Standard+1

** __Enhancing Core Teaching Skills with Technology__ **

==#1. Facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity == ===Teachers use their knowledge of subject matter, teaching and learning, and technology to facilitate experiences that advance student learning, creativity, and innovation in both face-to-face and virtual environments. Teachers: ===
 * promote, support, and model creative and innovative thinking and inventiveness
 * engage students in exploring real-world issues and solving authentic problems using digital tools and resources
 * promote student reflection using collaborative tools to reveal and clarify students' conceptual understanding and thinking, planning, and creative processes
 * model collaborative knowledge construction by engaging in learning with students, colleagues, and others in face-to-face and virtual environments

My artifacts demonstrating this standard (What?)
//1.// This wiki, [|A Thousand Flat World Tales], brings students from around the globe together and gives them the opportunity to write short stories and share them with other students.

2. This wiki, A Broken World, takes information that the students have gathered about history from WWI to the Cold War and posts it on a wiki. It is supposed to be used as their textbook. What a great learning experience for students! It is mind boggling the kinds of things that the students could have come up with when they have the ownership of studying and creating their own online textbook.

3. I watched the video, [|"Learning Without Borders: Students Connect with Their Peers Worldwide."] As I watch and review some of these activites of other schools and other students throughout the country, I am quite envious. Not only of the teachers, but more so of the students. I wish I would have had the opportunities that these students have had. I wish my children will have these opportunities. They are just so....cool. The one statement that sticks with me is what the one teacher said in this video, "It is just cool to be smart at our school." That is something that definetly lacks at Port Allegany High School. The video itself catalogues activities that a charter school takes part in in San Antonio, TX. This charter school utilizes its proximity to Mexico to attempt to make some of its learning global. They have a model UN that all students participate in at some point in their high school year and they utilize technology and collaboration. Three more comments, this school help prepare students for the 21st C. The school also would be one that I would want to send my children to. Finally, after viewing a role play activity, it made me decide that I have not done a role play activity in awhile in my classes...so I am going to plan for one in a week or two.

4. In Port Allegany High School, teachers and students have access to gaggle.net. Gaggle is filtered email for education. It also has documents like google docs. I have been using the email feature with my students. For this assignment, I emailed my students instructions to write a short story. They wrote the short story and then shared the document with a friend. The friend read the document and added their comments to the document. Additionally, some students emailed their responses back to the original author. I am now in the process of responding to their short stories using the same sharing tool.

5. Following is a reflection of project-based learning in my classroom.

I have learned a lot over the pass year and a half about project-based learning. It is a difficult concept for me to wrap my mind around. I just know I do not do anything that is what they describe. I really like to do projects with my students, but they are always the assessment at the end of the a unit. For example, two of my seventh grade classes wrote skits for a short story they read and then filmed them. It was a fun project that utilized technology, but it was not a learning based project... I see that students would really learn a lot from a project that they were trying to learn from...the downside...I just wouldn't know where to begin as a teacher. Also, the students would really need to be independent. I know that they would need some basics before we began - students always do need to start with the basics. I think with independent reading I could start using project based learning. I could have the students share information about books using Web 2.0 tools like glogs and prezis. Students could also collaborate using a wiki or even gaggle email and email glogs. I have no idea what I would do...or what I could do at this time. I am sure that there is something I could do with my Young Adult Literature class. With technology, I always like to start small and then go from there.

6. Following is a summary of my librarian interview.

I just read Mr. Healy's post and thought to myself, "Self, I could just cut and paste everything that Mr. Healy posted because that was the same thing that I was going to write about." But...I guess since we read about copywrite earlier maybe I shouldn't do that. However, I do have the same thoughts that Mr. Healy had. I sat down with the Librarian earlier today. Before I did sit down with her, I thought that it would be a ridiculous excerise. As Mr. Healy pointed out, our librarian does an outstanding job of keeping the staff informed of the lastest happenings. But I sat down with her and learned about the BIG six. That was interesting... In my own class, we are utilizing gaggle and AR and destiny. I really try to incorporate the things that our district pays for. If they are going to pay for it, I am going to use it. Destiny is neat. The students can look up books in the library. They can make recommendations to other students about the books. They can read reviews. They can rate the books. They can put books on their shelf that they are reading, that they have read and that they want to read. We no longer have reading days - we have AR days. The students are allowed to read or update their shelf and make recomendations using destiny. That is a fun tool and I think makes the students more like read readers. So, yes, our librarian is cool. Our librarian rocks. Our librarian helps with whatever we want. I am thankful for our librarian. YAY librarian!

7. Following is my What Works document taking notes on my experience researching technology and **Marzano.**

8. This is my lesson plan for the week I have my students using gaggle to collaborate on graphic organizers.



As I reflect on the lesson, I found that my students worked harder on their assignments and were more careful because they knew it was goig to be shared with the group. I also found that my students were excited to use the technology and were very interested to see how the technology worked.

9. For my innovative project, my tenth grade students are going to create a poetry glog that they are going to update all year long. They are going to write poetry, using the various literary devices required by the state of PA for PSSAs, and embed their glog on a wiki. That wiki will be a collaborative wiki with a group of fourth graders in Susquenida school district. They will also create poetry glogs and embed them on the wiki. Then, using the discussion tab on the wiki page, the students will respond to each other's glogs.

10. For my authentic assessment, my students going to use zoho writer, an online writing tool, to plan, draft, revise and complete an expository essay. To make it authentic, the essay is taken from the yearly Olive Garden Pasta Tales writing contest. Once they have completed the essay, the students who bring back permission slips, will submit their essay to the writing test. Here is my prezi that explains the requirements to the students.

**My Reflection on meeting this standard (So What?)**
//I believe that these artifacts show how I can facilitate student learning and creativity, especially my last two items which are the authentic assessment and the innovative project. However, I am still working on the collaborative aspect. This needs to be done slowly and carefully because I am not one who has traditionally done a lot of collaboration with students outside my classroom.//

My Future Learning Goals related to this standard (Now What?)
//I am going to continue to think about how I can use Web 2.0 tools and the technology that I have available. More importantly, when dealing with this standard, I am going to think about how I can use the technology for more collaboration//