EDLD+5364+Teaching+with+Technology+Reflection

Before being enrolled in EDLD 5364 Teaching with Technology, I was unaware of how much time and effort that teachers have to put into developing assignments for their students. Because I am not a teacher, I assumed that all of the assignments were pretty much standard across the board for all students. After completing the UDL assingment in this course, I can truly say that I have a lot more respect for teachers. In the past, I have had several bad experiences with group assignments and prefer to complete assignments on my own. The problem that I have encountered in the past has been with teammates not being reliable. With that being said, I have to say that I was very nervous about this class when I discovered that we had to form a group to complete the assignments.

During the first week of this course, we developed our group to address the class project scenerio. We also talked about constructivisim. Constructivisim takes ones existing experiences and building on top of them in order to develop new understanding. Traditional teaching is centered around the teacher's lectures and the textbook. This can create a lot of boredom for students and increases the drop out rate in America. In classrooms where teachers do all the work, students may be a captive audience, waiting for the end of class (Southwest Educational Development Laboratory, 1999). When I was coming up through grade school, I was stuck with the same old traditional style of teaching. It is a good thing that technology has evolved and entered our schools in a big way for today's digital learners.

In the second week of the course, we discussed an interesting topic dealing with Univeral Design for Learning (UDLs). I always wondered how teachers addressed the different needs of students. I assumed it was just one size fits all. The idea behind universal design in architecture is to create structures that are conceived, designed, and constructed to accommodate the widest spectrum of users, including those with disabilities, without the need for subsequent adaptation or specialized design (Rose & Meyer, 2002). After reading this, it became clear to me that all students have different needs and teachers must accommodate those needs. In the following week of this course, we had our opportunity to create our own UDL. This was an exciting, yet difficult, task for me. After reading the articles for this week, I gained a deeper understanding of the three diverse brain networks (Recognition, Strategic, Affective). This decreased the stress level that I was having while developing my UDL. The readings also enlightened me own the different technology software that provides students with immediate feedback. Feedback is important in the classroom because it increases the students interest level in class. Research shows that the more immediate feedback is in classrooms settings, the greater its impact on student behavior (Kulik & Kulik, 1998). With help from the articles and videos, I was able to create a effective UDL. We also created an eBook for this week. I found the eBook Builder to be a very useful tool for teachers to use for our digital learners. I was able to learn how to use all of the features of the application in a short period of time. I did experience some minor lag in the speed whenever I made a change to the content in the book, but overall I was very pleased with all of the features that the application had to offer. The text-to-speech feature was a great add-in and it truly made the application universal for all students. The coaches feature provides a wonderful perk for kids to better develop their project. Research shows that when students are allowed to set some of their own learning goals, their motivation is higher than when they pursue only teacher-set goals (Hom & Murphy, 1983). This added motivation would increase the students' overall performance in the classrooms. Overall, I feel the the eBook Building software is a great step in moving towards 21st century learning for students I found this activity to be fun and exciting. The software was easy to use. It is amazing how an eBook can address several needs within one classroom of diverse students. Giving students choices of content and tools can increase their enthusiasm for learning particular processes (Rose & Meyer, 2002). While there are many benefits of UDLs, they still present problems for teachers.The main issue with UDLs is time. This issue is created because school districts are more concerned about standardized test. All schools are driven by requirements to maintain and improve standardized test scores (Solomon & Schrum, 2007). Instead of teaching students skills to address problems that they will face as adults, schools focus on standardized assessments that have no genuine meaning to the students.

In the last two weeks of this course, we discussed strategies on how to put our group action plan together. My team and I were able to address all the needs of the students presented in the scenario. I chose to focus on creating a KWHL chart for students to fill out. I felt like this was important because it gives the students an opportunity to present their prior knowledge about the rainforest. The KWHL chart is an excellent tool to use when introducing new content to a classroom. This is a great way to activate prior knowledge and to have students personalize their learning goals, which is one of the research-based classroom recommendations (Pitler, Hubbell, Kuhn, & Malenoski, 2007). Overall, I was very pleased with the outcome of my groups action plan.

The knowledge that I gained from the course will be very useful to me in the future. Considering the fact that I am not a teacher, I now feel that I would be of assistance to the teachers within my school district. I now have a deeper understanding of UDLs and all of its benefits. I feel that I would be able to communicate better with teachers because of the knowledge from this course. Although I have a deep understanding of UDLs, I plan to futher investigate and evaluate how effective it is in a real classroom setting.

References

Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kuhn, M., & Malenoski, K. (2007). Using technology with classroom instruction that works. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, 155-164.

Solomon, G., & Schrum, L. (2007). Web 2.0: New tools, new schools. Eugene, OR: International Society for Technology in Education, 168-176.

Southwest Educational Development Laboratory, (1999). Learning as personal event: A brief introduction to constructivism. Retrieved on October 4, 2009 from []

Rose, D., & Meyer, A. (2002). Teaching Every Student in the Digital Age: Universal Design for Learning. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. Available online at the Center for Applied Special Technology Web Site. Chapter 4. Retrieved on October 5, 2009, from []

Hom Jr., H.L., & Murphy, M.D. (1983, November). Low need achievers' performance: The positive impact of a self-directed goal. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 11, 275-285