Final Reflection Entry

This class was one of the most interesting and challenging I have had in a long time. The challenges were mostly of my own making, but I believe I learned a lot from this semester, in part because of all the things I did wrong. I particularly enjoyed these blog posts because they gave me the opportunity to write about subjects and ideas which I had no been familiar with until taking this class. The textbook introduced me to all sorts of great ideas for incorporating technology into lessons - one of my particular favorites was the concept of mindtools, or assistants to the learner rather than the thing through which the student learns.
One of the key objectives of this class was to learn how to communicate through technology in an effective manner and I must admit that I failed to keep in contact with you Professor Coleman, when I began to slide down on the grading scale I should have been in much more frequent contact. I know that you were trying to assist me as best you could, and for that I thank you. I have learned that effective communication can be the difference between successful course outcomes and a failure. Luckily, I have managed to achieve success in this course in many areas and I have learned the importance of effective online communication.
Our discussions were always fascinating because of the various degree of opinions which ensued. Some believed the role of technology should be reduced in student's classroom time, while others felt that in order to best move forward it would be better to up the ante and create more opportunities to integrate technology into our student's lessons. I feel personally that caution is never a bad idea - but neither is progress. We must always strive to keep our students thinking and moving forward, as well as ourselves.
I am particularly proud of my teacher website/portfolio for the class. I felt that project was my finest work here, and that it was the moment I really pieced together all the course objectives for this class. The various photographs featured throughout were sourced as fair use and I was able to create all of my pages in a seamless manner while informing potential students of my expectations of them in class, and including hyperlinks to a number of online resources as well as all of my work for this course. I enjoyed using twitter for educational purposes and I believe that it will be a great way of quickly communicating any updates or announcements for classes for future students.
My Teachers Website
I felt that some of the best examples of learning in this classroom came from sources traditionally thought of as opposing education. Minecraft is a videogame and yet it is being utilized as a modicum of learning how to compose music and a whole host of other lessons that we often think of as firmly outside the digital realm. It is incredible how much technology can do for us as educators, and for our students. It is also incredible how much it will change even before I begin my career as an educator.

I have to thank you for the opportunity to learn in such a collaborative environment - this has been an incredibly interesting introduction to the various means of including and using technology as an educator and I am absolutely excited to use them within my own classroom! Thank you again for the lessons included here, and I hope to see you in the future through Twitter or some other tech-based communication platform!

References

Maloy, Robert, Verock-O’Loughlin,Ruth-Ellen, Edwards, Sharon A., and Woolf, Beverly Park (2013). Transforming Learning with New Technologies. 2nd Edition. Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc.

Creativity Strand Reflection!

This is my final blog post for this class! I'd like to wrap up by discussing the K-12 Conference I viewed and by reiterating how helpful this class was in understanding the utilization of technology for education, as well as the ways this conference illustrates that utilization!

I viewed the Creativity Strand conference and it was enlightening! The utilization of traditional teaching methods and integration of technologies were, in each of the examples presented, seamless!
In this conference video, educators from around the world showed off their classrooms and lessons. In this case, the educators were all artistically motivated - though many incorporated various subjects within their lessons, the best example being Samuel Wright's incorporation of music into math lessons at the Korean school he taught at. In that video, Wright showed students how the Pythagorean theorem could relate to music by having the students access a music app on iPads provided by the school. Again, within this lesson technology was utilized in a streamlined way which felt very natural within the lesson.
The entire conference was very interesting to watch because much of it focused on the students, and the way they fulfilled the lesson and learned for themselves. The teacher involvement seemed secondary, and that was by design. Much of the lesson planning focused upon what the students could contribute.
As a future educator, this was a wonderful example to follow. I plan to teach social studies - history and/or political science, along with other studies on the people of the world. With that being said, I am a huge fan of theater. This conference showed me how I could incorporate theatrical and artistic elements into my lessons in history! It also showed me that technology can be used in the most interesting ways - I never would have thought of a multiplayer game like Minecraft as a tool for students to learn about musical composition, as well as a new tool to create music in an entirely new and unconventional way.
I cannot wait to see more conferences like this - I feel like seeing examples of student learning is one of the best ways for me to learn how to be a better educator! My time is best served trying to suit the needs of my students, so seeing them learning in ways which make them happy and engage them in the process makes me very excited for future possibilities! It also gives me a few ideas on potential lesson plans for the future, and certainly shows me ways of presenting lessons which do not just involve the traditional lecturing format.

Digital Blog Post L - Integrating Technology in the Classroom

This chapter is all about integration of technology within the class. Integration is the way educators use technology to connect with ideas about the real world and the lessons they are teaching. It means they find ways to incorporate it continuously into the learning experience. It is part of a larger phenomena known as educational change, which refers to the process by which teachers introduce new ideas and patterns into the educational process. The integration of technology is a form of educational change which many have embraced.
One of the most important issues the chapter brought up was the participation gap and digital inequality. Though we often think of the internet today as a necessity, it is astounding that so many students go without access to useful forms of technology for education. In more wealthy households, students are more likely to use the internet every day, and they are able to use it often for a better educational experience it. But poor families - and in particular, poor minorities - are less likely to be able to afford broadband connections. So in recent years they have turned to the smart phone, but due to the differences between the smart phone and typical computer, school work is not as easily done on the smart phone. Thus, it's capacity in education is diminished to an entertainment device. Therefore, as an educator, one of my jobs is to find a way to enhance and embolden the experiences my students have with technology.
Another important issue the chapter discusses is the way technology and our school cultures interact and influence one another. The way schools currently function, technology is limited by the organizational structures in place. The books main point is that change cannot come from the top of the organizational structure downward, rather the ideas should flow from teachers, students, and communities up into administrations...
And one of the cooler terms of this chapter was mindtools, a term created by David Jonassen to describe computer based tools and learning environments that have been adapted to function as intellectual partners with the learner. The concept is about learning with computers rather than through them, and it means that the computer supports the learner through doing and supports exploration, as well as knowledge construction. The computer essentially plays the role of a helper, or friend, and assists in the learning rather than being the tool of learning.

Maloy, Robert, Verock-O’Loughlin,Ruth-Ellen, Edwards, Sharon A., and Woolf, Beverly Park (2013). Transforming Learning with New Technologies. 2nd Edition. Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc.