In my GAME plan I focus on teaching students the necessity of technology. I feel that I need to continue to develop my ideas on how implement that technology. As of now, I have used technology in hopes of increasing motivation and engagement rather than also increasing higher order thinking. Another change that I would like to make towards my GAME plan is to include integrating technology in the assessment part of my classroom. I want the technology to help with “monitoring and evaluating the academic progress of students” (Cennamo, Ross, & Ertmer, 2009, p. 163). I want to use technology in every unit to assess my students, whether it is a formative assessment or a summative assessment.
The resources that have been given every week have helped me to find more ideas on how to implement technology. I have also been doing some brain storming on how I could integrate technology through various presentations and projects. I have also been provided many ways to score these types of assessments. Using rubrics seems to be the most beneficial for the students because it shows the “different levels of quality” (Cennamo, Ross, & Ertmer, 2009, p. 155).
PowerSchool will be beneficial for me to individualize my instruction, as it summarizes all of my students’ data that is collected on a daily basis. As a teacher, it is important to remember that “early identification and reporting of student difficulties can lead to identifying helpful interventions before the problems become insurmountable” (Cennamo, Ross, & Ertmer, 2009, p. 158).
One point of discussion that really sparked my interest this week was my use of technology as it relates to higher order thinking. A lot of my ideas have been for lower level thinking, such as playing math games to get a lot of practice. Every time I teach a lesson or assess my students, I want to ask myself if the students were able to use higher order thinking.
References
Cennamo, K., Ross, J. & Ertmer, P. (2009). Technology Integration for Meaningful Classroom Use: A Standards-Based Approach. (Laureate Education, Inc., Custom ed.). Belmont , CA : Wadsworth
Jenna Enevoldsen
Jenna,
ReplyDeleteI think adding technology when assessing your students is a great change to your plan. One of my main goals is to assess my students using wireless responders with my Promethean Board. When you add technology into the classroom and then assess the students with the same tools that you used to, it sends a mixed message. Students learn differently but they can all test the same way and be successful. I disagree with this. I think many students need the opportunity to show what they learned in multiple ways. It will give more valid results.
In response to your higher-level thinking question, it depends on the game. Do the students have the chance to advance to different levels? Can you have these students work on the same skill, only with word problems instead of simple problems?
Allison
Jenna,
ReplyDeleteHave you checked into any subscriptions your district may have to any software you could use in your classroom? Much of the software we use in our district offers us a great way to assess our students. We are able to pull up a certain student at any given time and view his or her performance on certain objectives. This helps our teachers assess progress gained and identify areas for additional intervention. Some of our software includes Success Maker, MySatori, Renaissance Place, Grand Central Station, Rosetta Stone and many others. Do any of these sound familiar to you? Does your district have any software that could help you in assessing your students?
Allison
Jenna,
ReplyDeleteYou've got some great ideas to work with technology in your classroom. Working with Powerschool is especially useful for giving immediate feedback to parents. My district uses this system as well, and I like the way I can efficiently give multiple levels of feedback to all of my students. I always feel good knowing that the student, parent or both are looking at the grades and comments I post. A marked improvement over sending home the graded paper with the student, probably getting crinkled and wet or otherwise destroyed on the way home, or spending the rest of its life in a locker filled with other papers.
-Dan
Response to Allison H., Allison R., and Dan,
ReplyDeleteThere have been many games that I have found on-line that allow the students to advance to another level. I wish my district subscribed to some software because software would be much better organized and more challenging for my students. I have asked the technology department and they do not have any programs for my school right now, but that could be something in the future that I could help to get going. I will have to make sure that when I look into some software there are a lot of word problems along with basic skills to assess and practice all levels of math. Thank you for all of your feedback, it has helped me to look at how affective games on the computer are and I am going to try to find some software for my school.
Jenna Enevoldsen