REFLECTION (My GAME Plan)

The GAME plan in which I had in mind for my students was to set Goals; choose Actions; Monitor goals; and regularly evaluate their progress. Although I have been able to set short term goals for students, the long term goals are going to be a different story. I have introduced technology to my students, but sometimes it is hard to let them explore on their own. Our short term goals are working well. We are taking small steps to learn about technology and incorporate it into our classroom. My long term goal is to have my students create a digital story by the end of the year so that we can really put our GAME Plan to use.
Throughout this course I have learned so much about technology and how to integrate it into my classroom. Even though technology changes daily, it is important to have a GAME Plan in mind. Short and long term goals are an important part of carrying out and achieving the GAME Plan with students. As I set my goals I realize that having them in place will have a great impact on the instructional practice that I carry out with my students. Having a GAME Plan has made me realize that goals are achievable.
Even though my students are young, I have learned that in order for a GAME Plan to remotely work, you do need a ton of patience. They are young learners, but seem to catch on to a lot.
As for the integration component in my classroom, I plan to continue to set goals, goals that are in reach of my students. My students are young and learning is fun for them. Technology is something that will be part of their learning for a long time to come. They may be small and it may take them time to achieve their goals, but in the end they will turn out to be lifelong learners.

Using the GAME Plan with my students

Using the GAME Plan with Students
When implementing a GAME plan, you have to look at a process that helps achieve short term, and long term goals through self-directed learning. Self directed learning is important for students because it gives them a challenge to learn in a different way. One way I can use my GAME plan in my classroom is to model goals for my students, both short and long term and show them how to be self directed learners.

As I reviewed the NETS-S I realized that they aligned to the steps involved in a GAME plan.
1.Creativity and Innovation

Students demonstrate creative thinking, construct knowledge, and develop innovative products and processes using technology.
This aligns with the Action part of the GAME plan.
2.
Communication and Collaboration

Students use digital media and environments to communicate and work collaboratively, including at a distance, to support individual learning and contribute to the learning of others. This aligns with the Evaluation part of the GAME plan
3.
Research and Information Fluency

Students apply digital tools to gather, evaluate, and use information.
This part of the NETS-S also is aligned with the Evaluation part of the GAME Plan.
4.
Critical Thinking, Problem Solving, and Decision Making

Students use critical thinking skills to plan and conduct research, manage projects, solve problems, and make informed decisions using appropriate digital tools and resources.
This aligned with the Monitoring part of the GAME Plan as students use their skills to solve problems.
In closing, I would use the NETS-S to help my students realize that my students can achieve success by using goals with self directed learning. The goals can come from the NETS-S to aide in all parts of learning.

References:International Society for Technology in Education (2010) Retrieved October 2010, From: http://www.iste.org/standards/nets-for-students/nets-student-standards-2007.aspx

Revising my GAME Plan

Revising my GAME Plan
As I look back on my goals that I set for my GAME plan, I have realized that some of them may be out of reach for my Kindergarten students. It is easy to believe that they can achieve the goals that I have set, but they may not be achieved right away.
As I have read and researched throughout this class, I have found some very interesting things that I can do and use with technology to teach my students.
I am not ready to set any new goals in my classroom for my students. I want to add to my action plan by trying to use a form of social networking in my classroom. I want to use a kid friendly sight such as, www.kidswirl.com
I also want to collaborate with other teachers somewhere in the world and start working on more technology projects with my students so that they can learn other forms of technology.
My goals have led me to use my Smart board a lot more than I can even imagine. My students love the interaction, animation and use of a chalk board that comes with it. I have learned things about social networking that I never knew and want to implement with my students.

Evaluating My GAME Plan progress

Evaluating My GAME Plan progress

In order to learn more about technology, I used the GAME plan method as a approach to help myself achieve success learning about technology and to get where I need to be with my goals.. With the GAME plan method, you should always begin by establishing goals to carry out, and then you set them into action, monitor your own progress, and then evaluate your progress along the way. With all of these steps in mind, you are well on your way to a GAME plan that works for you.

During my GAME plan, I am very anxious to complete carrying out my goals. Once I set them into action and see where they go, I seem to be on the right track. As I monitor my progress, I get to see what worked for me and my students and what did not work. The hardest part about the whole plan is evaluating the progress. I cannot seem to be a good judge of my own evaluation when it comes to my GAME Plan. I want it to be right the first time so that I don’t have to evaluate it. I know that that will never happen though.

One of my goals is to teach my Kindergarten students how to make a Power Point slide. Since I know how to do it, it is easy. As I begin to set it into action with my students, I need to remember that they are five years old and it is not that easy for them. As we work toward making a slide or several slides, I need to be patient and understanding so that I can evaluate their progress.

I am excited to have more than one GAME Plan in order for the school year. Not only using technology in my classroom, but with other parts of the curriculum so that I can set goals, carry them out, monitor the goals and evaluate them on the way.

Monitoring my GAME plan

All teachers should make a formal GAME plan in which they set Goals; choose Actions; Monitor goals; and regularly Evaluate their own progress (Laureate Education, 2009). I am especially interested in learning more about technology and ways to integrate it into my Kindergarten curriculum. The information and resources that I need to strengthen my GAME plan are readably available to me, it is just a matter of being able to have the technology to use in my classroom to follow through with the plan. My action plan is always being modified. I like to modify it in my head on a daily basis. I am always thinking of ways to make my plan just a bit better for myself and my students. So far, I have learned that there are many assessments out there to use with technology. I am excited to be able to incorporate some of the assessments linked to using technology in the future. One of the neatest assessments that I found to be interesting was the company Wireless Generation. They use a handheld computer to allow teachers to gather and compile student response almost instantaneously (Cennamo, K., Ross, J. & Ertmer, P. (2009). I thought that this was amazing. It is a great tool to use when having to do running records for the whole class. Doing them by hand is time consuming and takes more than one period. Cennamo states that you can make changes to your instruction as needed, even daily as necessary, based on real time data collection. Technology is just amazing. Even though it changes daily, there is so much that I do not know and so much that I want to learn. A question that I have learning about technology and technology resources would be to find out if grants can be written for other types of technology to be available to schools. At our school, we currently have a grant writing team for Smart Boards, I wondered if this type of grant or grants were available for other types of technology such as the handheld computers to aide in running records and instant results.

References:
Cennamo, K., Ross, J., & Ertmer, P. (2009). Technology integration for meaningful classroom use: A standards-based approach. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.

My GAME Plan Monitoring

All teachers should make a formal GAME plan in which they set Goals; choose Actions; Monitor goals; and regularly Evaluate their own progress (Laureate Education, 2009). I am especially interested in learning more about technology and ways to integrate it into my Kindergarten curriculum. The information and resources that I need to strengthen my GAME plan are readably available to me, it is just a matter of being able to have the technology to use in my classroom to follow through with the plan. My action plan is always being modified. I like to modify it in my head on a daily basis. I am always thinking of ways to make my plan just a bit better for myself and my students. So far, I have learned that there are many assessments out there to use with technology. I am excited to be able to incorporate some of the assessments linked to using technology in the future. One of the neatest assessments that I found to be interesting was the company Wireless Generation. They use a handheld computer to allow teachers to gather and compile student response almost instantaneously (Cennamo, K., Ross, J. & Ertmer, P. (2009). I thought that this was amazing. It is a great tool to use when having to do running records for the whole class. Doing them by hand is time consuming and takes more than one period. Cennamo states that you can make changes to your instruction as needed, even daily as necessary, based on real time data collection. Technology is just amazing. Even though it changes daily, there is so much that I do not know and so much that I want to learn. A question that I have learning about technology and technology resources would be to find out if grants can be written for other types of technology to be available to schools. At our school, we currently have a grant writing team for Smart Boards, I wondered if this type of grant or grants were available for other types of technology such as the handheld computers to aide in running records and instant results.

References:
Cennamo, K., Ross, J., & Ertmer, P. (2009). Technology integration for meaningful classroom use: A standards-based approach. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.

Cennamo, K., Ross, J. & Ertmer, P. (2009). Technology integration for meaningful classroom use: A standards-based approach. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.

EDUC-6715I-3 New and Emerging Technologies Reflection

As the course has come to a close, I have taken everything that I have learned about new and emerging technologies as a top priority in the technology department. This course had so much to offer and learn about, I was very impressed as I am looking back and reflecting. The technologies that I didn’t know about and learned about are amazing. The learning activity in week 6 and 7 was an activity that was interesting to me because it gave me the opportunity to be able to develop a lesson/activity in the technology department to help my students become more knowledgeable with technology and learn at the same time. The completed assignment helped me to demonstrate learning in this course because it gave me the opportunity to be able to develop an emerging technology that maybe one day will be out on the market in the technology world and really be a part of my students learning.
I would like to continue to research and find some of the digital games available for teachers. Digital games provide students with an engaging and motivating way to both learn and practice a variety of skills.
This assignment has given me an opportunity to integrate new technology in place of old, to teach meaningful lessons that my students will enjoy and embrace. I look forward to learning and creating new technologies that will allow for the best possible learning environments for my students. I am excited to try new emerging technologies and also use technologies that have already emerged in the future with my students.
I also look forward to using and sharing emerged and emerging technologies with colleagues and others interested in learning new evolving 21st century technologies. The future of our students and of our classrooms will be based around technology. I am glad that I am able to be a part of learning it and making it a part of our everyday learners so that they can take it into their future with them!

New and Emerging Technologies

Week two in new and emerging technologies was very interesting! I was very impressed to learn about new and emerging technologies. My school is so large that it is hard to get Smart Boards (interactive whiteboards) for every classroom at the same time because of the expense. I learned, after I did some research, that the Smoothboard, it the almost the same as a Smartboard and a lot cheaper!! You actually use a wii remote and a laser pen! It is pretty neat! I shared the information with my principal and I am actually going to try it out at school to see how it does! Here is the link: http://www.smoothboard.net/
Hopefully it works as it says and can be a substitute to a Smartboard while I wait for mine!!