school cams

In a high school in Philadelphia, all the students received laptops to use to improve their education. Students are even able to take these computers home to work on homework. So what's wrong with that? Nothing. Except school officals could/did remotely activate the web camera in the laptop to see what students are doing. This feature was put in place as a security feature to help locate missing or stolen laptops.
In November, the vice principal activated the webcame and took a photo of the kid doing something that she thought was illegal. Major flaw in her plan - parents and students had not been told about the schools' ability to do this. FBI and the Philly police are looking into this....

What do you guys think?

http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/Parenting/pennsylvania-school-webcam-students-spying/story?id=9905488

customized textbooks

Macmillan (textbook company) is coming out with something called DynamicBooks. This is an online program where college professors can edit textbook information without consulting the textbook writer.
My understanding is that professors require their students' to purchase the book online for a much cheaper price. The professor goes in, and adds/deleates/rewrite paragrpahs, chapters or questions. So the book becomes personalized to their class. So it's not really a professional collaborative wiki. It's just individualized for each class (ex: Dr. Merril and Dr. Zhang each teach EDU 290. They could both get a book with DynamicBooks and personalize it to their teaching personalities.)

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/22/business/media/22textbook.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

SNOW DAY anyone???

Did anyone get a snow day yesterday? I think that my school was literally the only school open. By recess, we had 7 inches of snow!!! The kids loved it though. We spent a lot of time making snowmen. It's so easy to impress 6 year olds :)

IPods for 3 year olds

In Weston County, they have placed Ipods into preschool classrooms. These IPods were preloaded with learning applications before they were placed into the classroom. The applications were suppose to help with numbers, colors, animals....etc. The students were given no information on how to use them.
I have mixed feelings. I think this is pretty cool. However, I don't know that students need "tethered" to technology at that early age. What do you guys think?

Technology Advances for Toddlers
(Not sure why the article is titled toddlers when a 3 year old is not a toddler....but whatever)

Johnny's Budget

Johnny wants to go the Olympics in Vancouver. He has a firm (can NOT go over) budget of $1200. He does some research online and finds out that it would cost him $300.75 for a round trip (there and back) airline ticket. He does a little more research and finds that he can get a nice hotel room for $125.25 a night. He also budgeted $50 a day for food. Since his family won’t be able to go, he budgeted $80 for souvenirs for them. He is planning on staying for 5 days. Can Johnny afford to go to the Olympics on his budget?

community college at the end of 10th grade

So now that I've posted, I've found another article on the whole get kids out of high school in 10th grade debacle. This one offers more information and I guess I can see their logic. The idea is to get kids who are ready out of high school and into college level courses. The high schoolers who don't pass the test at the end of 10th, 11th, or 12th graders will know ahead of time that they might have a hard time in college. This gives them a fair warning rather then having them be "surprised" when they are placed in a remedial class.
It would also allow high school teachers to focus more on the students who need some extra help.
Apparently, countries such as France, Denmark, England, Finland and Singapore use systems like this (or they use this?). They are all considered "high performance nations."
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation are providing a $1.5 million grant to get this going. And schools are hoping to apply for some of the $350 million of fed stimulus money.

Sounds interesting. I still like the idea of keeping high school the way it is though. If you graduate after 10th grade how are you suspose to pay for community college? Not many 10th graders don't have a "real" job. (Babysitting is not a stable form of income) But maybe this would essentially "force" them to get a job. I'm not sure how I feel about this.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/18/education/18educ.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Get rid of 12th grade?

Utah senator Chris Buttars has proposed getting rid of senior year of high school. He believes that this would save $60 million which would help to make a dent in the $700 million that they are in the red for.
According to the article, several other states are considering having students take a proficient test at the end of 10th grade which would then allow them to enter community college. (I think this would be similar to an AP exam in that it says the student is proficient at/for a college level.) This option is not suspose to be a money saver, but it is suspose to reduce the number of remedical classes at the college level.

Anyone who teaches high school care to comment?
Personally, I think that the senator should leave the 12th grade alone. MATURITY is a huge issue - high school students need that extra year or two to mature a little before they leave the nest. While this might not be true for some students, I think that as a whole, it is.

http://education.change.org/blog/view/no_more_pencils_no_more_books_eliminating_senior_year

Autism

There was a new study that confirms that moms who are older have a higher risk of having a child born who is autistic. This confirms one study and contradicts another. One of the recent studies that this one contradicted suggested that the age of the father was the most important risk factor. However, this study found that while the age of the father was important, the age of the mother was more important. It is also believed that 1 in 100 children in the US are Autistic. WOW. 1 in 100 children. To me, that number is shocking. I have run into a few children that have autism, but I didn't think the rate was that high. What do you guys think?

http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/35296409/ns/health-mental_health/

AP tests

I've seen a few articles about the fact that more students are taking AP tests. And more students are failing (getting a 1 or 2) on the AP exams. I'm going to be honest - I really don't care so much about the exact numbers or stats. I just think that it's great that more students are willing to try to take the AP exams. I feel that they have nothing to loose - it is cheaper to take the test then it is to pay for the credits to take it at a college.
When I was in high school, I took 3 AP classes. One my sophomore year (US history), 1 my junior year (European history), and 1 my senior year (psychology). The only one that I got credit for was psychology. That being said, I am still glad that I took the other 2 classes. I know (even then I knew) that I was not devoting enough time to my studies. I knew that I probably wouldn't pass the history exams before I took them. But I liked how they were set up. I liked how they gave me greater responsibility for my learning. It showed me what college was going to be like - the skills I was going to need to work on.
I ended up doing great in college - I graduated with honors. So I say, keep pushing the AP classes!!!
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/11/education/11college.html?ref=education

WiFi bus

I was reading this article about how a school district installed WiFi into a bus. Students on the bus are able to get WiFi during their rides to and from school. When the bus is used to haul athletes around, they are able to do homework. Many students do homework, and some play video games.
I have mixed feelings on this. As somone who graduated from high school about 5 years ago, I think that it's very cool. My bus ride was about 50 minutes. I would have loved to sit there and do homework. Especially since I worked and played sports - I was always trying to budget my time. I think that the WiFi would have been great for the 2 boys who rode my bus and use to get into fist fights and shove each other around on the bus (they had a love-hate friendship). It would have stopped the girls from sitting in the back and giggling obnoxiously and flirting with the boys. No one would have been screaming everytime the driver hit a pothole in the hole. (Switzer! You're killing me! Oww! Watch were you're going! How'd you hit that pothole!?!)
On the other hand, I feel like we are going way overboard with the use of technology now-a-days. Minivans have satalite TVs in them. "Everyone" (except me) has Internet on their phones. Do we always need to be "connected" to others? I don't think so. One of the positives of the bus, is that it allows students to develop their inter-personal skills. Students learned how to get along, carry on a conversation, make friends... Are we still teaching students these skills? Or are they being forgotten with all this new technology?

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/12/education/12bus.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Olympics

What event in the Olympics are you looking forward to the most? Why?
Who will you watch it with?
What do you know about the Olympics?

Make sure to use proper spelling, capitalization and punctuation when responding.

secritary fired for speaking Spanish to "hysterical parent"

A secritary at a school in North Carolina was fired for speaking Spanish to a "hysterical parent" who was beside herself because her young son had been sodomized. Since she was hired as a bilingual secritary, she was acting as a translator for the Spanish speaking parent. The principal then fired her for breaching their school districts' policy of only speaking in English.

I'm sorry, how is helping the kids? Who came up with this policy? If you were the principal wouldn't you be more concerned with the fact that one of your students was abused? What happened to teaching kids to be tolerant of other people's differences (such as languages) and teaching them to proud of these differences?

http://education.change.org/blog/view/school_secretary_fired_for_translating_for_concerned_parents

SNow!!! :)

So on Wednesday, at school, we were going to have our Dad's Day celebration. It starts at 7:30 and ends around 8:30 so that dads can attend and still get to work on time. Then we just begin our school at the usual time. With all this snow that we are suspose to be getting, the admin decided to push Dad's Day back 2 weeks.... (2 weeks!) All I can say is we better be getting some snow!

Math Olympics

One school in New Jersey had their 4th grade student body compete in the math olympics. They began by marching with a "torch" into the gym. Then they played 20 different math games which includeded, "Guesstimation Station," "KerPlunk," "Number Line Hopscotch," "Continent Hopping," and "Name that Numbers."
What a fun way to teach the kids a little about the olympics and math sense. This is a way to make math fun and accessable to all students which will hopefully reduce the math anxiety that some students have.

http://www.northjersey.com/community/events/83517037_The__name_of_the_game__is_math_.html

Qualities of a Good Teacher

Bill and Melinda Gates have donated $45 million into a 2 year research project that will study what effective teachers do/ what best practices are. The study will research 3,700 teachers across the US using "videotapes, surveys, and student assessments" to compile a list of qualities of good teachers.



At the end of the article, the author included a list of, "10 qualities of a great teacher: (1) has a sense of humor; (2) is intuitive; (3) knows the subject matter; (4) listens well; (5) is articulate; (6) has an obsessive/compulsive side; (7) can be subversive; (8) is arrogant enough to be fearless; (9) has a performer’s instincts; (10) is a real taskmaster."



What qualities do you think make a good teacher?



http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2010/02/03/20starkey_ep.h29.html?tkn=NOMC%2FftpboQaBg6bw4JxVeqJ4G%2FG7L4b8YFE

Abstinence Only Education - Does it work?

In 2 of my feeds, there was an article on abstinence - so it must be ground breaking. According to the version of the article that I read, they used 662 African American middle school students and sent some to a weekend-long abstience only program. They were also paid $20 for their time.
The results: "...only about a third of the students who participated in a weekend abstinence-only class started having sex within the next 24 months, compared with about half who were randomly assigned instead to general health information classes, or classes teaching only safer sex. Among those assigned to comprehensive sex-education classes, covering both abstinence and safer sex, about 42 percent began having sex." This is the first abstience-only study that has seen these positive results.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/education/03abstinence.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

I think that this is great. I 'm glad that these kids decided to wait a while before having sex. However, I feel that part of their decision to pay attention during the workshop was the influence of the $20 that they were given to participate. And once they started becoming "sexually active" did they use birth control?
I understand that some religions (such as mine) are proponents of abstience-only. However, what happens once they do start having sex? Aren't they at higher risk for pregnancy and STDs?

Brain Rules

On Edutopia, there has been a lot of talk about brain research and it affects teachers and their teaching styles. This has prompted me to go grab my mom's copy of Brain Rules by John Medina. She had encouraged me to read it this summer, but I didn't have enough time between all my activities. So, no time like the present! Has anyone seen the article that started this all?

Winning isn't everything

There is this 15 year old kid in Conn who has polled over 700 kids asking them the question of "Why do you play sports?" And his #1 answer - it's fun! 98% girls and 95% boys listed "fun" as their reason for participating in sports. I found this article to be very refreshing. Especially since every summer you hear about parents brawling over Little League games or parents who verbally attack the refs. It's nice to know that kids don't share those same attitudes.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/31/sports/31youth.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

So I went to go check out my Google reader using my mom's laptop. The graphics on her laptop don't really work very well, espically links and stuff like that. So when it wasn't showing my list of subscriptions I wasn't too worried. I just started reading articles like "The 25 Best Coffee Mugs," "Glow Paint on the Walls," "The Most Nondiscript Video Ever".... And then I finally figure it out. My sister did not sign out of her yahoo account and I was in her reader. Feeling like a genius. Although she did have some pretty interesting articles in her feed.

Technology and Service Learning

I found this article that I thought was pretty cool. START, Microsoft, and CNCS have worked together to pilot a program that has students doing community service by using technology. These 6 pilot programs are spread over the states - Mississippi, New York, California... One of these schools refurbished old computers for their service learning projects. The article doesn't say what the others did. I love service learning.
I just want to differentiate between service learning (all students in a classroom do a service to the community that goes along with GLCEs) and community service (students do on their own after school hours). Last semester, I had my 1st graders perform a service learning project at Halloween time. They absolutly loved it! It was a very rewarding experience for me, my 1st graders, and the kindergarteners that we "serviced." My 1st graders felt empowered knowing that they were able to help others and make a difference. So I think that this program that I read about it a great idea! I hope they can make it work :)

And on a totaly different note, I received my letter from the MDE asking for my $160 so I can get my teaching certificate from the state of MI!!! Yay! I think it's the first time in my life that I've been happy to see a bill! :)

J.D. Salinger died

So I got up this morning and I listened to the news on TV as I was getting ready. J.D. Salinger, a famous author, died. :( Like so many others, I had to read "Catcher in the Rye" in high school. I loved it, despite the fact that Holden swore in pretty much every sentence. I still read it occasionally when I have "free time" and no library books around. "Catcher" was pretty much his only book that I liked. I also had to read his "9 Stories" for school and I did not like it at all.

On the today show website, you can vote for your favorite J.D. Salinger book. "Catcher" is currently winning at 62%.

http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/26185613/ns/today-the_new_york_times/

web address

I forgot to post the web address: http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/01/25/play-then-eat-shift-may-bring-gains-at-school/

Recess then lunch

Don't you love days where you are gone from your house for 13+ hours? It's fantastic.
My boyfriend has had my laptop and will continue to have my laptop because he is correctly installing the new Microsoft 7 onto it. I muddled the 64 byte, then he couldn't get it. So now he's just going to do the 32. I don't care. I just want Google to work again on my computer! I really just want my computer back. It's that feeling like when you leave your cell phone at home for the day....

I took a "How Well do You Know Current News" test on one of my RSS feeds. I scored a 1 out of 5. Pretty pathetic since I watch the news as I get ready in the morning. As if I care about the basketball play was just suspended....

I skipped over all the hype about the iPad and read this really interesting article on why students should go out to recess first, then eat lunch. When students go out to recess first there is less food waste, less trips to the school nurse, 10 extra minutes of instructional time (students can "cool down"/"unwind" during lunch rather then during class), they loose less items such as gloves, and they eat healthier foods. I just thought this was pretty cool. I'm not really sure why ever school that I attended or have volunteered/worked at has done lunch and then recess. Guess it's tradition? What does your school do?

no dictionaries in school??!?!

So far, I am really enjoying the RSS feeder. I have several subscriptions, and I have made the time to check it first thing in the morning while I listen to the news. The blogging and the wiki I am not enjoying as much as the RSS, I think because I feel a little "vulnerable" putting my thoughts out there. But I can most definitely see the usefulness of them in a classroom.

So I found this one article titled "Dictionary Definitions: Too Sexy for School?" One school in California has decided to pull their dictionaries after parent complaints that kids were looking up dirty words. (Namely the phrase"oral sex".) And they will be reading the rest of the dictionary to look "for things of a graphic nature." Who has the time for that?
I'm sorry, but I think that this is ridiculous. The kids are actually using the dictionary for the purpose for which it was intended (looking up words). And wouldn't you rather your kids find out this information from credulous source rather then a friend who mixes up the facts? As the article points out, it's not like the kids have the Internet or anything at home either where they can google these words...

"Pope to Church Leaders: Blog Already!"

I found this article to be mildly amusing because I in my head I pictured Pope Benidict sitting in his pajamas (like me) with his Mitre (tall hat) on his head blogging online - even though the article didn't say HE would be blogging, just that he was encouraging Church leaders to... I'm going to have to ask my Catechism kids their thoughts on this tonight. Maybe I can mesh it in with our John the Baptist lesson :)
Seriously, I wonder what priests would be able to blog about? There are some privacy issues with what they talk to others about. Then again, I wouldn't say that my days are incredibly interesting and I still manage to find stuff to blog about.

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/pope_to_church_leaders_blog_already.php?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+readwriteweb+%28ReadWriteWeb%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

School Lunches

I’ve found a few interesting articles on school lunches within the last day. The first is an article in the Chicago Tribune. It’s about how some people are trying to improve school lunch get rid of their districts’ “Brunch for Lunch” since it is all carbohydrates, sugar, and fat. The part of the article that was most eye opening to me was that statistic that this district can only spend about $1 per school lunch! ONE DOLLAR!!! That’s less than a McDonalds’ or Taco Bell meal – and we all know how fatty those places are. It’s crazy.
I knew that Obama was into improving schools, and the article provided a little more information for me. “As Congress prepares to discuss the Child Nutrition Act, President Barack Obama has asked for an additional $1 billion in funding for school lunches, which would mean about 30 cents more per lunch.” (Chicago Tribune) One dollar and 30 cents per lunch doesn’t sound like much, but I guess it is an improvement.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/health/chi-suburban-school-lunches-jan05,0,6750587.story?page=1

Which is why two women in California (I think?) have decided to open Revolution Foods. Revolution Foods provides lunches to school. These are not normal lunches, they are “meals [are] prepared fresh daily and feature foods free of artificial preservatives, colors, flavors and sweeteners. Every lunch includes fresh fruit and vegetables.” (NY Times) I think this is great. Maybe a little over the top with the no artificial flavors or hormones, but way healthier for everyone. According to the NY Times, Revolution Foods makes about “30,000 lunches a day, in mostly low -income communities.” Fantastic since those kids tend to be heavier due to their parent’s inability to purchase expensive and healthy foods.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/24/us/24sfpolitics.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

The last article that I read was about Canada having something called The Healthy Food for Schools Act. This Act banns junk food, pop, and candy from school and mandates that kids have at least 20 min of recess!!!! Way to go Canadians!!! I hope Michigan/Granholm take a cue from our neighbors to the North and implement something similar. With the obesity rates being at a record high we need to do something. (And if my memory serves me correctly isn’t Detroit one of the fattest cities in the US? I’m pretty sure I read that somewhere at some point…)
http://education.change.org/blog/view/junk_food_unwelcome_in_canadian_schools_eh

Facebook

So way back in my senior year of high school I made a Facebook page. Back then, Facebook was new. Only people who were associated with a college and who had a college email address were able to make a Facebook account. Only people who were your friends could access the information. Everyone else used MySpace or something similar. I purposely elected to avoid MySpace and similar sites because EVERYONE had access to your information. I made a Facebook page because there were some "pretty good" privacy settings on it. It's fair to say that I felt pretty safe on it.

But hello changes! I'm not too happy with all the changes in privacy setting that Zuckerberg has made. I don't want all my stuff out on google or any other search engine. I don't want random people looking at my profile. And I'm seriously considering deleting it- especially since I'll be looking for out-of-state jobs soon. Not that I have anything worth "hiding," I lead a fairly boring and typical life. It's just that I don't want everyone to have all my information. That's how identities get stolen - and according to TV commercials, identity stealing is an ever growing field.

Anyways, here's a link that I thought was helpful. It was on the ReadWriteWeb RSS feed.
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/the_3_facebook_settings_every_user_should_check_now.php

PLCs

I found this article called "Teachers and Community Members Practice TLC with PLCs." This article is about PLC (Professional Learning Communities) work together to change schools and make differences. While one individual can work hard for change, a community need to collaborate in order to make a big difference. The example cited in the article at Jefferson Elementary were 53% of ELL students are "proficient" at English. (Up from 3 % in 2002.) Math scores at the same school have also greatly increased.
Last semester, I was part of a PLC at an elementary school. I loved listening to all the experienced/veteran teachers talk about what they do in class. It was great to hear differing points of view and different solutions to my problems. We also created several school goals and came up with a few ideas on how to reach them. For example, one of our goals had to do with MEAP scores for next year. Everyone looked at past scores for our school and offered suggestions about what could be done to improve even though some of the teachers (speciality, kindergarten...) had nothing to do with MEAPs.
I feel that since we all are teachers, and we have all linked blogs and wikis, we are part of a PLC. But does anyone else participate in PLCs at their school? What are your thoughts/feelings on them?

http://www.edutopia.org/professional-learning-communities-collaboration

Antiworksheets

I thought that this was an interesting website. There is not much on it yet, but I think I'll check it out in a week or two. The idea is to build a site that "containing “Free Thought-Provoking Project Ideas” that teachers can use to enhance their practice and create a rich learning environment in their classrooms"

They are also looking for ideas/help/feedback if anyone is interested or has ideas. Click on the second website at the bottom.

http://www.antiworksheets.com/

http://www.antiworksheets.com/contact/

Recycled school supplies - very cool

Every teacher that I know spends loads of money of their classroom every year. As many of my friends and I are just beginning our careers as teachers, and trying to find/purchase classroom materials, our hard -earned cash is being rapidly spent. I stumbled across this article in my RSS in the ASCD Smart Brief. It is called "Nonprofit helps shave classroom costs with recycled supplies." In Arizona, there is a new organization called Treasueres 4 Teachers. Teachers pay a $50 fee and are then allowed to pick up "new, donated, and recyclable supplies." According to the article, large companies donate items as well as other people.
What a great way to "reduce, reuse, recycle" and teach your students about recycling and community. Not to mention cost saving. This would also be a great organization for a beginning teacher to join to get materials and great ideas from other teachers.

http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/2010/01/17/20100117edsaving0117.html

"Race to the Top"

Does anyone know anything about this/go to MEA meetings? I don't belong to MEA. Is it because it is not "finished"? Or does MEA have other issues with it?

http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2010/01/13/324035miracetotopmich_ap.html?utm_source=fb&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=mrss

I think I've subscribed to too many RSS feeds...

So I was working my way through all my RSS feeds (I subscribed to 6 plus a bunch of ppls' blogs) and I found some interesting articles on SMARTboards. The first one is called "SMARTboards are Work for Edmund teachers." First of all, the name of the articles bothers me. I mean all "new (to you)" teachnology is work. Teaching in general is a lot of work!!! I guess the title just made it sound like SMARTboards are a total pain for all teachers to use.
The article talks about how it takes one teacher 2 hours to create one activity on it. Another teacher rates her knowledge at a 2 / 3 on a scale of 1 (know nothing) to 10 (expert). Then the article goes on to say how the district hopes to place one of these into every single classroom. (Sounds like conflicting points of view from teachers and school board?)

I agree that it is time consuming to come up with activities on the SMART board, but they are amazing and totally worth it. If you try to google some activities, you can find some for free that can really fit into the curriculum. When I did my student teaching last semester we found that Everyday Math (our math textbook) had a website with free SMARTboard activities for every lesson! It was great. Even though we did not have a SMARTboard in our room, we still used it with the computer and the Elmo. The kids loved it!
If teachers don't feel comfortable with new teachnology they need to try to make the time (even though there are never enough hours in the day!) and take a few classes or ask some colleges for help. Especially if there is one teacher who is great with technology. Or another grade level teacher with whom you can work together to make SMARTboard lessons or swap activities with.

The SMARTboards are great. They get, and keep, kids interests in lessons. Many kids are hands-on and need that extra manipulation of items rather then watching someone else do it.
http://newsok.com/smartboards-are-work-for-edmond-teachers/article/3431851

I also stumbeled across this other interesting article called "New projector makes any wall an interactive white board" about two different projectors that can turn surfaces into an interactive white board - like a SMARTboard. The projector is self-contained, doesn't need extra software and only cost $20000. Pretty cool.
http://www.eschoolnews.com/2010/01/13/new-projector-makes-any-wall-an-interactive-whiteboard/

Thanks for the suggestions :)

So I think that I might finally getting the hang of this blogging / google reader thing :) yay! Next thing to tackle is the wiki!
I’m going to try to get Firefox onto my computer when I get home (borrowed dad’s work laptop and am currently at Panera ). When I googled my issue yesterday, I found that as a suggestion so I'm hopping it'll work. Thanks for the suggetion !
New in my world – my boyfriend is switching from Verizon to AT&T for his phone service. This means that he is getting the iPhone! (I mean why else would one switch to AT&T if not for the new gadgets???) This means that I get his fancy new 16 g, touch-screen, connect to wi-fi, has a million aps ipod! That’s right – I’m 23 and I’m finally getting an (used) ipod!!!! As if I’m going to use any where near 1g on it… It'll be one more piece of "technology" for me to learn to use.

On my google reader, one of the articles that I was looking at is called "2010 Trends: Sensors & Mobile Phones" It's by Richard McManus and it's part of my ReadWriteWeb RSS. Apparently the iPhone has a bunch of built in sensors. There's one for noise, ambient lighting, temperature, and proximity. According to McManus, the iPhone has a built in accelerometer which is a motion decetor. This is used for playing games and "re-sizing your iPhone display from portrait to landscape." Your phone collects all this "real-time data" from you and stores it. I guess the ida is to let others know about traffic jams etc... using your accelerometer. Could be helpful, but I feel like this might end up being a "big brother" kind of a thing.

Beginning of the school year

Can't believe that it's already the beginning of the semester. I feel like I'm a little crazy for graduating in December and already starting a masters program. I'm also feeling very technologically illiterate! - since I have never used most of what we'll be learning about in class.
For some reason google does not work on my laptop so I have to borrow someone elses' to get onto my blog and reader. That's annoying. Does anyone know how to fix that/what the issue might be?
I'm looking forward to meeting everyone next weekend :)