What I have learned and how has theory guided my work?
I have been using technology in my classrooms for a long time; 15 years ago I was using Flash 3 to develop engaging websites and HTML, databases and Perl to develop self-marking, multiple choice tests. Over the last 10 years I have found some very good uses for technology with my students, but on occasion I have had to stop and question what I was doing and why I was doing it.
The main thing I will take away from this course is that Relative Advantage must be considered before the introduction of technology. The questions I have posed for myself in the past were about Relative Advantage but I didn't have a name for it back then! I knew what I was trying to do wasn't achieving what I wanted so I had to reassess the purpose of using the tech.
Unfortunately, in the past, I had already introduced the tech to my students before they and I realised that it wasn't achieving the intended goal.
Through a combination of "design with the end in mind" instructional design principles and a thorough consideration of Relative Advantage, I intend to do a better job for my students and not waste their or my time in future!
Roblyer and Doering emphasise the Tech-Pack model throughout their book, giving worked examples of how teachers have assessed themselves in the project they are working on; I enjoyed reading these and allowed me to apply the examples to my own work and that of the teachers I coach.
How the course work demonstrates mastery of the AECT standards?
Much of the course has allowed me to demonstrate use of computer based technology, media utilisation and technology integration, message and instructional systems design. Each of the objects are referred to in my blog and the labels identify each.
How you have grown professionally? How your own teaching practice or thoughts about teaching have been impacted by what you have learned or accomplished in this course? What will you do differently as an educator as a result of this course?
Through my own practice, working with other teachers, my students, the course, my PLN, etc., I do my best to give students choice. This course has brought me into contact with more options and possibilities to offer my students the choice I am trying to provide. As I mentioned above, I am more thoughtful about precisely why I want the students to use a technology and I will not force the "round peg" into a "square hole".
The Stem Cells Webquest activity I developed allowed me to design with the end in sight. I take more time now to consider what it is I want my students to get out of the task I set. In this regard, the learning objective and assessment criteria need to be more explicitly communicated to my students and I have been doing this via rubrics. In my role as a tech coach I have already been expressing this need to my colleagues and modelling the techniques.
While I was initially worried about the Language Arts, PE, Art, Music and MFL lesson activities I developed, the process allowed me to view content form the perspective of my colleagues in other departments. Doing these activities gave me a mechanism to provide more choice for my students as I was applying different strategies and tech to my science based content. From a broader perspective, I was reminded that there is a lot of crossover between the content students are expected to know for the various subjects they learn - the MFL lesson aimed at the environment has a lot of crossover with Biology but obviously from a different angle; PE, Biology and Psychology are similar in this regard. I hope to make connections with the other departments to build more rounded projects that have links across all the content students must learn.
Roblyer, M. D. & Doering, A. H. (2013). Integrating Educational Technology Into Teaching. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson
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