Overall, I feel I did pretty well in meeting my goal for Standard 5c: “evaluate and reflect on current research and professional practice on a regular basis to make effective use of existing and emerging digital tools and resources in support of student learning”. I have been able to find some good educational technology blogs and read about some interesting new ideas that have been implemented in the classroom. This can be difficult since I do not teach a core class but rather business and computer courses. There is traditionally a plethora of websites and databases available on content-specific courses, but business tends to fall through the gap. Since we are on summer break, I will know more about the effectiveness of my GAME Plan at the end of the first semester in December since I will have time to implement and reflect on it. I have learned that there are ample resources available for both teachers and students to use in the classroom and that it just requires the time and patience to locate them. I do not have any questions at this time, but I have learned that technology is ever changing so I will need to keep current on new trends and concepts as they happen. Since my goal is to keep introducing new content once a month, I may need to adjust this more or less depending on my workload at the school or how effective the new activities are.
With Standard 4d: “develop and model cultural understanding and global awareness by engaging with colleagues and students of other cultures using digital-age communication and collaboration tools”, I have not had near enough time to spend fulfilling this goal during the summer due to my busy coaching and summer-work schedule. However, I feel I have set solid guiding actions to help prepare me for an activity of this magnitude. I have learned that I do not want to jump into an activity like this without having all of my bases covered to help eliminate as many potential problems as possible. I also lack the experience in dealing with this type of activity so I have a lot to learn in that regard. I will likely need to adjust my plan so I can work with a mentoring teacher who has participated in this type of activity before so I can follow their lead and learn from their guidance and leadership.
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Monitoring Your GAME Plan Progress:
As I monitor my GAME Plan progress, I realize this is no small matter. There are several steps that are needed to accomplish an effective GAME Plan. I have been able to find a lot of good information and resources to help employ a collaborative project with a different school as well as educational technology blogs to help implement new assessment strategies within my classroom. I am comfortable searching the Internet so I typically can find what I am looking for when given the time to do so. As such, I don’t feel that I need to modify my action plan at this point as I am able to currently stay on track with the goals I set to accomplish.
What I have learned so far is that while creating a GAME Plan may seem a little overwhelming at first, when it is broken down into its smaller components it is not as daunting. To me it has similar characteristics as the research paper we created in a previous Walden course. Additionally, I have learned that the time needed to accomplish my GAME Plan goals is higher than I had hoped for, but that is also largely in part to the fact that I have a very busy summer schedule. Things really don’t slow down for me once school starts back up as I coach two sports (football and basketball), am the student council advisor, and am the sophomore class sponsor. My major concern is how to find time to stay current with new technologies and undertake a large collaborative project while fulfilling my duties within my school and trying to avoid burnout at the same time. I have done a fairly decent job of keeping balance with my professional and personal life, but I am ever fearful of becoming overwhelmed with too much.
What I have learned so far is that while creating a GAME Plan may seem a little overwhelming at first, when it is broken down into its smaller components it is not as daunting. To me it has similar characteristics as the research paper we created in a previous Walden course. Additionally, I have learned that the time needed to accomplish my GAME Plan goals is higher than I had hoped for, but that is also largely in part to the fact that I have a very busy summer schedule. Things really don’t slow down for me once school starts back up as I coach two sports (football and basketball), am the student council advisor, and am the sophomore class sponsor. My major concern is how to find time to stay current with new technologies and undertake a large collaborative project while fulfilling my duties within my school and trying to avoid burnout at the same time. I have done a fairly decent job of keeping balance with my professional and personal life, but I am ever fearful of becoming overwhelmed with too much.
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Carrying Out Your GAME Plan:
In order to accomplish Standard 4d: “develop and model cultural understanding and global awareness by engaging with colleagues and students of other cultures using digital-age communication and collaboration tools”, I will need a variety of resources. First of all, I will need a cooperating professional from another school district to work with during the collaborative project that our students will be engaged in. Additionally, different forms of communication with said person such as email, phone, or discussion boards would prove to be beneficial. Having a mentor who has had experience with collaborative projects would be vital to creating a successful project. Lastly, examples of successful collaborative projects to use as references or pull ideas from would be of great assistance. Up to this point, I have only been able to research the Internet to find ideas and examples of collaborative projects.
For Standard 5c: “evaluate and reflect on current research and professional practice on a regular basis to make effective use of existing and emerging digital tools and resources in support of student learning”, the resources needed would be largely independent and research based. I would need an aggregator to compile various educational technology blogs. Also, researching the Internet for additional sources outside of blogs would be useful in implementing new technology into the classroom once per month. So far, I have found a few educational technology blogs and found a few technology ideas that could prove to be beneficial.
In order to accomplish Standard 4d: “develop and model cultural understanding and global awareness by engaging with colleagues and students of other cultures using digital-age communication and collaboration tools”, I will need a variety of resources. First of all, I will need a cooperating professional from another school district to work with during the collaborative project that our students will be engaged in. Additionally, different forms of communication with said person such as email, phone, or discussion boards would prove to be beneficial. Having a mentor who has had experience with collaborative projects would be vital to creating a successful project. Lastly, examples of successful collaborative projects to use as references or pull ideas from would be of great assistance. Up to this point, I have only been able to research the Internet to find ideas and examples of collaborative projects.
For Standard 5c: “evaluate and reflect on current research and professional practice on a regular basis to make effective use of existing and emerging digital tools and resources in support of student learning”, the resources needed would be largely independent and research based. I would need an aggregator to compile various educational technology blogs. Also, researching the Internet for additional sources outside of blogs would be useful in implementing new technology into the classroom once per month. So far, I have found a few educational technology blogs and found a few technology ideas that could prove to be beneficial.
Thursday, July 8, 2010
Developing Your Personal GAME Plan
In order to strengthen my proficiency integrating technology into my classroom I have evaluated the NETS-T Standards and identified what I believe are my two weakest areas that I would like to improve. The first is Standard 4d: “develop and model cultural understanding and global awareness by engaging with colleagues and students of other cultures using digital-age communication and collaboration tools”. The second area is Standard 5c: “evaluate and reflect on current research and professional practice on a regular basis to make effective use of existing and emerging digital tools and resources in support of student learning”.
GOALS:
Standard 4d: The goal I have set in regards to Standard 4d is to create a collaborative project assignment with a class from a different high school. As this is a brand new experience to me, it is definitely an area in which I am severely lacking. I will need to absorb as much information as I can during this initial project to help ensure success in future endeavors.
Standard 5c: Since technology is always changing and evolving, it is difficult to keep current, especially with all of the other roles that each of us plays in our own lives. In order to stay current, my goal is to implement one new educational technology tool into my classroom each month. This technology can vary in difficulty or size, but must be something I have never used in my classroom before and occur once per month. By the end of the school year, I will have tried nine new tools in an effort to stay current with technology.
ACTIONS:
Standard 4d: In creating a collaborative project assignment, I will need to take several actions. Researching previous collaborative projects and how they were performed will help give me information based on others previous experiences. This will help me narrow down timeframe, content, assessment, and communication. Additionally, I will need to contact several educators who either have experience or would be willing to learn with me in this endeavor. To do so, I would need to look at educational forums, blogs, and websites to help identify potential partners. Lastly, I would need to have constant communication to my collaborating partner to continually assess, evaluate, and receive feedback.
Standard 5c: Since the Internet is a vast ocean of information, it can be difficult to find exactly what you are looking for when you aren’t quite certain yourself of what that is. Thus, I will let others do that work for me and subscribe to several different educational technology blogs which will gather that information into one location for me. With the information coming to me instead of finding it, I have more time to evaluate and try different technologies and find ways to implement them into my classroom.
MONITOR:
Standard 4d: Monitoring progress will need to be done at the end of each segment to ensure that students are working collaboratively and meeting the requirements. Again, communication with my collaborating partner will be a key factor as we will be able to identify what successes we are having with the classrooms and what difficulties we encounter. We also need to let our students know that this is a learning process for us as well and that they need to ask questions and provide feedback whenever they need to.
Standard 5c: Monitoring for this Standard can be a little more tricky than others, but jotting down notes in my agenda and finding assignments whose assessments or instructional strategies I feel are lacking is a positive way to start. From there, I can look to pair a new educational technology into my classroom that will be fitting for the content I will instruct. I will have to record notes on student excitement, engagement, and degree of difficulty as well as promote feedback and questions from students to help enhance the new technology being used.
EVALUATE AND EXTEND:
Standard 4d: Evaluation for collaborative project will come from the level of involvement between the students from differing schools, the quality of work submitted, the amount of time involved, and weighing the pros and cons from the various components. Working with my collaborating partner would allow us to build upon the aspects of the project that were positive and change the aspects that were negative to help improve the project as a whole for the next time. Additionally, receiving feedback from the students (whether it be through surveys, reflections, etc.) is a great way to receive firsthand information about the project.
Standard 5c: To evaluate the effectiveness of using each of the new technologies, I feel creating a folder or document to keep track of the strengths and weaknesses of each that was implemented will provide beneficial when I seek to implement them again in the future. Also, any difficulties I encountered the first time around would need to be prominently addressed to prevent reoccurrences in the future. While every new tool that I implement in my classroom may not be used again in some format, the process will continue to help my classroom adapt and evolve with the technology of today and the future.
GOALS:
Standard 4d: The goal I have set in regards to Standard 4d is to create a collaborative project assignment with a class from a different high school. As this is a brand new experience to me, it is definitely an area in which I am severely lacking. I will need to absorb as much information as I can during this initial project to help ensure success in future endeavors.
Standard 5c: Since technology is always changing and evolving, it is difficult to keep current, especially with all of the other roles that each of us plays in our own lives. In order to stay current, my goal is to implement one new educational technology tool into my classroom each month. This technology can vary in difficulty or size, but must be something I have never used in my classroom before and occur once per month. By the end of the school year, I will have tried nine new tools in an effort to stay current with technology.
ACTIONS:
Standard 4d: In creating a collaborative project assignment, I will need to take several actions. Researching previous collaborative projects and how they were performed will help give me information based on others previous experiences. This will help me narrow down timeframe, content, assessment, and communication. Additionally, I will need to contact several educators who either have experience or would be willing to learn with me in this endeavor. To do so, I would need to look at educational forums, blogs, and websites to help identify potential partners. Lastly, I would need to have constant communication to my collaborating partner to continually assess, evaluate, and receive feedback.
Standard 5c: Since the Internet is a vast ocean of information, it can be difficult to find exactly what you are looking for when you aren’t quite certain yourself of what that is. Thus, I will let others do that work for me and subscribe to several different educational technology blogs which will gather that information into one location for me. With the information coming to me instead of finding it, I have more time to evaluate and try different technologies and find ways to implement them into my classroom.
MONITOR:
Standard 4d: Monitoring progress will need to be done at the end of each segment to ensure that students are working collaboratively and meeting the requirements. Again, communication with my collaborating partner will be a key factor as we will be able to identify what successes we are having with the classrooms and what difficulties we encounter. We also need to let our students know that this is a learning process for us as well and that they need to ask questions and provide feedback whenever they need to.
Standard 5c: Monitoring for this Standard can be a little more tricky than others, but jotting down notes in my agenda and finding assignments whose assessments or instructional strategies I feel are lacking is a positive way to start. From there, I can look to pair a new educational technology into my classroom that will be fitting for the content I will instruct. I will have to record notes on student excitement, engagement, and degree of difficulty as well as promote feedback and questions from students to help enhance the new technology being used.
EVALUATE AND EXTEND:
Standard 4d: Evaluation for collaborative project will come from the level of involvement between the students from differing schools, the quality of work submitted, the amount of time involved, and weighing the pros and cons from the various components. Working with my collaborating partner would allow us to build upon the aspects of the project that were positive and change the aspects that were negative to help improve the project as a whole for the next time. Additionally, receiving feedback from the students (whether it be through surveys, reflections, etc.) is a great way to receive firsthand information about the project.
Standard 5c: To evaluate the effectiveness of using each of the new technologies, I feel creating a folder or document to keep track of the strengths and weaknesses of each that was implemented will provide beneficial when I seek to implement them again in the future. Also, any difficulties I encountered the first time around would need to be prominently addressed to prevent reoccurrences in the future. While every new tool that I implement in my classroom may not be used again in some format, the process will continue to help my classroom adapt and evolve with the technology of today and the future.
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