Week 5 Course Reflection

The knowledge I gained from this assignment is one of respect for what teachers do in the classroom. I am not in the classroom nor am I a certified teacher. This assignment proved to be somewhat difficult for me because the assignment seem to assume these criteria were true for me and each member of the team. I think if I had more (any) K-12 classroom knowledge I would have connected with this assignment and gained a whole lot more than what I did.
     Critically reflecting on the relationship between new information gained and old information previously held is based on the recently gained respect I have for what teachers do in the classroom. If a teacher is customizing lessons using their knowledge of the student’s learning ability, this can be difficult and challenging to do with the current class sizes. Based on my exposure to my daughter’s teachers from their journey through public education, most seem to teach to the middle with the advanced students being neglected and the slower students using the majority of the teacher’s time. This makes it difficult for teacher’s to push their regular students into becoming advanced students. This also explained the push-back I received and the unsuccessful attempts to advance my daughters above the middle level. This assignment showed me with a little extra effort on the teacher’s part and the use of technology a teacher can create assignments to reach students outside the boundaries of the middle.
     It is tough to explain the relationship between old and new information without having a solid and established teaching foundation. If I were in the classroom, the assignments showed me that with a little extra effort and the use of technology I could easily teach with technology and create assignments that would reach all my student’s learning abilities.
     I really feel learning should flow naturally and build on existing knowledge. My lack of classroom knowledge and developing lesson plans experience skewed my approach and strategies used in completing the assignment. Looking back the assignment should not have been as difficult and disconnected as it was. As a result my approach and strategies were spent playing catch up to gain the basic understanding of what the assignment was trying to accomplish. I don’t believe that’s a successful way of learning.
     As a learner I like to build on previous and established knowledge. I feel with a solid foundation you are able to grow and retain any information easier. I felt my personal performance for this assignment was like a bad dial up connection back when you had to use modems to connect to the internet. I spent the majority of my resources trying to connect and when I did connect the information and my performance was slow streaming across at 9600 baud.
     I believe this was the best part of the learning assignment. Before starting my Master program, I would cringe at the thought of group assignments. I guess that’s because of the horrible past experiences. Now I don’t mind them. I think the selection process needs to be better organized and matched, but that maybe a result of the Professor not knowing the students taking the course. The learning and interaction with team members was awesome. No Alpha personalities in the group and I thought we worked well together. I hope to work with them in the future. I believe our technology skill levels and experiences were equal which was an advantage and also a disadvantage to the group. I think for this course, it would have been ideal to have a non technology teacher in the group to lead and share classroom knowledge especially with the lesson planning (UDL) development part of the assignment. This is where I felt like I was the weakest link in performance for the group.  
      Teaching with technology opens up the opportunity for learning at many different levels. With kids growing up with technology, using that technology to keep them engage will impact the future of learning.
     Including this course as a past interaction and collaboration with colleagues it will impact my future learn by being a valuable resource to the learning process. I believe any time you can discuss possible solutions among a group intelligent people your problem become easier and faster to solve. Being able to use multiple resources, which collaboration does, is a new process I plan on using in future projects.  
     As a lifelong learner I will have to reflect on what questions or issues that challenges me. This course was far outside the scope of what I do professionally. I question if future research or investigation would be better spent on something else closer to a Director of Technology position.

References
Edutopia.org (nd). Big Thinkers: Howard Gardner on Digital Youth. Retrieved from http://www.edutopia.org/digital-generation-howard-gardner-video

Edutopia.org (nd). Big thinkers: James Paul Gee on grading with games. Retrieved from http://www.edutopia.org/digital-generation-james-gee-video

Edutopia.org. (nd). Big Thinkers: Sasha Barab on New-Media Engagement. Retrieved from http://www.edutopia.org/digital-generation-sasha-barab-video

Week 5 Reflection

When our group first came together, it became apparent that there was a wide array of different technology options for us to choose from. It came down to what was best for the students we were designing our lesson for. We were challenged to create a lesson that included technology that a teacher with minimum experience in technology could teach to a class of diverse learners. These learners included thirty students. Ten of these students were considered gifted and talented, two had disabilities that dramatically affect their learning, one student is blind, and one is hearing impaired. The other eighteen students ranged from low level to higher achieving. As we designed our lessons we kept in mind the following quote, “Learning is a process of accommodation, assimilation, or rejection to construct new conceptual structures, meaningful representations, or new mental models”, as stated in Southwest Educational Development Laboratory, (1999). Learning as a personal event: A brief introduction to constructivism.”

We tried to keep the individual learner in mind as we collaborated. We each chose different parts of the lesson and designed them so that every learner could be successful at the project. We took into account what the students would learn, and how to provide evidence of that learning.  Our group chose 6th grade math as we felt it would best encompass our knowledge and backgrounds as we designed the lessons.  Our lesson of choice was a unit on fractions. The goal was to design student-centered learning activities with technology.  Specific UDL lessons plans will be developed for each of the lessons, including but not limited to the following, converting improper fractions to mixed numbers, comparing fractions, multiplication of fractions, and QR codes. Use of multiple exercises through online games and manipulative, which will address the varying needs of students. These sites and activities offer varying degrees of difficulties and offer immediate feedback and results. Examples of such online activities and websites are, Fraction Feud, Dig It, Fraction Dolphin Racing Game, eBooks, QR codes and games, Mathematics glossary, Windows to the Universe, and Fraction Games with Real-Life Fractions.  We were able to assess evidence of student learning through pen and papers tests, and a wide array of online tools such as interactive learning, online games, interactive whiteboards, podcasts, videos, and learning and collaborative groups. Through the use of these online tools we were able to offer a wide range of learning tools to a wide range of learning levels. This allowed for each student to be successful in their learning.

Week 4 Reflection

I really enjoyed this weeks video and reading assignment. The videos expanded on the fundamentals of teaching. Something that I haven’t been exposed too since I am not in the classroom. The video interview talked about social and emotional learning. I found this very interesting. From my job and view point I always heard about the problems teaching to economic disadvantaged but never social and emotional. Couple videos talked about project base learning. As I have heard this before and been to several presentations promoting they style of learning, I found this to be interesting but difficult to implement. I would think the entire state would have to change its testing policy in order for all Texas districts to convert to this teaching style. As I go through this course I get more understand on how tough it is to be a teacher with today’s students.  

Week 3 Reflection

Week 3 was very interesting and productive but the confusion on how to teach with technology has not totally evaporated. I still have the feeling that it’s all vaporware and buz-words and that there is no set curriculum on how to fully utilize the technology in the classroom. The videos and readings were interesting but they didn’t explain how to teach with technology. This might be the result of me being saturated with technology on a daily basis and not being in the classroom. I like knowing the details on how things work and from this week’s information; I’m still getting the dream theory of using technology in the classroom. The videos gave me the impression that one student was the rock star with technology and surpassed the teacher’s knowledge of technology. Maybe I’m looking too hard at what’s being taught with technology and need to focus on the simple use of technology. But with random uses of technology in the classroom how can you standardize so all students across the grade levels get the same exposure and experience from being taught with technology. The ebook and UDL lesson plan exercise made me realize how individualize and flexible each teacher can be in the classroom. Having twins, I often joked about my kids getting two different educations from different teachers being in the same grade level. 

Week 2 Reflection

This week was a little more difficult than I thought. I originally thought as the weeks went on the concept of teaching with technology would become clearer and less confusing. I’m not getting that feeling. Since I’m not a classroom teacher, I was thinking this week would explain how to use the technology. I starting to wonder if the disconnect is from my perceived expectations from the title of the course or the lack of classroom foundation needed to maximize the content of the course.  So far this week, I have learned about the CAST website and how brain-based research suggests each individual learns differently and how teachers need to design tasks to help students understand the what, hows and whys of learning.  During the week I also learned about UDL, Universal Design for Learning and how it’s the blueprint for Center for Applied Special Technology innovation for all students regardless of abilities or disabilities.

 

Week 1 Reflection

      EDLD 5364 is a class in which I believe I will enjoy. Since I am not in the classroom and primarily support the technology used in the classroom, I looking forward to teaching with technology. During the first week, we were introduced to three different learning theories: Constructivism Theory, Connectivism Theory, Cyborg Learning Theory. In a constructivist classroom, the teacher is a facilitator instead of the traditional method where the teacher is presenting information and relying on student’s short term memory to complete worksheets and pass tests.  According to Christopher Dede, students do not develop deep understandings or long-term strategies with the traditional style of teaching (Dede, 1999).  The second learning theory is called connectivism. This theory shares a more complex construction of knowledge within each individual.  It is considered to be a continual process where students are making connections as they find sources of information through interactions and databases. Cyborg learning theory was very interesting to me since I am a Star Trek fan. This theory places implant into humans so they can connect to computer and other devices.
      After having taken several courses I’m very surprised how lost I feel during the first week of this course. It’s the same feeling I had during the first week of my first two courses. Usually by week three I have a solid idea what what’s going on. I’m not sure if it because I’m outside of my comfort zone since the course is about teaching with technology or if I’m just not fully understanding the senerio. Anyway, I will wait for week three.