Fun and GAMEs!

In this last blog assignment for this Walden course, we are asked to describe how we will use the GAME plan process with our students to develop proficiency in NETS-S. (http://www.iste.org/Content/NavigationMenu/NETS/ForStudents/2007Standards/NETS_for_Students_2007.htm) Looking at these standards, I see several (well actually, quite a lot) that my students need to work on. The first one that I want to tackle in my elementary computer lab is

	2. Communication and Collaboration
	Students use digital media and environments to communicate and work collaboratively, including at a distance, to support individual learning and contribute to the learning of others.

Though I think we do a very good job of collaborating within the walls of my classroom or even within the walls of my school, I feel that we do not nearly do enough of this with learners and experts in other locations. I also do not feel that we do enough collaboration online. This is my fault. I do not have any trouble creating a lesson that uses online collaboration, for instance, but I am intimidated by the implementation of such a lesson. There are just so many variables to manage. I think I need to accept that the first try at one of these projects might not be perfect, but the next try will be better, and the next even better.

One way to get the ball rolling on my focus on communication and collaboration would be to get the students to establish their own GAME plans as guides for increasing their proficiency in this area. I understand that by having the students write their own GAME plans, they will gain ownership of their own learning. They will not just have to passively accept what the teacher has handed down in her role as classroom dictator. They will be motivated to take responsibility.

However, I do have a concern about this process. Because the GAME plan strategy is so learner-directed, it seems that without considerable (obsessive?) teacher monitoring (Get out the roller skates!), there is a lot of room for students to get distracted, off task, or even actively engaged, but towards the wrong goal. I would think that it would take some training for students to fully understand their role in this process. To this end, I think I would introduce this strategy by discussing the NETS-S with my students and having them come to a consensus on a group goal. Then we would develop the GAME plan together. This way I could provide guidance as the teachers become familiar and adept at this process.

After one cycle of GAME, I would have my students work on another plan in groups. That would give them a little more autonomy, but allow me to monitor their progress in a manageable manner. Then I would have them work on individual GAME plans, but we would all do the same goal so that we could collaborate where needed. Only then would I send them "out on their own."

As the computer lab teacher, I would have a better chance at introducing the GAME plan with my students this way. I see all of the students in my school each week, so I could start my students with the first steps I mentioned in the early grades and move toward the later steps in the older grades. A regular classroom teacher might have trouble fitting all of this in within the window of one school year.

Anyway, I would appreciate any comments anyone has for my GAME plan implementation. Thanks for reading!

Not Letting Go...

This week in our Walden course we are asked to llook once again at our progress towards meeting the goals of our GAME plan. I am feeling like a bit of a broken record here (remember those?), but I am still stuck. I am no where near ready to let go of the goals and plans I have made even though my schedule may have shifted somewhat. I still want to accomplish what I set out to do, and I will. As a matter of fact, I find the goals I established to be ones that require an ongoing effort. They are not the types of goals that can be ticked off my list. These are areas that I will continue to try to improve.

That said, there are some things that I have learned and can apply to my instructional strategy. As an action to accompany one of my goals, I have planned on creating class wikis with my students. I have tried this once before, and the biggest frustration was getting all of the students to join the wiki. They needed email addresses, and if they used mine, all of the options were not available to them. One of my peers in our online learning community had run into the same problem and provided a simple solution. Now I am no longer dreading this part of our wiki activity when we get to work on it.

Another thing I have learned is that it might be a little rough to get the ball rolling, so to speak, when beginning a new technology project, but the results are well worth it. For example, getting teacher buy-in for the teacher wiki projects ahs not been easy, but I think it is begining to come together. I can envision it as being the go-to source when teachersare looking for resources for a particular lesson they want to teach. It may take us a while to get it there, but I know it is going to happen!

I am really not ready to set new learning goals for myself at this time, because I do not feel like I have made the progress I would like on the ones I have already chosen. Once again...I will get there. I would like to expand my use of podcasts to other classes in our school and help other teachers start podcasts on their web pages, too. I think it would be a wonderful way for them to showcase what is going on in their classes. We have monthly professional development meetings by grade level in our school. Perhaps I could find out if a grade or grades would be interested in having me teach them how to do this during that time. I mean, if we have to stay after school, we might as well learn something useful, right?

One thing that I want to keep in mind as I set new goals for myself is to try to do a better job of timing the start of my actions to accomplish these goals. It seems like my lab time with my students is constantly being interrupted, but some months are better than others. Next time, I want to start my GAME plan in one of those "good" windows.

A Holding Pattern...

Well, I seem to be in pretty much the same place this week that I was in last week with my GAME plan. I am still focusing on getting A+, the tutorial program I mentioned in my previous posts, up and running, and I think I am just about there. The kids seem to really like the motivational program I have initiated with it, and they should be comfortable enough to work on it in their classrooms. This will hopefully free me up so that I can work on my standards. Won't that be wonderful!

The teachers I have spoken to about the wiki are still willing to add their input to the teacher wikis, but the art teacher has asked if we can wait just a little bit to work on the school gallery. I have worked with her on things in the past, and I know that this will get done. She wants to see our school establish a gallery as much as I do, so as soon as she can handle working on it with me, we will tackle that project.

The student Skype and wiki projects that I had hoped to initiate are still on hold for the moment. As I mentioned in prior posts, the students started their research for the wikis earlier, and I think that we will return to that project in a week or so. I actually had a student ask me when we were going to get back to that last week. I was glad to know that the interest was still there even after such a large interruption. That is promising!!!

Through all of these struggles, I have learned one thing about my GAME plan. Flexibility is a vital component that is not given proper credit in this acronym. A teacher can have the best plans in the world, but the school and classroom situation may change and render the plans unobtainable, at least for the moment. The teacher needs to be able to either adjust her plan or be willing to put them on hold until the situation changes.

Until my situation changes, I will continue to do what I can to accomplish my GAME plan now and be patient until I can accomplish the rest.

Just checking in again...

Stopping for just a moment to check where I am on my GAME plan, I realize that I am in kind of a standstill. I hate to say that, but I do want to be honest. There hasn't been much of any change since last week.

Parts of my plan are still on hold because I am not actually teaching much (any) right now: I am administering a tutorial program called A+ to my students, and I didn't realize that I would be doing this for so long. The original plan was to get the students used to the program so they could comfortably go back to their classrooms and work on it with their own teachers, and I think I will be able to let it go (to some extent) very soon. However, I am now implementing a new reward/motivation system for the program, and I have to get that running first.

I have also been out of school for 3 days this week and had another project (the school's 4-page newsletter) to complete. I wish I had had moe time this week to work on my plan.

I have managed to do some things, though. I have explained the teacher wikis to a few of my peers and asked them to share their favorite sites. The podcasts are still up and running, as they were last week. Because of a crazy schedue, I haven't had lunch with the art teacher or even been able to share more than two sentences in a row with her, but I should see her tomorrow and get the ball rolling for the student art gallery.

The student wiki projects and the student skype projects are not cancelled: They are just briefly postponed. I plan to pick up those projects again as soon as I am back to my regular teaching schedule. (Trust me: I can't wait!) Cross your fingers and pray that this happens soon!

Checking In

Looking at the GAME plan that I created last week, I asked myself the following questions:
What resources will you need to carry out your plan (video, reading, experts or colleagues, etc)?
What additional information do you need?
What steps have you been able to take so far?

The resources I need to carry out my plan are already available in my school. We have a computer lab and laptop carts for the students. We have laptops for all of our teachers. Microphones, headphones, and headsets are available. We also have a few webcams available. Each classroom has a Smartboard and we have a camera to use to photograph student work and school events.

I need to see about locating websites that connect interested teachers, and I need to look into upgrading my VoiceThread subscription. Either that or I need to get the other teachers in my school to subscribe. I also need to find teachers who would be willing to add resources to the wikis so that we can publicize them to the faculty of my school.

So far, I have been able to set up the teacher wikis that I have planned, and I have been able to have my students start the research for their wikis. I have begun to publish podcasts of students reading their writing on our school website. I have not been able to begin my Skype projects, but my principal has asked me to do a tutorial program called A+ with my classes, so this part of my GAME plan will just have to be delayed. I do have one class who is interested in this project, so at least I will be able to assist them during my planning time. One last thing I need to do is meet with our art teacher to plan the student gallery. I think we may be able to do this during our mutual planning time this week.

I’ll be back with you next week to let you know how I am coming along.

My GAME Plan

As an elementary computer lab teacher, I work with students ranging from kindergarten through fifth grade for about an hour each per week when my class is not interrupted for testing, a mandated tutorial program, or an assembly. That is a very limited time window in which to accomplish my technology goals. Therefore, I strive to collaborate as much as possible with classroom teachers in my school. This way, I can reinforce the content standards while my students learn about technology and my students can tackle more complex projects than they could possibly do in my lab alone. I think this creates a wining situation for my students.

In my current course at Walden, I have been asked to develop a GAME plan (Cennamo, Ross & Ertmer, 2009, p. 4) for strengthening my confidence in at least two indicators in the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) National Education Standards for Teacher (NETS-T). With my situation in mind, here is my plan.

Goals
3b. Teachers collaborate with students, peers, parents, and community members using digital tools and resources to support student success and innovation.
4d. Teachers develop and model cultural understanding and global awareness by engaging with colleagues and students of other cultures using digital-age communication and collaboration tools.

Actions
3b. Develop a wiki for teachers to share ideas and resources. Teachers will be able to share Smartboard activities, arts-integrations lessons (we are an arts-integration school), helpful websites, and more traditional types of activities. Publicize the wiki.
Have students develop wikis about content they are studying. These would be collaborative lessons with classroom teachers. The product of these wikis would also be shared with the faculty of my school in an effort to encourage more teachers to use this tool.
Publish a school art gallery on VoiceThread to allow parents and community members to view and comment on student work.
Publish podcasts of student writing.
Classes will use Skype to meet with expert community members about content they are studying. For instance, they might meet with a banker when studying interest or a wildlife expert when studying about animal adaptations.
4d. Search for websites that connect teachers who are interested in collaborating on projects and contact those teachers.
Have our classes to use Skype to collaborate with students in other countries.
Post work on VoiceThread for our newfound network of learners to collaborate or comment.
Develop a wiki with the other class about the topic we are sharing.

Monitor
Ask the following questions:
3b. Are the teachers participating in the teacher wiki? Do they know about it? In the students’ wiki, are the students learning the content? Can they discuss what they are learning? Do the gallery and podcasts have visitors? How can we encourage more visitors? Do the parents know about them? Who are the classes Skyping? What other experts can we contact? How do we locate these people?
4d. Are there any teachers in my network that have already tried this activity? How did they find partners? Are there other sites for ideas about such projects that I can learn from? After talking with my partner teacher, are their changes to the project that he or she would suggest? Are the students excited about the project? If not, how can we increase their excitement? If so, how do we maintain it?

Evaluate and Extend
Ask the following questions:
3b. Did the collaborating teachers value this project? In what ways would they change it? Did the students master the content according to the classroom teacher’s assessment? Would the classroom teachers recommend the project idea to their peers? Did the parents and community respond to the gallery and podcasts? In what other ways can I collaborate with these stakeholders?
4d. In addition to the cultural understanding and global awareness, did the students master the content portion of the project? In what ways could I improve this project? Does the cooperating teacher have any suggestions? What changes would the students suggest? What other tools could we use to collaborate with students from other cultures? How can I get other teachers in our school involved in such projects?

I hope that my focus on these areas will increase my proficiency, make me a better teacher, and make my class more engaging for my students. I would appreciate any ideas anyone wishes to share regarding my plan.

Thanks for reading!

References
Cennamo, K., Ross, J., & Ertmer, P. (2009). Technology integration for meaningful classroom use: A standards-based approach (Laureate Education custom edition). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.
NETS for Teachers. (2008). International Society for Technology in Education. Retreived January 13, 2010, from http://www.iste.org/Content/NavigationMenu/NETS/ForTeachers/Nets_for_Teachers.htm

Reflection

I have grown so much as an educator through my study of integrating technology into the classroom at Walden University. The course I am just completing, Supporting Information Literacy and Online Inquiry in the Classroom, has proven to be just as enlightening as my prior courses. Thought I have learned much in this course, the one thing that has really struck me is how our students need to be taught new literacy skills to be able to successfully maneuver in our digital world. Yes, reading and writing are still critical, but students need to be able to use these skills within a new setting. I remember being told to focus on having our students to read more and more nonfiction, and this was on the right track, but the information that our students are bombarded with requires much more than being able to understand how to read nonfiction print. Students are often faced with unreliable, inaccurate, and invalid information online, and they need to not only be able to read this information and glean what is relevant and important, but they need to decide if the information is to be trusted. This involves a whole separate set of skills, but they are skills that are definitely worth cultivating in both ourselves and our students.

As an elementary computer lab teacher, the bulk of the responsibility of teaching these skills is likely to fall on me, at least until the majority of my peers understand the importance of information literacy. However, these skills really need to be taught in the context of the rest of the content my students are learning. I don’t believe that any skill taught in isolation will make connections for the student and therefore will not be likely to be valued or retained. Because of this, I will be seeking more and more opportunities to collaborate with other teachers in my school and help my students make the necessary connections. This will also provide me the opportunity to teach the new literacy skills and their importance to my peers. I feel that as we share successful collaborative projects with the rest of the school, others will “catch the fever” and want to use the wonderful tools available to them. This should make the learning of both content and the information literacy more relevant to our students, and this should be a goal of all teachers, not just the tech savvy.

Because technology is always changing, a professional goal I have is to be able to keep up with new tools available. There are many ways to accomplish this goal. One way is to establish a network of others who value technology. There is a group of us in my school district, and we meet periodically and share a group on FaceBook. I am also working on creating wikis for teachers at my school to share digital resources. Other means include reading blogs focusing on technology, attending workshops, and joining ISTE. Their journal is wonderful!

Another professional goal that I have is to introduce new technological tools to my peers. Our school is about to start monthly professional development meetings for each grade level. This would be an excellent time to share a new idea for integrating technology with our staff. In a recent evaluation of our school, we were told that we possessed wonderful technology resources, but that they were not being used to their full potential. I think I can help to fix that problem. I also think that as the computer lab teacher for my school, I should be an advocate for technology. And as I work through my Walden courses, I am feeling more and more confident that I am quite capable to meet this challenge.