Assessment

As a poor test taker myself, I personally try to have variosu forms of assessment in my classroom.  I really enjoy having my students participate in Socratic Seminars, discussions, projects, reading projects and taking tests.  Also, in the 'real world' students do not take tests on a regular basis, testing itself tends to be for special occasions.  So, when I generate projects I think that it helps the students prepare for the real world since they will be working in groups, analyzing what they have read, and discussing with co-workers.  Testing though, does have its place, standards need to be addressed, but  think that mixing it up so that students are assessed in various forms.  When students have to prepare for a test this also helps prepare for college and the high pressure situations.

Technology Infused Classroom

To me, personally, a technology infused classroom has technology seamlessly integrated so that students have a natural flow between standardized classroom instruction and the use of technology.   Technology is becoming such a cultural norm for all people that the students need to not only learn how to use the technology but be respectful with it, and one way to learn those values is with practice and guided instruction where the students are able to be corrected in the moment.  Also, a truly technology infused classroom cannot exist on its own, the students need to be accessing technology in various rooms and ways so that all their tech learning is supported.  I know that our world is becoming extremely reliant on personal devices, it is hard to be away from technology once you have integrated it, as I learned the last two weeks being without internet at home, so this also means that the technology infused classroom has to be able to be spread home to assist in the extended learning.




Works Cited:

 Netiquette for High School Students. (2013, June 14). Retrieved July 7, 2015. 

 Technology-Enabled Instruction. (n.d.). Retrieved July 6, 2015. 

Internet in the Classroom

Visuals are an important and vital aspect of use inside a classroom – many students are reliant on the internet and visuals to understand, so using the internet is a great way to add to your classroom to make students more engaged and interested in their learning.  I personally love to bring in vines, videos, and other internet aspects into my classroom because it creates a connection that the students are already engaged and find valuable, and more important than the teacher.  Another strategy when reading is to have students highlight using various colors difference aspects of their reading, for example, main idea and connected ideas get one color, while, setting gets another.  I would like the internet to be able to support the learning from the classroom and to give them students other aspects of the story or learning they may not have received.  I would like to incorporate more internet aspects within my classroom, maybe have the students create and share via the internet.

Instructional Strategies

In reading the instructional strategies, I have seen that I, as a teacher, tend to lean towards a very constructivist teacher, I like to have my students work on projects, discussions, and group projects.  To me these are great ways of learning, but this also shows me that I also need to incorporate other styles for students within my classroom, and other ways for students to access that information. I know that I tend to like these because in my mind they are ways that allows students to prepare for real world interactions.  In many jobs students have to be able to communicate with co-workers and classmates in order to accomplish whatever their jobs need.  Realizing that I tend to focus mostly on one type of learning, I would need to implement more strategies because in not doing so there are students who are not engaging in their own learning.  There needs to be many different types of strategies have to be used in order to create a stronger community of learners.  Not every student is able to learn in the same ways.

Technology with education is creating many different ways in order to allow for students to learn without the cost.  For example, I was able to Skype with a Russian immigrant during my Russian literature unit so that the students were able to hear about what it was like growing up in Communist Russia and how it is different to the American student experience.  In the area that my students are in, they do not have a very diverse population so being to interact via Skype was an amazing experience for many of them.  I would like to also add more Skype guest speakers because the students were able to ask questions I may not have been able to answer as well as they did.