Lessons+Learned

First of all I was overwhelmed coming into this classroom. I thought that I was way over my head and felt really stressed at times. However, I worked with some really great ladies who I just met. We stayed in touch and worked well together. I would recommend this class strongly to others. I am like some of the older ladies, I barely know how to email pictures and I require much maintenance and time when it comes to my computer. I told my techies at school that I would be taking this class and they applauded. This class forced me to look at new sites I would have never have otherwise looked at. This has opened my eyes to some tools that I would like to use to spark interest and excitement in my students as well as their parents.

We are such a rural community therefore, communication is vital in our everyday lives. By incorporating some of these informational tools, I will be able to stay in touch with my students and parents in a more personal way.Absent students can feel better if missed assignments can get done or be organized in a way that it becomes fun. I like the idea of accountability and how easy it would be to evaluate a student by use of a rubric, or other authentic types of assessment. Today we get so robotic about teaching to the WASL that we often forget to teach fun and engaging units that focus on critical thinking, problem-solving, and technical 21st Century Fluency skills.

As one of two second grade teachers at my school I feel confident in trying one or more of the units that we created this summer. I would like to showcase what our group has done and would be interested in asking our Professor to come and set up a workshop for our school. This has been a valuable class for me and I would really hope that others will be open to these tools to compliment their lessons.

I am currently working on my own wikipage.