Learning the Role of the Internet

Chapter 7 discusses primarily the role of the Internet and the different strategies that can be used to make it an easier and more successful experience.  It also discusses many pitfalls and how to navigate through negative components of the Internet.

URLs 

A way to help oneself when browsing the Internet is to have a good understanding of a URL.  URL stands for uniform resource locators and simply put it is Internet addresses (Roblyer & Doering, 2013 p. 216).  A key component to a URL is the last three letters in the address line known as a “domain designator (Roblyer & Doering, 2013 p. 216).  Domain designators tell teachers and students extremely important information that allows them to surf the Internet quicker and distinguish which sites are more reliable.  Some of the common domain designators are .com (commercial site), .gov (government site), .net (network providers), .edu (higher education institutions), and .org (non-commercial organizations) (Roblyer & Doering, 2013 p. 216).

Search Engines 

Another way to help oneself navigate through the Internet is by the use of search engines.  Search engines are special searching programs to help Internet users locate different topics and information (Roblyer & Doering, 2013 p. 219).  The top three search engines on the Internet today are Google, Yahoo, and Bing (Roblyer & Doering, 2013 p. 219).  The way that search engines work is that keywords are put in and from that information different websites appear.  This provides students and teachers with an abundance of websites to pick through and choose from at an extremely rapid pace.  It also provides endless educational possibilities and endless topics of interest just a few words away. 

Favorite Website #1 

One of my favorite websites is http://www.nytimes.com/.  The reasoning behind this is because it fits in with my subject of teaching extremely well.  As a history teacher, newspapers are an excellent source of curriculum.  They provide reports on past historical events while also report daily on incoming issues or current events.  Both are important when discussing history as an educational topic.  The reason why this website is one of my favorites is for its good structure and organization and easy navigation.  At the top of the page, there are links that one can view depending on the topic at hand.  There is world news, U.S. news, political news, and many more.  These categories allow people to easily navigate and find what they are looking for. 

Favorite Website #2

Another favorite website of mine is http://www.discoveryeducation.com/. The best thing that I like about this website is their extremely good structure and organization.  At the top of the page, this website distinguishes first your reasoning for visiting this site.  Some of the different categories are administrators, teachers, students, and parents.  I find this website extremely beneficial to all because it provides curriculum and lesson plans for teachers as well as digital textbooks for students. 

Web Evaluation Video    

Reference:
Roblyer, M. D., & Doering, A. H. (2013). Integrating educational technology into teaching (6th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson.

Hypermedia Tools for 21st Century Teaching

Commercial Hypermedia Product: Reference Materials

Reference materials are a commercial hypermedia product that comes in CD’s and DVD’s or on the Internet for little to no cost (Roblyer & Doering, 2013, p. 175).  Some of the key examples of this product include atlases, almanacs, encyclopedias, newspapers, and conference proceedings (Roblyer & Doering, 2013, p.175-176).  One reference material that is readily available and free to the public is the New York Times.  As a history teacher, this is the one reference material that I would use the most; the first reason being in order for students to keep up on current events and the second to find research on historical events that have happened throughout history.  Newspapers are great way to research a former event not just for the knowledge but so one can grasp the attitude of the writers’ during that specific time period. 

Here is a link to the New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com  

Chosen Multimedia Authoring Tool: Audio and Video Production and Editing Systems     

Audio and Video Production and Editing has exploded into the world of education to rival the rapid increase in word processing of documents (Roblyer & Doering, 2013, p. 188).  There are primarily three increases in technology that has allowed this phenomenon to happen and they are the emergence of digital cameras and cell phones, the iPod, and finally the start of YouTube (Roblyer & Doering, 2013, p. 188-189).  Due to this, a whole new creation of better and more polished video presentations have emerged.  In my classroom, the one that I believe would benefit me and the students the most is iMovie.  None can argue that Mac computers have become the most popular type in today’s society.  iMovie is a creation of the Mac that enables people to make videos with audio and then go back and edit them.  As a history teacher, presentations and videos are key to getting the students interested in the topic at hand.  Students need to see the pictures and hear the sounds to really learn what was going on during a specific time period.  Also, iMovie would allow me as a teacher to create video presentations so that students could watch them if I had to be absent at any given time (Roblyer & Doering, 2013, p. 196).  I truly believe that video presentations are the best way to capture young student’s attention and that is why I will be using iMovie in my classroom.   

Here is a link to iMovie: http://www.apple.com    
References:
Roblyer, M.D., & Doering, A.H.  (2013). Integrating Educational Technology Into Teaching (6th Ed.).  Boston, MA: Pearson.