Graphics Tablet

Peripherals can enhance computers and computer uses in many ways, personal use as well as for in the classroom. The peripherals or set of peripherals (probeware, QX5 Microscope, MIDI keyboard, graphics tablet) were shown in ED 429. I found all of these to be very interesting. The one that I found most interesting was the graphics tablet. Mostly because I have very limited artistic abilities. My children however, take after their grandmother who is a well known artist in the Southwest and Australia (of all places). I also chose this peripheral because my girl scout troop was creating a book for Thinking Day. The book was a three month long project with stories submitted by eight different troops and distributed to 140 girls in the Fairbanks community. We 'played' with the tablet and created a cover page for our book using the graphics tablet. My oldest daughter now wants one.
As a future teacher, one of our greatest challenges is teaching literacy. I was curious as to what could be done using this technology to entice or enhance literacy with my girl scout troop. What I found was that it worked well as a way to get them to read the stories submitted and then have them create a picture to go along with the story. I think this would work well in a larger group. Creating classroom books is a very powerful way to help students see themselves as readers and writers.
I really enjoyed the other peripherals discussed in class as well. I wish I had a few thousand dollars to buy a bunch of these things to enhance my classrooms. Not to worry, I'll eventually build that collection!