Post #9

While my group and I were working on our final project, we stumbled upon a free family tree web site. We had decided to base our final project on an assignment where our students would make their very own family tree using technology. We found a couple of resources for making a family tree that were similar to Inspiration, but we also found a family tree on http://www.familytree.com/. I really liked the idea that we came up with, especially because I want to be a history teacher, so this is something that I would like to use in the future.

The website has many resources for looking up one’s family history. There is a link to a free trial for ancestry.com (which is usually pretty pricy). The site also has a link to look up one’s coat of arms and surname history. Best of all, the website offers a number of different links and resources to other sites that have great tools for making a family tree. There is no subscription fee, and you don’t need a user name to access it, which makes the site very user-friendly.

Although it might sound a little boring, I would really like to learn how to make a grade book on excel. I am usually the kind of person who likes to use pencil-and-paper, but using excel will make everything easier for me. For one, I can easily average out the grades without having to do it manually. In addition, I can access a student’s grades on specific assignments, and even print out their own page for them to track their progress in the class. I would like to learn how to use a template, though, because I am not too thrilled about having to make my own grade book from scratch.

I was hoping that I would be able to reach this goal in this class (and if the class went over it, it was probably the day I was sick), but I will hopefully gain exposure to this somewhere down the line with my teacher education. If not, I am sure I can ask a teacher in whatever school I work to help me figure it out. I know that electronic grade books were already becoming popular when I was in high school, so it will surely be common practice by the time I become a teacher.