Week 5 Reflections

This week we learned how to make a movie using Picasa, and how to evaluate a website. I found these lessons extremely useful because I can now evaluate websites on my own time, before I pull them up in class. As far as the Picasa assignment goes, this sort of lesson helps me make more appealing teaching materials to use in my future classroom. Creating movies that use pictures I have taken (or perhaps my students have taken!) could be much more exciting than using a random, old teaching material.

The standards we used this week are:
S3. Model Digital-Age Work and Learning--The lessons deal with 21st century skills. They taught me to use a computer to make a movie, and how to look closely at websites.
S2. Design and Develop Digital-Age Learning Experiences and Assessments--In lesson 5 I learned how to make a movie as a Digital-Age Learning Experience.
S1 Facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity--The movie assignment would be a way for me to incorporate student ideas, and allow for them to contribute their own materials. It's a great resource for the classroom!

Week 4 Reflections

The WebQuest was a very useful assignment because it taught me, basically, how to make a lesson plan. In creating an assignment to explain to both teachers and students, I was forced to consider what information the students will need, but also what resources are necessary for the teachers who are following the lesson. I can use WebQuests to think through my assignments, but also to share with others. Teachers sharing lesson plans is always a good idea because it potentially gives students the chance to experience something new in the classroom.

I feel that completing this assignment has allowed me to learn the following standards:
S3. Model Digital-Age Work and Learning--My WebQuest is designed on a website, which demonstrates the fact that I have learned how to use a Digital-Age tool.
S1. Facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity--The assignment encourages students to write their own poem, a task that forces students to reflect inwardly and explore their creativity.
S4. Promote and Model Digital Citizenship and Responsibility--This lesson promotes responsibility in a Digital Age because students must learn to distinguish reliable and unreliable sources on the internet.

Week 3 Reflections

This past week in class I learned how to make a Google survey that I can use to collect data, and how to create an Excel Spreadsheet. These assignments will be extremely beneficial to me in my classrooms because I can use surveys to collect information about my students, and spreadsheets to analyze the data. Why would I collect data on my students? Collecting data would allow me to figure out what strategies work in my class, and which ones are not helping my students. Through this assignment I addressed several ISTE standards. I improved my skills with Digital-Age technology work by using the Google Survey software. The survey that I created allowed me the opportunity to learn more about my potential students' learning and creativity, and I could also use it as a different way to assess my students in the Digital-Age.

Weeks 1 and 2 Reflections

A blog, Wiki, or Google site are great ways for students to interact with class material outside of the actual class. A Google site or Wiki allows teachers to post helpful materials that students can access from home, and a blog allows the students to talk about what they've learned or questions they may have while home. The Internet Bookmark assignment was beneficial because it taught me how to make a hyperlink, something that will allow me to make clean presentations when teaching while still listing the information that I need to get to my students. The bookmarks, blog, Wiki, and Google site will be quite helpful to my content area-English. I can use the website to create hyperlinks and post secondary sources and I can have students use the blog to discuss the reading. The PowerPoint was helpful because I now know how to make a unique assignment that, hopefully, won't bore my students.

I feel that I have met the following standards through completing these assignments:
S1. Facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity--learning new pieces of technology allows me to do assignments in a different way and to teach my students to explore their own technological creativity.
S2. Design and Develop Digital-Age Learning Experiences and Assessments--the assignments I have completed all have to do with 21st Century Skills. I can now create hyperlinks, websites, and blogs, and all of these skills are ones that will allow me to participate in the Digital Age.
S3. Model Digital-Age Work and Learning--this is similar to the above statement. By being able to develop these assignments, I am now able to participate and model the work and learning styles of the Digital Age.
S4. Promote and Model Digital Citizenship and Responsibility--the Internet Bookmarks assignment specifically helped with this because, thanks to the category about copyright issues, I have learned a bit about how to be responsible with technology and information on the internet. The part of the assignment that dealt with cyberbullying also encouraged me to think about citizenship on the internet.
S5 Engage in Professional Growth and Leadership--Now that I know how to create these materials I have the chance to further develop my skills and emerge as a technological leader in my profession. I can use the years ahead of me to grow in the technological field and I can help others develop their skills as well.