juliannrosizky

Current Mood: bouncy

In reading the first chapter (chapter 8- Designing with Technology), I found the topic “Drawing Design Ideas With Computer-Aided Design Software) to catch my eye immediately.  A bunch of questions and concerns entered my mind as I was reading through it.  Firstly, the CAD program does sound very useful; however at what age should you introduce this program to children.  I am not familiar with this program; therefore I do not know how elementary or primary this program is.  I find that in a lot of my readings, I am learning something each week, however I am always asking the same question…and that question is always relating to the age of a child.  I, however, do believe this program can assist children in graphing and organizing their work, in order for teachers and other children to read it.  But, I do not think it should be used on a daily bases.  Part of learning, for children, is doing things by hand.  Even though the children are designing this “on the computer”, children (especially at a younger age), may need work on their penmanship.  I find that using this program may be an easy way out for many people.  For example, a quote that really struck out to me was “All this is done using a pen that never runs out of ink, drawing lines that never waver, and writing text in the perfectly readable script that only those who put many years at the drafting table every master” (p. 172).  We as educators should be promoting children’s writing on a daily bases.  We do not expect perfection, as there is always room for improvement.  A child who “draws lines that waver”, can fix that with a use of a ruler, and for a child who’s “pen/pencil that runs out”, can always get another one. 

This program however is a good idea for students, as it could help them organize their ideas in a way that they are not always erasing and going back to draw on top of.  It seems as through it is an easier way of producing and working through a “long term” project in which they can save, and keep going back to over time. It as well has a lot of fun and interesting things in which students and adults can have fun exploring with.

            While reading chapter 9, it brought me back to my High school years when it was talking about graphic calculators.  I believe that technology is incorporated in math in the way we use calculators.  For some simple equations, I believe that students should use pen and paper for, as we are slowly relying more and more on calculators, however, the graphing calculators provides linear lines, symbolic representation, numerical representation, etc.  Students who are graphing and entering a lot of data, graphing calculators are en excellent way of providing a graph, in which students probably would not figure out using pen and paper.

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