Monitoring My GAME Plan Progress

So far things are looking good for my game plan. The only thing I need to do is brush-up on my VoiceThread skills. I feel for VoiceThreads to work for my engineering class I will need to complete a "dry run" with another teacher. I feel if we stay in contact on a daily basis for a couple weeks I will be able to work out all the kinks. My big concern will be if the VoiceThread site ever crashes and if so, how often.

I stay in contact with fellow engineering teachers and real-world engineers on a weekly, if not daily, basis. I have a hand-full of real-world engineers that are on a committee that I have. It is nice to know that students have a valid resource to rely on if questions should arise. I am a master teacher for the curriculum I teach which means I need to be up-to-date with curriculum revisions and new software being adding. During the summers I teach the engineering curriculum to entry level teachers. I teach at different universities which entails me to be a mentor throughout the year for the new teachers. This allows me to see what is working for these teachers and what I can learn from them.

Carrying Out My GAME Plan

In order for me to carry out my game plan I need to prepare myself with resources. The resources that will help me with my game plan include computers, various software’s, Project Lead the Way (PLTW) colleagues, real-world engineers, and my school website. Computers are used in my classroom on a daily basis. Students use computers to complete everything from online research to cutting-edge software. Every year I get together with my PLTW colleagues to revise or add information to the curriculum. This allows us to stay up-to-date with industry and engineering colleges. Also, I have the ability throughout the year to post and reply to post on a forum that PLTW teachers have access to. The real-world engineers will help me stay up-to-date with real-world problems along with adding support for students who may have questions or concerns on their projects throughout the year. I post information, lectures, notes, links, and have discussions on my school website with students enrolled in my classes. Additional information that I will need to acquire is the best and proper way to effectively use VoiceThreads. VoiceThreads will play a key role in students being able to virtually work with other students on a project.

I have been fortunate enough to have every one of these steps completed, with the exception of VoiceThreads, to carry out my game plan. I have enough computers in my lab for every student, up-to-date software installed on each computer, ability to communicate with my colleagues, access to real-world engineers, and my school website is completed. I am in the process of furthering my education on the use of VoiceThreads. VoiceThreads will come into play around the middle of the third nine weeks of school.

Developing Your Personal GAME Plan

As a technology education major and an engineering teacher, I perform all five of the National Educational Technology Standards for Students (NETS•S) on a daily basis. In order for me to stay current with these standards I need to create a game plan. In reference to the game plan; Cennamo, Ross, and Ertmer (2009) state, “The GAME plan enables you to customize your approach to learning tasks, to develop relevant skills that are important to you, and prepares you for lifelong relationships” (p. 4). The two NETS•S standards that I would like to focus on are Facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity and Engage in Professional Growth and Leadership.

Facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity states, teachers use their knowledge of subject matter, teaching and learning, and technology to facilitate experiences that advance student learning, creativity, and innovation in both face-to-face and virtual environments. My goal to strengthening my proficiency in this standard is to engage students in exploring real-world issues and solving authentic problems using digital tools and resources. The actions I will take to meet these goals will include me gathering information from real-world engineers to get up to date real-world problems for the students to solve, collaborating with other engineering teachers and the use of VoiceThreads during the virtual design project. I will monitor my actions throughout the year. If I am not receiving enough information I will search out new means of resources to reach my goals. I will evaluate my game plan by communicating with the students. I will receive their feedback on the real-world activities and projects we complete throughout the year.

Engage in Professional Growth and Leadership states, Teachers continuously improve their professional practice, model lifelong learning, and exhibit leadership in their school and professional community by promoting and demonstrating the effective use of digital tools and resources. My goal to strengthening my proficiency in this standard is to remain up to date in the engineering curriculum. I receive training each year to stay up to date with the engineering curriculums that I am trained in. This allows me to ask any questions I may have and learn new cutting edge technology to incorporate in the classroom. I will monitor my actions throughout the year. I have the ability to participate in a forum online where I can ask questions and receive feedback from other engineering teachers. I will evaluate my game plan by seeing what did and did not work for my teaching of the curriculum. I will reflect on the different strategies I used and make improvements where needed.

Resources:

Cennamo, K., Ross, J. & Ertmer, P. (2009). Technology Integration for Meaningful Classroom Use: A Standards-Based Approach. (Laureate Education, Inc., Custom ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.

Supporting Information Literacy and Online Inquiry in the Classroom

Through the past eight weeks I have broadened my insight on information literacy skills and learned how to teach these skills to students through inquiry-based learning. Students need to hone-in on their internet skills. This does not mean faster ways to find their favorite internet games or selecting three random websites to use as references but, the proper way for searching, evaluating, and synthesizing the information from the internet.

As Beth Phillips (2007) emphasizes, students need to use the ABC’s approach when looking at a web site. The ABC’s of a web site have students look for important information to validate the web site such as the authors name, the basis and content of the site, dates the information was published, and if there is an editor. These ABC’s will help students validate the information and see if the information is safe to use. I feel it is very important for students to validate their information so they understand that they are not re-writing something that may not be valid.

One of my favorite assignments we completed was a think out loud evaluation on a website. I used a camcorder to record my think out loud evaluation where I went through and used the ABC’s approach to validate the site. Along with the ABC’s approach, David Warlick (2007) stresses to look at the URL and see where the web site is coming from. If a site has a .gov, .org, or .edu typically the site will have valid information. Dot-Com sites are different being they are commercial web sites.

I feel that students need to understand the proper way for searching, evaluating, and synthesizing the information from the internet. Students need to ask questions throughout any activity they work on. I agree with Eagleton and Dobler (2007) statement which is, “The most compelling inquiry questions are student-generated” (p. 82). They need to be able to evaluate and respect the digital information they find. First they need to validate the information then they need to give proper credit to the owner(s). Finally, they need to understand that synthesizing is gathering information on a topic and then transforming that information into answers through a process of deduction.

References
Laureate Education, Inc. (Producer). Information Literacy: Evaluating Information (DVD). New Literacies. Baltimore, MD: Author
Laureate Education, Inc. (Producer). A Teacher's Perspective: Evaluating Information Online (DVD). New Literacies. Baltimore, MD: Author
Eagleton, M. B., & Dobler, E. (2007). Reading the Web: Strategies for Internet inquiry. New York: The Guilford Press.

Personal Theory of Learning

I feel that students learn best when they have ideas or goals set for the day and for the end of a unit. I see my students succeed when I incorporate technology into the lecture along with not allowing students to have down-time. My curriculum is broking up into 4 units with multiple lessons, activities, and a major project for each unit. When I start a new unit with the students we go over what the unit is about and what the outcome should be. Also, I write daily objectives on the board, so the students can see what the goals are going to be for that day.

I use a lot of technology in the classroom, but there is always room to grow as technology will continue to improve. My goal is to stay up to date with current technology and to incorporate new technology into my curriculum. The first piece of technology I plan to use in the future is a VoiceThread. Students will have the ability to use a VoiceThread when they work on their virtual design challenge with other students from around the States. The other piece of technology I would like to incorporate into my curriculum is online testing for students. Online testing would allow the students to take exams and have their scores generated for them right away. This would make my life easier being the computer will do the grading which would allow me to spend more time helping students or preparing lesson plans.

Reference
Lever-Duffy, J. & McDonald, J. (2008). Theoretical Foundations (Laureate Education, Inc., custom ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc.

Can we go on a virtual field trip?

There are three video clips here.

Connectivism and Social Learning in Practice

This week I explored how social learning theories provide students with the ability to be activily engaged in constructing artifacts and conversing with each other. I have my students spend about half their time through the school year working collabrativly and the other half working indivdually. I feel students have a sence of control when they work collabrativly because they are in-charge of their learning. They keep each other going while understanding that I am their to act as a guide if things start to get out of hand or they have a question that no one in the group can answer.

When students interact with each other, a piece of technology such as a computer, or with the teacher, I feel they are able to retain more information. When they help each other it allows the student to feel good about themselves and it shows the teacher that they have retained the information. Also, this shows the teacher that not only does the student understand, but they are able to teach the information to others in the class and the student has gone above inert knowledge. Using a piece of technology such as the computer, Skype, or a VoiceThread allows the students to not only interact with their peers in the classroom, but with other people across the globe.

References:

Laureate, Education, Inc. (Producer). (2009). Connectivism as a Learning Theory [DVD]. Baltimore, MD: Author

Laureate, Education, Inc. (Producer). (2009). Social Learning Theories[DVD]. Baltimore, MD: Author

Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kuhn, M., & Malenoski, K. (2007). Using technology with classroom instruction that works. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.