Hats Off

Must take this opportunity to "pat" Dr. Rubin on the back for an excellent job in guiding me through this class.  Never before have I had a teacher to respond quite so quickly to e-mails as Dr. Rubin.  Any time I had a question, he was there with clear, concise directions on   solving the problem.   All assignments were graded promptly and feedback given on all.  The running grade average was very helpful.

Thank you so much for all the time you spent in helping me become a better teacher.

utilizing a class blog

I definitely feel like creating a class blog would be beneficial for my students.  Having a page dedicated to my class where students can post and interact.  I feel that posting links and videos that relate to the topic we are discussing and allowing the students to view and then discuss would be a great way to incorporate technology into the classroom and create a student led lesson where I can help point the kids in the right direction but don't have to dominate the discussion.

Technology

When the class first began, I was terrified.  Using a computer for word processing and viewing powerpoints was the limit of my skill.  I have learned more in this class than in any other class.  In each assignment, I learned different aspects of technology that I would not have attempted on my own.  I enjoyed making the powerpoint presentation.  I even used the one I created in my formal observation.  Creating my blog was my least favorite assignment. 

The podcast is one I am actually planning to use in my classroom.  I want to have my students create podcasts for black history month.  I realize it is too late for this year, but I am planning ahead for next year.  By creating these podcasts, other teachers in my building will be able to utilize them in their classrooms.  Students teaching students!

This class certainly has been a learning experience! We have been introduced to many aspects of technology and how they can be applied in the classroom. Some of these things I plan on implementing into my daily class activities. I had previously heard of podcasting in language arts training that I attended. However, I hadn't taken time to really process how I could use it in the classroom. One way I plan to use it is with our 4th grade Facebook page. We try to post pictures of class activities and school announcements on this page. By adding podcast, I can let my students to book talks or book reviews and post them to the page as well. There are many practical ways for students to use technology in the classroom. For me, the hard part will be releasing control to the students  and letting them learn how to use it through a process of trial and error.

Information Overload!

This class has been very informative and has introduced me to many different ways to use technology in my classroom.  I had heard of podcasts but never really understood what they were or used them.  Now, after this course, I can see the benefit of using them to provide information to my students and to connect with other educators and gather information from them.  Podcasts are something that I am going to try to utilize more.  I think podcasts could be a nice change from doing in class presentations.  I could have students create a podcast to share their information rather than just standing in front of the class reading from a poster.

Blogs also interested me.  Blogs would be a great way for me to communicate with students, especially after school hours about assignments.  Blogs also allow me to connect with other teachers and to share information.  A blog would also be a great way for me to communicate with parents.

I hope to be able to apply some of the things I have learned in this course to my own classroom.

technology in the classroom

With the increasing use of technology in the classroom I am very glad to have taken this course.  It has definitely opened my eyes to ways which I can use technology in my classroom and made me more comfortable with experimenting with different types of lessons (webquest, podcast, blog) that I may have shied away from before.

Web Blog

Before this class I had no idea that creating a blog was so easy. I had read blogs, but never really thought about creating one myself.  This will definitely be something I use in the future for personal and professional use.