My Beliefs

I believe there are many ways technology can be used in the classroom, but finding the appropriate form of technology for the grade level I will teach will be the real challenge. I worry there is a lot of expense involved in having a technology-rich classroom. The classroom I was in for field had 4 computers. One was the teacher's computer that was pretty current. One was connected to the projector and was a dinosaur!!  It was so slow it would take about 30 minutes to boot up and get to the site you wanted. Two were for student use, also very slow, but donated by the teacher's husband's employer. The neighboring class had about 10 computers and our cooperating teacher could not explain why he had so many when she had so few. She said it was a sore spot in the school.

I believe there can be simple, inexpensive ways of using technology, such as a digital camera. I have one I am hanging onto for my classroom to use. I'd like to see students using a digital camera in new and creative ways. They could create a photo story from their pictures. They could use the simple technology of the video feature on my old camera to create a vidcast. A cell phone can create a podcast. Students could write classroom blogs to keep parents up to date on what the class is learning. Even powerpoints created by students are simple and require no extra expense as long as you having a reasonably modern computer.

There is a long way to go for many schools to be technology-rich. But there are ways to still have an exciting teaching environment without creating a greater personal expense for the teacher.

Lessons Learned

All the articles and websites I visited seemed to introduce more and more technology and multimedia resources I have not learned about or considered. It does seem there are a lot of resources and advancements in integrating technology in high schools. It would be great if elementary schools also received as much attention and funding for technology.

I liked the high tech learning site because you could delve deeper into topics you want to learn more about. The resources, links, videos and articles could help me learn more about tools or applications I haven't yet discovered or feel confident using. I learned more about Web 2.0 through one of the links that I found very helpful. I've heard the term "Web 2.0" many times but never appreciated what it meant. (By the way, whenever I hear '2.0' I think of that episode of The Office when the handbag salesgirl comes to the office and Michael says something like, "She's like the newer version of Pam. Pam 2.0.")

These websites, articles and links taught me even more how technology can be integrated into teaching and how many tools there are out there.

Strengths & Weaknesses

After reading about the NET standards I felt I had strengths in several areas:
1. basic knowledge and skills
2. identify technology resources
3. technology for professional development
4. design technology-enhanced instructions
5. using technology to collaborate and communicate.
6. using technology to increase productivity

I feel these strengths are a firm starting block to build better technological skills to help my classroom. I have used #5 above many, many times this semester in our cohort. I created a facebook group, collaborated on assignments through google docs, created a schedule using a spreadsheet in google docs, communicated with teachers and fellow students.

My weaknesses were:
1. using technology to assess and evaluate.
2. knowing how to troubleshoot
3. knowing all technology out there!

My goals:
1. Become more familiar with technology tools available for use in schools.
2. Learn more about integrating technology in the classroom.
3. Become confident with a few basic technology tools to start my classroom off.

It just seems the more I learn, the more I realize I don't know. Technology is one thing that is always changing and you have to stay current because the students certainly will. The following website had lots of information, articles, even webquests for a teacher to learn more about using technology in a classroom as well as how to set up a technology-rich classroom. http://eduscapes.com/hightech/spaces/index.htm.  The UEN website has a professional development link with lists of courses and there are MANY about technology and multimedia. These would be geared directly toward the Utah state teachers and would be very applicable to a first year teacher just getting started.

Reflection #12 Sarah Sumsion

Field Experience Service Learning Project

Cherry Creek Elementary has a student population over 600. Twenty percent of the students are hispanic, with less than 1% of other races and nationalities. The 6th grade class in Mrs. Stephanie Truscott’s class has 28 students, half boys and half girls.
From the very beginning Mrs. Truscott has been more than welcoming and accommodating. When I first contacted her she thanked me for being so on top of things and for planning ahead to let her know what was going on. Whenever we would ask her what we could do for her, how we could help, or what hours she would like us there, she would immediately ask what was required for our assignments. She made sure we were in a position to accomplish and work on school requirements. She was always friendly and open to conversation and talking about her point of view and philosophy of education.
Mrs. Truscott looked forward to our digital story and smiled and seemed very pleased while watching it.  She told us afterwards she thought it was great. She liked that it uses the core and that it was something the students can relate to. Afterwards she told us she would like a copy for her classroom for future use.
She was happy with how our lessons went and felt we prepared well in advance. She liked how we ended with our digital story at the end of our teaching week. She did not want us doing any Olympics activities because that is a fun end-of-unit activity the 6th graders do each year. She did, however, feel it appropriate to play our Olympics digital story as a preview of future lessons to come.
We taught Mrs. Truscott how to create a digital story and shared with her several different tools available to use. We explored the idea that even the students could probably make a digital story with ease. She told us the training was “awesome.” We talked about how the students enjoy movie clips and youtube things, although that site is blocked in the schools. She said the students, living in a media rich environment, would enjoy something like that over reading a textbook.
I think this service learning assignment was fantastic. It was a fun assignment, although incredibly time consuming actually making the digital story if being very conscientious of copyrighted material. I liked being able to teach someone else, because that helps me remember how to do something. I gained the ability to make a “sales pitch” for encouraging ways teachers could use digital stories. It gave me a reason to think about how great it can be to share and spread knowledge within the education community as most are working with limited resources.
This assignment for service learning was worth it. I now have a digital story I can take to my classroom, as well as the digital stories from my fellow cohort students and more. Teaching Mrs. Truscott about how to make a digital story was simple and fun. She enjoyed it and it was not terribly time consuming.

Reflection #11 Sarah Sumsion

Today in class my partner and I taught our first lesson, Blow the Roof Off, a JHAT strategy which incorporates process drama.

This lesson was a great introduction to Ancient Greece where students could act out a portion of the lesson. Motions and actions were directed for them, however we did give them liberties to improvise and make new motions. They did very well and some of their actions were clever and funny. This lesson allowed them to think about what actions would be appropriate for their card.

I would do this activity again in a heartbeat. I would do it for math, science, social studies, even English topics. The kids really enjoyed it. The teacher said she plans on stealing this lesson from us. The students learned they could act and role play while learning. After the lesson we asked them what they remembered. Most remembered the facts from the cards they acted out, but some remembered other notable facts from memorably acted moments. 

Reflection #10 Sarah Sumsion

The only technology used in class over the past several days we've observed is an overhead projector. As we left class today they were headed to the computer lab to answer an email. They do have students updating a class blog as a job assignment, however we have not seen it happen yet.

The classroom has 2 student-use computers, but I've only seen them used once for about 5 minutes and I couldn't tell what work was being done on it.

I look forward to seeing more technology used in the class. Several of our lessons will be using technology and online sources through my classroom website (my.uen since google sites are blocked). I love being in the classroom and look forward to being there again tomorrow.

Reflection #9 Sarah Sumsion

Today in class we continued to work on our digital story. Our digital story is about ancient Greece specifically the Olympics.

The more we work on our digital story, the more prepared we are to teach our cooperating teacher how to create one herself. Learning about the copyright laws has been helpful, but sometimes essential pieces of information get missed. I was happy to hear how today in class the specific copyright laws we needed to know for our digital story. It's going to be awesome.

I am very excited for field. No butterflies or nerves whatsoever. I love being in the classroom. I'm happy to have gotten some information from our cooperating teacher about the technology available in her classroom. We know she has internet, a computer and projector. She does not have a document scanner, however. My partner and I feel knowledgeable enough about creating a digital story to be ready to teach our teacher.