Final Blog Reflection

In reflection of my GAME plan throughout this course, I feel that I am making progress on my goals.  I have created several lessons that integrate technology within content areas and enrich student learning.  I have also used our learning communities wiki to collaborate with colleagues within this course to build and expand on teaching ideas.  I have also collaborated with colleagues within this course through the discussion boards to develop further technology possibilities and further my professional development.  

At this time I do not feel that I need to revise my GAME plan.  I would like to continue to explore more possibilities for technology use for my students and myself to enhance teaching and learning.  I would also like to continue to find professional learning communities to broaden my technology experiences and teaching practices.  

I would like to use the GAME plan process with my students.  I think I would start by sharing my own GAME plan as a teacher.  Then I would introduce the concept to them.  They could set their own goals, actions, and I would assist them in monitoring and evaluating. 

In regards to technology integration for elementary content, I feel excited to try the new tools from this course as well as continue to explore new ideas and tools.  I have little experience with problem-based learning.  In fact I was a bit intimidated by it for young students.  Now I see the many applications problem-based learning provides and the countless benefits it provides for student learning.  Dr. Peggy Ertmer tells us that problem-based learning promotes students’ development as self-directed learners, promotes teamwork, teaches students to apply various skills to solve problems, can be applied across the curriculum, can cover more content, is more meaningful to students, and encourages a deeper understanding of content. (Laureate Education Inc., 2011) 

I am especially excited to attempt using social networking, online collaboration, and digital storytelling.  I have never used any of these in my classroom before.  These tools will be a wonderful resource to grasp student interest, participation, and differentiate instruction.  I want to use a blog for students to brainstorm ideas for writing a story.  I would like to use a wiki for small groups to create book reviews including interactive quizzes and comment sections.  I would love to use digital storytelling to promote reading fluency, how-to stories for building simple machines or an electrical circuit in science, and an “all about me” digital story to introduce each student at the beginning of the school year.  Our students are living in a world of changing technology.  It is vital to teach self-directed learning skills through technology so they are able to continue to adapt their life-long learning.        

References:

Laureate Education, Inc. (Spotlight on technology: problem-based learning, part 1.). (2011). Integrating technology across the content areas. Baltimore: Ertmer P.

Monitoring Your GAME Plan Progress

As I continue on this journey to explore and work toward my GAME plan I am discovering new information and resources that I believe will be valuable in the classroom.  This week was the last week of school for students at my school this week.  As I think back on this year, and toward my first goal, I try to think of lessons that would be enriched by using technology. 

A technology tool I discovered at our district in-service on Friday is a website called quizlet.com.  The basic membership is free.  This site is all flashcards.  You can create your own set of flashcards as well as use sets that others created.  The thing I like best about these flashcards is that students can use them in a variety of ways.  They can use them like traditional flashcards, they can scatter and match them, or they can select multiple-choice answers.  Once students have studied the flashcards, I can use the multiple-choice quiz to run a wireless responded with to give a summative quiz.  I think this site is a fabulous way to learn or practice story vocabulary, math terms, multiplication facts, science and social studies vocabulary, parts of a plant, and the list could go on.  I am really excited to begin using quizlet.com next year.     

Another resource that I would like to look into is the handheld computer to perform running reading records with students that was mentioned in our text this week.  I have done the paper version of this assessment, but this version seems less time consuming and easier to collect progressive data. “Running records of an entire classroom of students can be completed in less than a class period, and data from these records can then be aggregated and reported almost instantaneously- something that takes much longer to accomplish by hand.” (Cennamo, Ross, Ertmer 2009, p. 147)

My school district has implemented the use of “Thinking Maps.”  These are graphic organizers.  I would love to see these in computer software.  My students would benefit from being able to use digital pictures from the Internet on their graphic organizers as well as being able to save them, share them, and compare them.  Thinking Maps could also be a great formative and summative assessment tool for me.   

As an educator, I am continuously learning new strategies and ideas to use in my classroom.  My second goal is something I feel is vital to being an effective teacher.  I will always need and use professional development.  This course and colleagues in this course are providing me with new information each week.   I feel that I still need to branch out to search for online educational blogs and communities online.  I have not done this yet.  Has anyone found beneficial educational communities online that they enjoy? 

I believe I am headed in the right direction with my action toward my GAME plan.  I do not feel that it needs to be modified at this time.  I will continue to reflect upon lessons that will become enriched from technology for my students.  Does anyone have other suggestions on technology that works well at the elementary level?  I will also continue to look for more outlets for professional development.      

References

Cennamo, K., Ross, J. & Ertmer, P. (2009). Technology integration for meaningful classroom use: A standards-based approach. (Laureate Education, Inc., Custom ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.

  

Carrying Out My GAME Plan

As I reflect upon my GAME plan, I know I will need to rely on various resources to carry out my plan.  My current masters course, including my readings and videos, are a resource I am already using to begin my journey.  I also plan to use the Internet to search for information and resources.  Lastly, I will look to colleagues to support me and teach me ways to reach my goals.  My school district also has a technology educator that visits our school once a week.  This person will be a great contact for me to gain further knowledge and tools.  I realize that as I progress in my GAME plan I may find that I need or desire the use of other resources.  Flexibility plays an important role in learning and teaching.

Both my goals are pretty broad.  My first goal is to design my current lessons to include technology tools for students to explore.  For this goal, I feel I need more information on the technology tools that are available within my school district as well as the rest of the United States and World.  I also feel that I need more information on the types of technologies that are being used successfully in school settings and real life settings for learning and living.  Incorporating these digital technologies will allow me to reach the different needs of my students, or to “customize” their learning path. (Laureate, 200)  I will look to my colleagues, district technology educator, and the Internet to assist me in finding this information and resources.  By using technology in my lessons with my students I am able to apply all learning styles.     

My second goal is to continue to seek out professional development opportunities through technology.  The information I need for this goal involves local, as well as global training opportunities.  I will need to research classes that might be offered locally that are technology based.  I will also continue taking masters classes through Walden University online.  Both of these options will begin my professional development using technology journey.     

So far I have set my GAME plan in motion by reading my course text and watching course videos to build my professional development.  This week is the last week of school for my district.  We have an in-service day for teachers this coming Friday.  This district in-service training has a technology focus for all of the break out sessions.  I hope to acquire more information for my teaching as well as better practices for student learning using technology.   

References

Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2010). Program: Meeting Students’ Needs With Technology [Webcast]. Integrating Technology Across the Content Areas. Baltimore: Author.

   

  

Developing Your Personal GAME Plan

After reviewing the National Educational Technology Standards for Students (NETS-S) I have selected two performance indicators that I would like to improve upon in my teaching using the GAME plan.  The first indicator I would like to work on is 2b.  This indicator states that, “teachers develop technology-enriched learning environments that enable all students to pursue their individual curiosities and become active participants in setting their own educational goals, managing their own learning, and assessing their own progress.”  The second performance indicator I would like to improve upon is 5a.  This indicator states “teachers participate in local and global learning communities to explore creative applications of technology to improve student learning.” (International Society for Technology in education. 2008).

Goals:

2b – My goal is to design my current lessons to include technology tools for students to explore.

5a- My goal is to continue to seek out professional development opportunities through technology.

Actions:

2b- I plan to reflect upon my current lessons to determine which lessons can be enriched by using technology tools.  I also plan to practice using technology tools myself to discover new software and websites that I can expose my students to.

5a- Professional development is crucial to continuing growth as a teacher.  This goal is hard for me in finding local and global learning communities.  I plan to seek out educational blogs and am open to finding other sources that will expand my knowledge and student learning. 

Monitoring:

2b- I will monitor the use of technology in my lessons to determine if they are relevant and beneficial to my students.  Are they becoming self-directed learners because of this process?  If not, I will search for other technology tools that will provide a technology-enriched learning environment. 

5a- I will determine which local and global communities provide the best teaching and learning practices.  I will mainstream which communities I benefit from the most and continue to search for other communities that will improve my teaching and student learning.

Evaluating:

2b- I will evaluate my students learning at the end of each lesson.  Did the incorporated technology truly enrich their learning environment?  Did the technology encourage self-directed learning?

5a- I will evaluate my level of participation within the local and global communities.  Did I participate enough to benefit professionally?  Are the communities I participate with providing me growth as a teacher as well as improving student learning in my classroom?  Am I continuing to search for additional communities for professional growth?

References

International Society for Technology in Education. (2008). National education standards for teachers (NETS-T). Retrieved from http://www.iste.org/Libraries/PDFs/NETS_for_Teachers_2008_EN.sflb.ashx

EDUC-6712-Reflection

In reflection of this course, I have gained valuable insight and inspiration for teaching in my classroom.  One of the biggest insights I found is to teach new literacies to my students, yet keep the traditional literacies.  Eagleton and Dolber state, “We view Web literacies as an extension of our traditional view of literacy, incorporating the technologies that so strongly influence the ways we access information.” (Eagleton, M. & Dolber, E. 2007, p. 29)  Students at the elementary level still need the foundation in literacy that traditional literacy provides.  The same students also need to build on this literacy through learning new literacies strategies of questioning, searching, evaluating, synthesizing, and communicating, as well.  The two literacies truly go hand in hand to create strong lifelong literacy learners.   I am aware that teaching these new literacies strategies requires me to be aware of the technology skills I need and need to teach my students.  For example, I need to be able to teach how to effectively search for information.  I need to be able to show my students how to evaluate the reliability of a website.  I may use Beth Phillips’ ABC’s of evaluating a website, including A, for finding the author, B for determining if the website is bias, C for ensuring the content on the site is broad in scope, D for date of copyright, and E for editor, making sure there is someone checking the facts and information.  (Laureate Education, 2010)  I also need to make students aware of responsible Internet usage including citing their sources. 

This newly gained knowledge makes me realize the need to incorporate new ways of teaching.  One way to teach the new literacy strategies to my students effectively is through inquiry-based learning.  I have not used this method in the past.  I believe inquiry-based learning makes a strong impact on student learning since it requires students to think outside the box.  It also allows students to go in a different direction than they may have gone if they had set parameters.  Students are more likely to retain this information through this method. 

There are many goals I could set for myself after taking this course.  The first goal I would like to engage in is to start creating the bridge between the traditional literacies of books to the new literacy strategies including technology.  I know this is a rather big and broad goal, but one that is very important in schools today.  I will start small by encouraging questions at the beginning of units.  I will model good questioning and allow students time to ask high level questioning.  I will continue on by modeling for students how to effectively search for information using books and Internet sources.  Again, I would provide ample time for students to explore and discover researching.  Next I would teach my students the ABC’s of evaluating a website. (Laureate Education, 2010)  I would do lots of modeling of this within the classroom, and allow student ample amounts of time to try it in the computer lab as I conference with them to make sure they understand the skill.  These first three steps will take many lessons to teach and re-teach.  I want to start with these and move onto synthesizing and communicating when they are ready.  I think it is important for me to model and allow exploration all of these strategies as many times as necessary for my students to have the best understanding possible. 

   

References

Eagleton, M. B., & Dobler, E. (2007). Reading the Web: Strategies for Internet

nquiry. New York: The Guilford Press.

Laureate Education, Inc. (Producer). (2010). “A Teachers Perspective”.[Motion picture].

Supporting information literacy and online learning in the classroom.. Baltimore: Author

Week 8 - Reflection EDUC-6711I-3 Bridging Learning Theory, Instruction, and Technology

       In my original “Personal Theory of Learning” from the beginning of this course, I state that one of my responsibilities to my students is to provide experiences that promote higher-level learning.  After taking this course, I still believe this is my obligation, but I am more aware of new learning theories and learning strategies to achieve this goal.  I continue to believe that all students can and will learn.  My learning theory is that all students have the ability to learn in their own person way.  My instructional theory is that as the teacher, I must provide a variety of instructional experiences for my students.  I want to shift my focus from a primarily teacher centered instructional practice, to a more student centered practice.  During much of my career as a teacher thus far I have always reflected on Howard Gardner’s multiple intelligences to influence my teaching style.  I strongly believe that we are all different as teachers and students; that it is important to teach in a variety of styles to reach all of my students.     

            In the past few years I have made a shift in my teaching.  I have begun using more cooperative learning strategies with my students.  After taking this course, I realize the true importance of cooperative learning strategies and will have a stronger focus to incorporate them in my everyday teaching.  I am a technology native and realize the impact of technology in learning.  I currently use a document camera, projector, computer programs such as Photo Booth and Power Point, and take my students to the computer lab every week to play educational games on the Internet.  This year, I intend to use VoiceThreads as a new technology tool for teaching this year in the computer lab.  I am excited to explore its many uses with third grade students.  One project I want to assign to my students will be working in small cooperative groups to create a VoiceThread on simple machines.  I believe this assignment supports social learning theory and constructivist learning theory.  Students will build and learn through social interaction to create an end artifact to share with the other peers in the class.  Another technology tool I would like to incorporate immediately are virtual field trips.  This tool is a wonderful resource for my students in Alaska.  We are have many unique opportunities in our state, but are also limited in many other ways.   Virtual field trips open the door to another world that some students may never experience in any other way.  As I think about virtual field trips, I think it would be interesting to allow students to research virtual field trips that align with our curriculum to present or share with the rest of the class.  This type of lesson connects with cognitive learning theory in the fact that students are creating experiences and visual representations in their learning to link to their long-term memory.   

            My first long term goal change I would like to make for this school year and following school years is to have students work in cooperative groups to create a VoiceThread.  I have never used VoiceThread technology until recently and believe it is a strong tool for deepening student understanding and learning.  I plan to model how to use and create a VoiceThread for my students.  We will use our class computer lab time each week when we are working on a specific assignment such as the simple machines project I mentioned earlier.  My goal is to use VoiceThread for at least two separate lessons throughout this school year and to increase this by one additional project each school year for a few years.  I hope my students learn lots from me, but that I also learn a great deal from them as we proceed through the experience of creating. 

            A second long-term goal change I would like to achieve is using epals tool for online pen pals or something similar to communicate with students in other communities around the country.  In third grade my students study Canada and Mexico.  My goal is to start by having one epal account that I monitor as the teacher.  My students will have access to this account to interact with the students in the other communities.  I want them to learn first hand about their environments and cultures.  As time goes on, I would want students to have their own accounts that can be monitored by the teacher.  This would provide more interaction for each student. 

            Overall, I have learned many new theories and learning strategies in this course.  I feel that my biggest shift is my focus from mainly teacher centered teaching to one of student centered learning.  I think the theories and strategies presented in this course support this focus and will aide me in becoming a better teacher.     

    

Voice Thread Idea for First Grade Writing

Here is a link to a voice thread I created:  http://voicethread.com/share/1260377/

Please feel free to leave comments for improvement and other ideas.

Thanks!