Reflection

My course experience has opened my eyes to a new way to approach lesson planning in my classroom. So often I felt locked into the curriculum that was provided me by the Project Lead the Way company. I felt I had to present the lessons in the way they were given to me in as straightforward a manner as possible. The learning objectives that they provided were clearly the most important, and what I should be focused on in any lesson.
However, in this course I was presented with a myriad of literacy skills that I realized my students were lacking. I was shown that my students needed more than just the technology objectives presented by my curriculum. I could do so much more in a lesson where students build a house than just simply have them build the house. I could teach my students how to research online. I could teach them how to choose good websites from bad. I could teach them how to synthesize data and present it in a clear and effective manner. All the while my students would be learning about construction technologies while also developing their literacy skills.
I have learned so much from this course. I have truly learned how to integrate literacy skills into my every day lessons. This will influence and change every facet of my instruction. My students will benefit and my lesson planning will benefit. Even the lessons that don’t go well will be more effective because they target multiple areas. In the future I want to fully integrate these skills into each and every project I have my students complete. I want them to have to opportunity not only to create in my class but also to develop. So often I get lost in the project when I need to be thinking about the process. These literacy skills will help me keep focus on what’s truly important in every lesson.

Reflection

This course has been a rough one for me. I have been away at my parents for much of the summer and only check my course work two times a week. However, I believe I have managed to take a few important things from this class.
I want to say that I made modifications to my personal learning theory, and I'm sure that I have, but nothing that would directly contradict my first application. I now place a little more value on constructivist learning theory. I want my students to construct their knowledge in my classroom. They can do this through project based learning activities, and through group projects. Things like summarizing/note taking and cooperative learning have influenced how I will plan and manage my lessons. (Pitler, Hubbell, Kuhn, Malenoski, 2007)
As of right now, I have no immediate changes to make. It's summertime and there are no students! Seriously though, I want to build in more group activities for my classes that can handle them. My other classes I want to work with so that we progress towards being able to handle group learning activities. I want to focus instruction based on project completion so that my students can explore and freely construct their own meaning. I plan on switching my lesson plans so that they incorporate more of each of these things.
I suppose the above are both my immediate and my long term goals. Technology in the classroom is an important concept, but its even more important to understand how the technology is affecting students. I think that this is the key to a successful, technologically integrated, classroom.

References
Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kuhn, M., & Malenoski, K. (2007). Using technology with classroom
instruction that works. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.

Social Learning theories

The instructional strategies discussed this week were relatively easy to connect to social learning theory. Social learning theory is the belief that students learn by interacting and observing others through a variety of different situations. This can be observed in very young students as they imitate an older sibling or in older students as they observe a behavior or action and attempt to implement it themselves. Our very classrooms are social learning platforms where students observe and learn from their interaction with us.

The learning resources and strategies mentioned this week all came back to the same idea. Students need to interact with each other in order to construct and develop meaning. The different strategies included students developing projects together, or creating voicethreads, or even playing games together through their computers. All of these things promote interaction with course material which is what we should strive for in a strong social learning environment. Student interaction will foster strong development as long as it is focused and on task.

In my classroom sometimes it can be difficult to allow my students to work in groups. It really depends on what the class can handle. I've found that when I can manage to do focused group work in a class my students learn more. For some classes I've had this is simply not an option. Most classes I plan in group instruction and projects. I usually have one or two a year where I simply cannot trust the students with any equipment so they miss out.

My VoiceThread: http://voicethread.com/share/523158/

Constructivism

I found this weeks reading from the "Using Technology with Classroom Instruction" book to be very informative and very interesting. The chapter begins by Introducing the following generalizations:

1. The generating and testing of hypotheses can be approached in an inductive or deductive manner
2. Teachers should ask students to clearly explain their hypotheses and conclusions.
(page 202)
They followed up with the following generalizations...

1. Make sure students can explain their hypotheses and conclusions.
2. Use a variety of structured tasks to guide students through generating and testing hypotheses.
(page 203)
These two sections clearly explain how teachers should approach the generation and testing of hypotheses in their classrooms. They are to require students to be able to explain their thought process while at the same time providing students with tasks to support students in their research and conclusions.

In my opinion the generating and researching of hypotheses is directly correllated with constructivist theory. Nothing is better at allowing students to construct knowledge than to let them develop and test their theories and ideas while at the same time challenging them to explain as they go. The text goes on to explain six different ways that students can do this.

1. systems analysis
2. problem solving
3. historical investigation
4. invention
5. experimental inquiry
6. decision making

These six activities are excellent ways to force students to develop theories and test them. The text suggested that spreadsheet software be used to assist in this, but also stated that not a lot of time should be spent gathering data, rather more time be spent on analysis and conclusions. (page 204)

The different instructional strategies talked about in this weeks resources all align directly with constructivist theory because they allow the student to create something. It is assumed that with this creation students are also creating knowledge of their own. This is the very basis of project based learning. Students are to create their own knowledge in an attempt to build a firmer foundation than simply stuffing them with facts from a lecture or a textbook. Students who apply data are generally more likely to be influenced by it than students who simply hear or read it.


Resource:
Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kuhn, M., & Malenoski, K. (2007). Using technology with classroom instruction that works. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.

Cognitive theories

COgnitive theories of learning treat the mind as a learning tool that can be understood. This is a very different approach than the behavioral learning theories. Pitler, Hubbell, Kuhn, and Malenoski talk about two sets of instructional strategies to support cognitive learning approaches in the classroom.

The first one they discuss is "cues, questions, and advance organizers". In a classroom these three things could be presented through various forms of software. Word Processors can be used to create cues, or present questions. Spreadsheets can be used as advanced organizers. And numerous organizing applications can be used to sort and order thoughts and ideas. In a cognitive learning classroom these things are all directed towards stimulating the student's ability to learn. These different software styles give students the tools to organize their thoughts, and different cueing or questioning techniques are included in lessons in an attempt to stimulate student learning and thought process.

The second strategy they talked about was "summarizing and note-taking". This can be instituted by using the same software mentioned in the last paragraph. Students can use word processing software to do both of these things. Summarization is an extremely important cognitive skill for students to cultivate. They can type a short summary to an article, or summarrize directions to an assignment. They could jot down notes into an outline in powerpoint or possibly type out important facts into a bulletted list in Microsoft Word. These two techniques are designed to target students ability to sort through important data, and weed out the important parts.

Overall both of these instructional strategies are very strong in their ties to cognitive learning theory. They both really target students thinking skills and attempt to develop them further in whichever way they can. Technology can be used to assist these attempts by giving students a medium in which to be questioned or in which to organize their thoughts.

Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kuhn, M., & Malenoski, K. (2007). Using technology with classroom instruction that works. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.