Blog Post #3

Blog Post #3 

1.  Peer review is an effective way to evaluate and improve a classmate's academic work. It can be immensely effective so long as the parties involved subscribe to certain rules of conduct. I find from personal experience, that it is helpful to obtain constructive criticism from not only an authoritative presence, but from peers as well. If done properly, both parties can benefit from such instruction.
    When receiving peer review, it is important to keep an open mind to suggestions and corrections. One must be careful not to become defensive about any suggestions that are offered. Furthermore, the person offering suggestions must be careful to not only offer constructive criticism, but also suggestions for improvement as well as compliments. Also, you are going to want to remain positive and stay away from any instructions or statements that maintain any negative connotations. Also discussed in the tutorial and video, it is important to be thorough in your review and to make sure to give the effort that you would expect in return. The point of peer review is to improve students' abilities. By sticking to the guidelines discussed in the tutorial and video, one can improve a peer's writing abilities without stepping on toes.

2. a) In the video Technology in Special Education, Lacey Cook demonstrates how her students with verbal, audible, and learning limitations utilize technology to improve their capabilities in an academic setting.
    It was very interesting to see the broad spectrum of uses this particular class had for technology to improve their ability to learn. Everything from audible limitations, to communication limitations, to visual limitations, the students in this class could use technology to their advantage to better overcome their limitations. It is also exciting to think that as technology progresses, the possibilities for future advancement in special education through uses of technology will increase. This video showed how a student who once was limited to not participating in class activities because of their physical or learning disability can overcome those objections and participate.
   b) I found an app entitled Sentence Builder that I feel would be highly effective with a special needs student that had any type learning disability. This app allows the student to literally build a sentence from the ground up. I feel as though this would be effective because it has great graphics that will not only help to keep the student engaged, but it is organized in a way that allows the student to make mistakes but is instantaneously corrected. The words are large and gives the student the ability to make their own mistakes and fix them.  The video Harness Your Students' Digital Smarts by Vicki Davis was an interesting video that stressed the importance of empowering students through allowing them to incorporate themselves in the   world using technology in the classroom.
    I found it very interesting that the classroom where this video was filmed was at a rural school in south Georgia. Ironically, as mentioned by a lady on the film, these rural students were connected to students all over the world. There seemed to be a certain level of academic freedom in this setting. The students in Mrs. Davis' Class were able to think more critically and to brainstorm and come to conclusions independently because of the technology present in their classroom. Vicki Davis even admitted that her students had recently taught her something that she did not previously know.
    I took away a lot of information regarding this project and it's effectiveness. None more important than the fact that because these students were allowed to freely think and learn, they demonstrated to their teacher their strengths and weaknesses allowing for their teacher to adjust her curriculum to maximum effectiveness to each and every student. With traditional instruction styles, only specific  students benefitted from a paper and pencil type education, whereas with the inclusion of technology, instructors can now concentrate to dial in on each and every student.