Week 8 Reflections and Ruminations

Throughout this course, I learned more about being a student. Many of the things that I require from my students I was faced with during the past eight weeks. With my tumultuous personal life interfering with my learning process. I wish that I had been able to explore each of the things we learned more in depth. Creating a unit plan with a problem-based learning lesson, a collaborative lesson, as well as a digital story was incredibly insightful. Each lesson grew and developed as my understanding of each was finally realized. It was not until I was creating my digital storytelling lesson plan that I could visualize exactly how this unit would flow, and how each part builds upon the previous lesson.

In regards to my GAME plan, I was not as successful. I had set high expectations for my students and myself. During this course, my class had access to the computers six times. During those periods, we discussed digital etiquette and how to respond respectfully online. We accessed Kerpoof.com to create, share, and discuss different items. It was just an introduction to a much bigger lesson. We spent the majority of the time with the laptops working on our keyboarding skills; I realized after speaking with other teachers that because of the requirements later in school my students were not as prepared as possible. I had to spend time having students learn and have a basic understanding of keyboarding skills. They are becoming much more comfortable with a keyboard and where to find each letter, it may not be perfect, but they are still learning proper techniques.

I have been introduced to many different professional learning communities online. I have begun following different educators on Twitter, following different blogs, and accessing websites that will help me to grow and learn as a professional educator. This has been the most valuable for me. I enjoy observing other educators with their successes and failures in our profession to find things that may work or things to avoid in my classroom.

I look forward to continuing to develop my GAME plan and identify more realistic goals for a short-term project, as well as identify a long term GAME plan for the rest of this school year and to prepare for next year. For the time being, I have many new technology tools to use within my classroom. One thing that I am very excited to begin using with the new quarter is www.kidblogs.com. I am looking forward to having students write blogs as a means to respond to their reading, as well as to discuss their own learning processes. Thank you for following along as I try to make sense of an overwhelming amount of information and resources!

Educational Technology.....Goals.....Future....

In looking back to the last few months in my master's program I have found many interesting things.  The latest course has really helped me to try new things, and to allow others to help show me new things also.  I may know alot of things about the latest technologies, but there is still lots to learn!  To increase student acievement with technology I am going to utilize the 21st century skills within the classroom.  By having projects that students have to collaborate on, and work together on, students will gain more experience and knowledge of the skills necessary for the future work environment.  Even if we are not using technology, I can still prepare my students for the skills and attitudes necessary for the future.  I am laying the ground work for future teachers to add in the other components that students will need.

One goal I am looking to accomplish in the next couple of years is to have mp3 players for students to listen to reading.  I believe that students need to hear good readers and follow along in their books.  I am writing a proposal in DonorsChoose.org to ask for the materials, as well as from families for the players, books, and supplies to continue having the mp3 players available.  Another goal that I would like to attain is to utilize more web 2.0 tools within the classroom.  By having a class website, wiki, and blogs that students contribute to, students can take more ownership and responsibility for their learning.

I have really enjoyed a class that I was able to try out the technology, but also to hear the pedagogy behind them!

21st Century Skills for Students......Fisherpeople

This week, I listened to Dr. Chris Dede speak in the program "Technology Interfaces" from Laurete Education, Inc.  I was really interested in the idea of how teacher's roles have changed.  The workplace has changed and so must the learning environment that these future employees come from.

In this week’s resources, I was intrigued with the message of teaching students not just a program’s menus and tools to tweak things, but on the rhetoric of those programs. When should students use wikis, blogs, and videoconferences? I see this as being my challenge as a teacher. I am not teaching students the information as much as I am teaching them how to find information to answer their questions, and what is the proper platform to present their information. The 21st century skills for students require them to be more responsible for their learning. Are students ready for this?

In my classroom, I plan to change my role as the answer book, to the informational guide. By using blogs, wikis, and my webpage, I hope to collect valuable resources for students to utilize. Having more opportunities for project based learning and more team oriented assignments, I hope to instill the collaboration and communication skills that are necessary in the future work environment. By creating a classroom that fosters teamwork, communication, and problem solving, I hope to address many of the needs of my 21st century learners.

I am using the courses at Walden to improve my flexibility with technology. I will never know as much as my students do about technology, but we can all learn about it together. These courses are reminding me that it is about trying new things without a teacher’s guide. Thinking like my students, just pushing a button and learning from the mistakes and celebrations of others is extremely valuable learning.

Image from WWF   http://www.panda.org/about_our_earth/teacher_resources/own_goals/overfishing/

Wiki Wiki Wonderful five times fast!!!!

This week a group of online classmates and myself created a wiki.  A whata??  A wiki is an online collaborative site.  We were able to create a site that housed all the wonderful blog resources we have found so far.  I am hoping that our group continues to add to the wiki and really utilizes it as a place to share valuable resources.  Here is our wiki website: technologyandteachersoutofthewoods.pbworks.com/ Try it out!

Our posting for the week was a reflection of the wiki process and how we might use a wiki in the future.  The following is my reflection to the wiki we created.

In creating the wiki this week, there were some high and low moments in the process.  It was frustrating working with a group of such different backgrounds, and needs.  When starting the process I was unsure of how our wiki should develop and to what purpose it would eventually serve.  I find that I need to have lots of clarification about the end result. 

The low points were the frustrations with communication.  I was unsure of the result and so I was frustrated with exactly how to proceed.  My group members were fabulous in communicating all the steps and changing things to help improve our wiki.  It would have helped if we had a chance to get to know each other better before working on a team project.  I tend to be very concerned with people’s feelings, I really did not want to step on any toes, and so I was more hesitant to do too much on the wiki.  I would have liked to know my classmates better so that we were all confident in changing things if needed, recommending different directions, or getting feedback that was helpful.

The high points in creating the wiki, was my group members.   We all did our piece of the project to make it a great resource.  Everyone was able to contribute with his or her talents to improve the wiki.  I also really appreciated the simplicity approach we all seemed to have.

With my students, identifying the final outcome of the project would be the most beneficial.  I like how the wiki shows all the changes each person makes.  Giving students a complete structure and ideas for each step of the way would help my students.  I would also have a rubric to identify the different components necessary and a chance for students to identify each role that they will take in the wiki.  At this time, I do not know if I will use a wiki in the classroom.  It would be more beneficial as a staff resource.  I have used a wiki in collaborating a training that a group of staff members attended.  It was very helpful to have a place to put our information and the different steps we were going to take to implement the information within our building.  It would also be very helpful to have a school wiki where staff could find documents, calendars, and another way to voice opinions about the information at the school.