Throughout this course, I have learned a great deal about instructional technologies that we can use to create courses that are more dynamic, engaging, and effective. In IT 645, I have created course webpages, electronic documents, a presentation, a video, quizzes, and a quite a few resources that are accessible to students through the Internet. Though I considered myself fluent in digital literacy, there were many artifacts I developed for this course that were new to me. In addition to learning how to create these new digital resources, I have also learned how to better incorporate digital materials into my classroom. In the end, I believe my digital skills have been honed by this course. I now have a much better understanding of technology and its role in the classroom, how to integrate this technology, and how to manipulate digital resources for the benefit of myself and my students.
The textbook for this class, Teaching and Learning with Technology, provided an excellent overview of the issues regarding digital classroom technologies. It was both comprehensive and easy to use. The concepts were presented in a clear fashion and the chapter reflection questions were through provoking. Additionally, I liked all of the digital resources that were available through the book. Overall, I think this textbook is extremely helpful to those who beginner or intermediate learners in instructional technology. It provided many samples lesson plan ideas and creative ways of implementing technology within the classroom.
Weebly is an excellent resource for any instructor or student. Through Weebly, and similar sites (such as Google Sites), one is able to create a dynamic space for students to engage, interact, and learn. Websites are free to develop and use without any intrusive advertisements. Through resources like this, teachers are better able to adapt the activities and lessons to the needs of the students. Additionally, since it is utilizing the web, a medium which students already love, they are more apt to take advantage of this resource. It is easy to use for both students and teachers.
The Dynamic Instruction Design model for lesson planning was something entirely new to me. Through this method, teachers can ensure that the activities focus on the curricular goals, educational standards, and the competencies the students must develop. It was simple to learn and exceptionally beneficial. I have already begun utilizing this method in the courses that I am currently teaching.
The Google Drive Suite of apps utilized in this course include: Google Docs, Forms, Slides, and Sheets. These are some of the best resources for both instructors and students that I have ever come across. I have been using Google Docs for years, but only through this class started experimenting and creating with Forms, Slides, and Sheets. These apps provide incredibly flexibility in lesson creation, collaboration, and transparency. In addition to the suite, Google Drive also has storage capabilities, which allow instructors to share materials easily and safely with their students. Files can also be embedded into webpages (as is the case with my teaching philosophy on this site). Overall, this is the most useful set of resources for me. I have already started integrating them into my courses—having my students create and collaborate via Google Drive and the suite. It is easy to use for both students and teachers. In the future, it will certainly play a major role in my digital instructional methods.
For this course, I needed to create a podcast—something which was entirely new to me. I have created recordings for my classes before, but never anything to be accessed at home and studied independently. Typically, I have used Vocaroo or my cell phone to make simple recordings for my classes. For the podcast, however, I wanted to make sure that the quality was higher. I used a microphone and recorded myself speaking with the OS X app Garage Band. It allowed me to record and rerecord without worrying about making mistakes. I could simply delete any mistakes and easily replace it with new recordings. I have only used Garage Band once before, so it was difficult for me. However, by the end of the activity, it was quite easy to manage. Podcasts are something that I have incorporated into my classes before, but never something I have created. I enjoyed this learning experience and I plan on making more materials available to students via podcast in the future.
The video lesson was also an interesting learning experience. I knew about a function of Microsoft PowerPoint that allowed you to save a slideshow as a movie. While that did work, it was too difficult to make the timing and audio work. In the end, I used iMovie to drastically edit the PowerPoint video. Through iMovie, I was able to time the transitions as I wanted them and was able to lengthen or shorten the amount of time a slide was showing. Additionally, I recorded the audio directly in iMovie. It was similar in functionality to Garage Band, but without as many options available for audio manipulation. In the end, however, it was rather simple to use and I plan to incorporate video lessons into my courses in the future.
The Flipped Classroom is a term that I was familiar with before starting the course. However, I was not familiar with how to go about implementing the concepts behind a flipped classroom. This course site was created through Weebly (discussed above). I tried to make the content both accessible and effective. Creating this site forced me to analyze the types of activities and lessons I was creating to ensure that what the students would be presented with was both valid and reliable. I like the flipped classroom method. It promotes creative thinking, problem-solving, and individual responsibility. I will certainly be using this method in future courses.
I was impressed with how easy to use the Weebly Quizzes/Surveys were. Though they are limited in some functionality (number of questions, limited number of attempts, and no way of ensuring that someone enters the correct name), the quizzes are easy to use for both students and teachers. Tough they are useful and interesting, because of the limits mentioned, I am more likely to incorporate Google Forms as quizzes in my courses.
The Weebly forums are an excellent resource. They promote interactivity among the students and allow discussions to occur organically (or be prompted) within the course. It gives students the ability to express themselves to their classmates—which is especially important for the virtual classroom. I have tried, with limited success, to include Moodle forums in face-to-face courses before. If the forum were on a site like the one I created, however, I believe the students would be more enthusiastic about participating. Certainly one of the biggest hurdles in online education is voluntary participation in vitally important areas like online discussion forums.
Rubistar was an interesting online tool for creating rubrics. One of the elements of this website that I liked the most was the ability to reference past rubrics by other professions. Through this, we are able to ensure that our rubrics more reliable and comprehensive. Creating a rubric through this site was easy and I will certainly be using it in the future. I did have some trouble exporting it as an Excel file and uploading it to Google Drive (see journal titled “Distance Education”). However, now that I know a workaround, it will be simple to create rubrics for future assessments.
EasyTestMaker is exactly what the name says. It was probably the simplest test maker I have ever used. The categories are simple, clear, and allow for a variety of question styles. I especially liked the ability to quickly create multiple versions of the test. This system will become a regular part of the digital resources I use in my classes.
ThingLink is a web resource that allows anyone to use an image from the internet (or anywhere) and affix content to it. The content can be webpages, videos, or anything else available on the internet. It was simple to use for teachers or students. I have already begun incorporating it into my current classes and my students are impressed. I especially like the ability to allow changes from other people, so students can create ThingLink images on their own or collaborate and create class images related to the current chapter.
Scoop.it, like ThingLink, allows for either individual creation or collaboration. I can image myself, in the future, creating a class Scoop.it where the students can all contribute to it together. I also like the ability to add commentary to others’ “scoops”. I disliked that the page customizability was so limited in the free version. I was surprised when the background I had uploaded automatically deleted after one week. Even still, it is a fantastic resource that helps expand the content out of the textbook and into the real world.
TrackStar is similar to Scoop.it in that it allows someone to bookmark (“scoop”) a webpage for others to see. It is much more limited in the interactivity (no comments are possible). Additionally, since it is just showing the websites in frames, it is not as pleasing to look at as Scoop.it. In future courses, I doubt that I will use TrackStar, since Scoop.it has much more interactive features. However, I do think it could be useful to use both—having TrackStar as essential informational pages and Scoop.it as supplemental. Dividing the content this way would make it easy for students to know what is required and what is recommend.
Overall, I believe I am quite strong in most skill areas assessed in this course. That is not to say I do not have room to improve, however. I still need work in audio and video creation and editing. I have already begun integrating into my classroom several of the technologies discussed throughout the course. In the future, I would like to develop html and css skills. Though they were not a required part of this course, knowing these two coding languages would have greatly helped in the customization of the course site. Further integration of technology into my classroom is inevitable and I am eager for the advancements to come.