Going into my 3rd year as an international school teacher, I realize how much I have grown. When I first arrived at KAS, the school was just integrating a 1:1 environment for middle school. While I have personally loved technology, coming from the US, I found that I had no idea where to begin. Thankfully, we have an amazing Learning and Design Director, Victor.
My idea of education is that the skills student are acquiring will help them even when they aren’t “in school”. So, the first thing I decided was that I wanted my students to be blogging. I signed up for Edmodo and as Google school, we use Google apps. My classroom ended up being virtually paperless. It wasn’t that I set out intentionally to be paperless, but with every choice I made for the class, I attempted to include my students with the decisions.
A teacher tech team was formed, and I was invited to be a part of that group. I lead a few PD sessions, and also began taking Coetail course. Recently I attended Learning 2 for the first time. All of these aspects have me constantly questioning technology and my own reasons for utilizing it.
After reading Reid’s blog post, it reminded me of my own thoughts about technology. Students can use it following the SAMR model, but CREATION is where the magic of learning happens. As one of my favorite comedian, Ricky Gervais states,
When I first started teaching in a 1:1, I was clueless. It started out with substitution but quickly escalated to redefinition. Yet, after my first semester, I realized I wanted students to create something. I wanted them to have the skills available that would give them more just a “right” answer from a text.
Last year I started the 20% project in my classroom and am continuing it this year. It is more about the process than anything, but students must work towards creating a product. The product can be physical or virtual. As a Language and Literature (English) instructor, I want them creating stories, presentations, products, etc that show originality, creativity, and innovation. I want them to believe they are capable of creating something that could one day change the world.
Two years ago, I began looking at flipped classroom. But honestly couldn’t wrap my head around it for English. I totally got it for Math and Science, but didn’t find much for English resources. Seeing as I don’t give, in my opinion, unnecessary or an unreasonable amount of homework, I am not sure flipping would work for me. Gave up on that one pretty quick.
I really loved the picture I posted on Twitter. It really made sense to me and caused me to reflect and evaluate how and why I use technology in my classroom. I know I am constantly moving in the right direction. If it wasn’t for my PLN that is slowly growing, I wouldn’t have come as far as I have.
Ms. Marcum's Mission 