Eight weeks has flown by quickly and shown several new pieces of technology that I haven't used before. I am at the end of a technology class for my master's degree. The class covered the use of technology in the classroom and how it can be used to make teaching more effective and meaningful. I have experienced blogs, podcasts, and wiki's, not to mention learned many ways to help my students.
At the beginning of the class, I was using the technology in my classroom to enhance my lessons and manage many routines that go with being a teacher (grading, attendance, etc.). In this class I have found new uses for some equipment and better uses for others. For example, I have added a passworded blog site to my class website, allowing my students to sign in and post to the morning's discussion question. This has worked as a warm-up and a way for my students to practice communicating in a safe manner on the internet. I have found ways to incorporate my current lessons so that I am using technology to teach my students 21st century skills. These are the skills that they will need to enter the workforce and be contributing members of society.
As a teacher, I have always felt that the students should direct the learning and I should be facilitating and ensuring that my students are having quality learning opportunities. I had the opportunity to help a future colleague during this eight weeks by having a student teacher. While I was reviewing and learning in this class, I was able to help guide her in her own teaching and help her design lessons that increase the amount of student-centered time in the classroom.
The internet has opened a whole new world of collaborating with others about what they are using technology for in their classrooms and how we can use what we have to teach those 21st century skills. Technology has always been of interest to me and I plan to continue to explore the technology I have in my classroom to enhance my teaching.
The two areas that I would like to focus attention to make better are redesigning lessons to meet 21st century skills and incorporating more technology into my lessons. Both of these goals are held back by the same obstacle, time. Several lessons that I currently teach are close and do not need much tweaking, however there are always units that can be improved especially after learning about more best practice ideas. As I get ready to teach units this spring, I will be reviewing and changing lesson to meet the needs of the 'digital natives'. Over the next two years, I would like to transform more of my lessons to include the technology that is available and search ways to make more technology available to my students.
During the last eight weeks, I have found many ways to raise my level of teaching and new ways to use what I have available. I have been able to share with my colleagues and student teacher different ways that we can reach our students in all subject areas. My students will hopefully be able to see a change in the ways things are done and how they are learning. My favorite part about this class was that the lessons were designed so that the students facilitated their won learning and it was immediately applicable in the 'real world'.
-Melissa
