This has been a very busy and productive few weeks and I am very happy about lessons I implemented and have yet to implement in my classroom. Although I have not followed by GAME plan very closely I still think there are important concepts I need to address in my classroom.
I had hoped to develop a global classroom with my economics class. We are finishing a Stock Market simulation and many students had questions about European and Asian stocks. I normally teach math and have a hard enough time addressing the economic content standards let alone looking at the global economy. I did not find a foreign classroom to communicate with but if I teach this class in the future it will be a priority.
I was able to help some students advance beyond Power Point presentations with their current events work. All students were required to deliver a digital presentation that supplemented a current events research paper. This assignment allowed for me and the students to experiment with mock newscasts, documentaries, YouTube videos as well as other alternatives like www.presi.com that supplement an interactive whiteboard perfectly.
The first few years I was teaching the math department successfully convinced our colleagues and administration that many of the new technological classroom instruction would have to wait because of the specific content standards that needed to be addressed. Over the past two years I have realized there is a place in all classrooms where technology can have an immediate impact. The technology that is and will be available for students to access various websites needs to be used as an educational tool. Students have to realize the pros and cons of internet research at an early age so they can realize its usefulness later in their education. I will be introducing wikis and interactive applications to all of my content area subjects now that I have seen students respond positively to such material. It is the responsibility of all teachers to make sure they are addressing technology literacy at all ages.
My GAME plan may have been a little much. I am new with a lot of this material, specifically with information and technology literacy. I will gradually implement this to Applied Mathematics over the entire year but other classes will have to wait until I have reached my comfort level. My recent classwork with Walden has helped a bit and I hope to have a steep learning curve but it is a little intimidating to address to all of my Algebra students at this time.
