Online Learning

My coursework at Walden University is quickly ending. This week during my final course, New and Emerging Technologies, we looked into Course Management Systems (CMS), also known as Virtual Learning Environments. These valuable tools really have the capability of changing our classrooms for the better. This past year, my district has integrated a CMS called Moodle at the High School and Middle School level. The teachers cannot say enough great things about it and love the way it has already made improvements on student learning and management. Now, a couple of us who teach at the elementary level are really pushing to get Moodle implemented on our computer systems as well.

Below is a link to a presentation I have created in order to inform the elementary teachers in my district of the values of using Moodle. Check it out and let me know what you think and if there are any other key points that you think would help get elementary teachers on board to the use of Moodle.

http://prezi.com/l4qaz3mndftx/

Magan

Universal Design for Learning and Differentiated Instruction

One would think that after you have learned a given lesson once or twice that you take it with you and you generally do not have to learn it again. However, a lesson I find myself learning time and time again is that nothing is ever as complicated as it seems once you take a closer look and break it up into steps. I have a feeling many of us can relate to this feeling of being overwhelmed at the thought of starting something new and adding strategies into our teaching styles. Luckily this course also helped break two great ideas in education up in smaller pieces. Now, implementing the Universal Design for Learning and Differentiated Instruction into my classroom does not seem quite so scary.

During this course, we were required to set up a group NING. Very helpful!! It was great to be able to chat and discuss some issues we were having, resources we had found, and ideas on how to get the most out of our time with our students.

I have learned so many valuable resources throughout the course and I plan to use many of the resources to offer my students options in their learning. Just because all students have a common goal in mind, does not mean that all students need to get to this goal the same way. Things like United Streaming, Starfall and Kidspirtation are programs that students will be able to use independently to enhance their learning, while programs like VoiceThreads, Podcasts, and digital stories, are all great resources that allow students to portray their learning to others. Read.Write.Think is a resource that Tanika offered up that I can’t wait to explore more in depth with my students.

With all these new resources, it sure makes implementing differentiated instruction seem a lot less complicated!

One more course to go! There is light at the end of the tunnel after all.

Magan

Close of Course 8

It is hard to believe it, but I’m at the end of another course towards my masters. Eight down and two more to go! Each course so far has left me not only feeling motivated to make leaps into the 21st century with my students, but has helped give me the confidence in knowing that I can bring my students into the 21st century.

What this particular course, the focus was mostly on creating GAME plans that allow you to first see what goals need to be achieved, then how to map out the plan to achieve them, and finally, forcing you to make a conscious effort to keep up on the progress of the goals through evaluation and reflection.



The biggest adjustment that I think I will be making to my teaching with this information is creating plans for myself and with my students that clearly lay out what needs to be learned, what they want to learn and improve on, and just how to go about doing it. Sometimes it is easy to get that tunnel vision where you are concentrating on just one particular skill, that you forget to take a step back and look at why that skills is important and what knowing it help you achieve in the big picture of things. So by keeping some of the goals in the game plans broad, I think it will cause myself and my students to see more of the big picture.

Magan

Benefits of a GAME Plan

So how effective was having a GAME plan? I think the biggest advantage about actually setting up a GAME plan, has been the fact that it really makes you think about the details and holds you accountable for them as long as you keep monitoring and reflecting on your progress. After I first developed my plan, I looked ahead to future assignments for this particular course and saw that we were to be reflecting on our GAME plan every single week. My first instinct was a bit of an eye roll, because I thought this would get extremely redundant reflecting on the same thing for six weeks. However, I have to now admit that it was actually very beneficial to do this because it motivated me to make sure I was actually making changes and working toward my goal every single week. This got me to thinking that if I had my students set up their own GAME plan for content standards throughout the school year, they would be made extremely aware of what it was exactly that they were working towards. My thinking is that if for each new unit in a subject area, I would help students create a GAME plan to achieve those objects. Then not only is the teacher responsible for teaching the material, but it also really helps to hold the students accountable for their own learning. Obviously for the younger grade levels, there will be a lot of assistance in creating these GAME plans, and I think it would be more beneficial to create a class plan rather than individual student plans. What do you think? I am also leaning towards incorporating the NETS-S right into the curriculum plans because then students and myself would have a better chance of finding ways to intertwine the curriculum standards with the technology standards.

GAME Plan Continued

Well it’s been six weeks now since I have created my GAME plan. My original goal was to expose students to solving real-world problems using technology while using professionalism and responsibility of their use on the web and other technology tools. I have to say, that in just these pas six weeks I am very happy with the progress that I have made toward this goal. While I started out trying to find one large project that would achieve this goal, I have come to realize over the last week that one project, no matter how significant it is or now well it relates to the real world, is not enough. In order to achieve this goal, I have to be consistently involving students in solving real-world problems, and constantly modeling and expecting them to use technology responsibly and professionally. By creating an interactive whiteboard in my classroom has made a world of difference! I can show students first hand how I go about searching and selecting quality video resources on the internet, how I give them each resource credit, and I can use countless flipchart type materials on the board that allow students to interact with real world situations on a daily basis.

Since I’m feeling pretty confident in my current goal, I am extending my NETS based goal to include using technology to help inspire creativity in my students. There is no doubt that using technology in my classroom has inspired student learning, but I still would like to see my students pulling out more creativity.

To achieve this goal I will certainly start where I started my last goal: turning to my colleague for advice and suggestions. With various education blogs, forums, and my own teaching staff, there are endless amounts of resources out there to get started. I think for this goal it is also important to allow as much student freedom as possible. So…now starts the process of improvement all over again!

Magan

GAME Plan Update

So far my GAME plan is coming along quite well. It’s funny how when you start out looking to achieve one specific things, so many other things arise along the path that end up achieving that you never even dreamed of! In my previous post I mentioned that I had taken my first step to overcoming the problem of limited access to the school’s interactive whiteboard, by creating my own inexpensive board in my classroom. After more educators caught wind of what I had done, I have now been asked to present the creation process along with what types of things can be done on this valuable tool at my district’s professional development day. I find this a great honor because a big part of our technology standards rely on sharing information and knowledge with others. Now I am not only able to use information I have found from other resources, but now I am able to help pass this information along to other educators.

I do not feel that I need to make any adjustments to my plan this week. Another step in the right direction I have made over this past week was that I have now made the decision about what my students will create their digital storybooks about, and how it will allow them to integrate our core curriculum in with solving real-world problems. On my pervious post, Erin Beauvais had a wonderful suggestion that I have students select different children’s books and take the underlying lesson taught in the book and use that for real-world lessons that impact the student’s lives each and every day. I love this idea and cannot wait for my students to get started with this project in the next couple weeks. My plan is to have students broken up into groups of four and select from a variety of children’s book that they want to write about and elaborate on. Students will then use the book’s lesson to think of ways they can help carry out that same lesson in their own lives. Obviously this will be kept at a pretty basic level since these are 1st graders, but I really think they would get excited about this project and take a lot out of it.

Magan

Reflect and Revise

Well another week as gone by which means it is time to take a closer look at how I am progressing with my GAME plan.

This week I was able to overcome a couple of significant barriers that would potentially get in the way of achieving my plan. My school unfortunately has very limited access to technology in our classrooms so even though I had big plans to get my students making digital storybooks and viewing a large variety of United Streaming videos that tie into our curriculum, it does get difficult to schedule ample times in our schools shared computer lab. So after doing some research to see what others have done to break though this very same barrier, I came across an excellent substation for the expensive smartboards that all of the teachers in our school wish for on a daily basis. Using johnnylee.net as a resource, I was able to build my own interactive whiteboard in my classroom for less than $70. Since this was about $1500 cheaper than the actual Promethean Boards themselves, our principal has agreed to help get all the teachers in our building funding for this project! My students can now have unlimited access to this useful tool so they can share, edit, view videos online, all while working hands on.

After seeing how much time my GAME my game plan is taking at this point, I have decided to modify it a little bit and take things one step at a time. Originally I wanted to set up a digital portfolio online of all the student artifacts that were created over the years. Now I have decided to just keep my basic digital file folder of all student material and notes from the lesson. I do still hope to create a digital portfolio that can be shared with teachers, parents, and students, but at this time, I would like to focus on the creation of the actual lessons, and then later on, work on getting them out there to the world.

The main question that I am still pondering over is what real-world scenario I want my 1st graders to create digital storybooks about. I want a topic that excites them, pulls out their creativity, but also does not make them feel overwhelmed. Any good suggestions out there? I would love to hear them!

Magan