Spotlight on Emerging Technology: Online Learning in K-12 Schools

Here is the link to my presentation. http://voicethread.com/?#u733601

Reflection for Reaching and Engaging All Learners through Technology

As I look back at the past eight weeks of this course, I am amazed at the plethora of information for how many ways a teacher can differentiate instruction. Over the years, I have differentiated when I saw the need to do so, but not to the extent of what I have read about and researched during this course. For the past eight weeks, I have been learning about Universal Design for Learning, Differentiated Instruction, and how these two concepts affect learning for all students. I now know of new ways to incorporate technology into my instruction to assist, engage, and motivate my students to learn. I have also learned of ways to use technology to assist students with learning and physical disabilities.

Our groups were required to establish a Differentiation Station social network to collaborate on UDL/ DI and the use of technology. We shared various web sites that we found to implement into our lessons. This has not only allowed me a multitude of new tools to use, it has also made me realize the importance of establishing a social network of this type for support and sharing of information. By using the various tools we have found, I can differentiate my instruction in a myriad of ways to engage learners at all levels of readiness and skills. I am also grateful for the assistance, understanding, and encouragement of my group members when I was struggling with one of my projects. I truly believe that it is just as important for students to have this social network as it is for teachers. When I am teaching again, I will establish this type of network for my students.

Until I am teaching again, I will not be able to apply any new adjustments to my lessons. I can, however, start going over lesson plans that I use and make revisions to incorporate the use of technology. At the start of each school year, I would like to get the students comfortable digitally recording themselves signing stories. I would also like to have students create a class web site and class blog to use for displaying work and collaborating with peers. Finally, I am contemplating having my students use an e-portfolio for storing their final products. All three of the presenters in our course, Drs. Carol Ann Tomlinson, Grace Smith, and Stephanie Throne, were in agreement that teachers need to start with one or two things that they want to change. Once they feel comfortable or confident with the changes they are making, they can move forward to the next change. The important thing is to keep moving forward, and this is what I plan to do.

Towards Self-Directed Learning and Creative Problem Solving

My GAME plan consisted of getting my students comfortable recording themselves using digital technology to promote enhanced learning and performances in American Sign Language (ASL). These recording would also serve as a reflective tool for self-evaluation. To accomplish this goal, I had decided to address the first standard of the National Education Technology Standards for Teachers (NETS-T) and two of its indicators.

For my goal, I wanted my students to work together in groups to define Deaf culture. I also wanted them to have a chance to collaborate with deaf students from a residential school enabling them to experience Deaf culture firsthand. As a final project, I wanted my students to create a visual story of what they had learned from this research and experience.

For my actions, I created a unit lesson plan for Deaf Culture. I began with a lesson plan for Problem Based Learning, continued with a lesson plan involving social networking, and finished with a lesson plan using digital storytelling.

Monitoring consists of using class blogs and wikis, along with checklists or rubrics for students to keep themselves on track. Evaluations will be made using rubrics.

As I proceeded with my GAME plan, I noticed that I even though I started with only one standard of the NETS-T, with the addition of each lesson, more standards were being addressed. The GAME plan is not only a valuable tool for the teacher, but for the students as well. By teaching students to use the GAME plan, they will become better organized in their working habits and develop 21st century working skills.

As a result of this course, I will be teaching my students how to use the GAME plan. I will also adjust my lessons to incorporate more social networking and digital story telling!

Using the GAME Plan Process with Students

It saddens me to know that I will not be going back to work this September. As the start of the school year approaches, I sit here and contemplate my GAME plan and how beneficial it would be to teach the GAME plan to students to help them develop proficiency in the NETS-S.

As students learn to set goals for themselves, they will be using skills in critical thinking, decision making, communication, and collaboration.

As they decide on what actions to take to meet these goals, they will be using skills in creativity, innovation, communication, collaboration, digital citizenship, and technology operations and concepts.

When students are monitoring their progress, they will be using skills in all of the above areas as well as problem solving, research and information fluency.
And as students evaluate and reflect on their work, they will again be using skills in critical thinking and communication.

Therefore, teaching students to use the GAME plan ensures that they will be meeting all the standards of the NETS-S.

GAME Plan Week 6

My original goals for my GAME plan were 1.) to promote student reflection using collaborative tools to reveal and clarify students’ conceptual understanding and thinking, planning, and creative processes, and 2.) to model collaborative knowledge construction by engaging in learning with students, colleagues, and others in face-to-face and virtual environments.

This week we have learned about social networking sites and how they can be used to enhance student learning as well as to motivate and engage students in learning content. These sites are wonderful online collaboration tools for students to utilize for communicating with their peers, experts, teachers, and a variety of other people. These sites will certainly help me with my goals.
I have not started setting new goals, nor have I extended the goals that I already have. I have been busy searching for teaching positions in my content area. This is my first time on unemployment and it is a humbling experience. It is also a lot of work!!!!!!

GAME PLAN Week Five

This is week five of our GAME PLAN. As we continue to work on our plans, I am struggling to make sense of problem-based learning and how I can apply it to my content. If I am understanding it correctly, PBL is addressing complex problems and working in small groups to negotiate solutions in a collaborative manner. It also seems to me that PBL is geared mainly to math, science, or community issues. My problem is coming up with a complex problem for the students to solve. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

Monitoring My GAME Plan

I have recently found a web site that has a lot of information on using technology in the classroom. The site is called Classroom 2.0 and is located at http://www.classroom20.com/. I had been looking for information on wix and weebly when I came across this web page for teachers. Check it out and let me know what you think.

Also, weebly is free software that you can use to create a classroom website & blog, accept homework assignments online, keep parents up to date, and manage your students’ accounts. I am interested in using this for my students as part of my GAME plan. If any of you have used this, please let me know if you like it.