CLRN - Web Info Links (WIL's)

After completing my technology-enhanced lesson plan on line symmetry, I decided to take a look up this topic on CLRN's site. I find their site very easy to navigate, and I love that there at NO ads!!! After watching the informative tutorial on how to use WIL's (Web Info Links), I went to "test" out my topic. All I had to do what click "Browse" under the WIL's toolbar, and I was taken to a web-page that listed all subjects. After clicking on Mathematics, I was taken to a web-page that listed 14 "categories" in mathematics. One quick click on "Geometry" brought me to a web-page that listed 35 links, 2 of the links being line symmetry! How exciting!!! Here is a website that I wouldn't have found using Google  - and it is awesome!!!! 

http://www.adrianbruce.com/Symmetry/index.html

I am thankful that sites like CLRN exist, because too often I find myself sticking to Google....and there is so much more out there!!!!!

General Technology in the Classroom

I found myself almost laughing out loud in my Principles of Methodology class. There were several grad students in the class who said they were intimidated by the idea of taking online classes. I don't think it was even the actual technology that bothered them either but rather the absence of a physically present teacher or professor.

It amazes me that people similar in age to me can be intimidated by technology. It's not like my parents who have a severe learning curve to overcome in comparison to the technology they had access to.

These types of fear have to be overcome as a whole in order for the entire learning world to progress. This won't occur unless their is a collective effort to learn as much as possible, and even more importantly, to allow for a higher level of generally accepted priciples provided by technology.

Bottom line from my perspective, technological learning, be it sophisticated software concepts or grasping long-distance learning, the positives far outweigh the negatives.