Reflection on Learning

I was talking to a colleague this morning about taking the online courses that I am taking this semester and why I am taking them. I came up with the following answers:

1.    I love learning- it is so important to me to be able to expand my knowledge. Whether it is education, English, or lacrosse, it is important to me to always learn and hear other people’s perspectives.

2.    I never want to lose my teaching certificate- in today’s world, you never know what will happen with your job, but if you can continue to generate options for yourself you will be in a better position than if you don’t.

3.    I have the opportunity to take course without cost- while I work at a college, I want to utilize the resources available to me, one of those is to further my education.

4.    I can apply classroom teaching techniques to my team- teaching and coaching go hand in hand and continuing to develop my philosophies and teaching skills will make me a better teacher and coach.

I feel that I have greatly expanded my knowledge of 21^st century skills and how they can be applied to students of today. I have really gained an understanding of how important keeping up with technology and how important it is to the classroom.

I truly feel that the tools (Mindmeister, dropbox, GoogleDocs, etc) will be tools that I will use throughout the future in my personal and professional life.  

Change can be Difficult

Change can be a scary and difficult thing. Especially when you have completed a task a certain way for so long. I think technology in education is something that causes a lot of stress for teachers, and maybe students. Using something, like dropbox, or Google Docs, or MindMeister, if you have never used them can be a frightening process.

You ask yourself questions like:

What happens if the information gets lost?

What happens if I cannot access the Internet?

What if it does not present the way that I want it to?

And while all of these questions are valid, it really comes down to taking a risk and knowing that in the end, you will be a better teacher and student as a result. 

Rubrics & GoogleDocs

I think that working with rubrics is a great idea. I wish that I had them when I was going through school. It does two things:

1.    It allows the students a clear understanding of what is expected.

2.    It allows teachers the chance to grade more efficiently by checking off what the student has.

Rubrics are excellent tools for education.

I truly have enjoyed getting to know GoogleDocs. Using the tool in this class has inspired me to use the tool during the summer to pass information along to my students. I will no longer be printing out their workouts, but sending through GoogleDocs, since all of our students have Google accounts.

A New Kind of Projection

Yesterday I was in the classroom at the local middle school I have been volunteering in. It was great to be back in the classroom and interacting with the students and the teachers.

I noticed that the teacher, instead of using a typical overhead projector, was using a projector that scans the document through the computer and projects it onto the screen. I have not been in the classroom for a while and so this piece of technology was impressive to me. 

In response to assessing students, I think that portfolios and rubrics are an excellent way to assess students. Rubrics provide students with a framework for what they should be completing. It gives them guidelines on how to do well and what a teacher will be assessing their work on. Portfolios allow students with all strengths to assemble their best work and put a variety of assignments together in order to do well. Making the portfolio an e-portfolio will allow students to showcase their use of technology and we can therefore assess their 21^st century skills even further. 

Other People's Blogs

Commenting on other people’s blogs is a fun way to interact with people that you don’t know. I follow a few running blogs and have never commented, simply because I really like to just read them. But after this activity I will comment more!

I commented on three of our classmate’s blogs. I love how everyone’s personalities come out in their postings and in the creativity used to set up the blogs. I liked Mary’s bookshelf and the colors that Erica used. I like how some posts can be long and others short and you are still contributing to the education world.

The first external blog I commented on is: http://www.21stcenturycollaborative.com/2011/03/1811/#comment-1548

The post I read examined how education is becoming to standardized and how teachers should be able to teach and not be dictated to. It was very insightful and refreshing to hear others feel the same way that I do.

The second blog I visited and commented on is:

http://thegatewayto21stcenturyskills.blogspot.com/2011/03/connecting-dots.html?showComment=1300967909736#c3822738268629757897

This post looked at constellations and how teaching can be intertwined amongst the subjects. I really liked how the author provided insight into how we view the constellations in the past and how we will view them in the future. The author also provides example of lessons for each visitor to the site.

Google Docs

Yesterday, I was helping to edit research papers that the students are writing in the class I am volunteering in. As I was doing so, I could not help but think how much the students in this class would benefit from a program like Google Docs. I feel that being able to share and edit the papers through this tool would be much more environmentally friendly as well as resourceful. The students could see the corrections right away and be able to continue working without have to re-print every day. 

A New Setting

In order to continue to maintain my certification in teaching I have been advised to volunteer within a classroom. The reasoning behind this is so that I can keep my classroom management skills sharp and so that I can keep the teaching of lessons sharp as well.

My first day was this past Monday, March 21, 2011. I will continue to work within the 8^th grade Reading & Language Arts (RLA) classroom for the remainder of the school year, once per week. I go to the school for one hour every Monday, during the writing lab. While I am there, I will be working with the students on their research papers. Some of the students are “low level” learners and need some extra attention that is where I come in.

Immediately upon walking into the classroom, I noticed the teacher, Ms. B (shortened so that I can ensure anonymity), using her computer to display lessons and objectives. Since I have not been in the classroom in a while, I was impressed that she was using this form of communication as opposed to the chalk or white board.

When Mrs. B was finished with her introduction to the lesson, she told the student to bring out the laptops and continue working on their assignments. I thought that the school being able to provide laptops to the students in the classroom was a great resource. The students did not get to keep them, but just having one for each student during the class is important. The students worked, and I observed for this first day.

The students were researching using the Internet to complete research papers. They were using search engines like Google to find articles on their topics. Additionally, Mrs. B stated that she regularly communicates through email to the students. This is a great use of 21^st Century Skill.