Reflection Week 7

I enjoyed this class I was able to learn about the game plan that I was already following in my teaching adventure but I had not put a name to the steps.  I realized that It is important for a teacher to understand the relationships between self-directed learning, creative thinking, technology integration which helps students to understand the content being taught because the teacher does not always have to lecture to students to help them learn different objectives, he/ she can let the students teach themselves using technology, and the students will be able to create a very good artifact through creative designs.  Students can easily be taught the game plan – setting goals, taking action, monitoring progress, and evaluation to help them do self-directed learning as stated by Cennamon, Ross & Ertmer (2009).  I will, because of what I have learned in this class, began to incorporate more social networking/online collaborations projects, more problem-based learning projects, and more digital storytelling projects.  I plan to incorporate into my lesson plans five projects per semester consisting of problem-based learning, social networking/online collaboration, and digital storytelling.

Reference

Cennamo, K., Ross, J. Ertmer, P., 2009.  Technology Integration for Meaningful Classroom Use:  A Standards-Based Approach.  Laureate Education, Inc.  Cengage Learning, Mason, Ohio.

Monitoring Your GAME Plan Progress

To continue my Game Plan I am finding the information and resources I need , I do not need to modify my plans,  I have learned that my students are very interested in this project, they are excited to learn about how to determine if the information is valid and how to  post to a wiki.  The only new question that has arisen is will we finish the project on time?

Carrying Out Your GAME Plan

In order to carry out my action plan I will need to create cooperative learning groups, teach my students how to use search engines and Boolean techniques and how to find valid information for the wiki, I will need to teach the student’s how to create a wiki as well as how to make entries on the wiki.  I will need to make a worksheet concerning Boolean search techniques, how to find valid information, and create a worksheet explaining the information required for the wiki.  So far I have been able to create the worksheet which explains the information I want the students to find about the famous person, create a worksheet that explains search engines to use, how to determine if the information is from a valid source, and information on how to use Boolean searches.  I have demonstrated how students are to use search engines to find information, how to determine if the information is from a valid source, and how to use a Boolean search.  My students have started finding information for the biography.  I have placed my students in cooperative learning groups, which provides for the diverse learners as well as the ESL learners, to complete this artifact.  Other resources I will need is one computer for each group as well as the worksheets.

Developing Your Personal GAME Plan

The two National Education Standards for Teachers indicators that I am not as confident and proficient as I would like to be are promoting student reflection using collaborative tools to reveal and clarify student’s conceptual understanding and thinking, planning and creative process, design or adapt relevant learning experiences that incorporate digital tools and resources to promote student learning and creativity.  My goal on the first indicator is to incorporate into my lesson plans assignments that require students to create, and participate on wikis to create a biography of a famous individual using http://biography.com/ using a worksheet, creating blogs, voice threads, and concept maps, and podcasts on various topics.  On these digital tools, I will monitor the progress of these projects by checking the wikis, blogs, voice thread’s, concept maps and podcasts daily for entries.   Students will study their wikis, blogs, podcasts, and voice threads and complete a paper assessment of the information.  My goal for the second NETS-T indicator is to create a tutorial screen cast which will teach students Microsoft word with all of its features, access, and excel software.  I plan to give assignments, and incorporate them in my lesson plans that require students to use a computer as mind tools – where they create databases, concept-maps, use inspiration and kidspiration software, use hypermedia  - create movies using sound, images, videos, animations, and create websites, have students do some digital storytelling where they will write a script, develop  storyboard, create a movie, and present their project, evaluation of these mind tool features will be done when the students present their projects to the class.

Integrating Technology into Instruction

My personal theory of learning is that students learn through repetition and the Nonlinguistic teaching strategy - I called it, at the beginning of this class, the mind’s eye – this course helped me to put another name to my theory of learning, the nonlinguistic teaching strategy.   As is stated at the beginning of this course my personal theory of how students learn is repetition and, teaching students to use the mind’s eye - once again as stated by (Pavio, 1980), his hypothesis asserting that when we see an image, both the image and a label for that image are stored in memory.  It is my theory, that if a student put’s seeing and hearing together they will have a good memory, hands-on activities, project based learning, and learning through technology which makes the information being taught relevant to the students’ will all help the student to learn the objectives being taught.   This course has reinforced my personal learning theory by introducing me a teaching strategy that supports my learning theory the minds eye - Nonlinguistic Teaching Strategy.  As a result of this course, the immediate adjustments I will make to my instructional practice regarding technology integration are the fact that I will use technology to teach any objective I want the students to learn, I will make sure I give the information along with a picture to incorporate the nonlinguistic teaching strategy in my lessons.  I will include Wiki’s, Podcasts, Blogs, and Voice Threads technology tools to teach my objectives – because the students love to use technology I will use it to my advantage and let them use these technology tools to learn what I am teaching. Another immediate adjustment I will make to my instructional practice is to use the instructional strategy of cooperative learning. The two long-term goal changes I would like to make to my instructional practice regarding technology integration are to use the Podcast to teach various objectives in my class, and to use the Voice Thread to teach various objectives in my class.  I have already prepared lessons that include the Voice Thread, the Wiki, the Podcast, and the Blog to help provide my students with some of the twenty-first century skills.

Reference

Laureate Education, Inc. (Producer). (2011). Program one: Understanding the brain [Video

           webcast]. Bridging learning theory, instruction and technology. Retrieved from

   http://laureate.ecollege.com/ec/crs/default.learn?CourseID=5700267&CPURL=laureate.ecolleg com&Survey=1&47=2594577&ClientNodeID=984650&coursenav=0&bhcp=1

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URL to my VoiceThread

voicethread.com/share/2510641/

URL to my Voice Thread

https://docs.google.com/present/edit?id=0Ad2i0Zlsfp9vZGdtNDlqaGdfMmdtbjgyYmM3