Week #15 - Final Course Reflection

Final Course Reflection

I have learned quite a bit about how to utilize technology in the classroom. I must admit that I was very nervous about this course. I would like to reiterate that I am in no way computer savvy nor creative, but this course has given me a new perspective on technology.

Let’s begin with the blog. I am in no way a blogger. I had and still have quite a bit apprehension about blogs. Though I do not personally care for them, I do see the value in them. They can be utilized for communication purposes as in this class. The blog helped me share my difficulties with the projects as well as my individual learning experience with each assignment. The blog project will be useful in my classroom for the sake of students sharing their experiences on class assignments. The students’ blogs will help me assess my teaching and make necessary adjustments. These blogs will be visible to only students in the class. They will not be for the general public to view. I will not subject my students to any outside nonsense or predators.

The listserv was fairly easy for me to create. I was already familiar with this tool. I am currently on several different listservs at work. When you need general information disseminated to particular people really fast, the listserv is an awesome tool. Like for instance when the university is experiencing difficultly with SOAR, I receive an email via the listserv notifying me of the issue. I plan to establish a listserv for the students, parents, and administration at my school. I will post information such as class cancellations, assignment changes, and anything else that me be of importance to the class. The listserv will be available for all of the above groups use.

The podcasts and videos done by the professor proved to be very helpful to me when trying to figure out exactly what was expected. The podcasts and videos demonstrated exactly how the project was to be done or they gave me enough of an idea to figure out the project at hand.

I guess my favorite part of the class was creating the grading spreadsheet and the classroom website. I am very good with excel since I use it everyday in the workplace. I am also good with numbers, so when I saw that I had to do a grading spreadsheet in excel, I was very confident in that task. The website on the other hand, made me a bit nervous. This was my first time every creating a website. This task introduced me to new technology that I will definitely by using in my classroom. I can post the class syllabus, assignments, class averages, and resources for the students and parents use. The website was really the best piece of this class for me.

The flyer on the other hand was very difficult for me because I have no sense of creativity. I am a no-nonsense kind of person. I stick to the facts and get straight to the point. I am not much for the fluffy and smell good stuff that often times accompany the bottom line/facts. This again is why I was not very good with the PowerPoint quiz either. According to the professor, my quiz was very linear. Again, I reiterate that I am a linear person. This has proven to be my strength in my career and I hope it will remain a strength for me when I become a teacher. I will be teaching secondary education, so I will stimulate the minds of my students with facts and challenges not artsy work. Needlessly to say, when I had any project outside of my comfort zone, I did not do as well as I would have liked. Unfortunately for me, just about everything was beyond my comfort zone. Though I was introduced to a great amount of technology and tools, I mastered none of them. By the same token I must admit that I did enjoy them for the most part.

I will try to use flyers and PowerPoint presentations in my classroom when applicable, but I assure you that I will not be going out of my way to use either of the two. I will stick to those things in which I am good. I will stick with the classroom website, listserv, grading charts, parent letters, and things of that nature. Though I may have the students do a project that requires PowerPoint. The project may be graded by the students themselves in areas of appealing, design, and content. This may help me in utilizing PowerPoint more often in my classroom while giving me input on the students learning and creatively.

Again, I was terribly frighten of the movie, it turned out not be as difficult as I had first imaged it would be. The movie helped me to realize when I create my classroom website; I will need to be very familiar with every aspect of it. I had to constantly go back and forth on the website to make sure that I was stating everything correctly as I was doing the voice part of the video. This assignment taught me as well as got me more familiar with the website layout. The video making process was very time consuming and a bit tricky at times. I would do something and forget to save it and would end up repeating the step again. All of this taught me to save at every step of the process. This is yet another assignment that I think I may give my students. They may be responsible for making a 2-3 minutes video on a skill that is being taught in one of the semesters. This will not only benefit the students by introducing them to more technology but it will show me how much my students know about a particular skill.

Overall, I must say that this course has been a valuable asset to me. It has introduced me to a wide variety of tools and resources. I can envision me utilizing these tools in my classroom. Of coarse, some more than others, but I am open to all of the tools I have been fortunate enough to learn about this semester.