EDUC 6711 Course Reflection

As I think back over the last few weeks in this course, I can honestly say that I have deepened my knowledge into ways that I can incorporate technology into my classroom. I also learned many different instructional strategies that can be used in the classroom. Overall, this course was very helpful to me and gave me many different ideas and uses of technology in my classroom.

Reflection on prompts:

1. After reading back over my “Personal Theory of Learning” I do not believe that I have any major modifications at this point. The only thing that I would like to being implementing into my teaching practice is more use of technology into the classroom and through this course, I learned various tools that I can use to engage my students and give them those positive learning experiences that are needed.

2. Next school year, I hope to be able to incorporate more uses of technology into my classroom either through the use of the Smartboard or through some of the different technology tools that have been discovered thus far. Two of the technology tools that I would like to use with my student is concept mapping and blogging. Through the use of these two technology tools, I feel that my students will get a variety of learning experiences and will allow them to be more engaged in the learning process.

Through this course, I have learned many different instructional strategies that I can use in my classroom. I use a few of the strategies that we have talked about in this class but there were some that were new to me. I hope to be able to incorporate a few of the new instructional strategies in my classroom in the near future.

3. Two long term goal changes that I would like to make to my instructional practice is to begin incorporating more use of technology into my classroom and obtain more technology devices to use within my classroom. As far as the incorporation of more technology into my classroom, I plan to begin doing that during the upcoming school year. Through out some of my courses, I have learned various organization or websites that I can look into at obtaining technology devices for my classroom at little to no cost. My goal is to begin looking into some of those organizations and websites with some colleagues of mine at the start of school.

I hope to begin working towards many of my long-term goals at the start of next school year!!(2011-2012)

:)

Voice Thread

This week we had to complete a Voice Thread that was based upon an issue we faced either in our classrooms or schools. Please take a look at the problem that I faced in my classroom.

Check it out:) https://voicethread.com/?#u1845824.b2094368.i11159037

Connectivism and Social Learning in Practice

This week we learned about the instructional strategy of cooperative learning. As I read about cooperative learning, I realized that I already implement this strategy within my classroom. The one way that cooperative learning is prevalent in my classroom is through learning centers. During these learning centers, students are placed in groups and are given specific task to work on in each center. The tasks normally align with our classroom curriculum. As far as grouping, I try to vary groups from week to week. Sometimes I group children based up their ability levels and other times I do random grouping. My students enjoy change therefore they accept any change within the classroom.

Through these cooperative learning center groups, students are socially connecting with one another. These learning centers are giving students the opportunity to interact with their peers on a different level than when outside on the playground. It is teaching students the appropriate way to interact with their classmates when working in cooperative learning groups. Through these learning centers students are becoming those MKO (more knowledgeable others) which in turn helps to foster students ZPD (Zone of Proximal Development).

From experience, I can say that my students enjoy working in centers and it teaches them great interaction skills that they may not get elsewhere. It also gives me a break from teaching and them a break from sitting still and listening therefore it's good for both parties involved. :)