by Cristell Ramirez

For this blog post, I decided to watch a show from a different country. I love watching different shows and movies from different cultures because I always find them so much more interesting. I watched a show on Netflix called Million Yen Women. It is a Japanese show about this group of girls working together.

I love watching shows in Japanese so I loved watching this one. In the show, you can see how different the culture in Japan is from here in the United States. This show is about a struggling journalist who is struggling to write his book and he is living with five mysterious women. Each one of the girls has a different personality and each one has their own quirk.

The landscape there is completely different. I think this is because they live in the city and here in New Jersey, you are used to seeing more of a rural atmosphere. And the way it looks so different in Japan. Over there, yes you see cars but most often you see people walking from place to place since everything over there is closer.

It was an interesting show to watch. I like watching shows with subtitles no matter what show I am watching. There are options to watch the show in English being the voiceover and have the english subtitles. But I dont like listening to the show in English because I feel like the translation is not exact. Even though I do not know or even understand Japanese, I would much rather watch it with the english subtitles.

You can also see how the inside of homes are very different from the inside of homes here. They are more modern and they have more gadgets inside. Usually the weather was cloudy and sunny, but mostly from what I saw was cloudy most of the time unless it was night time. And they would again, walk or use a car to get places. They live in a complete different culture but I love learning more about it. They live a life which is different compared to how we live here.

As technology begins to grow in today’s world, we now have a lot more advancements that our advantage especially to use in global collaboration. A tool that can give students an idea of a place outside of their range would be Google Earth tours. Google Earth tours is a online tool that can be used in giving a virtual tour to see places on a map within minutes. It is very convenient in giving a idea of the outside world to your classroom. This tool gives the opportunity to work on student’s geography skills when it comes to find areas on the map. The tools allows people to get as close as street views on these virtual tours. I think it is of very beneficial to use when trying to get access and a accurate look to finding places especially while keeping students interested.

Thanks for reading! 🙂

by Cristell Ramirez

For this virtual field trip, I went to Tokyo, Japan. As long as I can remember, the idea of going to Tokyo to discover and explore has been in my mind. And ever since I watched Fast and Furious Tokyo Drift, watching the Shibuya crossing, I fell in love with it. So I took this little virtual field trip to Shibuya Crossing in Tokyo, Japan.

Shibuya Crossing is probably one of the busiest intersection in the world. It is always moving and there are always thousands of people moving on it. I would love to one day cross it because of how amazing it is to me. From using the tool where I can see a full 360 view of it. And you can see how there are people constantly walking back and forth on all of the walks. It is also called the Shibuya Scramble Crosswalk for how many people walk by and most likely, a lot of people get confused on where they are going.

Check it out here!: https://www.360cities.net/video/shibuyacrossing-8k360vr-mp4

In this week’s assignment we got the opportunity to explore an experiment of Paul Salopek’s 24,000 mile journey. Paul went to walk on this journey to experience the pathway that the first humans who had migrated out of Africa in the stone to the world that we know of today. While on this journey he discovered stories about things such as Climate Change to technical innovations and mass migration to cultural survival. He slowly began to find a better understanding of how we got to our new world of today.

With his journey on all these places I choose three places to explore, the first one I choose to “walk through” was Yusan, Yunnan China. Yusan means “umbrella” in mandrian which I found to be a cute fact to know about this place. Yusan is located in Yunnan Province in far southwest China. It is difficult to understand how long this place has been around but its believed to be around the Ming dynasty era because of how old the roads are. China is known for being crossroad of memory and Yusan happens to be apart of it as one of the bridges.

The next spot I choose was Pyla, Cyprus, Paul made a stop here on his 548th day of the voyage which was his 21st milestone. When I was exploring I noticed it’s dry desert-iness but it wasn’t fully deserted it still had some bits of life with the patchy grass. The dry chalky roads stood out to me because it wasn’t something that I had been used to seeing. Just for the looks of Cyprus you can only imagine how hot it is. I would most definitely go see it as it wold be a place out of my comfort zone.

On the last place that I explored was Qafzeh Cave, Israel, which happened to be apart of the holy lands part of Paul’s voyage. From the looks of Israel it is the opposite of Cyprus, it has the less of the dryness look to it. It gives a cool and calm feel to it which looks very peaceful making it seem a very fitting place of me to explore.

Thanks for Reading!

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As the year comes to a close, and with virtual learning still going strong, technology within the classroom is more prominent than ever. Kyle Byers writes about the top ed tech trends of the year and how they help in the classroom. You can check out his article here: https://explodingtopics.com/blog/edtech-trends

He writes about different trends on the rise such as VR and online homeschooling. He even mentions how e-learning has become prominent in colleges as they offer online programs as well.

Now with students online, these trends have become more accessible to students around the world. They can participate in school from home with the use of zoom and other video chat mediums, elevating these levels of e-learning.

Using VR in the classroom is also on the rise, especially with STEM classes being adapted into curriculum. Byers even mentions how VR can help students with disabilities by giving them scenarios that they will experience in the real world.

Read more about it here:

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-autism/how-vr-helps-kids-with-autism-make-sense-of-real-world-idUSKBN1ZL1JS

The Out Of Eden Walk is a truly eye-opening experience. Being able to see someone capture so much land and routes of the original humans just seem so bizarre but so simple at the same time. The first point that I chose was the Afar Badlands. The author is able to recreate the scenery with descriptive words that help the reader get a good understanding of where he is. It is said that there is no camel food, making us believe that it is just pure desert and not much else other than the rocky terrain that they are walking through.

The next point I chose was the arrival at Djibouti. The author mentions that the sanitation situation is difficult because he says that they had to wash themselves at a camel watering station. This is helping us see the determination that the author has to pursue this research. He mentions that the sound of the US fighter jets above them breaks the sound barrier and is incredibly loud, showing the lack of respect that the US has for ancient grounds that are significant to the origin of humanity. But nonetheless, the vivid imagery depicted by the author is once again as beautiful as the last, describing the shore and valley that is forming as Arabia drifts away at the slow rate of 16 millimeters a year.

The final place I chose was the crossing of the Red Sea. This section is incredibly different from the last in the sense that rather than writing a description of what he sees, he used a poem to describe his sea journey. The poem goes into detail about how the motion of the ocean is unpredictable and how we are so minute on a grander scale, using clever wording. It seems almost as though he used a poem for a deeper meaning, one that seemingly looks simple but is incredibly intricate as you break it down. Just how we view the ocean.

After going through the We teachers resources on the WE wesbite: https://weschools.we.org/we-teachers , I found a lot of interesting content that can be applied to the classroom. The first module I wanted to look at was the Mental Well-Being module.

As I am doing observations in a middle school, it has come to the attention of all of the teachers on my team that both the students and teachers need to address mental health more. Teachers are experiencing some pretty bad burnout, and the students are struggling more than ever. They are also at an age where they are going through so many changes, and not having social interaction in school for about a year beforehand has greatly affected them. I thought going through this module would be beneficial to aide the situation in the classroom.

I really liked the way this module was set up into the different sections. It made navigating it much easier. I also really liked how they had a very in depth section on the mental health for teachers. Addressing such an issue brings light to the fact that teachers are struggling. And if teachers are struggling, they are not putting their best work forward for the students, causing a chain reaction

I highly suggest looking at this module:

https://a.storyblok.com/f/64423/x/fa4cc4c5b3/we-teachers-module_mental-well-being_2021.pdf

In 2019, Parasite became the first non-English movie to win the Academy Award for best picture. This was always a movie I have enjoyed so I was eager to watch it again as I have not seen it in quite some time. I watched on Hulu: https://www.hulu.com/movie/parasite-2fd691a0-f66b-467f-8635-00d7f151f3d4.

I didn’t notice any huge differences that stuck out in setting. It felt as if there was no difference than any other major city. The weather was consistently grey, and even had a storm take place. I feel as though that helped drive the plot and set the tone. At first, the characters struck me as not much different than anyone else, but as the plot continued, I found out I was wildly incorrect. The plot takes a very interesting turn as different character conflicts are revealed.

Some cultural differences I noticed at first were the food and the money. Obviously, when taking place in a different country, that country’s form of currency is going to be used. The food and brands used are typical of Korean culture: rice, kimchi, etc.

There were also some similarities as well. The movie portrays different social classes and how they interact with each other. The upper class family seems no different than any other upper class family. They hire people to help around the house and help the family. The lower class family also comes across as a typical lower class family: minimum wage jobs, trying to make ends meet, etc. If it weren’t for the dramatic plot with its twists and turns, I’d say this movie is very similar to that of other cultures.

Some of the courses I visited that I hope to incorporate into my future classroom are rather heavy topics. I hope to include some form of mental health wellbeing check-up on my students. I want them to think of me as someone to talk to and open up, so they know they are in a safe, loving environment. I wouldn’t want any of my students going through something difficult or that takes their minds off of learning. I would also want to include a strict anti-bullying policy. As seen on WE.org, there are multiple courses that offer some form of learning on anti-bullying. This is important to me because it would take away from the loving, trusting environment I want to build.

The use of virtual reality, or VR, in classrooms has become more and more common. It gives students the opportunity to broaden their experiences and look at the world around them through a different lens other than images online.

Google Cardboard is a fantastic option to use in the classroom. Viewers are decently priced, and you can find ones that hook up to any device in the classroom.

By downloading the Google Cardboard app, you can access Google Earth to take your students on trips around the world! A fun idea for a literature classroom is to have your students participate in a Google Lit Trip. Take your students to significant places in their stories. It’ll help them imagine that they are in the story themselves.

Be sure to check out this link for more ideas on incorporating Google Earth and VR in the classroom: