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 =Welcome to Kimberly Irwin's Page for EDLD 5364 =

=Week 5: December 14th-18= I was really interested in the web video by James Paul Gee on using video games in the classroom as a means for teaching, learning and assessing students. He mentioned that the entire time students are playing a video game they are making decisions and analyzing situations. He also noted that they are being assessed all the while because of the choices they are making. I teach in such a small, conservative district and don't really know if this will ever happen here, but I believe there is power in this strategy for learning. Whenever our students leave for the day, most of them plug-in to some kind of technology, and many of them video games. Clearly, using video games as a learning tool would be a successful strategy.

Edutopia.org (nd). //Big thinkers: James Paul Gee on grading with games.// Retrieved on Oct. 5, 2009 from http://www.edutopia.org/digital-generation-james-gee-video

We truly are teaching a generation today that doesn't know or understand a world without technology. Our students write their English essays on their cell phones and email them to their group for peer editing. They video with their iPods and create a movie for class projects. They keep a blog with their pictures from their digital cameras, videos and personal thoughts. They are simply amazing. It is up to us, as their teachers to understand their world and adapt. We have to become integrated with the technology so that we don't hold our students back from all they are destined to achieve.

=Week 4: December 7th- December 13th= I spent several hours this week searching blogs and teaching sites that justifed my UDL lesson. I really wanted to find articles on the importance of technology as strategies for students with disabilities. I found a very interesting article on Students with Disabilities Excel on TechLearning.com. The article focuses on how 26 students from Minnesota were trained for a summer job using various forms of technology. This particular quote jumped out at me, " At another post in the vision materials production area, students scanned educational worksheets to Braille which, in turn, makes them accessible by screen readers. This allows visually impaired students to work on class material at the same time as the rest of the class. Over 30 books, totaling over 4,000 printed pages, have been scanned." I have only worked with one visually impaired student. Having his worksheets and texts in Braille would have been such a treasured tool by both the student and myself, and allowed him to feel like he was part of the class.

My other interest this week was studying and creating rubrics. I found another article on TechLearning.com by Carol S. Holzberg called Designing Rubrics. The author sites different websites for creating rubrics with descriptions about each site. I went to each site she suggested and some links worked and others didn't, but I did find some good "rubric advice" at the Education World site:

A GOOD RUBRIC …
Whichever tool you decide to use, however, keep the following guidelines in mind for judging the rubric's validity and reliability. A good rubric should In the end, I went to @Rubistar and found a rubric that could be used on my UDL lesson for our group project. I then created some rubrics that I needed for some ongoing class projects of my own.
 * address all relevant content and performance objectives;
 * define standards and help students achieve them by providing criteria with which they can evaluate their own work;
 * be easy to understand and use;
 * be applicable to a variety of tasks;
 * provide all students with an opportunity to succeed at some level;
 * yield consistent results, even when administered by different scorers.

=Week 3: November 30th- December 6th= The video of "Cameron" has been on my mind all week. I was absolutely mesmerized at what that young boy could do with a computer and the talents he had. I watched in awe as he helped his teacher and how willing she was to let him help her. I think the video of "Luis" was excellent, as well. I would love to implement an after school program to enrich the lives of children through technology, in ways that aren't available during a regular school day.

I appreciated the selection from Pitler's book, in regard to the four basic questions for technology enhancement: What will students learn? Which strategies will provide evidence of student learning? Which strategies will help students acquire and integrate learning? Which strategies will help students practice, review, and apply learning? I have added these questions to my lesson plans, to ensure that I am meeting the needs of all of my students. I have also made note of the NETS for students to make sure I am meeting those standards.

Working with my group has been a very positive experience. We are all at different grade levels, with quite a range of experience. However, we are also very goal driven and quality is the most important aspect of the group. Creating a UDL lesson and book was a new experience for me. I had the opportunity to sit down with my special education teacher and show her the book and sampled other books. What a wonderful tool for our special education students!

=Week 2: November 23rd-29th= This week I was introduced to a new acronym: UDL, Universal Design for Learning. I had the opportunity to witness how it worked through our weekly videos that were shown at the CAST site. This is a wonderful site to help educators with expanding learning opportunities for all individuals. I believe this is the most difficult job in the world, instructing a classroom full of students individually to ensure that they have the proper understanding of the material, in order to be successful. It's a daunting task at all grade levels, whether you are the third grade teacher with fifteen students in your room, teaching them reading, writing, math, science and social studies, or the high school English teacher seeing 134 students per day.

At the CAST website, I spent much time looking over their professional development section. Before we can "Teach with Technology", we have to have the knowledge and skills to properly use our technology. I believe this is difficult because of the lack of time and money districts have for proper professional development. However, it doesn't matter what technology access teachers have, without proper training, the students will not receive the maximum benefits. On the professional development page, I was led to the Teaching Every Student website. There, I found lesson, interactive lessons, curriculum and other tools. I will be looking even deeper in this website in the next coming weeks and will probably be one I bookmark for the rest of my teaching career.

=Week 1: November 16th-22nd= "Technology can transform teaching and learning. Collected in this book are a number of truly useful educational tools and examples, aligned to research-proven teaching strategies. Used as we have described, this technology can move you from a good teacher to a great teacher and give you the positive influence on student learning you have always hoped for." The above quote, I pulled from my discussion board post, because it represents every outcome I hope for this class. It is my greatest desire to move from good teacher to great teacher and to be a positive influence on my students' learning experience, through technology. Although, technology doesn't just train itself, nor is it a magic wand, with instruction and strategies, technology is a wonderful opportunity to prepare our students for real-world success.

A great tool for using technology to transform teaching and learning is the constructivism approach to education. All learners bring something new and unique to the table throught their own personal experiences. It is my job, as the teacher, to facilitate and coordinate these students to move collaboratively together to accomplish a goal, solution or final product. I recognize the benefit of technology to a classroom and how it allows all students to have an equal playing field. Daily, I witness this technology to serve as a translator, tutor, means of communication, and a challenge. I believe the whole-heartedly that the success of the 21st century learning depends on their ability to use technology in a successful way.

Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kuhn, M., & Malenoski, K. (2007). //Using technology with classroom instruction that works.// Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, Introduction, 1 – 14.