Digital Badge # J-Chapter 4

Teaching Goals, Methods, and Procedures (How to Teach)- While reading this section of the chapter, I thought how hard it must be when you first become a teacher. To know the right procedures in order for your students to learn things successfully must be hard to do at the beginning. I have had the experience of having a first year teacher as my teacher my freshman year in high school. He did seem a little confused at what exactly we were suppose to do, then at almost the end of the school year I did notice how much he grew as a teacher and his experienced. Then I have had teachers who have taught for over 20 years which "what to teach" was easy for them, or well it seemed like it. I guess as time passes by things get a lot easier and that is when you start including more technology as part as your lesson of the day. Good thing is that I have learned of quite a few in this class, which will be beneficial for me in the future. 

Learning Assessments (Knowing What Students Have Learned)- In my opinion, I really do think this is so important. It is important to get your students feedback because that is when you find out how good they retained what you just taught. Most of the time online surveys, digital portfolios, or student response systems are the best way to get feedback. Some students are bad at taking tests and quizzes period. So why affect their grade while their is other ways of testing their learning. For example in this class we do so many assignments that includes us reading the book, when we do our blogs our professor is able to see our understanding. Other things such as in class discussions and online discussions, are able to be used. I am not against tests and quizzes at all, but there are definitely variety of ways, also fun ways to know what students have learned. Once again this class has done a pretty good job at showing us a lot. Thank You !

Using technology in Lesson Planning- This has actually been the purpose of this whole class. We have learned about all the technology and softwares we are able to use and include in our lesson plans. There are so many out there for us, and when I become a teacher I am sure that there will be a lot more. Technology allows us to be creative while we also allow our students to be creative and learn in a fun interacting method. Technology allows us to do many different things and using it in lesson plans is what every teacher should be doing especially teaching the 21st century students which are more likely to learn faster using it. There are so many engaging free educational websites, also apps that support lesson planning. Overall technology does a pretty good job at supporting lesson development. 

Resources: Maloy, R. W., Verock-O'Loughlin, R., Edwards, S., & Woolf, B. (2011).Transforming learning with new technologies. Boston: Pearson/Allyn and Bacon.

Digital Badge#I-Chapter 12

Photo Credits To: Jean Carla Limpias on Word Cloud Generator

The opening story of this chapter is a great example of two teachers using technology integration and educational change. Both Tim and Heather used all the technology tools they had in their classroom and included them in their lesson plan. What good can technology be if you do not make any use of it? I understand sometimes teachers do not know how to use them but that is why we should be ready for change and learning. We can not move on from old ways until we make an effort to learn new ways. What these two teachers are doing is great and it should be exactly what every teacher should do. Starting with a tool a week is a good step. When I become a teacher I will definitely be like both Tim and Heather. 

  Stages of Technology Integration- This section of the book is basically the steps you need to take to integrate technology into your classroom or in which stages some teachers are currently in their classroom. Like the book says as moving from "dabbling" to "doing old things in old ways" to :doing old things in new ways" to "doing new things in new ways". I though it was pretty neat how these stages are all labeled right. How every teacher can be at different stages teaching the same grade or class. If I were to be a teacher now I would definitely like to be in the last stage which is Invention. This stage is where teachers basically start to experiment many instructional patterns and ways of relating to students. I think this is the stage where all teachers should be at this point especially teaching the 21st century. When teachers do this, it enables the students to understand things a lot better and participate more because technology is their "thing" . I think just like the book says "when teachers make technology a regular resource for learning, students benefit."

Technology Integration Issues- All of the six issues that occur for classroom teachers that directly affect their efforts to ingrate technology into teaching, the one I would agree with the most and put as the number one would be "Unwillingness to change favorite lesson plans". This includes those teachers that have been teaching for ever who are so used to doing their lesson plans a certain way and now they think is too late or too lazy to change their ways. The answer to that is stop being so negative about technology and change your ways a little. You never know how good things can turn out to be until you try them. Most of these teachers that are stuck on their old ways, do not know what they are missing on. technology can make these lesson plans they have been doing for years a lot more interesting and fun to do in class. 

Overall, this chapter talked about a lot of what i already know and common sense concepts. I did learn some cool statistics presented and was not surprised at all from what I saw. One thing I did not mention that I loved the thought of was the One-to-one laptop computing. Great chapter, good concepts to know about that would help my in my career !

Here are a few clips that I found on youtube that were pretty interesting, that had to do with this chapter. 

Resources: Maloy, R. W., Verock-O'Loughlin, R., Edwards, S., & Woolf, B. (2011).Transforming learning with new technologies. Boston: Pearson/Allyn and Bacon.

Digital Badge H-Chapter 9

     

All of the tools presented in chapter 9 are creative digital tools that can be used  in all different grade levels. These digital tools can be used with all types of learning styles while expressing their creativity and learning new and cool ways to show their understanding.

Podcasts as a Learning Technology- I never really thought of podcasts being used in a classroom. I think it would be a pretty cool tool to use with students though. They are able to learn to be creative and the teacher is able as well to see each and everyones skills and understanding. Podcasts can allow teachers to assign a student for a summary of what they have learned each day, or to create videos to discuss with other students in their classroom or even students from a different class but the same grade level. Teachers are able to evaluate these kids understanding while also being able to see how they are able to improve their teaching skills themselves. Using podcasts to create a portfolio for each student can be something useful to see their progress throughout the school year. Thinking about the advantages of creating podcasts in a classroom, I am more convinced that this is something I would like to incorporate in my class in the future. 

Digital Storytelling- I have decided that if I become a teacher, I would either like to teach Language Arts or ELL students. Using digital storytelling with these students would be fun for them but also challenging. They will have to create summaries on books they are assigned to read or books they have read for fun. This can help other students choosing the right book to read next. Digital storytelling can also be used to have kids do presentations on other things related to the class. I have never had this experience as a student before, but this seems so interesting to me. I think it would also be very good to use in my future classroom.

Next-generation presentation tools- I have heard of prezi before but I have never really used it and figured it out until I took this class. I have always seen people use prezi for a class project or class presentations but it never occurred to me of making one. Last week, it was my first time trying it out. It was not as hard as I thought it would be to create one. I had fun while I was doing it, I think I did a good job for my first one. I will continue to create prezis whenever I have presentations due because I like the whole set up and cool backgrounds you could use. Animoto was another tool I have just discoverd in this class and I want to mention how disappointed I am that I now just did. I think animo to is a cool tool to create video clips and although it could be used in classrooms you can use it for personal use as well. I think I will create one of these with all the pictures of my future wedding. I did see a clip made by someone else and the idea of it and creativity made want to do one as well. Glogster is another tool, but I find  this one a little hard to create. I have not really gave it a chance, but I think on my next blog I will see what I can create.

Resources: 

Maloy, R. W., Verock-O'Loughlin, R., Edwards, S., & Woolf, B. (2011).Transforming learning with new technologies. Boston: Pearson/Allyn and Bacon.

Digital Badge #G- Chapter 10

   

 Creating Culturally Relevant Curriculum and Instruction-  I have to agree a lot with this concept. It is true that every student is more interested in learning about something they can relate their own life experiences to. When you could relate your school work to your life it is much easier to understand or remember. I feel like throughout all the years I've attended school, when I relate things to my life I find it easier to understand the subject. The book gave the example of the math problem, my example would be anatomy class. In order to remember certain definitions I would think of my body and how it functions, it would help a lot more to make sense of it. Another example would be when writing essays, I get a better grade on one that I can relate most to it instead of something I can't or don't know anything about. The fact that techonology  can place curriculum topics within the context of known situations its wonderful and very helpful. 

Expanding Teaching Methods and Approaches- The more ways we can have students communicating with each other the better. When students are able to communicate with each other they create better bonds. They are able to get to know other people outside your regular circle with different backgrounds or beliefs .This gives them the opportunity to learn new things. Having blogs for students or working in groups helps a lot for all of this to happen. In some way or another students eventually have to say something. The fact that they will know their classmates a little more than, this will help them feel more part of their classroom and more confident in sharing new ideas .Whereas students that are in a class with no form of communicating, thats when they start to feel left out and they are divided into groups where they think they fit in. 

Assistive Technology To Reach Diverse Learners- I think this is very important to include in a classroom for individual with disabilities to do things they might otherwise not be able to do. I had the chance to experience this first hand my senior year in high school. I took the teaching assisting class we would facilitate another teacher for a whole period. Of course I chose the kids with disabilities. Being in their classroom with kids with all types of disabilities where the teacher had everything she needed to help these students succeed as if they had no problem. I did see there was one of the keyboards with the large keyboard lettering for one of the students. Another one would use a program on the computer that would read her the story she chose to read for the day.

In conclusion, I learned a lot after reading this chapter. All the concepts brought upon the chapter were really interesting to read and relate to it. This is a great example why I enjoy doing blogs for this class, because are assignments let me relate to my own personal beliefs and life experiences, therefor is a lot easier for me to write about. 

Photo Credits to : Ingoism on Flickr 

References:

Maloy, R. W., Verock-O'Loughlin, R., Edwards, S., & Woolf, B. (2011).Transforming learning with new technologies. Boston: Pearson/Allyn and Bacon.