LESSON 5! Internet Communication in the Classroom

I am in my 5^th week in the Educational Technology Class, and I am STILL Learning!  The first thing that really stood out to me was that every school has an Acceptable Use Policy for teachers and students.  Since I am not in the school system yet, this wasn’t something that I had ever really thought of.  Now that I have done readings and watched videos on this, it is definitely something that is a MUST!  Internet technology could be a life saver for teachers and students today.  An AUP is crucial so that we make certain no one, whether it be students or teachers, are abusing what we have to use in the classroom. 

The reading that I did on Online Communication Tools gave me so much insight on what I can do as a teacher to meet the different educational needs of my students.  Because I am already very comfortable using the Internet for business and personal use, I know it will be something that I become even more comfortable with in the classroom.  For a very long time now, Email has been an everyday thing for me in my life.  Now that I know I can use this in my classroom to teach my students, I am so excited!  I will use email when communicating with parents and always have an “open door” policy for parents emailing me.  Using this type of communication tool with parents is good because it eliminates “phone tag”, and will give parents and teachers the opportunity to communicate on their own time.  I will use Email as a learning tool for my students also.  I think it is important for students at a very young age, to learn the different communication tools that are out there and to learn how to be proficient in the use of all of them.  I cannot wait to get with my students and send an email from the entire class to someone like the President or a local congressman!  I will teach them how to get their opinions and ideas out there.

Now that I am familiar with using blogs, I have already decided that my future classroom will have its own blog!  I will first introduce blogs to them by showing them different blogs from other classrooms around the Internet.  After that, we will create our own.  Each week certain students will be responsible for updating the classroom blog.  At this point, we will be able to share our experiences in our school with students all over the world!

I absolutely cannot wait to use all of the educational technology ideas in my classroom.  It making me a little more impatient in getting out of school and getting a teaching job J!  Thank you Educational Technology for all the great ideas!