Reflective Blog #2

This activity suprised me because I have been using search engines for as long as I can remember and I always assumed that the first couple of web pages were the best options.  Now that I have done these assignments I think I better understand the kind of information that I want might not always be the first couple of web pages.  I learned that for the most part if you look at the ending suffix of the website then it can go along way in letting you know what kind of website it is.  For instance, sites ending in .edu, .org, or .gov are better than just .com sites because they actually come from educational institutions or organizations which are better equipped to help you find what you are looking fo,r not to mention that they are normally more in line with what is considered state approved material.  I wish I would have know this in the past because I would have been more able to sort through the sites that wouldn't be much help instead of getting frustrated because I am not able to find what I am looking for.

This can be a big problem for our students because if they are just going off of the first couple of sites that pop up then they will be more likely to spit out the same information as everyone else and it will become a continous cycle of repeating the same material over and over.  Doing this will hurt their ability to learn new information and more importantly find information that can be the most helpful and from credited sources instead of just some person that started their own blog or web page.  We have to teach or students how to sort through this information so that they might better be able to sort fact from opinion and learn new ideas from different sources.

I feel their a big advantages with using Delicious or Google Reader because they are able to sort information to your liking and it gives you the best possible results for what you are looking for then if you were to just type it into a normal search engine.  Also, you can save these sites and share them with your class so that way you know that the information they are getting is reliable and accurate.  Students will be able to sort through 5 to 10 sites instead of 1000s.

The way I would like to use this in the future is to do a lesson where the students get into small groups and try to find a new sport or game for the class to learn.  They will be responsible for learning the rules and history of the sport.  After they do this they teach the game to the rest of the class and hopefully the class will enjoy a new activity.  I can use sites that I know have tons of ideas so that way they aren't all picking the same thing.  This will give them an oppurtunity to do research and to learn how to implement what they read and learn into actual teaching of a new game to their peers.

The advantages for using wikis is you are able to get ideas that you normally wouldn't be able to because the amount of information possibilities are endless.  Some of the disadvantages are that sometimes the information might not be accurate, therefore actually hindering the learning process.

There are a ton of applications that I would like to use such as foodical.  It could help students better understand their diet and how their eating habits could hurt their health.  It will also give them a way of tracking what they eat so they can make better decisions to lead a healthier lifestyle.