Monitoring my GAME progress:

I am ashamed to say but with the holidays upon us I have been kind of slacking on taking the necessary steps to meet my goals I stated earlier in the course. The few searches I have done, I am still struggling to find ways to integrate technology. One idea I do like is the use of a digital camera or video camera (Cennamo, Ross, & Ertmer, 2009 p. 146). This is a great tool for me and my students. I can use these tools in a variety of ways to help my students and athletes reach success in my classes and in their athletic events.

I do not think I need to modify my action plan, I just honestly need to get motivated and start searching a little harder since technology is such an important part of today’s’ education and the success of students. I have learned that there are many ways to incorporate technology into my physical education classes, it is just a matter of figuring out what is going to work and what is not going to work with the diversity of my classes. I have thought of one question that keeps coming to mind is how to incorporate technology with a class of 40 students and then with three other classes in a small sized gym? Another question is how to get my students motivated in using technology without them feeling as if there P.E. time is going to be taken away from them? P.E. is one class that they really like and it is such an important class I would hate to turn them off from P.E. I am still looking forward to getting back to researching and figuring out solutions to all my questions and integrating technology into my teaching, as usually any suggestions would be appreciated.

References:
Cennamo, K., Ross, J., & Ertmer, P. (2009). Technology integration for meaningful classroom use: A standards-based approach. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.

Resources Needed to Achieve my GAME plan

After reviewing my GAME plan I realized that I am going to need many different resources. I have found that I am not doing all I can do to help prepare my students for the future, by integrating technology into my teaching. The first resource is going to be asking and receiving advice from those who are more proficient and more knowledgeable. I have had many coaches who I work with who have taken classes on technology integration, and I need to come out of my comfort zone and ask them for help and some ideas. I also need to attend workshops that are deal with technology even if I am unsure if they will benefit me. The more I expose myself to the integration of technology into physical education and health, the better I am going to become as a teacher. I also think that since computers are such a valid technological tool that I need to become more familiar with the computer. I know a lot, but I need to know more on how to apply the computer and computer resources to my profession and into my classroom.

I have already begun to discuss how fellow teachers I work with integrate technology into their teaching and classroom. I have also gotten on the internet and researched some ideas and options that I could use within my physical education classroom. I think I could really benefit from joining in on a chat room with other physical education teachers and getting their ideas and sharing my ideas with them. That is going to by my next step and what I am going to begin doing in the coming weeks.

NETS-T Standards for Teachers

As a physical education teacher I am sad to say that I believe I could work on all of the NETS-T standards for teachers. I really do not feel comfortable with any of the standards, except I feel a little comfortable with standard 1 which is “facilitating and Inspiring Student learning and creativity” (ISTE, 2008). I do know that I do many activities within my physical education curriculum which requires critical and creative thinking among my students called cooperative games or activities. I would like to become more proficient in the area of engage in professional growth and leadership as well as promoting and modeling digital citizenship and responsibility since I do teach a diverse community of students.

My first goal that I will try to achieve is providing learner centered activities and meet the needs of all my students and not just the athletes or more skilled individuals. My second goal is to try to implement more communication on my ideas to students, teachers, and parents by trying different digital media and formats.

My plan of action is to try to attend workshops and classes that are offered throughout the year to increase my knowledge on how to meet the needs of all my students, and to try different activities that I have in the past been hesitant to try because of the different skills levels among my students because I do not want to set them up for failure. I will also try to use digital tools such as the smart boards, and taking students to the computer lab and use the virtual world to show students what is being done in other parts of the country and around the world. Secondly I will talk to colleagues and other people in my field of work for ideas and suggestions on how I can achieve this goal.

I will monitor and evaluate my actions by keeping record anytime I learn or experience some new type of digital tool or technology. I will try the new tools with my students and then get feedback from students as well as parents to see if my action is benefiting them or not benefiting them. I want to ensure they are receiving and retaining the knowledge that I want to them know and understand. I will check myself, checklist and students feedback every month to see my improvement in my teaching.

Reflection 8: New Literacy Skills for the 21st Century!

During this course I learned how much broader the definition of literacy is today. In the past it was referred to the ability to read and write, now however now there are new strategies associated with literacy. The new literacy strategies that we as teachers must teach our students these days consist of “questioning, searching, evaluating, synthesizing, and communicating” (Laureate Education, Inc. 2009). I was very surprised at how much literacy is evolving and me being a teacher and teaching the people of the future how I could not know this? I realized that these skills are going to have to be taught at a young age and continued throughout their entire schooling. I was surprised as well at how much I learned from this course and how are we as teachers suppose to be teaching this without the assistance and guidance of background information in order to teach our students properly. I realized that using these skills as much as possible is the best way to ensure knowledge and understanding is by doing, doing, and doing more.

I will definitely as a teacher try to incorporate these skills as much as possible. AS a P.E. teacher it is going to be a little harder than say a math, English, or Social Studies teachers, but if I am given the chance I am definitely going to enforce and incorporate these skills to my students, because I do not want my students to be illiterate.

I would really like to increase my knowledge in the area of these new literacy skills in the 21st century. I would also like to plan a project that incorporates all these new literacy skills and make it a yearly project. The steps I will take to do this is to use each year as a learning year and to improve year after year. I will first have to think of an interesting project which will not make my students upset that they will not be doing physical activity in physical education. Once I figure that out I will then being to setup process and getting all necessary materials so I can be fully prepared when I do start the project, as well as allow enough time to complete the project thoroughly and get and learn the new skills, without taking away too much physical activity time. I believe that once I become more familiar with the skills I will be better able to communicate the skills to my students and help them understand why they are so important and in order for them to be successful in life they are going to need these skills, and just not the reading, math, and writing.

Reference:
Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2009). Program one. Skills for the Future
[Motion picture]. Supporting Information Literacy and Online Inquiry in the Classroom.
Baltimore: Author.

Class Reflection: Application 8

Personal Learning Theory

As I am about to complete this class I have learned many things. The first is after reviewing my initial theory of learning, I still have the same theory about physical education being kinesthetic/tactile learning style or in other words hand-on and learning information through physical means (Orey, 2001). After this class, however, I have decided to add to my theory of learning.
I realize how important technology plays a part in teaching students and engaging them actively in learning. The theory of social learning left a great impression on me and since I use it already I want to expand of the use of the theory and incorporate many new ideas and activities into my teaching. Social Learning theory is “students actively engage in constructing artifacts and conversing with others” (Laureate Education Inc., 2009). Once I get back into school after summer vacation, the first technology tools that I am going to incorporate into my teaching is PowerPoint. Even though students are going to be engaged in physical activity for most of the semester they are going to have two projects that they are going to have to do throughout the semester. Students will of course be working in groups and will create a PowerPoint for the specific assignment that will be given to them. Students will be given a rubric as well to know “exactly what is expected of them” (Pitler, Hubbell, Kuhn, & Malenoski, 2007).
Another tool that I am going to implement is going to try to use more graphic organizers to present information to my students. Students will be given a topic such as ancient Olympics, importance of exercise, etc, and are going to present a graphic organizer to the class presenting the information they believe important pertaining to the topic (Pitler, et.al, 2007). This will help my students with organization and note taking, which can be beneficial to them for their other classes such as math, English, social studies, etc.
Two long term goals that I would want to change in my instruction is convincing students as well as other teachers how important technology integration is in physical education and even though they may not be doing physical fitness every day, they will be doing it most days and the days they are not they will be strengthening their thinking skills and learning about how to stay healthy and live health lifestyles now and in the future. The idea of staying fit for now and the future is what I believe is the biggest goal of a physical educator to reach to students, and just like in any other class using a variety of activities is going to do nothing but help the child grow and retain information needed to be physically fit. I believe that the best way for me to go about this is first convincing my students that physical education is about having fun but more importantly staying healthy and how to stay healthy. Students need to research and try many activities to really gain knowledge about staying fit; coming in everyday and playing games is not going to achieve this goal. Once I have convinced the students it will be time to convince the teachers and administration.
The second long-term goal that I want to try is using different technological tools that I have learned about during this class and implement them into my teaching. I want to use PowerPoint, wikis, blogs, graphic organizers, non-linguistic representation, etc to reach the needs of all my students and their abilities (Pitler, et.al, 2007). The way for me to achieve this is to start experimenting different ways to incorporate technology and see what works best for me and my students. I have really enjoyed this class and have gained some great ideas and I cannot wait for the next school year to start so I can start implementing some of the fantastic ideas presenting throughout the course.

References:
Laureate Education, Inc. (Producer). (2009). Program eight. Social Learning Theories [Motion picture]. Bridging learning theory, instruction and technology. Baltimore: Author.
Orey, M. (Ed.). (2001). Emerging perspectives on learning, teaching, and technology. Retrieved
from http://projects.coe.uga.edu/epltt/.
Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kuhn, M., & Malenoski, K. (2007). Using technology with classroom
Instruction that works. Alexandria, VA. ASCD.
· Chapter 1: Setting Objectives
· Chapter 2: Providing Feedback
· Chapter 5: Non-Linguistic Representation

Connectivism and Social Learning in Practice

Connectivism and Social Learning in Practice (application 5)

This week we discussed the social learning theories and instructional strategies that correlate with the social learning theories. First I think it is important that we know what the social learning theory is, which was presented by Dr. Orey; he states that social learning theory is “students actively engage in constructing artifacts and conversing with others” (Laureate Education, 2009). One of the strategies discussed this week was the use of cooperative learning. Cooperative learning focuses on “having students interact with each other in groups in ways that enhance their learning” (Pitler, Hubbell, Kuhn, & Malenoski, 2007).

Social learning theory is based on the concept that students work and learn better when they are in groups and able to socialize with peers. When using cooperative learning it is important that you as a teacher group students based on ability levels sparingly, the groups should be small, and cooperative learning should be used consistently but not overused (Pitler, et.al., 2007). One activity that was mentioned for cooperative learning which I found very neat was the use of keypals. Keypals allow “communication with students in other cities, states, and countries” (Pitler, et.al., 2007). I think this is a fantastic activity that can be incorporated in all subject areas. Any activity that allows for the student to learn outside of their zone of proximal development is great, and if that information comes from peers it is ever better because students can relate to them better than say an adult giving them the same information. The zone of proximal development is what the child is able to learn at the time, but to reach above that level students need a more knowledgeable other to learn the information (2009), in this above case this would be the peer they are communicating with to learn their culture and issues that they encounter in their lives.

Social learning theory is a theory that should be used in classrooms today. A classroom should not just be base on social learning theory but needs to be included into the classroom. You can incorporate this by having students work in groups, having students use keypals, webquests, multimedia projects, creating websites, and even playing web-enabled multiplayer simulation games (Pitler, et. al., 2007). Any activity that allows for the students to work together and communicate with their peers is going to benefit the student as well as engage students in learning.

References:
Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2009). Social Learning Theories.
[Motion Picture]. Bridging learning theory, instruction, and technology. Baltimore:
Author.
Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kunh, M., & Malenoski, K. (2007). Using technology with classroom
instruction that works. Alexandria, VA: ASCD

Voice Thread: http://voicethread.com/share/525620/

Constructivism in Practice

When I first saw the topic of generating and testing hypothesis my mind automatically went to scientific method and I was curious as to how this was going to fit into this week’s assignments. I read the first sentence and realized I was wrong. In the book Using Technology with classroom instruction that works, it states that “when students generate and test hypotheses, they are engaging in complex mental processes, applying content knowledge” (Pitler, Hubbell, Kuhn, & Malenoski, 2007) in all subject areas. When applying generating and testing hypotheses in the classroom it is important to “make sure students can explain their hypotheses and conclusions, as well as teachers need to use a variety of tasks to guide students through generating and testing hypotheses” (Pitler et al., 2007).

Students being able to generate and test hypotheses allow students to be creative in trying to figure out a possible solution to the problem given in front of them. When they generate a hypotheses it allows each student to “construct his/her own meaning” (Orey, 2009), which is a characteristic of constructivism, there is no absolute. Once the student has come up with their own ideas and solutions, it is time for the student to test their hypothesis. With the development in “probeware and interactive applets, allow students to spend more time interpreting data rather than gathering the data” (Pitler et al., 2007). The use of various web resources makes is easy and interactive for students to generate and test hypotheses on a particular subject area and they are also able to see the “outcome of their hypotheses in virtual situations that would be impossible or financially unfeasible in real life” (Pitler et al., 2007). Using the following: spreadsheet software, data collection tools, and web resources students are able to generate and test hypotheses easier and are more engaged because they are not having to gather all the information which can be “tedious and error prone” (Pitler et al., 2007) for students.

References:
Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2009). Constructionist and Constructivist
Learning Theory.[Motion Picture]. Bridging learning theory, instruction, and technology.
Baltimore: Author

Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kuhn, M., Malenoski, K. (2007). Using technology with classroom
instruction that works. Alexandria, VA: ASCD