Journal #3

Copyright and Fair use are very prevalent on the minds of many educators.  In order to understand why these are a big deal, we must know what they really are.  Copyright allows for creators to protect their work from others stealing it and claiming it as their own.  This sets boundries with the general public about how they can use and appriciate other people's creations, however these boundries are not always crystal clear.  Many people may not be certian what constitutes as an infringement on a creator's copyright.  Creative Commons licenses allow for these boundries to be explicit.  However, people are still able to take parts of books and insert images from the internet into their own presentations.  This is where Fair use comes into play.  Fair use allows for people to duplicate other's work, but only with in reason and for non-profit use.  Fair use does not allow for someone to claim a work as their own or copy something and sell it.  With this knowledge, I would make sure to take care about what I am creating, both in terms of making sure to cite my sources, follow fair use guidlines, as well as using Creative Commons licensing for any original work that I can use in my classroom.  In doing so, I am able to share informative or instructional creations with fellow teachers, while staying in control of my copyright.  In terms of my students, I would make sure to approach this conversation in an age appropriate way.  The ages I wish to work with are kindergardeners, so I would make sure that they are thinking outside the box to create original work.  If they do have a form of inspiration, I would have them inform me or include in in whatever it is they are working on.  

While in other classrooms, these technology implementation issues may have a bigger impact, I feel as though many of them would not be as prevelent in my future classroom due to the young age of my future students.  With that being said, I can see a future where lack of funding and decreased productivity can be an issue.  I believe that the biggest obstacle for implementing technology in the classroom would be a lack of funding, due to the fact this this is already an issue many schools nationwide are struggling with.  In my case, I was fortunate to attened a school that had laptop carts so the students could do work online, but other schools are not so lucky.  If I do work at a school where this is a prevalent issue, I would have to have most of my work be on paper.  I don't think this is neccessarly a large issue as it allows for the students to work on fine motor skills, but it does limit the activites that I could use in order to enrich their learning environment.  A solution that I could use, would be to use or purchase my own personal technology and bring it to the school for the students to share under my supervision.  While this is not an idea I am particularly thrilled about, I do think it would be good to do every once and a while to switch things up.  This brings me to the issue of having decreased productivity in the classroom.  Seeing as how I intend to work with small children, this can be a frequent issue for me.  If the students are getting bored and tired of doing similar work, then they lose their drive to be productive.  By implementing technology, such as games, videos, and interactive websites, I am able to be more creative with the lessons and activites we participate in.  It also permits me to have more ease in switching up what we do, since its all in one place.  

Working on the newsletter assignment taught me many new skills with the Microsoft Word software.  I was unaware that there was so much you could do in that program, and seeing as how I enjoy using Google Docs for most of my assignments, there was a sharp learning curve in order for me to gain the skills to complete the newsletter.  A lot of it was just learning where everything was and what the icons meant.  It was an adjustment with having to learn to make the columns and page breaks so that the information I had written down didn't become distorted.  I also had to learn how to create the permission slip from scratch, as well as how to insert an image so that it could be placed freely amoungst the text.  I think I could improve my newsletter by not having it be so wordy, which is a common issue for me.  I also think that I could have included more pictures, but I wasn't sure if I had enough space.  The skills I learned while doing this assignment can be very useful in my future career.  They would be helpful when creating assignments and informative games, so that they are visually stimulating in order to decrease a lack of productivity in my future students.