Reflection of Game Plan: Week 8

As I reflect on the Game Plan that I have being implementing with my students, I am still excited about my students blogging and sending emails to each other about their work. My co-teacher and I have come to a conclusion that the blog post and the emailing can be used in our classroom as a summarizer of that day's lesson. I am so excited about that point. The students have been making power points, learning about doing digital story telling and having a ball emailing each other about their work. I really love the students' enthusiasm about their work and how they are really learning everyday about technology. My plan is to take my students to whatever level they need to function for a future 21st century technology life.

As I look at my instructional practices I am very inspired that I have been able to facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity, because my students are very excited about learning more about blogging and they have already started. I still trying to get others in the school involved with the process of teaching our students how to promote and model digital citizenship and responsibility when it comes to Internet practice. Our school now has a school wide letter about student email and Internet practice so we are all on the same page with that effort. My students are still set to present their blog site to our parents at our parent meeting in November. I am very excited about getting the parents involved and allowing the students to display their learning.

One area that I will definitely focus on more is the digital story telling. But, at this point, all of my Game Plan has been very effective. Since there are no immediate changes, I will follow my Game Plan as written. The students are well on their way to learning great things about technology.

Game Plan with My Students: Week 7

As I sit and think about how I will be able to use the game plan with my students, I can't help but remember what our text book tells us about implementing and following through with a successful game plan. According to Cennamo, Ross, & Ertmer (2009) the GAME plan is a four step guide to help teachers and their students become better self-directed learner. The GAME plan requires you to think about and take steps to direct your learning process, specifically while learning about technology and how to integrate it into your curriculum each and everyday. I can't but think about the word proficiency, which forces us as educators to prepare them everyday and give them the opportunity to use technology daily so they can get better and better with it.

According to http://www.iste.org/standards/nets-for-students: I will continue to work with my students in the following areas:
•Demonstrate creativity and innovation
•Communicate and collaborate
•Conduct research and use information
•Think critically, solve problems, and make decisions
•Use technology effectively and productively.

As I continue to prepare my students future which is going to be fully 21st century by the time they are adults, it is imperative that our students know how to function properly in each of these areas on a daily basis. My students must know how to work collaboratively and cooperatively in groups and at the same time remain proficient in these areas.

Lastly, the game plan is a great process for allowing you to stay consistent with a plan and see it completely through. Since it is such a great tool for teachers, it will allow me to continue using the process to prepare my students for future technology work.

Revising My Game Plan: Week #6

As I take a look at my Game Plan, I have not had to revise much at all, except again for the time effort of getting a lot done in such a short period of time. The aspect of Social Networking has played a very big part in the developing of my Game Plan as a whole. Again, I have already developed my student's Blog spot (www.mathsciencesandbox.blogspot.com). We are going to practice next week blogging about the past semester as practice of how to blog correctly. I will be able to manage this, because the students will be able to blog about their own progress.

1. What have you learned so far that you can apply in your instructional practice?

As I look at my instructional practices I am very inspired that I have been able to facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity, because my students are very excited about learning more about blogging and they are eager to get started. Another area in my instructional practice was to get others in the school involved with the process of teaching or students how to promote and model digital citizenship and responsibility when it comes to Internet practice. Our school now have a school wide letter about student email and Internet practice so we are all on the same page with that effort. My students are set to present their blog site to our parents at our parent meeting in November. I am very excited about getting the parents involved and allowing the students to display their learning.

2. What goals are you still working toward? I am still working on trying to get all of my letters back from my students so they can all participate on the blog spot. I made a host of phone calls this past week to remind the parents to send those letters back so all students can be involved in such a great learning experience.

3. Based on the NETS-T, what new learning goals will you set for yourself? My new learning goals now would be for my students to use technology effectively and productively, also learn how to communicate and collaborate.

4. If you are not ready to set new learning goals, how will you extend what you have learned so far? With our new blog spot, as a community we are ready now to extend our learning.

5. What learning approaches will you try next time to improve your learning? The next step that we will take as a learning community is to learn how to conduct research and use that information to think critically, solve problems, and make decisions.

Evaluation of My GAME Plan.............

I am so glad that I am finally finished setting up my blog page for my students. You will simply love the website (http://mathsciencesandbox.blogspot.com). It is taking me a little time to get my students started with the blogging, however, I hope to accomplish that some time this week. I am extremely excited that my epals letters went home, I am actually about to have all of them turned back in. YEAH!!!!!!!

I believe my effectiveness with meeting my goals started our moving a little slow, but it really has picked up a lot for me at this time. I would like to mention that my students are really excited about this adventure. As we speak to our students on a daily basis about not giving, up I have learned to apply to my instructional practices not to give up. Sometimes, things will move slow or even get held up, but the point to remember is always strive to stay productive and never give up. I definitely have learned that you have to keep everyone that you need involved up to notice, because if someone that is apart of you plan is not aware of what is going on, it will slow down your process. I have not had any questions to arise at this time, however, that does not mean questions will not come up in the future.

My current needs are most important to me. The way I am going to adjust my plan right now is time constraints. I have to adjust my time effort in order to meet all of the goals that are intended. If I am stay focus, I know I will meet all necessary deadlines and my GAME Plan will be effective.

Checking Back on the Game Plan..........

As I look back on my game plan, I am finding much of the information that is needed. My group has been very helpful with websites that I am not able to find. Also, I am getting my forms back in from my students very well. I think the students don't want to be left out of the fun with the website.

Modification:

I may need to look at the fact of whether or not I receive a permission form back or not per my game plan team. Thanks for their help.

What Have I Learned:

I have learned that this is a tedious process. I am trying to make sure everything is in place so my students can really benefit from this. However, I am trying to take a long look at everything and make sure every step is being followed through.

Questions that have arised:

What do I do when students don't bring their permission form back?
What happens when I have a student that violates the internet ethics?
What happens when my principal has a problem with the process?

Steps for Carrying Out My Game Plan

Resources Needed:
E-Pal Accounts (www.epalaccounts.com)
Use of Voice Thread (www.voicethread.com)
Laptops and Other Desk Top Computers
Smart Board and ELMO (Document Camera)
Blog Page (www.southeastsandbox.blogspot.com)
Principal, Colleagues, and Technology Teacher
Parental Support
Letter for Permission from Parents for students to have E-Pal Accounts

Additional Information:
Parent Letter for E-Pal Accounts
Technology Letter from School System
Set Up of My Portfolio Online and On Paper
Information on how to set up a Web Quest

Steps Taken so Far:

I have already set up my blog page and my E-Pal accounts for my student's email accounts. I have printed the letters for the parents to sign and I will send them home this week. Students have already been introduced to how to post comments on the blog website and we will continue our discussion this week.

PUTTING MY GAME FACE ON.............

As I sit and think about what two areas I will consider to concentrate on in my game plan, I had to consider what areas will better benefit me and most of all my students. According to Cennamo, Ross, & Ertmer (2009) the GAME plan is a four step guide to help teachers and their students become better self-directed learner. The GAME plan requires you to think about and take steps to direct your learning process, specifically while learning about technology and how to integrate it into your curriculum. This week Peggy Ertmer, (DVD, 2009) encourages us as teachers to make sure you have knowledge, confidence, true beliefs and a supportive culture. While sitting and thinking, I do believe strongly that I have all of these areas surrounding me. As I think about all of these important things, all of the knowledge I continue to gain, it will help me as an educator to better prepare my students for the 21st century. I went and visited the ISTE website and have identified two NETS-T standards that I would like to see myself grow in. The two standards are:

1. Facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity: Teachers use their knowledge of subject matter, teaching and learning, and technology to facilitate experiences that advance student learning, creativity, and innovation in both face-to-face and virtual environments.

2. Promote and Model Digital Citizenship and Responsibility: Teachers understand local and global societal issues and responsibilities in an evolving digital culture and exhibit legal and ethical behavior in their professional practices.

The Game Plan:

GOAL #1: I will set up a Blog spot for my students to collaborate and communicate with each other on assignments and projects in Science, Math and Writing. Students will be given their own E-pal account where they can communicate at school as well as at home about assignments, homework, problems, questions, etc. Students will also be exposed to the use of Voice Thread with their assignments, Skype with another class about their assignments, and students will participate in the Technology forum offered at our local college.

GOAL #2: When I set up each account for the students, the accounts will be set up where it has constant student monitoring. I will need to monitor each account in order to make sure students are displaying the proper etiquette for using the Internet. It is also my responsibility to make sure students are displaying proper legal and ethical behavior while using collaboration on the Internet. I will also make sure the students see daily comments from me where I am displaying proper behavior for our school accounts.

ACTION FOR #1: I will make the plans to go ahead and set up each account for the students and issue necessary materials to my principal and system technology department. Students will be given their passwords and log ins. Students will be given a set of rules and regulations for using the Internet at school and school accounts at home. The blog and skype accounts will be set up as well. The rules and regulations will also include teacher/student ethical behavior when using the Internet. Lastly, I will issue any paperwork to parents and/or guardians to sign for the student's participation in their classwork via the Internet.

ACTION FOR #2: Is to prepare lessons for the students that will help them to understand how to use the accounts, blog spaces and the skype account. The plans for the skype account is for the students to use as whole group. We will also discuss rules and regulations, and proper legal and ethical behavior during these lessons. As the leader of the group, I will continue to do my professional learning with my colleagues via our Ning website drawing suggestions and ideas from various topics that we carry on. Once lessons are complete we will use our classroom laptops to practice how to use the accounts and students will be allowed to send the teacher a message at that time. This allows the teacher to know who knows how to use the accounts and who needs further instruction.

MONITORING FOR #1: I will keep a classroom portfolio of all student work that will be printed from the Internet and all work that is done by the students using paper and pencil. Teacher will also be responsible for printing off student emails and keeping them in the portfolio as well.

MONITORING FOR #2: I will keep in touch with parents via emails (those that have them), letters and phone calls as we move towards such a great experience in the students learning. I will also keep my principal informed of our progress as well via email. Lastly, I will make sure all work in the portfolio is kept up to date just in case I have a parent conference or my principal would like to view it.

EVALUATION FOR #1: I will continue to update our portfolio for presentation at our local technology conference to be held at the University in May. I will continue to communicate with the students on how we can better improve our communication with each other and make changes in our portfolio as needed.

EVALUATION FOR #2: I will continue to communicate with my colleagues on our Ning website for suggestions and ideas. I will probably consider putting some type of form on their maybe a survey or poll to gather information from them to help our communication in the classroom. Lastly, I will develop a team that will help me evaluate our portfolio before we make our presentation at the Technology Conference at the University in May.

References:

National Education Standards for Teachers (NETS-T) located at http://www.iste.org/Content/NavigationMenu/NETS/ForTeachers/
2008Standards/NETS_T_Standards_Final.pdf

Cennamo, K., Ross, J. & Ertmer, P. (2009). Technology Integration for Meaningful Classroom Use: A Standards-Based Approach. (Laureate Education, Inc., Custom ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.

Laureate Education, Inc. (Producer). (2009). Program three. Enriching Content Area Learning Experiences with Technology, Part 1 Motion picture. Integrating Technology Across the Content Areas. Baltimore: Author.

Any suggestions to my plan are greatly appreciated!
Thanks a lot,
Amy