Special Assignment #2

Khan Academy

Khan Academy provides free tutorials and resources and practice exercises with self assessments.  The library of 2100 videos encompasses K-12 math, biology, chemistry, and physics.  Also other topics included are finance, history and statistics. Each category has sub-categories. If there is something that the student doesn't understand from their own teacher or book, Khan Academy will definitely get the concept across.  One has the "A-ha" moment with Khan Academy.  Sal, the instructor, is humorous and easy to understand.  His demeanor makes explanations make a student go "I get it now!"  In watching the tutorial videos, the viewer doesn't see Sal explaining. The viewer sees a cursor or pointer moving on the screen as Sal explains a concept.
Instructors should use Khan Academy as a resource to help explain content to students. Khan Academy should be bookmarked on every student's computer.  I think it has been the best tutorial web site I have ever used.
The video I watched was found in the Chemistry section.  It was "Introduction to the Atom: the Atom, Proton, Neutron, and Electron."  This video was so easy to understand.  I have watched other videos from Khan Academy for subjects that I have taken in college.  I know from personal experience that this has been a huge help for my comprehension. I will have my students use this site for more understanding and a go-to for help.
http://www.khanacademy.org/video/introduction-to-the-atom?playlist=Chemistry

iTunesU

The thoughts that ran thru my head as I looked at what is available on iTunesU were "How cool is this?"  "OMG!", and "Why bother going to class?"  I felt like a kid in a candy store. The information that is available is astounding. From university lectures,audio from The Library of Congress, and learning foreign languages are just the tip of the iceberg! Choices are endless! I now understand why people constantly have earphones in.  I used to think they were listening to music.  I am now hoping they are listening to iTunesU. I will be using iTunesU to enhance my students' learning, and help to provide a more thorough knowledge base.
I watched "Introduction to Psychology" Defining Mental Illness.  This course surveys questions about human behavior.  I listened to it because I have an interest in psychology.  Here is the link. http://itunes.apple.com/itunes-u/introduction-to-psychology/id341596834#ls=1

TED

TED is a website dedicated to free lectures on technology, entertainment, design, business, science, and global issues.  These categories are then broken further down into what type of message they are conveying. They can be persuasive, courageous, ingenious, fascinating, inspiring, beautiful, and informative.The concept of TED is "...to bring together the world's most fascinating thinkers and doers."  The lecturers are challenged to give the talk of their lives in under eighteen minutes.  I thought this site could be for the high school level student and  the college student. I could use TED in my classroom to provide another point of view.  I feel like TED is more like an editorial section of the newspaper.
I watched the lecture Conrad Wolfram: Teaching Kids Real Math with Computers. Wolfram says in the real world, we use computers for math.  In education, we do math by hand. Wolfram poses the question "Why are we teaching students math?" We teach math for technical jobs, everyday living, and for logical thinking (math teaches it).  He states that math liberation hasn't made it to education. He also says that it takes too much time to hand calculate.  The days of the horse and buggy are over and we need to use computers to speed things up.  Wolfram does say that math by hand is good for estimation.  It seems to be quicker.  The argument against using computers for math is that it may dumb math down.  The argument that Wolfram uses is that one has to know how to use the program in order to figure out the math. I enjoyed listening to Wolfram's viewpoint on the subject. It was interesting.  http://www.ted.com/talk/conrad_wolfram_teaching_kids_real_math_with_computers.html

I wasn't surprised in having this type of assignment being assigned.  I knew about Khan Academy but TED and iTunesU were new for me.  I am going to use all three resources for my students.  I think they will appreciate having more tools that they can use to broaden their horizons.