Mod 9

In what ways have I grown as a professional as a result of this course?  

I was not aware of the technology standards before taking this course. The SAMR model was new to me and now I find myself placing every activity that uses technology on the ladder and thinking, "Is this the best use of this tech tool?" I'd never heard of Symbaloo before.  I love all the websites I now have collected in one place that I can easily share with others.  I'd never given much thought to the idea of curating resources for my students or teaching my older students how to curate.

How can I use this knowledge to increase my leadership in my corporation?  

I'm already known as the techie music teacher. I am the go-to person for several of my co-workers when they have a technology question.  I know my principal would like for me to do more formal sharing at our teachers' meetings/internal PD sessions.  The information I have gained from this course has given me even more ideas to share with my colleagues.  The SAMR model will be one of the first things I share.  

Mod 8

My digital footprint is very light.  Googling my full name results in almost nothing - a listing of my teaching license on the DOE website is there. Googling my nickname shows that I have a facebook account and a twitter account.  My classroom blog also shows up although I write that under the name of our class mascot, a doll named Kit.  I am very much just a lurker on the web.  I might read what others have posted but rarely post anything myself and if I do it is usually just a "good job" or "congratulations".  I just think it is better to keep my opinions to myself.  I like to think that I have finally learned to what to say and what not to say in real life - the idea that one moment of bad judgement on the web will haunt me forever keeps me from saying anything.  I know this makes my digital footprint very neutral and I like it like that.  There are a couple positives on the web about me if one looks hard enough. My classroom blog is something I'm proud of and a deep enough search will show that I was awarded a 2013 Lilly Grant.  

Mod 7 Reflection

A dedicated symbaloo page seems like an obvious choice to store the resources that have already been curated for a certain project that is used every year.  I have a separate powerpoint presentation for each week of the school year and I would link to the symbaloo page to appropriate powerpoint so that it would be waiting for me when I started that particular week of school.  I would also try to remember to add to the symbaloo throughout the year as I naturally came across new resources that would be nice additions to the information already curated.  If I were to have several dedicated symbaloo pages created for different topics or units I would create a master symbaloo that contains the all the topics for the entire year and then have just one place to go to update all my resources at any time.

Module 5 Reflection

Motivation

Rewards vs Autonomy

This video has me thinking about the way I teach my students to play recorder.  I use a karate belt method where mastery of each progressively harder song results in a different colored narrow sticker (belt) to wrap around the student's recorder. Students learn a total of 8 different songs and earn belts that are white, yellow, orange, green, purple, blue, red, and black.  I like this system and the reward of the sticker seems to be pretty motivating.  The idea of autonomy has me thinking though.  What if a student wants to spend more time at the yellow level?  Right now I only have one song that is a yellow level, once it is completed the only option is to move on to orange. Why can't that student stay at the yellow level by learning another song at the same difficulty level until he/she decides to move on?  What if there were five songs at the yellow level and he/she could earn five yellow belts?  I always have students who are ready to move on faster than most of the class too.  These students would probably enjoy having the option to move to harder songs more quickly. I think I'll try this idea where the students have much more autonomy to decide what they are working on.  I'll probably still keep the extrinsic motivation of the stickers though.  After all, even in Mr. Pink's examples of companies with FedEx time or 20% time the employees still get paid. No one is working at these companies and turning down their paycheck because the autonomy of their working environment is so fulfilling that they are willing to do it for free.

Module 3 Reflection

My students' use of technology is Active/Adaptation-Transformation.  I use technology to allow my elementary students to compose music without having to know all the rules of traditional music notation.  Some of the apps I use are very abstract - sounds are created by moving vines and rhythm is created from the falling star drops.  Other programs I use are more like traditional notation - notes are placed on staff but there is constant feedback available as the note plays itself as the student drags it into position and the computer plays the song back to the student as many times as he/she likes.  The student can create six part harmony, change the tempo at the slide of a button, change the voices of the notes with click.  I feel this is transformational.  The songs a 7 year old student can create with these tools are far beyond what a child of the same age could do with a pencil, staff paper, and a piano.

I would like to work on moving my students into the collaborative and constructive parts of the model. How can we use technology to create a song with kids from another school?  Another country? How can technology be used to connect everything I do in my room?

Module 2 - Moving Mindsets

The mindset I think I would have the hardest time changing in my classroom would be the idea I have that if I am not talking to the whole class all the time, I am not teaching.  I only see my students once a week (50 minutes) or twice a week (50 minutes times two).  I feel that the time I have with them is precious and it is hard for me to hand them all ipads and let them work with the device instead of me.  Yes, I still walk around and interact with the kids while they work with the device but it always feels a little like I'm not doing my job if I am not actively engaged with all my students most of the time.  I'd love it if the kids could all have their own ipads so that I could spend our class time showing them what they can do with them but they could do the actual exploring/creating outside of my room.  I strongly feel that time spent in class should be time spent engaging with the teacher.  Am I willing to change?  A little.  I can give up some time with my kids to let them explore and create on the device but I never want my elementary music classroom to become a place where it is the norm for the student to be more engaged with a device than with making music with me and the other students in the room.

Reflection Module 1

The question:

Which set of digital standards would you be most likely to use as a point of reference in your professional situation? What characteristics of those standards make them the best choice?

My Answer:

I find that iste-nets.t standards speak to me the most. I am an elementary music teacher who is looking to expand the opportunities that my students have to interact with both me and my subject area after the school day ends. I am most interested in standards that support creativity and communication. Standard 1 - Facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity and Standard 2 - Design and Develop Digital Age Learning Experiences and Assessments are exactly what I am about (except for the assessment part - assessments wouldn’t be necessary in an optional, enrichment, extension-of-my-class online environment for elementary music students).

My Evaluation:

Examination and analysis - I feel that I am effective here.  I believe that I am focused on how nets.t standards 1 and 2 apply to my somewhat unique situation as an elementary music teacher.

Use of evidence - This one seems to be evolving.  I don't really have professional or personal experiences incorporated or evidence from readings.  I am not sure the question really lends itself to that type of answer.

Presentation of ideas - I like exceptional for this.  I think my ideas are clear.

Collaboration - Evolving/Effective- (see peer response below) I believe I expand on the topic.  I feel that I show how my choice of standard would also apply to their situation.  I did not ask any open ended questions.

Here is my peer response:

Motivation is everything, isn’t it, for both the teacher and the student.  It is so hard to teach to people who aren’t motivated to learn.  I have a very hard time standing there saying things I have said thousands of other times to people who aren’t really paying attention or showing any interest. As an elementary music teacher, I feel that it is my responsibility to create that motivating environment that makes my kids excited to be there.  I use a lot of technology to do that but I also know that if the kids got to use the iPads every time they came to music that excitement would soon disappear.  I chose nets.t because the first standard is about inspiration and creativity.  I want my kids to be inspired so much that they have the motivation to go home and use the online resources I create for them to continue their learning. I think standard one from the nets.t complements your choice of IN Standard 2.4 about keeping the students motivated and engaged.