Reflection on Chapter 1

To begin with, I must simply say, "WHEW!" There was so much information in what I have read this past week. I am not the most "tech-savvy" person and had a hard time understanding portions of what I was reading. From the things that I did understand, I would first like to bring up what I learned when comparing the paper literacy palette to the digital literacy palette. It was interesting to me to see how much more hands-on the information can come to a person digitally instead of simply on paper. Videos, links, sensors, 3D animation and sound can all be displayed digitally. To me, that is a huge difference than simply reading out of a text book. As a future teacher, I would love for my students to be able to use and have access to this kind of technology in and out of the classroom. I also thought it was interesting when I read about the correlation between people using the internet and the income that they made. I never had put these two aspects together and thought about how beneficial that the use of the internet can be for a person, in the long run. I also liked thinking about the actual definition of a page. We, as educators, must somehow be able to understand the 21st century thinking that a page is not simply that, but also a "web"page.
My favorite thing that I read from Chapter one was the realization that the internet is a shared database, that if used effectively, can be an opening to a world of knowledge that has been collectively created by people. Like Montessori said, "The hands are the instruments of man's intelligence." Our hands can be used in many ways, and should be. As a teacher it is my responsibility to introduce plenty of hands-on activities and ideas to my students so that they are able to understand how changing our world is every day.