This course has enabled me to look at digital resources and look at how they can push students thinking and learning forward, and not just something fancy that really doesn't have an impact on student learning. Some digital resources I felt unsure of and nervous to try as a teacher. I felt that I didn't have the time or energy to explore something new, when what I was already using worked for me. If I am back in the classroom next year I already have so many new ideas and strategies that I want to implement. The biggest piece that I will forever take with me is the reading about how the brain works. There is so much incredibly useful information there, I wish this was part of my credential program. When educators understand the science behind learning, it can help them to create lessons that work with the brains wiring, instead of against it. It has intrigued me to dive into the research more. I especially enjoyed the book Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain by Zaretta Hammond. It really makes me stop and think about how a students brain wiring can affect behavior and learning. How do I now apply this to my classroom?
Also, as COVID-19 and SIP has dominated our lives, I feel incredibly thankful that I chose to join and complete this masters. I feel much more confident and prepared than I would have been without the provided knowledge. While I'm not in the classroom working directly with students, I am supporting many teachers through this transition, and my confidence with my knowledge has taken some of the stress away. I feel like I have great resources and ideas to share with teachers that will benefit the students learning at this time. I am thankful that we use Zoom for our classes. Knowing this platform and interacting with it on a weekly basis has been so instrumental in Distance Learning. I know what it is like to be both a student and teacher on Zoom. I was able to support teachers in quick learning of the digital platform.
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I am very grateful for this program. The last month has been full of so many emotions, up and down. As an extrovert I am struggling to stay at home and not go out to see friends. My heart breaks for my son not being able to interact with other children and not being able to visit a park to climb, explore, and enjoy the swings. My emotions are struggling at times. I am home all day with my 1.5 year old son while I am working. I have found my way around this, but it has been a struggle. Not only do I need to be a mother, but I also want to do the best job I possibly can to support all my teachers. The saving grace has been that by going through this program I am not worried about Zoom and how to use it. Instead I am helping other teachers and administrators navigate the Zoom world. I am also able to take teachers concerns and help to provide the digital tools that I have used. I can share my own personal experiences with them as a student and the positives and negatives that I experienced. I can't imagine going through this experience while trying to learn all these new programs. As a result I am able to put my energy where it is needed. I know this will end and this experience will all be a memory that will go into history books, but right now I am taking it day by day and looking forward to the time when I can spend time with my friends and watch my son play with other kids.
The study of the End Users helped me to realize that I really need to have my end users in mind as I create a website. The work needs to focus on these end users to make sure it helps the end user to reach their goals and that the site is helpful and has valuable information. Also, as the site is created you need to make sure it is organized in a way that is easy to navigate and understand. After reading Clark, the parts that really hit home was to make the work simple, helpful, thoughtful, organized, and precise.
My research plan for round 2 was exciting and I was ready to implement it. I was excited to work more with teachers on the focus of the academic language in math. I was looking at different programs that are already available out there that can be brought into the classroom. I was also looking at extending some of my work into the Elementary Migrant Ed summer school program that I run during the summer break. I am sad at the idea that this program may not happen. Nothing is for sure, but not sure summer school will happen. I was excited to make big changes that would increase the academic rigor of the program. Hopefully we will still be able to have this summer school opportunity, but to be honest, at this point I am not as hopeful as I once was that it will still happen. Take a moment to try and make sense of how you might use what you’ve explored in your next round of designing action research for your driving question. Share your new questions and the methods you might use to research them.
"Negotiations must take place when learner goals are different than the goals of the enterprise that hire them or the community that produces them." This quote is from the SITE model reading and it hit me hard. Since I am in the profession of training teachers, I feel like I am fighting this battle every day. Teachers have their own needs and wants, that often are different from the needs and wants of the school district or the site. So if I am giving a training that follows the districts focus and drive, it may not be what a teacher wants to spend their time on, so I get lots of push back from teachers. The biggest struggle is how can I continue to work and train teachers in something they find helpful and useful for their own individual classrooms while following the direction of the school district in which I work for. My driving question involves working with and training teachers. I have found so many challenges outside of my scope of control that have really created a struggle to really give the time and focus that I need to really get my question answered. However, these distractions are all part of the education world, so maybe it is actually a hidden part of my question? When I was in the classroom I always had great ideas of what I wanted to do and dreamed of doing, but then the reality of my time and energy hits, and I wasn't always able to achieve those grand ideas. The readings have really got me thinking, how can I take these district initiatives and use technology to differentiate the trainings so that teachers find the trainings useful and time well spent? Would teachers be receptive or would their initial feelings block them from trying something new? Baggio Chapter 4-6
I've never been a strong reader, but strong enough that I am able to make sense of what I am reading. I read the whole article "Qualitative Research in Information Management", but I'm not sure I could really tell everyone exactly what it is about. I know it is about research and how asking questions to groups of individuals can provide insight into a problem to help researchers find a solution, but I'm positive there was more to it than that. Stepping back and thinking about this article I realized this must be how many of our ELLs must feel like while reading texts that are too far above their reading lexile. They can get an idea, and recognize the words, but the way they are used in conjunction with each other, they get lost. I had to read many paragraphs more than once, and try to develop an understanding. I felt so relived when they had pictures. I was able to read and then put the words into the picture. I felt like, "finally, they gave a picture!!!" For me to work through the article I had to chunk it apart. It was too much for me to do all at once. I read, reread, thought, did something else, came back and continued. I needed time and renewed brain power. (Caffeine may have helped with this. Lol) I remember the moment that I started reading the article I was frustrated that there was no pre-discussion or review of important terms and ideas. If I were to teach this to a group of high schoolers I would do just that, I would introduce the article, discuss important terms and ideas. This way students would have the prior knowledge to at least begin to understand the article. I would likely take the first few pages, have the students read it, and then discuss what they think it is about. This way students can learn from each other about how to comprehend the article. They may learn different strategies about how to make sense of what they are reading.
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May 2020
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