10-5364+Teaching+with+Tech.

Teaching with Technology Course Reflection

The Google site created by our team can be accessed [|here].

10-5364 Teaching with Technology
Week 1 - The readings and videos this week were thought provoking. In some instances they seem to go against my school district's current philosophy of ensuring the curriculum is taught as planned rather than allowing for more constructivist processes in the classroom. Reading through the chapter from __How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School__ (Bransford, Brown, & Cocking 2000) brought some interesting points to my attention. The most thought-provoking is the concept that teachers need to develop deeper understanding of their subject matter. "Helping teachers become comfortable with the role of learner is very important. Providing them with access to subject-matter expertise is also extremely important. New developments in technology provide avenues for helping teachers and their students gain wider access to expertise." The ability of teachers to develop a deep understanding of the concepts they teach is vital to their ability to lead student learning. I also found it encouraging to learn that the National Board certification process requires structured reflection about a person's teaching. (Bransford, Brown & Cocking 2000). According to the chapter research proves this to be a valuable tool in improving teaching along with teacher collaborations. While these seem logical for teacher improvement, the article also points out that it is seldom incorporated into teacher staff development or planning time. While most teachers can recite the levels of Bloom's Taxonomy, and many the revised version, the chart included in __Using Technology with Classroom Instruction that Works__ (Pitler, Hubbell, Kuhn and Malenoski, 2007) provides an interesting look at specific strategies that are proven to work well in advancing student learning. As the chart shows identifying similarities and differences as generating the largest percentage gain followed by summarizing and note taking, I will be incorporating these strategies more often in my own classroom. The articles about social networking lead to some in depth thinking about how these technologies can be implemented in the classroom effectively. The potential for these technologies seems great, but not without it's potentials for abuse or as a distraction with students. These issues must be addressed by the teachers in order to effectively utilize the power of the social networking tools. The lectures provided links to the [|CAST Web site]. This site will provide a useful tool not only for this course, but also as a reference site to return to and share with colleagues. This includes information on Universal Design for Learning.

Week 2 - This week one of the most important things that I learned was how important collaboration can be. I am working with a team of three other educators and they are amazing. We were able to develop a lesson idea, share work responsibilities for our task, help each other out when we were stuck or had time constraints, and come up with much better ideas than we would have on our own. This week we truly functioned as a learning community/team and it was not only productive but fun too. We read a research report that compiled results of multiple research projects on the effectiveness of technology use in classrooms. Schater (1999) reports that students who use technology that has a clear purpose and is focused tend to have higher test scores and also more self-esteem. I found the self-esteem comments that were repeated throughout several of the studies Schater used to be an interesting side piece of information. Frequently we look for content mastery alone without considering the effect of success or motivation on the student's self-esteem, or in turn how an increase in self-esteem could positively affect the student's learning. Those additional considerations will help us as we move forward in our task to develop a lesson for a classroom of multiple level students.

Week 3- This week was challenging as we developed Universal Design for Learning (UDL) lesson plans, created our own eBook, collaborated on a team lesson and reflection and tried to incorporate technology into our lessons. The Center for Applied Special Technology (CAST) web site had good tutorials on the rationale and processes for using UDL. The basic premise is to ensure equal opportunities to the content for all learners. The videos this week showed students who were highly successful using technology that were informative and inspirational. The readings offered insights on teaching with technology and tips for using it successfully in the classroom. One particularly thought provoking segment was the section on student feedback. Pitler (2007) pointed out: "1. Feedback should be corrective in nature. 2. Feedback should be timely. 3. Feedback should be specific to a criterion. 4. Students can effectively provide some of their own feedback." Developing the e-book and UDL lesson were time consuming projects, but worth it in the end. I developed an e-book that tied to our group mythology lesson titled Athena. Each of our UDL lessons are available on our team Google site. My personal UDL lesson called for students to research gods and goddesses and use the information they gathered to create trading cards using an online program.

Week 4 - This week we worked to develop technology based learning activities for our lesson plans. The challenge was to make sure we could address all of the different needs in our classroom, including students who were disabled, LEP, G/T, or slow learners. Since this reflects the make up of many classrooms across the country, the assignment makes sense. Last week each of our team members focused on one specific group that was identified in the scenario. This week we developed the activities and lessons we had planned for each of those groups into a unit that could benefit the entire class and incorporated those same learning activities. The ability to do this will be crucial for technology leaders as we try to enable our colleagues in their use of various technologies to help customize learning for their particular groups of students. I found the videos to be inspiring this week as we saw what some very talented educators are doing in their own classrooms. By providing ideas for staff development for our unit developed to solve the scenario, we also had to think about the fact that "Many teachers remain uncertain as to how to embed technical training into instruction and are uncomfortable assuming the role of technical trainer in their classrooms. Because they lack strategies to integrate student computer skills efficiently and seamlessly into instruction, teachers are also concerned that training students to use technology will drastically reduce the amount of time dedicated to achieving mandated content standards." (Williamson & Redish, 2009). These are just some of the issues we were forced to address this week and by addressing them for our classroom scenario, we will be better prepared to address them in real classrooms in our own schools.

Week Five This week we were able to review our entire plan for assisting a teacher who was not skilled in technology in designing activities for her very diverse classroom. Working together to find activities for the various needs of the students in the scenario allowed each of us in the group to use the ideas and suggestions of the others to improve our own ideas and branch them off to allow more differentiation than we would have developed on our own. It also allowed us the opportunity to see that teaching with technology did not necessarily mean using the newest, most expensive “toys,” but rather we could use easily accessible technologies to improve a lesson, make it more interesting for the students and at the same time allow for more differentiation to better meet the needs of a diverse group of students. The readings and discussions helped us focus on what a school of the 21st Century could really look like even without a large technology budget. As pointed out in Solomon & Schrum (2007), David Warlick suggests a school of the future where teachers blog weekly including a report blog that shares the upcoming topics for the week. “The school librarian subscribes to all of the teachers’ Monday report blogs and uses a shared spreadsheet to maintain an ongoing curriculum map of what’s being taught in the school as a way to support the teachers.” This is an easy to obtain future with technology and would support greater cross-curriculum integration what would ultimately benefit the students by giving them context for their learning in all subject areas. Bransford, J. D., Brown, A. L., & Cocking, R. R. (2000). Chapter 8. Teacher Learning. //How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School// (Expanded edition)pp194-205. Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press.

Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kuhn, M. & Malenoski, K. (2007). //Using Technology with Classroom Instruction that Works.// Alexandria, VA. Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD).

Schater, J. (1999). //The impact of education technology on student achievement: What the most current research has to say.// Santa Monica, CA: Milken Exchange on Education Technology. Retrieved March 1, 2011 from [].

Williamson, J. & Redish, T. (2009). //ISTE's Technology Facilitation and Leadership Standards.// Eugene, OR. International Society for Technology in Education.

Solomon, G. & Schrum, L. (2007). //Web 2.0 new tools, new schools.// Eugene, OR: International Society for Technology in Education.