Final Reflection for Learning Effectively

One of the most important things focused on in this class was the importance of critical thinking. Project based learning is a method that can be made to be cross-curricular and more authentic to students. More and more, students say that they “power down” when they come to school because they are being taught in a way that they find boring. If they are given the opportunities to make the projects their own, and then given an authentic audience, the learning will become more meaningful for the students.

The levels of technology were very interesting because it gave a set of guidelines for evaluation. It also put into perspective how I personally have used technology in my classroom and how I need to improve my use for my students. Many examples were also given to help understanding. This is also a good way to evaluate a teaching staff to show where growth and instruction is needed.

Overall, Learning Effectively with Technology gave me a different perspective on how to develop a project and what my motivation behind a project should be. Students need to be taught how to use technology correctly and proficiently while giving them an authentic audience to help them create more meaning in their learning. When students are at the center of learning, the project is the most successful.

Week Five-Almost There

Probably one of the most frustrating things this week was trying to justify what LoTi level my unit plan attained. Throughout the course, we have been analyzing LoTi levels, so it shouldn’t have been difficult. I think part of my problem is that I’m so close, and it is hard to look at my unit plan objectively at this point. I need some more time and distance before I’m able to look at my unit plan without thinking if I have all of the requirements in place for class before thinking about how I could take it to a higher LoTi level. It’s so much more difficult to analyze your own work than that of a classmate.

On the positive side, I really appreciate how we were encouraged to work on our unit plan, and it was broken up into pieces. I had very little work to do on it this week because I had accomplished so much of it in the previous weeks. Overall, I think it was a positive experience. I hope that I have to opportunity to teach it and experience letting the students take control of their learning.

As Tim Gunn would say, "Make it Work" for Week Four

This week I was at a SMART Board class/workshop through a CESA 2 EETT Grant. I basically forced my Digital Footprint PBL Unit to fit the requirements. When I presented my final SMART Notebook presentation to the class, other teachers asked me to share it with them. I think this is because a lot of teachers know it is important to teach about the digital footprint, but don’t know how to go about it. That’s how I felt when I first started designing this unit. I really appreciate how PBL can be just as much of a learning experience for the teacher as it is for the students.

There were a lot of interesting articles put out by the Pew Research Institute. I read a few, and found them packed with statistics. While I get overwhelmed by all of the numbers, it has been my experience that administrators thrive on them. If I have to give a presentation, I would defiantly go through some of their research because it was comprehensible and easy to use.

Week Three-Delving Deeper

I remember hating reflecting in Undergrad classes. Now it's my favorite part of the week. I'm not certain of what has changed, but it could be that I don't have to reflect on one specific aspect of class. There is freedom of what I want to think about more. This is something I'm keeping in mind for future consideration in my classroom.

It has always been a challenge for me to take an idea of a unit and then structure it in a specific plan. Conceptually, I really like my plan of exploring the impact of the digital footprint. However, I don't know that much about digital footprints. I'd probably be learning along with the students. Therefore, my lack of knowledge makes it challenging to fit my ideas it into the required unit plan parts.

I recommend to anyone who is looking for additional content area standards for their unit plan to look at the Language Arts Media Standards. It's often overlooked, but it might apply to your objectives.

It's only week two?

Echoing some of my colleagues’ statements on their blogs, this has been a whirlwind of a week. I’m moving on Saturday, and I have not packed a single box yet. I’m also taking another one week 3 credit class next week as well. This is not looking good for my sanity or my homework completion rate.

Back on track, I’m still struggling with integrating PBL into a Language Arts Classroom. Part of that is because so much of LA is reading from the cannon. Students today have a hard time connecting the events in literature to their lives. However, the PBL I looked at for analysis asked the big question of why we still read this literature. It could help students see that human kind really hasn’t changed that much. It’s what to do with that information that would make the learning even more authentic. So much of what I’ve read is not to solve a problem, but to relate it to their own lives.

Week One-Project Based Learning

The premise of Project Based Learning (PBL) makes sense in my head. In everyday life, students are able to personalize their belongings, accounts, and other aspects. And since they are exposed to so much technology, they often do not have to engage in critical thinking. PBL would put both together.

I appreciate how the Intel Reading mentioned how PBL should be part of one’s instructional techniques, and not the only one. Often, I find it frustrating to be an English teacher because everything that I instruct really needs to be applied in other subjects. Sometimes I often wished that I could pair with a social studies teacher to make my content more authentic. I don’t think that everything in an English classroom can be taught through PBL, but there are opportunities.

My other challenge is looking at this from the perspective of a LMS as well. I think that a LMS would have to help the classroom teacher connect with the community to help students with their authentic research. Maybe we could spend time in class focusing on how the LMS can support the classroom teacher, and how we can promote these projects to the staff.

The other major topic of the week were the LoTI. After taking the survey, and thinking about it, last year I was probably at a level 2. If was to continue being a classroom teacher, I think I would have been a level 3 next year. So much of technology and applying new knowledge take time to work things into the classroom. I am not someone who likes to take huge risks in the classroom. My preference is to have someone else try it first, ask them questions about it, and then try it in my classroom. Again, it goes back to Intel Reading advising to try one thing at a time, and then it won’t seem as overwhelming.

Week 5-Web 2.0 and Tokbox

I thought that making the Tokbox reflection this week was very nice. The thing that I’m finding frustrating or challenging about oral reflections is that you can’t go back later to edit. I planned the topics that I wanted to discuss, but then as I watched it again, I realized that I went a bit off topic in one part. It wasn’t bad enough to warrant redoing it because I liked the rest of it. Because of what we were using, I couldn’t just redo that one part. Whereas with a written reflection, I could have fixed it when I edited it. I’m not sure if that was for lack of planning or just how oral reflections happen.

I enjoyed looking at the Web 2.0 tools that were not covered in class. I used picnik.com to edit photos that were taken at my church’s VBS. You can see the end results in the previous post. The other tool I will be reviewing is polleverywhere.com which was to focus of my screencast. I haven’t chosen the other two yet. I hope that we get to discuss them in class on Wednesday because I want to know what everyone else found.