Final Thoughts

Overall, I have found most of what we have done in TPTE 486 to be very helpful. This class has given me new resources to be able to integrate into my classroom. The idea of using more than just PowerPoint presentations is not quite as intimidating as it was before I entered this class. After completing many of these projects, I now have ideas for activities and lessons that I can implement in my own classroom. Integrating technology into the classroom can be sometimes frustrating as I have watched while observing in the schools as well as seeing in this class. However, when it is a sucess, some really neat things can be done. Students today are all about the digital world. Therefore, technology in the classroom is a great way to get them to interact with the material. Finding ways to use different programs with the content will help keep their attention on what they should be learning. Also, because so many students are very interested in technology, we can easily make material relevant to them, which I find to be extremely important to teaching. In addition, the students' interest in technology like the internet also needs to be addressed. As teachers, it is our responsibility to show the students how they are supposed to use this resource. We need to teach them how to properly evaluate a website's content, what can and cannot be used such as copyrighted music, and how to properly cite sources they have used from the internet. They need to learn how to responsibly use technology not just for the classroom but the real world as well. They will be long gone from my classroom when they are still using the internet, so it is important to teach them properly as early as we can. I am very optimistic about using technology in my class. I think it will be a fun and engaging way to conduct many lessons.

Adaptations and technology

I have been thinking a lot about the adaptations that teachers are required to make for students with special needs. After being in this TPTE 486 class, I really think that trying to integrate technology especially with students who may have a disability will help them be able to learn the material in maybe an alternate way. I have a few ideas about how to incorporate technology to assist all kinds of learners. Technology is so universal it makes it easier for teachers to supply accomodations for a lot of students. For example, the Inspiration Layouts that we made would be good for students with reading disabilities. They can actually see this digital graphic organizer and create it themselves. These kinds of projects have little wording, so they can get the gist of the information that is important. Another example of making adaptations could be presenting content in a very visual way. For students who are visual learners or even hearing impaired, digital stories would be a helpful tool to use during lessons. Even allowing students to make one as a project could allow them to become engaged very visually with the material. I really have worried about how I will be able to accommodate all kinds of different needs that make up a very diverse classroom. However, programs that I have used in this class have made me start thinking about all of the various possibilities. I am very excited to be able to use technology as a resource that will allow me to adapt to all kinds of learners. I think this class has quelled some of those fears, and I can see now options that I can take advantage of.

Building Websites

As a final project we have been building a website to showcase our projects from all year in TPTE 486. Using Google Sites has been pretty easy to figure out. I like the fact that things are so simple to use in order to make a workable site. There's no having to spend hours building html code and it still looks nice, neat, and professional. There are also decent layouts to choose for the design of the site, but it doesn't totally limit you there because you can go back and change colors too. There are a lot of choices that you can make without all of the extra work of building a site from scratch. That would be way too time consuming especially with our busy teacher schedules. So, I really liked using this site and if possible would like to use again.

Depending on the amount of internet that my students have access to, I would like to be able to use a site similar to this to create for the classroom. I think a site for the class would be good for parents, as well as students, to access because it will allow them see what I am like as well as what we are doing in class at that time. It is important to be able to communicate with parents on a positive note, and not just contact them when there is an issue with their child. Establishing positive relationships with both the students and the parents is very important to make a learning environment successful. Also, if the students wanted to get a head start on make-up work, they could to get assignments from the website and do not even have to wait until the next day. It is also kind of a fun tool that the students can interact with and engage actively in the class. I really hope that enough of my students will have access to the internet so that I may use a classroom website. It will be fun!

More Observation

So, I have finally completed my high school observations. I observed an Economics class. During his lectures, he used technology in the classroom. He required students to take notes from Powerpoint, the overhead, and the Smartboard simultaneously. I really like the Smartboard. He was easily able to provide practice problems to go along with the notes the students were taking. However, it would have been nice if he allowed the students to be interactive with it as well. For example, giving problems and then letting them come up to the board to do them. I think it might have engaged the class a little more actively.

In my high school, we didn't have Smartboards. So, I am not really familiar with this technology too much. In both of my school observations, I saw it implemented, and I would like to try it out in my classroom. I think it would be a good interactive way to get the students involved with the content. I know when I was in school, everyone liked to go up to the whiteboard, so I think that students would like to use the Smartboard. With this tool there are all kinds of activities that are available.

Watching Technology in Action

In completing our pre-service teaching, I have completed observation in a middle school 7th grade classroom. In this setting, I observed the teacher use technology in a way that provided a more actively engaged class. I witnessed games played on the Smartboard and the making of Key Note presentations.

The games that they played on the Smartboard allowed the students to interact with material they were reviewing. The students really seemed to be interested because they got to go up to the board and answer questions individually. Nearly every student was completely engaged. I think especially in a middle school, this was a good way to get the students involved and having fun. She offered rewards for the winning team, and I think at this age rewards still really seemed to have worked. It gave them incentive to participate, and once they did, they were enjoying themselves.

In addition, I also helped the teacher give the students aid while making these Key Note presentations in the computer lab. Now, many of the students were unfamiliar with how to make these presentations, which made it more time-consuming. While all of the students seemed to be engaged with the activity, I am not sure they really delved into the content (which were the different types of government and world leaders) as much as they were worried about completing the task at hand. I also think the teacher was feeling the same way. She did not require the students to cite any information and many of the students just copy and pasted from Wikipedia. This made me think about the challenges and obligations I will have as a teacher. One one hand, we want these students to learn how to use these kinds of presentations, and we also have to make sure we do not waste time in the interest of fulfilling standards. However, we also need to make sure that we are instructing them correctly on how to go about doing research. I realize they were only middle-schoolers, and as they advance in their schooling they will have much more practice in doing it correctly. I do think though as a teacher, it will be my responsibility to show them the correct manner to use technology appropriately, even in the interest of time.

Digital Story

This is a video that I have created using Windows Movie Maker. I created this video as a tool that I can use in my classroom in order to study the Civil Rights Movement. It is a brief 2 minute video that introduces one of the most well-known figures associated with this time, Martin Luther King Jr. It doesn't go into a lot of detail, but it does highlight the big events that he was associated with. I would use it most likely at the beginning of the Civil Rights Movement unit.

Making this video was rather time consuming. Going into this, I really had no idea what I was doing, but as I played with the program I began to figure out what I was trying to accomplish. Trying to sync audio, video, and text all together is not difficult. However, it does take a while. If I was to do it again then I may be a little quicker. While knowing how to do this is pretty handy, I do not think I will create a lot of videos for my class like this. On the other hand, I would like to make students create them if they all have computer access. I realized making this you have to engage with the material you want pretty well in order to summarize it briefly as to highlight the main points. Assigning something like this can allow the students to figure out what things are most important as well. After doing this, I would like to make them present them to the class.

Above is a screen shot that I developed for my 486 class. It is a quiz over World War II. At first, the formatting was a little difficult to get the hang of. I worked through it, and now, if I did it again I could be much faster at it. I do not think it is very hard to learn, but you do need to know some things about excel such as how to do functions. The result though is worth it because you can pop out all kinds of quizzes like this to get your class motivated for the day.

These kinds of quizzes I believe would be good to get the class started at the beginning of the period. A short quiz like this can just get their brain in gear for the material that we are about to be engaged with. I find Excel to be more beneficial than I thought. I really did not know you could do stuff like this with it. I figured it was more for like math people or grades. However, a simple quiz like this can be used across the curriculum and various grade levels. I just think it is kind of a fun way to get things going.

I would definitely like to make these for my classroom. I think it is a good way to integrate some technology into the classroom. It is not that difficult to make or for the students to use. However, it still uses technology to an extent more than just viewing a Power Point every day. They can actively do a quiz like this on the computer and get immediate feedback. This is another useful tool that we have discovered in this class that I hope I will be able to use in my own classroom one day.