EDUC 6713 – Week 7 REFLECTION

During the course of this class I have developed and monitored a GAME plan regarding the use of technology in my future teaching career. The two indicators I chose during week 1 to strengthen my confidence and proficiency went hand in hand. The first was modeling digital-age work and learning, and the second was engaging in professional growth and leadership. Throughout this seven week process I have been working towards achieving these goals. I found multiple sites that introduce new technologies that I subscribed to the feed of. Additionally, I contacted people in my district office who are in charge of learning about new technologies and integrating them into classrooms. They will be of great importance in achieving my goal of staying current! Developing this GAME plan will impact my instructional practice because I will always be on top of new technology trends. This is vital because students especially need to stay current. At this time I do not feel the need to revise my plan based on my progress because my main goal is to strengthen my confidence in digital-age work and learning and my plan will help me do just that. I did also talk to my principal about sharing new technologies with the staff to help with their professional development; he offered me time during faculty meetings. I may use the GAME plan approach with my students in Kindergarten when I introduce a new topic. I believe the plan and creating an essential question go together nicely and I plan on using both.

With the learning from this course I have learned that there are many benefits to integrating more technology into my Kindergarten classroom next year. Problem-based learning lessons are meaningful, but a bit overwhelming for a kindergarten student to do independently; therefore, we will do these lessons as a whole class. I plan on using social networking/online collaboration for big science projects, like the PBL I created on space. Having experts in a field answer their questions will be very engaging and memorable! Finally, I will incorporate digital storytelling into my instruction for many projects over the next year, especially during the first few months. This will serve as a get to know you activity among other things. I have enjoyed learning about each type of technology because they have made my instruction more interesting and fun for the students in my class!