Thursday, March 26, 2009

Ideal Classroom Reflection

-Describe the topic of your Ideal Classroom project.

Megan, Lisa and my project topic was a 10Th grade Geometry class with Units on Triangles and 3D figures. We were wanting to incorporate the two Units in a final project of Architectural Design.

-Why did you select that topic and what did you hope to create?

We selected the topic based on our area of study at UNI. We wanted to create a classroom that was fully functional for our students to learn best. We wanted the best resources and technologies to help advance the students learning in Geometry. The three of us knew how 10Th graders can be and we figured including lots of technology would help capture their attention.

-Describe the thinking and creation process that you used to create your final project.

As a group we answered most of the questions. At the same time I would be getting the opinions for Lisa and Megan about the types of technologies, the furniture, the software, and the resources we wanted in our classroom. I would look up the prices and together as a group we decided on how many to buy. I then on my own time wrote up the spread sheet. From the two questions we did not get done as a group Lisa and Megan each took one to do. Megan was also in charge of the layout of our classroom. If she added something to it that she thought we needed, she would let me know and I would add in on our spreadsheet and she added it to our set of questions.

-How did you use technology to collaborate with your team partners?

Like I said above we divided the work up that we could not get done together physically. So I used Google Docs to get information from the other two girls. This helped us talk(type) out what types of software we wanted. Also Lisa send a Google Doc to let Megan and I see the progress she made on her designated questions. Megan used Google Layout for out classroom layout.

-Explain at least one barrier that you confronted while completing the project.

Like I said in class, at first it was a little over-whelming; the work that we had to do. There were so many different parts that needed to be completed, we did not really know where to start. However we just stuck to it and worked together as much as possible to get it done. In the end we were very pleased with our finished product and we ended up having fun do it.

-Explain what you learned from this project? This could include topic material, group work, etc.

I learned a lot about my wants and needs in my classroom as a teacher. I discovered that it takes so much to make the perfect classroom and it is not always the case where teachers get their ideal classrooms filled with the best up-to-date technology and resources.

-Any final words that you might have about the project or the process.

I enjoyed this project and it was funny to see our final result and our ideas put into play.

Monday, March 9, 2009

Spotlight in Education Technology Day Reflection


I volunteered at the Spotlight on Educational Technology Day in the ITTC building. It was February 27th and I was facilitating from 1:30 to 3. Along with I took notes on the things I found the most interesting.

I sat in on Cecelia Zangara's presentation called "Anyone Can Pass Science Class." She was from the Western Dubuque Schools Along with Ms. Zangara was a few of her science students. They helped present the different sorts of technologies used in the classroom. One website she uses is Discovery Education where students log into their own accounts and look at information that the teacher wants them to see. There is also an application on there where the site will read the information to the student. Ms. Zangara explains that it is also helpful in the classroom when the class reads aloud to the others. The students are more confident about reading aloud with this resource.

One other form of technology Ms. Zangara uses is Boardmaker software. It is where she can print of materials for visuals aids since she recognizes that most of her students are visual learners. She creates a definition sheet with pictures to go with them. She gives every student a copy and they class makes there own flash cards to help with memorizing of the terms. Then when it comes time to quiz the students over the definitions she gives them the pictures in random order and a list of the definitions. The student is required to match the definitions with the correct picture. She reported that she saw a huge improvement to the quiz scores when using the visuals aids from the software.

I was absolutely amazed at the Boardmaker software. Ever since I saw what she had down with the resource I have been coming up with ways that I could incorporate that software into my classroom. Math is very visual so it would only make sense to use Boardmaker to further my students' learning through visual aids.