Hold On Tight Here I Go!
Marisabel's Blog
This course has helped me evolve in my own learning and the way I think about learning. It is important that we think about how we present our lessons to our students. In this course we visited literary works by Dervin, Clark and Baggio they have helped me understand the importance of how we put together our lessons. We must stay up to date with all the new tools and technology so we can relate to the new type of student that we have today. Our students are learning about the jobs that may not exist yet. Teaching is an art that requires heart. We must help each student find that tool that will help them cross the bridge. We need to make sure that they are thinking about their thinking while we are thinking about our thinking and their thinking. Yes,it is that complicated. Like I said teaching is not for everyone. I feel it is essential that I keep learning about all the tools technological and otherwise if I am going to reach my students. All the research is pointing towards innovation and how it can help keep our student of today interested, engaged and learning. But hold up, not just adding technology to your lesson is enough, we must use it in meaningful ways. We must make sure we understand TPACK and how all the parts must work together to produce a learning experience for our learners.
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As I was looking at all the different tools, Educreations stuck out because it said it was an interactive whiteboard and that was very appealing to me. I enjoyed very much how easy it was to use and I was able to quickly do what I usually do in class. Because I can record it, I can have my students watch it without distractions from their classmates or the things in their desk and hopefully have a better chance at remembering the lesson. I decided to use Educreations to record myself work out a few problems for our Unit 3 math test. I decided to give my students an opportunity to add points to their score if they make test corrections. I recorded myself explaining a few of the problems from the test and I hope this will help them correct the rest of their test. I could eventually use this tool as an assessment tool. I could have my students watch mini lessons made by me and then give them a quiz at the end of the week. Another flipping tool I looked at was Adobe Spark. Adobe Spark looks very inviting and professional. I can see myself putting together some very eye catching videos when I have more time to plan out what I would like to do with it. My only concern with flipping the classroom is that all my students don't have a computer available at home. Using google classroom has been great for most of my students because they can access their work from home and they can get most of their assignment done quickly, but for those without equity only have class time to finish their work which in some occasions is not enough time. Nonetheless I see having my students use new tools in the classroom as important because they are being exposed and every exposure whether in the classroom only or at home is exposure that will help them be better prepared in the future. Punya Mishra explains TPACK as an overlap of Technological, Pedagogical and Content Knowledge. He explains further, technology changes: how we teach (Pedagogy), what we teach (Content), and the contexts within which teaching/ learning happens. This advances my knowledge on what we as teachers need to know when preparing our students for the 21st century. The learning pit reminds me of Dervin's sense-making metaphor except in the pit students are reassured that being in the pit makes for deeper learning and working through the problem with others makes for a successful learning experience. Therefore, if you avoid the pit you are not challenging yourself and are not making intellectual growth. Dervin's sense-making triangle emphasis has been placed on understanding how the individual saw self as stopped, what questions or confusions they defined, what strategies they preferred for arriving at answers, what success they had in arriving at answers, how they were helped by answers, and what barriers they saw standing in the way to arriving at answers. Technology in both of these scenarios if used in the way TPACK presents it will help the learner climb out of the pit or could help the learner bridge the gap. Students have the world at their fingertips when they have technology available to them throughout their day and are supported by teachers who facilitate learning through pedagogy. I am very excited about incorporating Google forms into my teaching practice and I have only begun to scratch the surface on what Google forms can do. Add-ons make a big difference when you want to personalize your forms or make them more user friendly. At this time I have only used one Google form in my class, that I created with my grade level. I had a hard time at first getting the results because I am still not familiar with all the ins and outs. Just like my students I am learning by making mistakes and trying new things. I have found many useful how to videos on the web and my Master's program instructor gave us lots of videos to watch as well so, it really only takes some searching and trial and error to get started. I see how using Google forms can make grading much easier and less time consuming. By having all the results from your students test all in one place neatly organized and scored, one can obviously see the benefits. Of course when grading written responses you still have to take the time to read them all but, you don't have to carry lots of papers that can get misplaced or lost. When thinking about my capstone project I could definitely use Google forms when surveying my students on wether they enjoy or prefer one tool over another. Another way forms could come in handy would be in surveying teachers about tools they may find useful and others they may find to be ineffective and why. Or to find out if they are having a similar problem that you may be experiencing in the classroom. CRAP! Yes that is what Baggio wants us to remember when we design. Contrast, Repetition, Alignment and Proximity. Baggio insists that using good visual practices when you design presentations and e-learning modules is about a lot more than just looking good. I must say that I don't spend much time designing slides for my lessons but I am curious and want to look into how all these design rules can be applied to my regular teaching day. How can I as a teacher make myself more interesting to my students. I need that missing piece of the bridge that is going to help me cross and bring all my students with me. I need to connect visuals with my teaching effectively.
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Marisabel OlguinNVLA 4th Grade Dual Immersion Teacher at Napa Valley Language Academy Archives
June 2018
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