EDUC 5306:
Educational Applications of Technology
"I am indebted to my father for living, but to my teacher for living well." ~ Alexander the Great
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The technology rich unit plan was a very helpful tool for incorporating all of the things that I learned throughout the course. My unit plan was about the four seasons and aimed at a second grade classroom. I think that allowing students to use and become familiar with technology at a young age is vital to their futures as 21st century learners. Communication and collaboration are key for the future of all students. This activity includes a technological assessment and conforms to standard II: The Master Technology Teacher selects and administers appropriate technology-related assessments on an ongoing basis and uses the results to design and improve instruction. This unit also uses standard IV because it would require helping students learn to use a new technology in Prezi: The Master Technology Teacher serves as a resource regarding the integration of assistive technologies and accessible design concepts to meet the needs of all students.
My TEASe was a simple introductory lesson to my unit on the four seasons. I used it as the anticipatory set for the science lessons that the kids would receive for that unit. I loved that I got to incorporate things like Frozen and Tom and Jerry that really speaks to kids at that age. I think that learning to use iMovie will not only add to my teaching, but to what I can teach students as I move on to 5th and 6th grade English next year. This also used standard III because I had to find all of the clips on the Internet and site them: The Master Technology Teacher applies knowledge of digital learning competencies including Internet research, graphics, animation, Web site mastering, and video technology.
My Web 2.0 tool was an application called StoryBuddy. StoryBuddy was a really interesting and useful tool that aids in comprehension and in creative writing. I thought that using the app as a story retelling tool would help to assess comprehension, and that using it as a creative writing tool for stories and pictures would be a really fun way for students to use technology to publish their original stories.
This lesson plan was helpful in guiding students about how to use Microsoft Excel. I think that this lesson showed the students how to take the data they collected and put it in an easier to read form. I really feel like this was a fun and more interesting way to teach the TEKS of graphing and tables and make it more fun and technologically enriching for the students. I think that this lesson exhibits technology standard I: The Master Technology Teacher effectively models and applies classroom teaching methodology and curriculum models that promote active student learning through the integration of technology and addresses the varied learning needs of all students.
This assignment was helpful because it brought to my attention many technology related products that teachers use in their classrooms to help students with special needs. I was not aware of all of the different ways that technology can assist students with learning disabilities. I also found that learning the differences between technology services and devices. It is really important to remember as a teacher that providing technology to assist learning is only the first part of the equation. A student cannot benefit from that technology with guidance and support from the teacher.
This assignment was really important, because I definitely don't want to break the law. It is really important in any field to know what the copyright laws are for your profession. It was really interesting to learn how different the laws are for educational purposes, rather than business purposes. This was also fun because, though this wasn't my first time to use it, I really enjoy using Prezi as an online presentation tool.
I thought that the treasure hunt was a really fun way to introduce the students to using research skills in a technologically advanced way. I thought it was fun to be able to use this as a way to get them off to a good start with research. The essential questions really helps the students to hand pick the information that they find and to decide what is useful and important. I have found that a skill students lack is researching information and picking out the important parts. I think this activity was really helpful with learning that skill. This skill incoporates stadard V: The Master Technology Teacher facilitates appropriate, research-based technology instruction by communicating and collaborating with educational stakeholders; mentoring, coaching, and consulting with colleagues; providing professional development opportunities for faculty; and making decisions based on converging evidence from research.
The glog for chapter 7 was a fun and new way (for me) to make a graphic organizer that helps to summarize content. I thought glogster was a little more interactive than traditional blogs and encouraged more graphic content, rather than just text. Making a graphic organizer is a great way to really retain information and I think this would be a useful project in the classroom for students to retain information from their own lessons.
The group book project was very informative. I liked the book that we read, but more than that, it gave me an opportunity to work in Google Docs with my peers rather than just commenting on student work. I really thought that Nicholas Carr made a great point about the way the Internet is changing our brains and I not only enjoyed researching opposing viewpoints, but also on creating my own based upon the myriad of information that I found.
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