Hola Peeps! Thanks for logging in.
So sticking with the subject of medical technology, I thought I would get a little personal this week. This past year was a tough one in the Lanham household, as we were visited by the big C word. Cancer. Scary just to look at isn't it? Kinda makes my skin crawl just seeing it sitting there.
Anyway, Mr. L (who I lovingly refer to as Better Half) was diagnosed with prostate cancer last year. On the very first day of summer vacation he had a radical robotic prostatectomy. That's right, ROBOTIC. Oh the technology implications . . . His surgeon actually sat ACROSS THE ROOM as he operated on Mr. L! Just like a video game. He has these goggles he looks into and he moves his thumbs and across the room the robotic arms that were INSIDE MY HUSBAND proceeded to do all the things that surgeons used to do the old way. Except when he was done, Mr. L only had 5 small incisions instead of one great big huge one. MUCH faster recovery time.
So go take a look at the pictures of the robot. Also, take a look at the article about Catherine Mohr (girl power!), who is one of the designers of the Da Vinci system.
Please read Tuesday. Please blog Thursday. You may give an opinion about the use of the robot. You may reference another article about the robot (please leave me a link). You may give me an opinion about Catherine Mohr.
Please remember: you must advance the discussion in some manner to get credit. "That's cool" or "I like that" is not advancing the discussion. Not now, not in May at the end of the year. You must TELL ME WHY!
You may also reply to someone else's post.
http://tinyurl.com/2mhxoh
http://singularityhub.com/2009/07/27/catherine-mohr-promises-more-robotic-surgery/
Talk to me . . .
Monday, September 27, 2010
Monday, September 20, 2010
Blog 3 - 9/20/10
Howdy Folks! Thanks for logging in!
Continuing our discussion of advancing medical technology, I want to take a look at this inventor named Dean Kamen. He was approached by the Department of Defense and asked to make a prosthetic arm that would more closely mimic the movements of a real arm with real fingers on the end of it.
To that end, he invented this arm which he named the Luke Arm (as in Skywalker). I want to watch a short video about Kamen from the TED conference, and then I want you to go read about the arm.
http://spectrum.ieee.org/biomedical/bionics/dean-kamens-luke-arm-prosthesis-readies-for-clinical-trials
Please spend Tuesday reading so that we can be prepared to blog on Thursday.
In order to receive credit for this weeks blog you may do one of two things:
1) Talk about where you can see this technology going. How can we benefit from this type of technology in the future?
2) Find other articles on either Dean Kamen or the Luke arm and tell us what those articles said. When you use resources that I don't send you to, you have to give me the link to YOUR article. Also? Once an article has been quoted 5 times it can't be used again.
Talk to me . . .
Continuing our discussion of advancing medical technology, I want to take a look at this inventor named Dean Kamen. He was approached by the Department of Defense and asked to make a prosthetic arm that would more closely mimic the movements of a real arm with real fingers on the end of it.
To that end, he invented this arm which he named the Luke Arm (as in Skywalker). I want to watch a short video about Kamen from the TED conference, and then I want you to go read about the arm.
http://spectrum.ieee.org/biomedical/bionics/dean-kamens-luke-arm-prosthesis-readies-for-clinical-trials
Please spend Tuesday reading so that we can be prepared to blog on Thursday.
In order to receive credit for this weeks blog you may do one of two things:
1) Talk about where you can see this technology going. How can we benefit from this type of technology in the future?
2) Find other articles on either Dean Kamen or the Luke arm and tell us what those articles said. When you use resources that I don't send you to, you have to give me the link to YOUR article. Also? Once an article has been quoted 5 times it can't be used again.
Talk to me . . .
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Blog 2 - 9/12/10
Hola Peeps! Thanks for coming back . . .
So I want to jump off into some pretty deep medical technology. There's a fantastic Readers Digest article about some of the newest medical advancements. Please follow this link to view the article. Please don't stop at page 1 . . . there are 5 pages.
http://www.rd.com/living-healthy/new-medical-technology-lifesaving-and-life-enhancing/article34117.html
I want you to read on Tuesday. I want you to let it work on you a couple of days and come back and post on Thursday. I want you to choose at least one of these medical advancements and give an opinion on it. How can it benefit you or someone you love? How can you see it advancing? Alternatively, you may discuss / debate someone elses opinion that's already been given.
As always, you must advance the discussion to get credit. A "yes" or "no" or "I don't care" will earn you a zero.
So I want to jump off into some pretty deep medical technology. There's a fantastic Readers Digest article about some of the newest medical advancements. Please follow this link to view the article. Please don't stop at page 1 . . . there are 5 pages.
http://www.rd.com/living-healthy/new-medical-technology-lifesaving-and-life-enhancing/article34117.html
I want you to read on Tuesday. I want you to let it work on you a couple of days and come back and post on Thursday. I want you to choose at least one of these medical advancements and give an opinion on it. How can it benefit you or someone you love? How can you see it advancing? Alternatively, you may discuss / debate someone elses opinion that's already been given.
As always, you must advance the discussion to get credit. A "yes" or "no" or "I don't care" will earn you a zero.
Here are MY opinions:
A) Ewwwwwwwa for using spider silk to repair broken bones. I mean, it's cool and all. But I absolutely ABHORE spiders and anything arachnid related.
B) Yay for fighting asthma in new ways. I developed asthma earlier this year (!) and it's a pain in the rear end to deal with.
C) Microchip for Meds skeers me. To think that I will need a reliable wireless signal for the microchip to transmit my meds to me? Pffffft. I can't even get a wireless signal reliable enough to play Words with Friends!
D) Using a scorpions sting to cure aggressive brain tumors? Well, at least those little buggers would have SOME actual use on this earth!
So what do you think? Talk to me . . .
Monday, September 6, 2010
Blog 1 - 9/6/2010
Hola Peeps! Thanks for logging in.
Let me 'splain how this will work:
Every Monday morning I will post a discussion question relevant to technology. You will have the entire week to post a short blog answering the question. It's very simple . . . you either advance the discussion or you don't. It's either a 100 or a 0. You can also respond to a thought posted by another user to advance the discussion. Every Sunday evening I will check off names. So you have from Monday AM to Sunday PM. Grading closes at 6pm Sunday. The first ten minutes of class on Tuesday will be devoted to reading the blog, and the first ten minutes of class Thursday will be devoted to answering the blog question.
Here are the things that this discussion is NOT:
This is not a social forum. All you guys have MySpace / Facebook / Twitter for that stuff. Holla at your friends on those sites.
This is not a place for you to ask me questions about your grade. Please remember that EVERYBODY will see all of your communication on this site. If you have questions about grading policies, etc. please see me before or after school, before class or on my conference period (6th). Barring that, please email me at rlanham@nacogdoches.k12.tx.us.
This is not a place for you to air grievances of any kind. Bad language, derogatory comments and intolerance of any kind will not be accepted. These will result in blocked usage for you, and zeros on weekly discussions for the remainder of the year.
What this discussion IS:
This is a place for us to explore how technology is affecting our daily lives. You guys are digital natives (meaning you were practically born with a cell phone in your hand) and you are not accustomed to thinking about life before this technology came along. I would also bet that most of you haven't given a lot of thought to where this technology is going either. Well, that's what I want to do here.
One more thing:
To the best of my knowledge we are still the only classroom in the district to use blogging as part of the classroom learning. Occasionally our Principal, Superintendent, and others from the district will be blogging with us. All eyes will be watching as this district prepares to incorporate more technology into everyday learning. Please keep that in mind. Let's have fun, but please be responsible.
Here's what you need to do now:
Make sure you are logged in and hit the "comment" section. Post a comment to me. By posting this first time you are agreeing to:
1. ALWAYS read my words. You should never just log in and click links. Doing that will cause you to miss the questions that I want addressed.
2. Leave your display name as I have it set. I have 92 students right now. I have no intention of figuring out nicknames every week.
3. Comment in the correct section for the week.
4. Understand that you get one (1) makeup blog for the YEAR. Because this blog is available 24/7/365 from any computer in the world, I don't allow more than one makeup. Go home and bookmark it. Go to the library and bookmark it. Always remember that if you're absent on Thursday when we comment, you'll need to get it taken care of before Sunday at 6pm.
OK, questions? Talk to me . . .
Let me 'splain how this will work:
Every Monday morning I will post a discussion question relevant to technology. You will have the entire week to post a short blog answering the question. It's very simple . . . you either advance the discussion or you don't. It's either a 100 or a 0. You can also respond to a thought posted by another user to advance the discussion. Every Sunday evening I will check off names. So you have from Monday AM to Sunday PM. Grading closes at 6pm Sunday. The first ten minutes of class on Tuesday will be devoted to reading the blog, and the first ten minutes of class Thursday will be devoted to answering the blog question.
Here are the things that this discussion is NOT:
This is not a social forum. All you guys have MySpace / Facebook / Twitter for that stuff. Holla at your friends on those sites.
This is not a place for you to ask me questions about your grade. Please remember that EVERYBODY will see all of your communication on this site. If you have questions about grading policies, etc. please see me before or after school, before class or on my conference period (6th). Barring that, please email me at rlanham@nacogdoches.k12.tx.us.
This is not a place for you to air grievances of any kind. Bad language, derogatory comments and intolerance of any kind will not be accepted. These will result in blocked usage for you, and zeros on weekly discussions for the remainder of the year.
What this discussion IS:
This is a place for us to explore how technology is affecting our daily lives. You guys are digital natives (meaning you were practically born with a cell phone in your hand) and you are not accustomed to thinking about life before this technology came along. I would also bet that most of you haven't given a lot of thought to where this technology is going either. Well, that's what I want to do here.
One more thing:
To the best of my knowledge we are still the only classroom in the district to use blogging as part of the classroom learning. Occasionally our Principal, Superintendent, and others from the district will be blogging with us. All eyes will be watching as this district prepares to incorporate more technology into everyday learning. Please keep that in mind. Let's have fun, but please be responsible.
Here's what you need to do now:
Make sure you are logged in and hit the "comment" section. Post a comment to me. By posting this first time you are agreeing to:
1. ALWAYS read my words. You should never just log in and click links. Doing that will cause you to miss the questions that I want addressed.
2. Leave your display name as I have it set. I have 92 students right now. I have no intention of figuring out nicknames every week.
3. Comment in the correct section for the week.
4. Understand that you get one (1) makeup blog for the YEAR. Because this blog is available 24/7/365 from any computer in the world, I don't allow more than one makeup. Go home and bookmark it. Go to the library and bookmark it. Always remember that if you're absent on Thursday when we comment, you'll need to get it taken care of before Sunday at 6pm.
OK, questions? Talk to me . . .
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