Creating a game plan
was similar to creating a personal professional development plan. Having a plan
to refer back to and reflect on has helped keep me focused on specific goals
over the last few months. Having a plan keeps instructional practices evolving
in an efficient manner. Overall, following the personal game plan has fostered
new learning and impacted instructional practices in a positive way.
The first part of my
game plan revolved around collaborating with fellow teachers to gather materials
that are aligned with curriculum changes. Using a Dropbox provided flexibility
and instant gratification. All participants loved the ease of use and ability
to collaborate whenever it was convenient for each individual. Moving forward, it
will be important to make sure that the Dropbox account does not become a
dumping ground for everything. The account needs to stay organized and
streamlined to fit the new curriculum changes within the district, including
common core alignment. Now that there is a specific group of teachers
collaborating on the assignment, it will also be helpful to ask administration
for a common prep or time during faculty meetings to collaborate further and
discuss materials.
After collaborating
with colleagues, my instructional practices have been directly impacted.
Websites have been shared as well as teacher-made materials. Being that state
testing will also be changing, I found it extremely useful to reference a document
one teacher created that highlighted the new skills being addressed. Sharing
resources has helped free up time for other important duties such as planning
and creating other problem-based activities.
Using Dropbox has been
a success. However, I would probably not open this tool up to a class activity.
It may be useful for students to create individually, but other digital tools
such as wikis and blogs would be more beneficial for students to collaborate
with. Other digital tools can be monitored much more easily. The Dropbox
account is acceptable to share among peers who understand internet norms and
privacy morals. Young students who are just learning the importance of these
topics need more monitoring and scaffolding.
Moving forward, I will
make sure that I use problem-based learning as often as possible. Designing
lessons that allow students to collaborate and make their own accurate meaning
from the material is very important. Also, the ISTE has shown the importance of
implementing and using digital tools appropriately. Today’s students need to
know how to use technology appropriately, and the ISTE gives teachers a
comprehensive list of skills to address. Finally, using
social networking appropriately is something I will try to do with students
more often. Familiarizing students with these skills can only benefit them
moving forward. Overall, I found the resources and classroom practices discussed
very useful to today’s school settings.
