Pam's Reflection on the Semester

I feel like there are a few things that I’m really taking away from this course. One of the main things I think is that I’ve gained is this new understanding about how children think and learn and how it’s important to use technology in the classroom not only because it can be fun and exciting, but because it reaches children on a level which they can really understand from being born into a generation where technology is easily accessible at their fingertips. Before taking this course, I thought of technology only as a way to spice up a boring lecture lesson, but now I see that it’s actually really important to use in order to engage the students’ learning and reach their level of understanding. I’ve found that because of the conversations held in class, and the readings we’ve read and discussed, that I now always try to find ways that I can incorporate technology into my lessons. I even wrote a lesson the other day that involved a digital camera and a photo printer, which I don’t think I would have ever thought about using in the classroom, just because I’ve always thought of things like that as a personal technology, not something that can be used educationally. Considering that, I’ve learned that there are fun or “personal” technologies that really can be used well in the classroom, such as blogging, wikis, YouTube, Inspiration, digital storytelling and so forth. I feel like I have learned many new ways to make ordinary lessons more intriguing and exciting, which the students can really get into because they will involve things that, really, they probably use on a daily basis. I feel like I would definitely like to learn more about how I can use technology more in the classroom for organizing things, like we read in one of our articles. I liked the ideas of keeping class rosters, notes about kids, their work and grades, and everything on the computer, but now that I know it’s possible to do all of those things, I would like to learn how. I would also like to gain more experience using the technologies that we used/talked about in class so that I will feel more comfortable using them in my own classroom some day. I would also like to learn the best way to incorporate technology into those classrooms that are less fortunate and don’t have access to such technologies.I also wanted to mention that from this course, I got this inspiration to get back into website designing and design my own website where I can organize all of the lesson plans that I have written throughout the past year and the years to come, so that I can use technology to really organize all of the hard work that I’ve put forth into my teaching career, because I’m realizing how unreliable my binder portfolios are since they’re so bulky and time consuming to go through. I think it’ll be really nice to have a place where all of my lesson plan ideas are compiled together for easy access if I ever need an idea, or to give other teachers and colleagues ideas, as well.