Recently I have been able to check out some cool online resume sites. I choose to do mine from LinkedIn. Here's the link:
Research is huge in any field of work. People need support and reasoning for the things they are doing. People need to know what they are doing is worth while. That is why research is available. To tell people why they are doing what they are doing and also how to do it better. One of the primary ways of research is surveying the population. Surveying is asking people their thoughts. Due to advances in technology, we are now able to do surveys online and send them out in the masses. It has never been easier or more efficient. For one of my graduate school classes, I had to see which websites had the best surveying tools. After looking and playing with various survey tools, the best one I found was KwikSurveys. I really liked this website because it not only did a lot of the work for you, it gave you multiple options. It allowed you to choose how you wanted your questions answered, in a variety of ways. It was also really easy to use in every aspect. Another one that I liked was, Survey Monkey. I actually used this tool in undergrad and it always proved reliable. It is very similar in the was is KwikSurveys. The only hassle I found with this site is the survey took a little longer to set up. The great thing about both of these websites, is that they both analyze statistics efficiently. They give you results as soon as possible and are less likely to make mistakes. This makes doing research less of a hassle and more of a great tool to get your work done. The absolute best website for analyzing statistics I have found is MailChimp. Even thought this website does not provide surveys embedded into the site, it gives phenomenal feedback to who has viewed your messages and how many times. It is great for organizations trying to get information out. http://kwiksurveys.com/s.asp?sid=t1vsyagdh0l7hqb493644 Fortunately for every young professional, today's world offers multiple ways for us to market ourselves. Before the internet was as efficient as it is today, everyone had to do all their own marketing for themselves. Now, we are blessed now only to not have to do it ourselves, but with a choice of how and who we want to market ourselves. The two primary ones are having a Personal Website or LinkedIn.
Even though today's technology offers people with the option to do as little work for yourself as possible, some people still like to "get their hands dirty". These individuals still like to do things for themselves and prefer projects where they are highly involved in every aspect. If this sounds like you, Per Before I got my teaching job, I was working at a gym as the front desk person. To be completely honest, it was not my favorite job. I had just graduated college, was trying to find a school to hire me and on top of that was stuck inside during the summer. While the job was easy enough, the conditions made me not be to excited to go to work everyday.
One day though, I was talking to one of the regular gym members and he mentioned that he was a music teacher at a local private school. When he heard I was a physical education major, he said the PE teacher at his school was looking for someone to take over her job when she retired. I am now in my second year of teaching at the school. The coolest thing about my job is, I would never have gotten it without networking. Most people believe networking is planning out who you should meet and where you should be. While this is great and really helps out, I believe networking can simply be being friendly to everyone that you come in contact with. You can never tell who is behind you in the line at Starbucks, or who you are passing on the street, but it never hurts to smile or start a conversation. Little things can often lead to big things, which I believe is the foundation for networking. The art of networking is being a friend and being good to people. Sometimes this can be hard, but it is always worth it. During every class in my undergraduate studies, all I heard was "Do not use wikipedia."
After graduating from undergrad, the number one source I use when I have a question is wikipedia. This is because of the easy access the website has and how I have never personally had a problem with it. Would I ever use it for a paper for my graduate work? No. Simply because the danger of using a source that anyone could change. From reading numerous articles on the "wiki movement", I was surprised to find some education using wiki type websites to enhance their classes. Teachers are beating the system at their own game by having students post their own research on the site. I think this is awesome because similar to any technology, wiki resources can be used to benefit one or tear down. I think wiki resources fit our culture and time very well. We live in a very fast pace culture, where time for research is extremely limited. This resources allow people to get the information they need without the fight of a library or reading an eighteen page online article. Therefore, I think educators are doing well when they are introducing students to them early. Also, with teaching students how to make and add their own additions to the wiki sites, the students are seeing how the information is put on. Hopefully, this will show the students that even though the site has good information, that kids like them developed the website. With the students realizing this, they will see that they may need other websites in order to prove their information from the wiki site is correct. Which is what they should do in gaining any information from the web. Similar to most technology, wearable technology comes with many pros and cons. Especially, in teaching students. Kids can make things either succeed really well or fail extremely well and you can never know which will happen.
Some pros about wearable technology in the physical education setting is the lifetime fitness is can build a foundation for. In the fitness word, many different tools are coming at that track your steps, stairs, calories, heart rate and even your sleep cycle. These tools can be worn as watches, clips on your pants, or even in your shoes. If these tools are introduced in school, students will become familiar with them. Also, if students are required to have them for school, the dream would be that students would then be accustomed to having them for the rest of their life. This would hopefully lead to students becoming more healthy because of this installment. No physical education teacher would be upset if this happened. Also, it would be easier for physical educators to see if the students were being active throughout the rest of the week because their device would show. Even though the pros sounds really great, there are some definite cons. One con is, the cost of these devices. In order for the devices to serve their best purpose all the students in the school would need to own one. That would cost a good amount of money, which with budgets not being the highest, are very unlikely. Another con is that, some students might not like the tracking of their every step. Some students may feel like they are being invaded or just not like to have every step recorded. If this would happen, students may be turned off of physical activity. The biggest challenge, is that we never truly know how this could play out until we actually try. Personally, I would love for wearable technology to truly invade PE. My dream is for every student to have some sort of pedometer and for them to be able to recognize their fitness levels. One of my goals for my teaching profession in the next couple years is, to encourage the faculty to be more active. A way I would like to do that is by having an app that everyone can know what activities everyone else is doing. It could be a competition to see who could do what or even a relationship builder, so that faculty could find ways outside of school to spend time together. I really hope that something like this will come out in time for me to put my goal into action or maybe I'll just have to create one for myself.
I think Apps are really incredible tools for learning. One App that I have on my phone is the HumanKinetic app. This app allows me to pull up any muscle on the body and different exercises that can be done to strengthen that muscle. When I am doing lesson plans, this really helps to me to see what muscles are being worked and even adds some new activities to my curriculum. I can also use it during class if a student has a question about a muscle that I can not answer. It is a wonderful resource to have and it makes my life a lot easier. I was very surprised how many of the tools I already used. The most surprising tool I found was tumblr. This is because when I usually use tumblr, I am looking for horse pictures, the new Taylor swift quote or different cute animals. I never thought I could use it for educational purposes. I recently just started following some fitness sites and have been gaining a lot of great ideas for the classroom. This list has been so cool to see and realize what I can be using for my profession. If I could figure out how to do this in one of my classes I would love it! Every day technology is getting better and better. Computers are getting faster, new websites are emerging and business are booming from a home laptop computer. With this Web 2.0, where the focus is people to people, possibilities are endless.
Just today, I was trying to decide which pedometer to buy. With the Fitbit, Runmeter and tons of other options, I had no idea which one to pick. From reading all the reviews, I was finally able to make that decision and I did not have to leave my house. This is because Web 2.0 is enabling people to do all the talking on the internet and pushing back all the boundaries that were first there. Web 2.0 is also allowing small business to rise up and create competition for the corporations. With websites and different ways to promote products, business are able to get more leverage than ever before. It is a really great time for the consumer. Students also can benefit from Web 2.0. Not only can they buy and sell textbooks, they can also rate a professor to see if they really want to take that class next semester. Or they can create groups on Facebook to help them study or do their homework. Education can truly become better with this technology with the proper use. |