Reflection Blog

After exploring the NETS, my goal is to strengthen my confidence and knowledge with the following indicators:

1b. Engage students in exploring real world issues and solving authentic problems using digital tools and resources.

3c. Communicate relevant information and ideas effectively to students, parents, and peers using, a variety of digital age media and formats.

5b. Exhibit leadership by demonstrating a vision of technology infusion, participating a shared decision making and community building, and developing the leadership and technology skills of others.

The actions for 1b are:

Available Technologies in the district:

●          Computers

●          Internet Access

●          PowerSchool

●          Schoology

●          Projector

●          Microsoft Office

Technologies that I’m comfortable with:

●          Computers

●          Internet Access

●          PowerSchool

●          Microsoft Office

●          Projector- I now have a remote, the light has been changed, and an IT person has connected it to my computer so I can use it as the demonstration computer.

●          Schoology- I have created an account, added all my students, and figured out how the interface works. I have also created and uploaded several assignments.

Now that these actions are completed, I feel that I need to work on tailoring my assignments to fit my students more specifically.  In my district, we administer STAR Renaissance testing, which shows the Language Arts and Math skills of our students.  It places them in one of four groups and gives indicators of strengths and weaknesses.  Now that I am comfortable with using the technology, I want to use it to tailor the assignments to scaffold the students to a higher level.

The actions for 3c are: (the reason I selected this indicator is because I do not communicate with parents often)

  I have collected contact information for my students in an excel sheet

  I have set up a class website for the two courses that I teach and have provided the access code to students, parents, and administrators.

  I will continue to maintain the website with up-to-date assignments and information so parents and students are able to access classwork at all times

The actions for 5b are:

●         I have signed up for the leadership committee at my school and have attended their meeting.  I spoke with them about the changes I made in my classroom and provided them with access code to my courses so they could see it.  I received positive responses from many of my colleagues for incorporating technology, going “paperless” (this is an initiative in our school), and for continuing my own education.

●         I have emailed the head of the technology department for permission and have been attending their professional learning community for technology at my school; this has given me the opportunity to use these teachers as a sounding board for different ways of incorporating technology in my classroom.  They are great with letting me know when including the technology is frivolous and when it is adding to the assignment.

The GAME plan was a very useful exercise.  The most beneficial thing that I learned from it was that having a plan for a specific goal helps me get things accomplished.  I made a checklist of the things that needed to complete and then I made a timeline for myself of when I needed to get them done.  Time management is one of my strengths so this is something that made it easier for me to organize my plan.  In the future, I might modify my GAME plan to include a timeline, especially if I were to give it to my students, as they have not mastered time management yet.

The immediate adjustments that I have already made to my classroom, and plan to maintain, are my incorporation of Schoology in my classroom.  This has completely changed the environment.  The students are more engaged in their assignments, they enjoy the blogging component, and there are no arguments over when students handed in their work because everything is time stamped on the website.  The students are also able to track how much work each student is contributing to group work, which is always a concern. 

I particularly enjoyed the results of my students’ digital story-telling assignment.  They had a lot more fun with this version of writing than they did with a regular Microsoft Word assignment.  It was also something that we were able to display on our website and provide parent access to.  I can also incorporate problem-based learning into my lessons whenever possible because I now understand the basics of implementing the lesson and the importance of providing the students with authentic assignments.