Reflection

After completing my current graduate class, I have become more aware of what types of technology are out there to use to enhance my current lessons. This class has also made me try some of the technologies to see which ones would be easy to use in the classroom and which ones might not work for my class set up.

When it comes to deepening my knowledge of teaching and learning process, I think this will always be a work in progress. I have learned a lot about setting up lessons and enhancing student learning.

Probably the biggest change since the beginning of the eight weeks is trying to make my lessons student-centered. I have had to start sitting back and allowing the students to learn the material on their own. I have started incorporating more research on their part and less lecturing on my part. I find myself at least one time a day beginning to lecture when I should be facilitating and have to stop myself.

To expand my knowledge of learning, I am going to continue to take classes. I am also going to continue to read the latest research and blogs about technology, enhancing current lessons, and other new processes that come about.

One goal that I plan to incorporate into my classroom is audio reading selections for my entire curriculum. I have already started taping the audio, and planning for the PowerPoint presentations. I think that the audio will help the students with their reading comprehension and allow the students to become more successful. The next goal I plan to incorporate is having the students make videos and podcasts of their own. I have already been researching and filing out purchase orders to get the resources I need.

Pod Cast

Technology is very important in my business managment classes. I wanted to see how much technology my students were exposed to. I completed a survey with my seniors and conducted three interviews. During the interview I asked the students questions about their exposure to technology. I was surprised that not all the students had access to a computer at home, and that not all had a cell phone or TV in their room. Go to the following website and Enjoy

http://kswitt.podbean.com/

21st Century Skills

Today I visited the Partnership for 21st Century Skills. My first reaction to the website is that it was a bit plain and not eye catching. I thought when I was going to pull up the website it would we full of videos, podcasting, and full of the technology that they are promoting. I was surprised that Ohio is not part of the state work listed in the state initiatives. I feel like the education I am teaching and the state curriculum in Ohio is promoting these 21st century skills. On the first day of school, our principal, talked about what skills our students needed when they graduate and we were to make sure that these initiatives were included in our lessons. These 21st century skills are very similar to what he was talking about.

I did not find anything on the site that I disagreed with and I actually welcome the effort of the government, business leaders, and schools working together to help the students. I teach a career and technical education program in Dayton, Ohio. My pathway is business management. The lessons I am teaching now and have been teaching promote most of these initiatives given on this website. The two I focus on the most are communication skills and business literacy. Having this website as a recruitment tool is going to be huge. I am always telling my students what they need to know when they graduate and this will give me one more place to send them to reiterate what I have been preaching to them so far. The website will also give me a place to turn to as the initiatives change. In 5 or 10 years they may be different so I can check and see what has changed and how I need to change my lessons to incorporate anything new.

How to use blogger in the classroom

As I think about blogging, I am wondering why I would use this in my classroom. What would be the benefit of the blogging? What would you think about using a blog as bell work? I would post a prompt on the blog and ask the students to respond to the prompt. The students would not only respond to the prompt, but they would also respond to the other students answers. If I did use the prompt, how long do you think I should allow the students each morning to respond and read? I also would like to know if anyone has used this method before. Has it worked? Should there be a new prompt each day, each week, each month?

Hello

This is all so new and exciting. I have only blogged twice in my life. I am excited to start this blog as I learn new ideas and uses for technolgoy in the classroom. I am looking for ways to get my students excited again about education and teach them the content but also the technology. I am a mother to three boys and have been married for 11 years. I teach a career and technical education program in Dayton, Ohio where my focus in business management. In my free time I am training to run in a 5K in September and another in October. In May, I hope to run in a 10K in Cincinnati. I also enjoy playing golf and watching my children play soccer and show cattle and hogs.