Professional Growth

Throughout my Master's coursework I have learned a ton about how to integrate technology into my daily lessons.  I used to think that I would need to plan out every detail possible in order to teach a lesson with technology, but I have learned that I can utilize the tools I already have to engage my students.

My teacher friend at my school and I are beginning work on designing our school's very first video production class.  The class will consist of many of the topics taught through the School of Education at APU and will incorporate shooting, editing and presenting videos.  Before entering the Masters program, I would have never thought I would teaching anything involving video.  I have always enjoyed editing as a hobby, but I never thought that I would be good enough to teach how to edit until I took my EDUC 514 class.

Browsing through YouTube has shown me that good teacher made videos are far and few between and some of the small things separating good teacher videos and bad teacher videos are lighting, edits, and content.  I look forward to starting my own video channel soon and beginning to make videos based on science content standards that I will be using yearly.

Another ambition of mine that was spurred through the School of Education is to start my own class website so that I can supplement my teaching with videos that reinforce concepts and encourage deeper investigation.

I've already begun to use video in my classroom to fuel imagination and the conversations that come about through watching those videos almost always leads to standards being taught.  However, a realization that I have come to is that I have always thought of teaching standards in a linear manner, but it doesn't always have to be that way.

For example, our curriculum tells us to teach tectonic plates first, then earthquakes, then damages to landscape.  Instead of teaching the standards in that order, I showed my students a video about slinkies that lead to a discussion and demonstration about P Waves and S Waves, which sparked a desire of two of my students to research historical earthquakes, which sparked another conversation about damages made to the landscape.  I let the students dictate the course of the conversation while I monitored the pace and led the discussion.  My class scored the highest they have on a quiz all year long.

I have learned to make small steps forward in using technology in my class because if I don't make small progressions, then I am bound to stand still and become stale.  Even making one small change if how I teach ever year will keep me from becoming stagnant and boring.  I think the most important piece of information I have learned this year is to stay connected because when you are trying to be innovative, you are going to need support from others.  One of the best ways to get that support is through other innovators...and Twitter is packed with them.