Blog #4

I liked the tree map to use in my classroom. I think it will be useful in elementary school for showing the hierarchy of things we may be studying. It is a good visual way to break things down so the students can see how they relate to each proceeding topic. I would use either Microsoft Word to accomplish this, or even an old fashioned chalk board or white board if I wanted to keep things simple. I also liked the concept map to show how many things can relate to one central topic. Both of these ideas are good to use with elementary aged kids, more likely in 3rd grade, to visually show them how things relate and give them a new technique to remember information.
I would definitely encourage my students to establish outlining, idea mapping and story boarding skills because they are useful ways to help you break down large chunks of information. It is especially useful for kids who are just beginning to learn by reading pages of information to then learn what to do with everything they just read. Eventually I think once the students have learned how to process pages of text and know what to take notes on or highlight, outlining may not be necessary but that takes a long time to perfect. I also think it is a good way to make sure students have actually read the information.
I have used some of the search tools we learned last week when I have been looking things up on Google. When looking for something and not wanting a certain word to come up, I remembered to use the dash before a word. All of the search tools will be useful because they will save me time going through useless website and helping me narrow down my search to things I can actually use.