Personal Learning Reflection Blog

Personal Learning Reflection Blog

Rhonda Noren

CEP 810

My areas of growth encompass almost all of the technology that I have learned in this class. This class was very difficult and challenging for me.  I would like to have spent more time on learning organizational strategies to keep this new technology more organized. My limitations included time, district policies, inexperience, and disorganization with the various assignments. I would have very much liked to learn more about mobile apps. This seems to be an up and coming trend. Doctors are even using it to diagnose patient diseases from looking at charts and x-rays on their phones.

My future plans to integrate technology include setting up my classes to use RSS feeds to keep up on information, setting up blogs either in my classroom or to include IB schools globally, to use Google Apps at home and in school, to communicate student work and schedules with parents via Google Calendar and Google Documents, to use free software when it is available, and to integrate technology whenever possible in my classroom. The communication piece is very important.

Effective teaching strategies while integrating technology into student lessons, includes looking at the TPCK technological pedagogical content knowledge framework. The three primary forms of knowledge in this are content, pedagogy, and technology.   A teacher can teach students to use critical thinking skills by conducting research and solving problems while using technology as their tool to make informed decisions and to communicate their findings with the technology.  Effective integration for pedagogy around specific subject matter requires developing a relationship between all three components. This is where I will gauge my effectiveness of my integration of technology into my lessons.

Using the internet opens up a whole new avenue of learning and communication. I am really excited about my plan to do an IB lesson with other schools globally while using many of the new technology skills learned in this class. My goals in my personal growth plan are just starting to be unwrapped.  The major project I will be doing includes implementing many of the new technology skills I have learned in this class. One thing though, I will master the goals I have planned for this school year first before attempting to integrate any more new ones. I see this as the beginning of a new way of teaching for myself.  My long term goals include learning and using the new technology skills in whatever subject I may teach. I will be teaching the business classes from a more transient direction than a static one. I will still support caution and safety as the top priority when teaching students to use anything that can be viewed publicly. I can see how by giving them responsibilities and asking questions that require collaboration to learn will help them to grow. I have always believed that creativity is a necessary piece in any assignment a student is required to do.

Upon reflection, I believe I have learned many things that I can bring to my students. I can see a new direction for my own teaching and learning. I am looking forward to learning more about cloud computing and mobile learning. I see this as being the next quest for technology in schools.