20% Project Jewelry Making: Step One Tools

Jewelry Making Tools: The Basics

1.  Wire Cutters
2. Round Nose Pliers
3. Chain Nose Pliers
4. Flat Nose Pliers
5. Crimp Tool

Recommended Extras:
Bead Stoppers

Here is a photo of the tools I bought and will be working with. In addition to the suggested tools I got a seed bead scooper, a bead reamer and this very thin and pointed tweezer like tool I don't know the name of. Most of these tools came in a nice little set I got at Michaels on sale. I plan on trying them out this weekend. :)

Please check out my Pinterest Board on Jewelry Making to see some of the sources I looked into to learn more about what tools to use and how.

Also here is a short video I found quickly going over some of the more common tools and their uses.






Visit Amanda's profile on Pinterest. Silver Jewelry's pin on Pinterest.

20% Project. Learning To Make and Sell Jewelry

20% Project. Learning To Make and Sell Jewelry

As a part of my credential program we are required to show our mastery of technology and our abilities to use it to learn and share by participating in an assignment called the 20% project. This project is based on practices that successful progressive companies like GOOGLE implement. These companies give their employees time to work on a project or idea that is all their own. This often leads to the invention of new innovative products and procedures. For my project I have decided to engage in a creative activity I have always wished I had more time to engage in and learn about, jewelry making. 

My goals:

1. Learn what tools and materials I will need to make jewelry.

2. Find interesting designs to try and recreate myself.

3. Make several different types and styles of jewelry.

4. Find out where and how I can sell my jewelry.

5. Put my jewelry up for sale. 

Stretch Goals:

1. Come up with my own style or design.

2. Create a how to video explaining how to create the new design I came up with.

CSUSM Arts and Lecture Series: Project Aware Reflection

Amanda Bevers

Cohort B

CSUSM Arts and Lecture Series: Project Aware Reflection

Project Aware was presented to us by RBV Assistant Principal Shannon Garcia and CEO/ founder of Project Aware Reginold Washington. They were supported by Narciso Igleseas who I believe is a teacher at a school for students expelled from other schools, and Jose Villareal whom I believe is a teacher at a different school but is involved in the program. They also had two teen guest speakers one a young African American girl whose name I didn’t quite catch and an older Latino teen boy names Ramero.

They explained how Project Aware was designed by Regi while he was in prison. He noticed that there were no programs to help teach young men how to stay out of prison so he designed one. This program evolved and branched out and is not helping at risk teens find the supports they need to be successful. The program is all about approaching behavior from an education standpoint and not a punitive one. It is about figuring out why students act out instead of just punishing for it. The program has successfully been implemented at RBV high and has resulted in a dramatically lower suspension and expulsion rate on campus. They are now branching the program out to other schools in the district.

Narciso shared some personal stories and explained how it is important to make content relevant to student’s lives. Shannon gave a presentation on how we need to focus on more than just the physiological needs of students. That we need to address the high levels of need on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. She also explained the “school to prison pipeline” scenario which details the statistics of the correlation between students who fail to complete high school and people who end up in prison. She suggests that intervention is key, not expulsion or suspension.

I felt that all of the information given in this presentation was extremely valuable and important to education. I agreed with all of the points they discussed and also believe in intervention over only discipline. Out of all of the amazing speakers however I was most moved by young Ramero’s speech. He shared his personal story of struggle and triumph over his behavior and his past. I never would have guessed that such a handsome, intelligent, and charismatic youth would have been subjected to such a hard life. One of the things that really impacted me was how he was able to forgive a peer for raping his sister and attempting to murder him. If a teenager can forgive all of that, than what can’t we forgive? He taught me that night that grudges and hate are not worth the trouble. He taught me to forgive.

I am extremely impressed with this program and hope that it spreads to more districts and quickly. When I get hired at a school this is one of the first things I look into trying to get my school to do.

Links:

CSUSM Arts and Lectures Series

Project Aware

Journal 10 NETS-T ( I )Point/Counterpoint: Does the U.S. Education System Support Innovation?

Ward,Welter, S. P. (2013, 03 04). Point/counterpoint: Does the u.s. education system support innovation?. Learning & leading with technology, Retrieved from http://www.iste.org/learn/publications/learning-leading/l-l-march-april-2013/point-counterpoint-does-the-u.s.-education-system-support-innovation-

The article “Point/Counterpoint: Does the U.S. Education System Support Innovation?” by Selena Ward and Pete Welter offer two different view points on the question of whether or not our education system is supportive of innovative thinkers.

Selena Ward offers the positive viewpoint saying that yes the U.S Education system does promote innovation by supplying schools with the money they need to purchase technological devices that will advance a student’s use with innovative technological machines. She believes it is not the system’s job to promote student innovation, she believes that job belongs to teacher’s and administrators.

Although I agree that it is a part of the teacher and administrator’s job to promote student innovation I think that she is wrong in her opinion that the education system is adequately supporting and promoting innovation by handing out money for tech. I think that that is the least they can do.

I agree more with the opinion of Pete Welter who believes that the education system is not developing, supporting, or promoting innovation. He argues that the education system today focuses to strongly on standardized testing. This focus creates kids that follow the rules without question, learn only what they are told to, and are made to believe that the only way to adequately judge intelligence is by passing a test.

Welter argues that this type of highly structured education is detrimental to creating innovative thinkers. He says that innovative thinkers are people who question the rules and establishments around them, they look for new ways of solving problems, they often specialize in a particular field and may not be as successful in others, and they are not afraid of failure because failure leads to better success.

Who do you agree with in this debate?

I strongly agree with Peter Welter’s argument because it makes sense. Our education system is stuck on conformity and innovation cannot properly thrive in such a constricting environment.

What do you think the U.S Education System should do to better promote and develop innovative thinking in schools?

I think the first major step needs to be completely eliminating the “No Child Left Behind” agenda and doing away with the strong focus on standardized testing. After that I think we need to make sure that the arts stay in schools. Arts classes are great at developing innovative thinking in students.

Journal 9 NETS-T (I-V)

Journal 9 NETS-T (I-V) Massive and Open: MOOCs Are the Next Big Thing in Online Learning.

Fasimpaur, K. (n.d.). Massive and open. (2013). Learning and Leading with Technology, 40(6), 12-17. Retrieved from http://www.iste.org/learn/publications/learning-leading/digitaledition/digital-edition-march-april-2013

Karen Fasimpaur introduces us to MOOCs in her article “Massive and Open: MOOCs Are the Next Big Thing in Online Learning. MOOCs or massive open online courses present us with a new and innovative way of learning. MOOCs are online course open to everyone and most of them are offered free of charge. You want to learn about circuits and electronics from MIT but can’t afford to go there? No problem now you can have an MIT online course experience for free through their MOOC space called MITx.

The article describes a few different types of MOOCs. There is cMOOCs which places heavy importance on participatory learning and group work. Another type is xMOOCs like Udacity and Cousera which are massive in scale catering to thousands of participants. xMOOCs are used more for independent study than group work and participation. The last type that was mentioned in this article is MOOCs for teachers. I found this section to be particularly interesting because it involved promoting and facilitating life long learning. Peer 2 Peer University or P2PU offers 25 courses for teachers on everything from differentiating instruction to e-portfolios.

Would you use MOOCs?

Yes I would use MOOCs. I would use teacher MOOCs to help me continue my goal of life long learning and to help me build my e-portfolio. I can also see how some MOOCs could be incorporated into the classroom to give students on online area of practice.

Are you afraid that online courses are the future and that soon teachers will no longer be needed?

I admit that yes this is a fear of mine but I don’t think that teachers will ever be completely obsolete. I think that as the decades pass we will see a rise in online courses but they still need teachers to run those courses. I just hope that face to face classes don’t completely disappear in the future because I think in order to build good and long lasting teacher-student relations you need that face to face interaction.

Journal 8 Adaptive Technology

Adaptive Technology

Communication 

Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC)

Augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) refers to all forms of communication apart from actual oral communication. AAC refers to communication that expresses the thoughts, needs, wants, and ideas of individuals. We use AAC when we make facial expressions and body or hand gestures, and also when we use symbols or pictures, even when we write. 

People with severe speech or language disabilities rely on AAC to help them communicate more fully. There are many types of special augmentative aids available to help these individuals express AAC. I’ve researched several of them but here are a few I found to be particularly interesting

An extremely low tech AAC aide option is a laser pointer attached to glasses. A person with extreme physical and/or speech disabilities who still has control of their neck and head movements can use the laser pointer on a chart across from them to help them communicate. The chart could have letters, commonly used words and terms, or pictures on it. Many severe to moderate special education classes have students who are unable to properly articulate their speech who also have certain physical disabilities that prevent them from being able to write as well. Communication for these individuals is severely limited. A device as simple as a laser pointer and a chart on the wall could give these students the ability to participate more in their classes and communicate with those around them.

A high tech AAC aide option is the Smart/128. The Smart/128 is a multi-level communication device. This device features a high tech grid display with interchangeable keyguards and visual scene capabilities. You record messages onto the grid associate with the visual images and the speech-impaired individual can then communicate easily by pressing the buttons associated with the message they want to convey. This device comes with an interchangeable flash card and overlay recognition to further add versatility to the device. It is expensive at about $1,185 dollars but if a school is able to afford this device they can provide their speech-impaired students with a great resource to add them with communicating with their teachers and fellow students. 

 

Assessibility

Input Devices

Input devices give individuals with special needs access to using a computer or electronic device. Input devices can be hardware or software related.

 

One hardware option I researched was the TM4 Mini. The TM4 Mini is an eye tracking device that you mount onto your computer. The device tracks the user’s eye movements and translates that into movement of the computer mouse on the screen. Staring at a button for a length of time equals clicking the mouse button. This device helps individuals with disorders and disabilities like ALS, cerebral palsy, muscular dystrophy, and spinal cord injury use a computer without any outside assistance. Helping them become more independent. A device like this would help students with these issues use a computer on their own to do homework, research, play games, search the web and more. 

 

A software option I researched was the Grid 2 program. The Grid 2 is a software package that allows people with limited speech function to use a computer as voice output communication aide. The Grid 2 also accepts input from switches, headpointers, touchscreen, mouse, and other options. This software is similar to what Steven Hawking uses to vocally communicate with people. In a classroom setting this software gives an individual with speech impairment the ability to vocalize what they want to. It also allows people to communicate via symbols through symbol chat and via text through text chat.

Click on these links to view posts on Adaptive Technology that I've commented on:

Julio's 422 Experience

Raihanna Siddiq Ed422

Jo422nne

 

Journal 7 PLN

Journal 7 (Personal Learning Network)

A PLN or Personal Learning Network is an online network for members of a website to gather information from and learn from others. I created several different PLN’s by utilizing Twitter, Diigo, Facebook, Wikis, blogs, and forums. These PLN sources allow me to connect with other educators and learn from them. It also gives me the chance to share my own ideas or resources. This will help me as a teacher because it will keep me connected with what is new in education and will provide me with places to reach out to when I need help or advice on something.

To build my Personal Learning Network I’ve started following several new persons involved in the field of education on my Twitter account. I am now following Jerry Blumengarten @cybraryman1 (educator and writer), Lisa Dabbs @teachingwthsoul (Educator consultant, former principal, and founder of #ntchat), Larry Ferlazzo @Larryferlazzo (Inner-city High School teacher), Rocco Versaci @rocco_versaci (English professor and writer), and Jeffery Heil @jheil65 (Educator and Google certified teacher).

Click HERE to take a look at some of the great educational resources I've recently used Twitter to share and explanations of why I found them to be worth sharing.

I’ve also started using Diigo, an online social bookmarking site, to build up my PLN. Diigo allows me to easily bookmark websites I find interesting and also to share those sites with others. It also allows me to search through sites that others have deemed worthy of note. Another great thing about Diigo is that it has provided me access to a new community of educators and education interested groups. I have added several people involved in education to my Diigo network. Including Vicki Davis, Rich Kiker, Shelly Terrell, Mary Beth Hertz, Dean Shareski all of whom I found through Professor Jeffery Heil’s own network on Diigo. I choose to follow these particular individuals because they all have posted very interesting sites about education, learning, and technology. Through a Diigo community search I found several very helpful sites that gave me tips on how to further build up my personal learning network and I tagged them as PLN in my Diigo library:

• PLN: Your Personal Learning Network Made Easy which is an article on WordPress that gives an excellent description of what a PLN is and how useful they can be.
• 5 Things You Can Do To Begin Your Personal Learning Network a blog post from The Innovative Educator Blog Site. The post gave five simple easy to follow tips on building my PLN.
• Creating a Personal Learning Network with Web 2.0 Tools, a Google site that provides a wonderful plethora of PLN links to explore.

I also became a member of the Educator's PLN, which is a public networking site in which you can add your own content and view others. You can also participate in forums and online chats. The site is full of videos, articles, and discussions about education, learning, and teaching. One of the video’s I recently viewed and found enlightening was a video by Rick Wormeli entitled “How Much Should Homework Count?” I’ve given this topic a lot of thought recently and believe that often homework is just assigned as busy work and can be detrimental to a student’s academic achievement. This video confirms and elaborates on that opinion in a very articulate fashion. Wormeli suggests that homework should be referred to as “practice” because that is what it is. Practice of the content learned in class. He argues that because homework is practice, it should not be counted heavily against the student’s overall grade; because the grade should only reflect the level of student achievement in understanding the standards taught. He suggests that homework should count for 5% or less of the students overall grade. I found his argument to be very interesting and it has given me much to think about in terms of how much I should make homework worth in my own classroom.  

I look forward to continuing to grow my PLN and connecting with more educators around the world.