Graduation Day

Well, graduation day is finally here. I am in Minneapolis and ready to walk the stage tomorrow. If any of my fellow classmates are walking please comment and maybe we can find each other tomorrow!

Voice Thread

I made a voice thread about the benefits of online learning in my district. Here is the link: http://voicethread.com/share/1881388/

Reflection

Throughout this course I created and followed a GAME plan. My GAME plan was to introduce a new Web 2.0 technology to my students and to design a content based self directed learning activity. While my initial thoughts were that the GAME plan idea was a waste of time, but as I worked my way through my GAME plan each week, my opinion changed. The GAME plan pushed me to actually design a self directed learning activity that uses a new technology. I am not at the point in my curriculum where I will implement the lesson plan yet, but I have plans to implement it some time in February.

Creating a GAME plan is a simple and easy way to set yourself up for success. I cannot count the number of times I have wanted to start something with my students but then never got around to doing it. Involving myself in this process actually caused me to successfully see an idea through. I have written about this before, but I think the thing that really helped me to be successful was monitoring my progress on a weekly basis through this blog. I have learned that for me to really follow through with an idea I need to have some sort of accountability in place, and I need to constantly monitor my progress in a timeline for completion. Doing this gives me the momentum I needed to follow through.

This class really opened my eyes to the difference in project and problem based learning. As most of the focus in this class revolved around problem based learning I feel I now have a good grasp on how to create a problem based learning unit. The problem I encountered in this class is that I felt it is very difficult to create a problem based learning activity with the content that I teach. My content is very fundamental and basic such as learning the letters and letter sounds. I really struggled with finding ways to create a good problem based lesson. I did design a problem based unit for math that I feel very proud of and will implement soon when I come to addition and subtraction in my curriculum. My hope is that after I carry out this lesson, the experience will give me more ideas for creating new problem based learning activities.

The one thing from this class that find easy to implement is digital storytelling. In fact, in my last discussion post I immediately thought of several ideas and ways to implement this technology. I cannot wait to start using this technology with my class. I plan to use it for math with learning shapes, in telling addition and subtraction stories, and to show sequencing, in story telling as a shared or interactive writing, and to retell events that the class participated in, in social studies to add to the curriculum, and as a way to introduce myself to the class and to highlight a student of the week. Really the possibilities are as endless as skills the students can gain from creating a digital story.

After this class I think that some adjustments I will make in my instructional practice regarding technology integration are: to consistently use the GAME plan process to push myself into learning more about technology and finding ways to implement it, to use the experience I will gain from implementing my problem based learning unit to design more of these types of units, and finally, to implement digital storytelling in all of the ways I listed above.

GAME plan with my students

Looking at the NETS-T and the NETS-S I can see how they connect with each other. As I develop my own technology skills and meet my standards, it pushes me almost simultaneously to help my students meet some of their standards. They are very inter- related. The teacher standards are about designing and the student standards are about demonstrating concepts that are essentially the same. Knowing that, I can use a GAME plan to meet standards that will help my students become more proficient.

My GAME plan was to use new technology and do a self directed learning activity. In implementing my own GAME plan and becoming proficient in my own standards, I helped my students to meet their standards and become proficient in creativity and innovation and communication and collaboration.

I believe that I will continue to use GAME plan process in this way- create plans for myself and in completing those plans, my students will gain more proficiency. I think my students are too young to get them deeply involved in the process of creating the plan. While we are constantly setting goals for them to reach as far as their own learning, I think the rest of the process is too complex for them to complete. I will get their input on what they would like to learn and then create a GAME plan to help me meet that goal. By continuing on in the process of making GAME plans, both my students and I can continue to grow and gain necessary skills in technology.

Evaluating my GAME plan

This week I am stepping back and examining my GAME plan. Over the past four weeks I believe I have met the goals I set in my original GAME plan. I have a self directed learning project with a new technology ready to go. I am going to implement it in February. As next step for this particular goal, I am going to present my lesson plan to my grade level and try to get my grade level to do the lesson along with me. I think it would be a good push for everyone. Having other teachers at the school implement a lesson with me will also ensure that I follow through and do it like I am planning!

I have been talking about the computer club that I am planning to start in January. Coming up with this project in the middle of my GAME plan has given me the momentum to keep going. Over my vacation I am going to write a GAME plan for the successful beginning of the computer club. I want to lay out a framework of the technologies I plan to introduce to these students and come up with an order of introduction along with a project for each technology. I think part of the success for me in carrying out this plan has been the element of accountability that comes from blogging about it every week. As I move forward I am going to find a way to keep myself accountable. I will either continue to blog or work with a partner that will keep me accountable. Once I start the club I have no doubt the students will keep me accountable as they will be joining for the express purpose of learning more about technology.

Progress Check

Now that I have been implementing my GAME plan for about three weeks I can take a step back and see how I am doing. My first goal was to implement one new web 2.0 technology this year with my class. My second goal is to do a self directed learning activity with my class. I have a lesson plan for a voice thread activity where students learn about a number by creating a representation of how that number is made (for example: 10 and 10 makes 20). I would like to turn this into a voice thread by uploading the student’s picture and having them narrate how to make the number. I looked at my district pacing guide to see when I can teach this lesson. I will not teach numbers 20-30 until about February. This feels like a long time to see my action completely carried out, and yet, with the holidays and benchmark testing coming up it is not realistic to fit in a big project before then. I feel like I am also completing this goal in a new way by beginning an after school computer club with upper grades. I am very excited about the possibilities the computer club holds. And through them I hope to introduce many new Web 2.0 technologies to my school. My hopes are that they go and share what they are learning about with other students and teachers.

Because I have been monitoring my progress every week, I have actually been carrying out my GAME plan. Reflecting back on failed projects of my past, I see that the vital step of monitoring was missing. Having a timeline in place and sticking to it has kept in motion throughout this process. When I first started to write a GAME plan I thought it was silly and did not see how it would fit into my professional practice permanently, but now that I have been going through the process I can see its value and I believe that this is a process I will use again and again to help me create and complete professional goals. Having this plan in place has helped me to follow through and carry out my goals. I would like to learn more about other ways to use a GAME plan, possibly grade level wide, or school wide.

As I have been carrying out my GAME plan I have already made an adjustment (or addition). Right now I see no further need to adjust my GAME plan, but this week I will begin to look at what a next step for my goals might be.

My GAME plan progress

I have made some progress on my GAME plan this week. I have a lesson plan that I would like to do that introduces my students to a new technology- voice thread. My next step is to check and see if I can access my voice thread account at work. The lesson plan not only implements a new technology, but it meets my goal of being activity based. Now I need to figure out when this lesson plan will fit in with my district’s pacing guide. It fits it with curriculum, I just cannot remember what unit.

My GAME plan has also taken an unexpected turn this week. After talking with my principal and a couple colleagues, I have decided to start an after school computer club with older students. None of the teachers at my school site teach their students about new technologies or about how to be responsible on the Internet. While I plan to expose my own students to these concepts, they are still a bit young to fully grasp them. My goal is to start the computer club and give some of the older students (grades 4-6) some of the skills that they are going to need in Jr. High and High School. I have already started a framework for what the club will look like. We will meet after school one day a week. I will start by teaching the kids about blogging and we will design a Computer Club blog page- in part for the students to communicate together outside of the club meetings. My next project will be to teach them how to do research online. Having just learned more about this myself, I have a passion to share what I learned with students. I will teach the students the steps I just learned about creating research- able questions, conducting a search online, evaluating resources, and eventually I will help them synthesize this into a project. Who knows what we will do from there. Since this is a student club I want to give them options and skills and let that design the activities we do together.

I am so excited to start this new project. If I would not have had this GAME plan, this idea would not have happened. It was only when I was researching and looking into ideas for my own class that I got the idea to expand and work with more students across three grade levels. I am learning that setting goals for myself works like oil in an engine. As I strive to achieve my goals, and focus on an area of my teaching new ideas come up and I start thinking about ways to take my goal to the next level. It has been an exciting process!