Personal Learning Reflection

Over the course of CEP 810, I feel I have accomplished a great deal of professional growth. My learning was supported by:

• a well designed system of instruction that included face-to-face class time
• a generous smorgasbord of on-line tutorials and links to useful web-based resources
• a classroom facility that adequately met the technology needs of the course
• and an instructor who has the magical blend of content expertise and approachability that makes him a highly effective teacher.

Things I’ve learned in this class that I plan to implement immediately in the Middle School Technology courses I teach include:

• use of Web 2.0 tools like Google Apps and Open Office ( I am especially stoked about the collaboration students can engage in using presentation software)
• blogging
• the importance of copyright and the existence and usefulness of Creative Commons
• what RSS feeds are and how you can use them to set up your very own personal learning network.

One of the things I've learned about effective teaching strategies when integrating technology is that once students have been introduced to the basics of different technologies (e.g. word processors, spreadsheets, presentation programs) and the differences between them, you should give students choices as to what type of technology they decide to utilize for assignment completion. Another thing I’ve learned is that you don’t have to be an “expert” at using a technology in order to incorporate it in your classroom.  You can introduce it and then let students explore it and decide whether or not it is useful to them.  In this way, you can “open the floodgates” on learning!

Integrating the internet helped me think about and evaluate uses of technology.  I think one of the biggest effects it had on me, is that I realized I need to be using Web 2.0 technologies with my students NOW. The fact that the tools allow collaboration (in contrast to "stand alone" programs like Microsoft Word) is in and of itself enough reason to jump on this.  In addition to the collaborative capabilities they contain, Web 2.0 tools are also highly interactive with each other. This allows creativity to flourish because instead of technology imposing limits on what is possible, it actually continuously increases learning opportunities.

I think the RSS Feeds Reflection assignment that we did in CEP 810 really exemplifies good teaching with technology.  First, I was introduced to something very useful that was taking place on the internet that I knew nothing about.  Second, the RSS feeds represent just how dynamic the internet is and why it must be part of one's professional development.  Third, the assignment requires you to construct your own knowledge over time.  Sounds like lifelong learning to me!

One area I would have liked to learn more about and grow more in is in my expertise at using photo hosting sites like Flickr, Picaso, andPhotobucket.  I don’t have much prior knowledge in this subject.  Being such a novice makes me slow and cumbersome on the learning curve in this area, so time and lack of experience were my biggest hindrances to learning as much as I would have liked.  I also think the timing of where this topic falls in the pacing of the course made it difficult to spend much time on the suggested extra resources and links to websites.

I am very pleased to report that I feel I have met the goals I established for myself in the personal growth plan I submitted.  I now have a clear vision of what my students need to learn in my classes in order to be effective, efficient, and discriminating users of internet based resources.  I also feel that my technology skills have undergone the transformation they needed in order to help my students explore and navigate the Web 2.0 world. It makes me smile just writing that!

New goals I have for personal growth are to learn to use Prezi and also to choose one of the photo editing sites and visit it on a regular basis.  I plan to reach these goals by setting aside time each week to explore and try new things. I also plan to incorporate use of them in my lesson plans so my students will get to experience this learning too.  In addition to these immediate goals, I plan to complete MSU’s Educational Technology Certificate Program and then continue on with the Master’s Degree.

Photo Attribution:
Filename: Do You Know Who I Am.jpg
by Hugo Sousa
http://picasaweb.google.com/slothminds/Gallery#5264284587680923266

How I might incorporate images into my curriculum:

I currently have 8^th graders do an assignment using Powerpoint to create a graphic organizer titled “Who Am I?”  In this graphic organizer, they describe themselves according to the following categories:  Sports & Clubs, Hopes & Dreams, Hobbies & Recreation, Lifestyle Preferences, Skills & Abilities, Community, and Talents.  I would have them do an extension activity to this assignment by having them create a collage of pictures in place of the boxes of text, that represent each of the categories of “Who They Are.”

flickr digital cameral upload



RSS Page Reflection

After considering the resources presented in our RSS Lab for CEP 810, my choice for an RSS Aggregator was Google Reader.  I felt this would work best for me because I like to keep things simple and streamlined.  Since I already had a Gmail account and am a frequent user of Google, setting up the account was a snap.  A Web Reader style of aggregator (like Google Reader) also works best for me because I needed an option that would allow me to access and manage my feeds from any Internet-connected computer. Because of the nature of my job and my lifestyle, I am frequently on different computers! Email Readers and Browser Options do not offer this flexibility.  They have the constraint of only being accessible from your own computer. The Mashup Reader also looks like an option that would work for me.  I like the opportunity it gives you to mash resources together which is like creating your very own personalized newspaper!  I would need to spend some time (not sure how much) figuring out how to set it up!  I plan to check into this further in my spare time.

The RSS feeds I subscribed to are shown in the graphic above.  They include the four specified in the CEP 810 RSS Lab and others that I hoped would contribute to my own professional development. I enjoy staying abreast of the latest news relating to educational technology and am always on the lookout for specific ideas to apply in my own classroom.

I’ve learned several things by routinely checking for updates on my RSS feeds:

•   Some subscriptions require you to register as a user in order to gain more access to content.  One of my favorite subscriptions is to Digital Directions:  Trends and Advice for K-12 Technology Leaders. I frequently found myself drawn to articles in Education Week and when following the links, sometimes was able to read the articles and sometimes was baited with an introduction to the article and then stopped by the message “this article is available to registered guests only” or “this article is available to premium guests only.”  I was able to become a registered guest for free by providing demographic information and this enabled me to read more of the content I sought.  The premium guest membership you have to pay for.  It allows you unlimited access to the content and also gives you printing rights.  The articles are so good it may be worth paying for!  Did you know there are rural school districts(I’m talking rural- where some students have as long as a two hour bus ride one-way) that have extended lesson time by equipping the backs of the headrests on their busses with DVD players that show science lessons like cell anatomy on the rides to and from school? I learned that from Education Week.
•     The frequency with which content on the feeds is updated varies greatly.  Some feeds update daily, some weekly, some monthly, and some (especially some of the blogs) update whenever their author feels like updating.  Kind of like my blog! Bloggers will simply explain their absence by saying they’ve taken a “hiatus.”
•    When you post a comment to a blog, the author of the blog decides whether or not to publish your comment, and it may take awhile to see your comment posted.  On October 16^th I commented on a post on the Teachnology Blog titled “A New Look at Study Skills” and it took several weeks to actually show up.  I had a sudden “feel like a Rock Star” moment when I finally saw my comment published!  Below is a screen capture of the interaction.
•  The skimming and scanning reading skills we teach our students are more important than ever in this Digital World.  Information overload is at our fingertips and we need to learn to manage it as efficiently and productively as possible.

It has been easy to find useful information in the professional online interactions the RSS feeds provide.  For example, the Teachnology Blog posting I commented on (illustrated below) is useful information for my groups SIG Proposal on using Multimedia in the Classroom. Research is showing that quiet study spaces and studying subjects in isolation are not the best way to help our students retain information. The author suggests that “mixing it up” by using technology to help students study will help motivate kids and offer them the flexibility they have grown so accustomed to having.

Another favorite subscription of mine is Free Technology for Teachers. This feed seems to have the most practical ideas for technology applications that I can use in my classroom or can pass on to colleagues. One posting was about Simple Timer and On Line Stop Watch; sites where you could find count down timers and stop watch settings to use on your computer.  I had just developed a review game for one of my classes and was going to borrow a timer from someone!  Another post was about Wylio.com – an image search engine for Creative Commons licensed images.  This would be a very handy site to use with students when they are writing blog posts for my class.  A third post I liked was about Google Cloud Connect which is a plugin that enables you to synch your Microsoft Office Docs with Google Apps.

I plan to incorporate the use of blogs and an RSS Reader in my classroom.  I am going to have my students each create their own individual blog and post to it in much the same way that we do in CEP 810.  It will be a digital portfolio of their work and will be wonderful to see their skills develop, since posts will be saved over time.  I’m going to introduce RSS to my 8^th grade students by showing them my feeds and explaining how I compiled them.  Then I plan to conduct an RSS Lab with them modeled after the one we did in this class and let them focus their feeds on any school appropriate topic that interests them.  As a daily warm-up activity, I will give the students five minutes to check their RSS feeds.

Before taking this class, I had begun to notice the RSS feed symbol on web pages, but I really had no idea what they were.  Amazing how much power one tiny little symbol has!

Atomic Learning – PC Maintenance and Security

Cost effective ways to keep your internet connected PC running smoothly.

Tutorial Introduction

One thing I learned that I will definitely be sharing with others:

·         Malware is a “catch all” phrase that includes viruses, adware, spyware, Trojan horses, and worms – software designed to disrupt and damage computer systems. 

Information that surprised me:

·         Instant messaging often includes spyware.

Tutorial Clean Up and Speed Up Your PC

One thing I learned that I will definitely be sharing with others:

·         You can use MS Config to customize which programs “start-up” on your Windows start-up.  My husband has been complaining that Skype starts up every time he turns his computer on.  I’m happy to be able to tell him how to solve this problem!

Information that surprised me:

·         After I followed the directions from the first tip, “remove unwanted programs,” my computer was considerably faster.

Tutorial Organizing Your Computer
One thing I learned that I will definitely be sharing with others:

·         You can organize “my documents” in a list view instead of using the default tile view.

Information that surprised me:

·         If you right click inside any folder and go to arrange files by type, your files will all be sorted into groups.

Tutorial Wireless Network Security
One thing I learned that I will definitely be sharing with others:

·         If you use a router in your home to set up a wireless network and don’t secure it, neighbors may be using your internet connection.

Information that surprised me:

·         People drive around neighborhoods looking for open networks and then from their cars, use the wireless network they find.  This is called “war driving.”

Social Networking

Social networking has fit into my workflow personally for a number of years.  Five years ago, when my oldest son left for college, I saw Facebook as a way to keep in touch with him. It worked well for that, but I was also pleasantly surprised at how easy it was to reconnect with friends from high school and college, some of whom I had not been in touch with in over 30 years.  I also found that Facebook was a good way to communicate with people I currently work with or have worked with in the recent past. Even though they are “work friends,” the information shared is personal and therefore the social networking site has added a new dimension to these relationships.

Since enrolling in Teaching for Understanding with Technology, I’ve learned that social networks can make a major contribution to my Professional Learning Network (PLN). In addition to Facebook , I’m now also an active user of Twitter and MACUL Space and was able to set up links between the three accounts. I use hashtags on Twitter to enable me to follow specific topics, and even though MACUL Space is already a “specialty” social network, I’ve taken that a step further by becoming a member of the MSU EduTech and Multimedia (MM) special interest groups on the site. These sites are all contributing to a customized professional development plan for me.

My students frequently talk about using the Facebook and MySpace social networking sites. They use these sites mainly for communicating and sharing pictures with friends and family.  I plan to share with them how I’m using social networking to support my own personal learning goals and to collaborate with colleagues so they too can see the possibilities these sites extend to them for creating their very own personal learning networks.

The Bag Lady Attempts to Master the Workflow

Organizing the Process

Even if we’ve never attempted to record our methods, I think all of us have some sort of organizational system. I discovered mine was a combination of bags of stuff, piles of stuff, stuff in email and snail mailboxes, and the stuff inside my head. The GTD process is helping me control the stuff, instead of the stuff controlling me!

Collect

I first had to identify the categories of inboxes I use and what I use each for in order to organize the process of Getting Things Done. Upon reflection, I found that I rely heavily on bags to keep myself organized!  I have a teacher bag, a coaching bag, a student bag, and a personal bag (my purse) to keep myself sane and productive. The other stuff I gather on a regular basis is email and snail mail. The bags and the email systems are the collection buckets for my stuff.

Process

I am currently using and maintaining three different email accounts.  The two that are for very specific purposes, are not used as frequently as my main email account. I have a MSU student email account that I check about once per week.  I immediately delete about half of the items that come in without even reading them.  The other half I read and then delete.  This account has fewer than ten items in it at any given time.  I also have a Gmail account that I use specifically for two purposes.  One is to communicate with classmates in my Educational Technology graduate program.  The other is for receiving Education Association emails from union members and union administrators who for privacy reasons do not want to communicate via the school Outlook Express system.  The items that come in the Gmail account tend to be immediately actionable and therefore are acted on quickly and deleted.  This account also usually has less than ten items in it.

The challenge for me in using the GTD process was in dealing with my main Outlook Express account.  I use this account for all work related and personal related communications.  This includes emails from colleagues, administrators, parents, friends, relatives, stores at which I shop, and targeted emails from education related businesses.  This account was a monster!  When I began the GTD process, my Outlook Express account contained 107 pages.  With roughly 20 emails per page, altogether, I was sitting on about 2,000 emails! 386 of them were in the “unread” category.  The first thing I decided to do was delete any unread messages that were over two weeks old.  Next, I deleted any store emails I’d been holding onto (e.g. Borders’s, New York & Co., etc.) Then I created folders to manage what was left.  The folders serve the purpose of allowing me to organize the email by categories, namely teaching, coaching, parent communication, stores, businesses, and personal. In the process I realized I didn’t need most of the emails and I deleted approximately two-thirds of them.  The remaining emails are things I want to hold on to for reference purposes and they were divvied up into the new folders I had created.

The bag system I mentioned earlier is working for me and serves as an easy and effective bucket for non-electronic stuff.  Since I usually set aside time once per week to clean out and update each bag, I already have been following the GTD process with these buckets.

Organize

Since I am a technology teacher and have computer access readily available to me throughout my work-day, I decided that mainly keeping electronic files for the organize part of the GTD process made the most sense for me.  I made a separate e-file for the projects, next actions, and waiting for categories of the organize step.  These are working like “to-do” lists.  Although I created an on-line calendar in Google apps, I’m still finding it easier and quicker to maintain my paper-and-pencil calendar because it is small and portable. 

Review

I do a twice per day review of my calendar and action lists.  In the morning, I prioritize the lists and add any other next action items I need to take care of that day.  In the afternoon, I revisit the action list and update it.

Do

What I can get done, how much time I have to do it in, and the energy I have left for it changes constantly.  Teaching is a very dynamic occupation and managing the workflow is one of the biggest challenges of the job. Prioritizing and organizing methods only make being an effective teacher easier.

1. Going through the process for the first time:

Actually getting started using the GTD process was the hardest part for me. The biggest question was, “What are, or will be, my inboxes.”  Once I was able to decide on the number of and the nature of my inboxes, I was able to begin. 

Organizing and deleting emails was time consuming and somewhat stressful.  I had to face the fact that I was being an electronic pack rat!  I am glad I did it and feel much more in control of the “stuff.”

2.  Helpfulness of the GTD process:

Undertaking the GTD process has been helpful to me especially in the area of my main email account.  I have always wanted to organize it, but was unsure of how to get started.  The GTD process gave me a clearer understanding of the stuff I needed to organize and gave me a suggested structure for doing so. 

3.  Continuation of the process/use of an alternative:

I will continue using the GTD process because it will help me prevent being buried by email again.  There is more I’d like to learn about it like how to effectively use and manage the 43 folders.  Since I am still using the workflow management processes that I used to use, I have already adapted the process to suit my needs.

Lifehacker.com posted an article titled Practicing Simplified GTD by Gina Trapini.  The author describes her GTD system in the following eight words:  Make three lists.  Revise them daily and weekly.  The lists suggested are:  a To-Do List, a Project List, and a Someday/Maybe List.  Trapini says that use of these three lists in addition to using an email inbox and calendar is all you really need and is much less cumbersome.  This sounds like a viable alternative to me.  I don’t think I will be a purist about practicing GTD because it is time consuming and requires a lot of organizational discipline.

RSS Subscriptions

Differences Between Traditional Web Pages and Blogs


While a blog is a special form of a web page, it differs from a traditional web page in several aspects.  First and most importantly, a blog is very interactive.  Blogs make information sharing a two way street. This is done by inviting readers to comment on posted articles and then displaying those comments to all readers of the blog.  While traditional web pages may invite some feedback, it’s usually limited and section-specific.  Comments or feedback from readers is not the primary focus of a traditional web-page, as it is in a blog. A second main difference between a traditional web page and a blog is the size of the audience.  In general, one could say that traditional web pages are meant to appeal to larger groups of readers. Blogs, on-the-other-hand, due to the specificity of their content, tend to be viewed by smaller groups of readers with special interests. Even though blog sites are as individual as those who author them, most have common elements.  In addition to allowing comments, the blog posts are time-stamped, show up in reverse chronological order, and most have an RSS feed. This RSS feed takes the news to the reader via a subscription which eliminates the necessity for the reader to "revisit" the site regularly because the latest news is "delivered" to them. Lastly, a difference between a traditional web page and a blog lies in the ease with which the author can maintain, update, and add new content to the site.  Changes to a web page require HTML code.  Entries can be added to a blog simply in the form of a written message – no programming required.