!

David Remillard Wrote:

Digital literacy and digital citizenship has been a recent topic among the faculty at my school. We want students to be able to find digital content and be able to analyze its validity. The phrase good digital citizen has many meanings depending on the context that you are using it in. One area that I have been focusing on is copyright laws and how this relates to my students being good digital citizens. In the education field I see photos being pulled off the Internet without any mention of the artists or link to the original photograph. Students dragging and dropping photos into a project without any understanding of the copyright laws or fair use rights for education. This weeks reading on copyright issues identify and describe the key points that students and teachers should know. Teachers should be giving students resources to copyright free material. Students should understand what can be copyrighted and what cannot be. When we look at copyright issues students today are producing more video projects to present during class time. I find they choose popular songs recorded by artists and do not have permission to use their music. By offering students alternative ways to produce their own original music for soundtracks or introductions to presentations we are fostering more creative projects but also educating students how to be a good digital citizen. Copyright issues go beyond the classroom when you look at school district performances, battle of the bands, and dances for fundraisers. In conjunction with our town officials we pay a licensing fee to broadcast music Inc. that gives the artists and composers royalties for the music that we will broadcast during special events. This is a general blanket that covers the town and the school district to perform without infringing on copyright laws. Finally the keyword still is education. Teachers need to understand the black-and-white of copyright laws and teach students how to access media responsibly.

Posted by Mr.Remillard  

Wk1Readings_KristiSwartz_Post1

Dog Images Have Copyrights, Too!

Copyright Dilemma…

Being someone who had a very limited knowledge of the copyright issues for music and film in our new social society, it was interesting to examine copyright issues this week, and learn so much about the issues with copyright for this century.

 In the documentary Good Copy, Bad Copy, the essence and complexity of copyright law and copyright infringement is explored through personal experiences.

From my learning this week, I do see the trouble for artist creation of music and film if it were to be left open to change without revenue for the creators of the songs, videos, etc. Artists put their talent, heart, and soul into creations and want to have the rights to those items. That makes a lot of sense to me. What about an image of my dog? Yes, even that has a copyright for me. Interesting.

I also enjoy the ability to use materials on Creative Commons to express my own ideas in the classroom using images, video, and audio designed by other creative individuals. I can imagine the change if teachers and students had access and the right to use original works, and could take parts and pieces of those works, put them together to share a part of history and retell a story, or express content in a new way. It could be very powerful for students. In the film Good Copy, Bad Copy this was illustrated through sampling and techno brega being created from original works.

It seems absurd that it is millions of dollars to buy out copyrights of songs from artists in order to simply use parts of the songs, or beats of the music in new creative ways. In my opinion, this aspect of copyright needs to change as we have a shift in culture to protect the artist from piracy.

If artists could share original content through a site like Creative Commons and give rights to others to use the works in new and creative ways while they still got credit and possibly profit, it could be more effective for today’s culture.

I see the use of sharing sites like Creative Commons becoming more and more popular in our 21^st century culture of Internet song sharing and digital creation sharing electronically. I do, however, also see the trouble for artists ability to keep the music, video, or work as it was intended. Quite an interesting time as this change comes. As for my dog, I plan to post him on Creative Commons!