Twas the night before class…(Fall 2011 edition)

Tomorrow is our first scheduled class meeting for the semester, and since I am up late (thanks to some medicine I am currently taking), I thought this would be the perfect time to write out my thoughts/goals/expectations for the semester.

• Get a better insight on the effectiveness of the course.  Although I taught the course after the “revamp”, it should be helpful to see how those changes have actually impacted the course and how the course can be further improved in the future.
• Provide more opportunities for application.  I enjoyed integrating the “Website of the Week” with them last semester so that they are introduced to some of the MANY tools out there, but this semester, I want to provide more opportunities for practicing what they are learning beyond just assignments for the course.
• Spend more time doing “workshop”  Although I have always conducted class in a workshop type manner, I think I will now cut back my “material coverage” time (which used to be going through the included powerpoints), which will hopefully force them to read and take more initiative to earn the information.
• Find out and attempt to address student needs  This is a goal every semester, but this time we are actually going to discuss it in the first class meeting.  I really want to know their expectations for the course so that I have a better idea of what they know and what they want/need to know.

Those are my overarching goals for the semester, and I of course will be adding goals after every class just for my own sanity.

Off to bed so I can be at my best for all of the new, shining faces tomorrow!

My, what a difference a semester makes!

I may be eating my words here soon, but it seems that all of the hard work I put in revamping my course was worth it!

On Monday, I taught a lesson on lesson planning.  For most of my students, this is their first introduction to lesson planning.  This is because this course is required for them to get into the TEP program (Teacher Education Program), which makes this course a little more difficult because it is hard to teach students how to integrate technology if they are not familiar with teaching and the pedagogy behind it.  Not and ideal situation, but as with any type of teaching, you just have to go with it :)

Anyway, because of their lack of knowledge with lesson planning, this module is always one of the most difficult in the course.  Last semester, my students really struggled with this topic so in my revamping, I made the directions and expectations much clearer and pretty much provided them with a template of sorts so that they just have to fill in the blanks.  To supplement that, I planned my lesson so that students would 1.) be exposed to a variety of actual lesson plans 2.) have a chance to critique lesson plans using the same criteria I use 3.) Have a chance to write their own plans.  The class ended up lasting longer than most, because I really wanted to take my time explaining it to them and inserting examples here and there because it is such an in depth topic.

One of the things that seemed to work really well was allowing students to critique lesson plans.  I found an awesome form at http://msit.gsu.edu/socialstudies/courses/6600_01/critiques.htm and I adapted it to fit the requirements that I was asking of my students’ lesson plans.  Then, I put them in groups, assigned them a grade level, let them choose a topic and associated lesson plan from the Alabama Course of Study objectives site, ALEX.

This activity led to some wonderful discussion amongst my students.  As I walked around the room, I heard things like:

• “One hundred and twenty minutes is WAY too long for kindergarteners to spend on one lesson.  I think she should have taken some things out to make it shorter and more engaging'”
• “It says here ‘Pass white boards out to students’,  but she didn’t list those boards in her materials.  She might forget to have those ready for her lesson”
• “This teacher has them taking a test after his lesson, but I think it would be more beneficial for them to do a project.  He can’t really assess his objectives properly through a written test”

These wonderful discussions were music to a teacher’s ears!  I was so proud that they were all (and yes I do mean ALL) engaged with the activity and really looking at these plans through a critical eye. 

So far, I’ve had about 15 lesson plan assignments turned in (out of 60) and I’ve had to count off points on maybe 2.  Like I said, I don’t want to jinx it just yet, but so far so good :)  I will update again once all of the plans are turned in Thursday evening!

This module last semester gave all of us fits.  The lesson plans were a mess and although they did what we asked, the expectations were not set very high (they were written more for experienced planners and had a lot of assumed expectations), and the lesson plans were not where I wanted them to be.  As I mentioned before, the lesson plans SO FAR are excellent and I’ve only had to count off points for nit-picky things like readability, and the objectives written in the incorrect format.

Lesson of the week:

If you want students to fully understand your expectations, put them in your shoes! :)

Things I would change:

Nothing for this time! :)  I just wish I could go back and reteach it to my students from last semester!

Starting all over again…

So, the spring semester is officially in full swing, and although we’ve only had one class meeting (thanks to the University’s change in schedule and having what would have been our first meeting fall on MLK Jr’s birthday), it seems like it is going to be a million times easier!

I’ve unfortunately never had the opportunity to “start all over again”, because I’ve never been in the same place for more than a year (or in this case semester).  It is nice going in, “knowing my stuff” and of course knowing what to expect.  Although I ended up having to combine my “Introduction” meeting and “Module 1” meeting all in one, it ended up working out okay.  My students seem pretty eager to learn and seem excited about the course, so that also makes it easier! :)

Surprisingly, I have a LOT of non-education majors this semester!  I was really shocked and I know that it is definitely going to keep me on my toes trying to keep them engaged.  During the first class meeting, I had them tell me why they were taking this course and most of them just said that they were required to take a computer class and this one sounded more interesting than the others (no pressure, right? ;)) One of my non-ed students told me that the reason he was taking my course was that he heard I was sweet, pretty, and smart…I think he’s trying for brownie points ;)

My approach for these non-ed majors is to try and make the material as relevant to them as possible.  Since I  have so many business students, I asked Alex about about how I could relate some of the education based assignments (like lesson planning) to the business world.  We came up with a few ideas, so I’ll definitely blog about how they turn out :)

The changes I made in the course seem to be helpful already.  Because I made the directions much more explicit, I’m having less questions.  Of course, I know there will never be a time where I don’t have ANY questions, but confusing directions do not help in that matter! :)  On top of the changes I made to the course overall, I’ve actually made some changes to my teaching as well that I hope will  help:

• I had the students make name tags to sit on the towers next to their computers.  I just basically had them create a name tent with their name on the front and the back (so that I could see their names whether I was standing in the front of the room or the back of the room).  It bothered me that last semester (especially if I needed to make note if they were not participating, i.e. playing on Facebook in class), I didn’t know all of their names, so I am determined to change that.  I’m hanging on to my photo roster, I’ve added their pictures to my Outlook address book, and I’m making them bring their name tags back every week so hopefully I won’t have that problem again :)
• I have created a separate e-mail address/account just for this class.  Last semester, I had them e-mail me through eLearning, the University’s course management system.  It was great having all the e-mails in one place, however, I had a problem with 1.) them checking eLearning often (since it is not connected to their e-mail and 2.) responding to their messages in a timely manner.  Because you can only access eLearning from a computer (as opposed to a mobile device or at least my Blackberry), I found myself constantly tied to the computer answering questions.  I do have my eLearning e-mails forwarded to my phone, but the only way to reply is to log in to eLearning on a computer.  It never failed that I would go through and answer all of these questions, log off the computer, and get an e-mail.  It was frustrating not being able to respond right back to them.  Having the specific e-mail account helps me keep all my correspondence together as well as making it MUCH easier to respond to e-mails (especially those “short answer” ones because I can do it from my phone)  So far, I’m loving it!
• Since it is easier for me to get in touch with them, I have been better about sending out tailored messages.  For example, today I sent out a reminder e-mail only to the students who had not turned in their assignment yet.  Having them all in my outlook has been a lifesaver! :)
• I used a Facebook group last semester, but I decided to use a Page instead this semester.  This way they can see it in their news feed and I even showed them how to receive updates when I post something there.  I don’t like that I can’t send messages, but I think that they will check it more since it is more like a “profile”
• eLearning was a struggle for me to deal with…not necessarily the technology itself, but rather the logistics.  Although I teach the same class to two sections, eLearning made me create two separate “classes” on the system.  It drove me crazy because every change I made, I had to make it twice.  It was also difficult when students sent me a message because I always clicked on the wrong class to reply back.  This time, I was able to combine both sections into one “super class” so that I treat both classes as one big class, meaning that I only have to make changes once.  It also helps me manage my students because they are a group of 60 (which is more how I treat them) rather than 2 groups of 30.  This worked out perfectly, because I kept the due dates/times the same for both classes, so it was really no different.  I LOVE it so far!
• I want to start integrating more technology ideas into the class rather than what I the course requires.  This semester, I have decided to try what I am calling “Website of the Week” or “WOW” (what can I say? I’m an elementary teacher at heart ;))  Each class meeting I’m going to introduce 1 to 2 (I haven’t decided this yet) websites that I think are useful.  This way they are getting a glimpse as to what is out there, and hopefully they will want to explore more :)  Since I have so many non-ed majors, I started out trying to pick websites that could be used both in education and outside ed, but I feel like I’m doing my elementary teachers a disservice by not sharing some great websites for elementary students.  I think I’m going to do 2 websites a week – one education, and one “hybrid” (as in it could be used in many fields)  and have them blog about them including 1.) a short summary of both 2.) how they can be used to meet the NETS standards (which is what this class is based on) 3.) how they can use one or both in their career.  Hopefully this will be a good experience for them and allows me to share some of the great resources I’ve been collecting throughout my doc journey :)
• I’m also making each class meeting more like a workshop.  One of the “suggestions” from my students in my course evaluations is that we didn’t spend enough time practicing the technology before they actually had to use it for an assignment.  I started this “workshop” idea during our class meeting, and I actually walked them through creating a blog, which was one of their assignments.  It was so much easier than having to keep sending them back asking for the correct link, so, so far so good.

I think that’s about it!  I better get back to grading :)  Here’s to an amazing spring semester! :)

MS