Game Plan

Developing my personal Game Plan with seamlessly integrated technology as I explore strategies that strengthen my confidence and proficiency seems like a very challenging undertaking. I am so glad there is a process I can work through to develop, implement, monitor and evaluate my personal game plan. I am very apprehensive about this concept.
They say that effective teachers model and apply the National Educational Technology Standards for students as they design, implement and assess learning experiences to engage students to improve learning. Well of course what teacher doesn’t want to be an effective teacher that engages student in their learning process.
The first step in this game plan is to identify and set a goal. I have chosen to focus on Design and Develop Digital-Age Learning Experiences and Assessments and Model Digital-Age Work and Learning.
Teachers design, develop, and evaluate authentic learning experiences and assessments incorporating contemporary tools and resources to maximize content learning in content and to develop the knowledge, skills, and attitudes identified in the NETS*S.
I wish to focus on part:
a. Teachers will design or adapt relevant learning experiences that incorporate digital tools and resources to promote student learning and creativity.
c. Teachers will customize and personalize learning activities to address students’ diverse learning styles, working strategies, and abilities using digital tools and resources.

New technology skills and opportunities move at a very rapid pace and for many people, power point presentations are “old news”. While others are advancing to smart boards and ebooks and a gazillion other new inventions, I am happy to learn some of the old tricks that seem pretty new to me.

My game plan for strengthening my confidence in using digital tools and resources and to customize learning activities to meet the needs of diverse learning styles, I have decided to learn to prepare lessons using power point.

The second area I hope to develop is Model Digital-Age Work and Learning.
Teachers exhibit knowledge, skills and work representative of an innovative professional in a global and digital society.

This seems to be an ever growing idea both in my school district and in this course. I plan to become more familiar with this whole concept of global collaboration. I plan to participate in doc sharing and global communication to locate, analyze, evaluate and use information to support learning.

Reflection Final Blog Posting

Reflecting on My Personal Theory of Learning caused me to think about who I really am and what I believe is important in education. It is hard in a few short paragraphs to truly express all of my philosophies and theories on what I believe make a successful learning experience but I am finding that I question everything and trusting nothing. I believe that my first responsibility should be to my students and not a bureaucratic, governmental organization that is not even connected to what is happening in my classroom.
In this course we learned about many new ideas and theorists that have unique philosophies about education and what seems to provide the latest and greatest success stories in education. Although there are many great theorist and many that are eager to sell their newest theory to us as teachers I am careful and reluctant to embrace many of these theories. Past history has proven that many of them are just theories and the ideas and philosophies that were cutting edge twenty years ago are no longer ideas that are considered valuable. I remember a very trusted mentor once told me to find my core values in teaching and stick to them. When new philosophies and new ideas come your way, which they surely will, evaluate them with an open mind and if they connect with your core values, embrace them, if they do not connect with your core then reject them and move on.
I think some of us as educators never question the value of some of these ideas and philosophies that influence us. We just jump on the band wagon with little or no thought to where we are heading. This course has made me reevaluate who I am and what my core values in education are.

In regard to long term goals, I know that I cannot teach what I do not know and this has caused me to seek new understanding in technology skills. Also teaming efforts at my school are taking on a new technology format very similar to blogs. Through these teaming efforts all student will benefit through collaboration efforts of a support team. Our teaming efforts will be ongoing and perfected throughout the coming years.

Immediate adjustments that I will make in my instructional practices include focusing on a few of the 9 categories of instruction suggested by Dr. Debra Pickering such as teaching compare and contrast using specific instructional guidelines and note taking.

Connectivism and Social Learning and Cooperative Learning

Of all the Learning styles I find the Connectivism the most fascinating. It boggles my mind to think that we have arrived at an age where there is so much knowledge floating around through the air waves. We live in a time where we can continually be connected with other. Our environment is becoming increasingly more complex and our ability to stay current with new trends in technology is overwhelming.
I wonder if the trend in education is to move toward and online learning environment where the majority of learning takes place in a network environment. This would fundamentally change the entire educational system. I hope that we never lose site of the importance of the teacher student relationship. I hope we never move to this extreme type of classroom.
There were two statements in the video, Connectivism as a Learning Theory I that I wish to comment on. I agree with the statement that knowledge is networked. (George Siemens) I think that means that we have the opportunity to learn and teach one another. I think that can be true in both the classroom situation and also in the world as we interact with one another. However there was another statement that I disagree with. The statement was Knowledge is not out there, it is something we create. (George Siemens) I absolutely think this is a false statement. To me it speaks of the arrogance of man. I believe knowledge is out there and it is up to us to find it and discover it but that does not mean that man created knowledge.
When I think of cooperative learning in the classroom, I think of students working together to create a common project. There is collaboration and lots of conversation and the group is responsible for everyone in the group. This is one learning technique among many learning techniques, and as with all learning styles they should be used with moderation and variety. Teachers should consider a variety of styles so as to meet the needs of a variety of student’s learning styles.

Constructionisum and Generating Hypotheses

Constructionist Theory & Hypotheses
Constructionists focus on approaches that emphasize the role and responsibility of the learner. Everything appears to be about what we can do to support the learner and how the learner learns. We try to build and create and accommodate the learners, which in my opinion is good to a point.
There are six tasks that teachers can use to help students generate and test hypotheses. These include a systems analysis where students study parts and make predictions about what would change if parts were altered or removed, problem solving where they look at various solutions, historical investigations, where students look at historical events where there is controversy, invention where students examine a need and work out a solution, experimental inquiry, where students make informal hypotheses about why or how something happened, and decision making, where students decide which choice makes the most sense. (Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kuhn, M., & Malenoski, K. (2007). All of these sound like a great ways to assist students in learning; however I have reservation about their usefulness in primary classes.
I often wonder what we are doing to our educational system. Do we take investigation opportunities to extremes? Should we provide opportunities for students to investigate and hypotheses IF their basic academic skills are not proficient? I think our students are less motivated and less educated and less able to think on their own than they were five years ago and we as educators keep trying to come up with some new and improved version of teaching them. In both the Constructionist Theory and the How to generate testing hypotheses it appears that students are investigating and creating all kinds of things but many do not have the necessary skills they need to help them excel, things like reading and understanding, and understanding money and how it works for you.
Perhaps these investigative, problem solving, analyzing, experimental inquiries systems are suitable or even beneficial in the upper grades but in the primary grades I believe they must be used sparingly. The primary grades are the foundation of the entire educational system of a child. If the foundation is not a solid one then the other educational years become a struggle. I believe there is no question that the young student could have many investigative opportunities in science. But the core academic subjects need to be taught with exactness.

Cognitivism in Practice

There are many cognitive learning practices that are extremely beneficial in the primary grades. I teach second grade and have had great success with teaching students skills such as "note taking" which is more commonly seen in upper grades. I find that teaching students to take notes and then referring back to to notes is very beneficial for writing and science and social studies. There are also many advanced organizers that have been created and simplified for elementary students. I think finding what works for your style is the key to success in any teaching experience.

Virtual Field Trips and Mapping

Wow!!!!!! Virtual Field Trips for me did not turn out the way I expected it to. When I was first exposed to Virtual Field Trips I thought they were the coolest, most unique technology I have ever seen. Naturally I was searching for a Virtual Field Trip that was similar to what I had experienced earlier. I spent every night searching and researching something that would be appropriate for second graders because that is what I teach. Working all day with an extremely intense agenda which included publishing a book, preparing for open house and practicing for a dinosaur program, the week has been over the top busy..I spent every night and all day Saturday working on this assignment. My first web attempt was a failure. After completing this Virtual Field trip and Concept Web experience I discovered a very important insight. I will probably never use this technology in my classroom mainly because it requires to much time to plan and also because I don't have enough computers to facilitate it... Something work out and something don't... this one doesn't work for me but I bet it works great for middle school and high school..

Behavorism

It appears that the philosophy behind behaviorism is being redefined. Behaviorism is now most beneficial only when used as a tutorial but the old operant conditioning of reinforcement of desirable behaviors and punishment for undesirable behaviors is no longer considered a valuable practice. I personally think that Behaviorism still has a valid place in the field of education and not just as a tutorial mechanism. I think many children of today do not have a clear understanding of what behaviors are acceptable and what behaviors are not acceptable in a classroom. I think it is important to teach and reinforce positive behaviors so that the children have a clear understanding of what is expected. I think that the word punishment should be changed to discipline. Discipline is really teaching not punishment. Behaviorism is still used in many classrooms but it appears that the trend seems to be away from this theory. Once again the pendulum in education is shifting. Why is that? Why must we always throw out the old theories and practices? Why must we always be seeking for the new and improved formula. Sometimes the old tried and true practices are the best.

Reinforcing Effort is a concept that is near and dear to my heart. I believe Effort is the most important factor in achievement (H.Pitler 2007). The amount of success achieved on any given task is directly related to the about of effort you have put forth. This is very evident in the classroom. Those students that put forth the effort to be successful students usually are successful students. Self efficacy is directly related to students achievements. Self efficacy is a person's level of belief in their ability to achieve. This idea plays a major role in a person's motivation. I never thought I'd meet a student I could not motivate but I have meet one this year. Life is tough when you have no self efficacy.