This course has helped me learn
several technology skills such as how to create and maintain a blog, use an RSS
feed to keep up with several blogs, and collaborate to create a wiki. Also, this course has provided me resources
to assist in my understanding of the 21st century skills that the
students need to have for their futures.
I have also learned about how to know my students’ prior knowledge
regarding technology in order to know what they are familiar with that can be
used for learning activities. Richardson
(2010) describes that many of our students today “are fearless in their use of technology”
(p. 7). Thus, we might as well use the
technology available to allow them to learn the way many of them enjoy
learning.
I have a more profound understanding
of the teaching and learning process. I
have been learning so much about how the 21st century is a place for
collaboration, inquiry, and technology.
While discussing topics with fellow colleagues, I have learned
strategies that will help me not only teach content to my students, but give
them the skills they will need to be 21st century workers and
thinkers.
Prior to reviewing the materials associated
with this course and collaborating with colleagues in an online setting, I thought
that 21st century skills was only about technology. While the capacity to use technology is a
part of the skill set needed in the expanding workplace, students also need to
be able to work with others to find solutions to real world problems. The classroom teacher is transitioning from
the center of the classroom to part of the classroom circle. Teachers are now facilitators of learning as
they provide guidance to students to allow the students to find and solve
problems with their peers.
While I incorporate some 21st
century skills in my classroom by way of collaborative projects, I still have a
classroom that is largely teacher centered.
I have two goals that I plan to achieve by the end of the next two
school years that will help me create a more inquiry, student centered
classroom. Nussbaum-Beach
(2008) mentions that “classrooms in the 21st century
need to be collaborative spaces where student-centered knowledge development
and risk taking are accepted as the norm and where an ecology of learning
develops and thrives.” I have the desire
and will work on my two goals to create this thriving learning environment.
One goal I have is to create a
question friendly environment. I often
find myself telling students simple, easy answers to questions that will make
them happy in the short term. I want to
change my teaching style into an environment where students want to ask and
find answers to their own questions. As
the students ask questions, I want to take the time to guide the students to
their own answers or predictions then verify the answers through research. A specific action I plan to implement is to
have a question wall in my classroom that I will write questions on as the
students ask them. As we answer the
questions, we will add them to the wall.
This way, we can see what the students are learning. Then, I can document standards that meet the
learning activities we had around the questions.
Another goal I have is to use the
questions from the students as a jump start into collaborative projects. Students must be interested in their
questions and concerns or they would not have asked them. Thus, I want to encourage this questioning by
turning their questions into projects. A
Partnership
for 21st Century Skills report (n.d.) states: “As much as
students need knowledge in core subjects, they also need to know how to keep
learning continually throughout their lives” (p. 4). This lifelong learning mentality begins early
in the students’ lives. I want the
students to know what to do when they have a question about anything. For example, when a student asks what
dinosaurs eat, I could have a set of dinosaur picture books available for a
group of students to “read” by looking at the pictures to figure out what dinosaurs
ate. Then, I would have the students
present to the class what they learned from the pictures. This project teaches several language arts
skills as well as science, social studies, and collaboration skills.
After reviewing the course checklist
that I completed in week one of my current course, I realized that one of my
answers has changed. I am now providing
more opportunities for students to create their own goals. I have begun asking the students what they
want to learn. For students who want to
read, I make sure during small group instruction that they get to engage in
pretend reading behaviors. This small
group setting is designed for the students to pretend to read while engaging in
book talk. Then, I will begin to allow
students to read repetitive or circular literature for the students to begin
reading the words on the pages of the books.
References
Nussbaum-Beach,
S. (2008). No limits. Technology & Learning, 28(7), 14–18.
Retrieved
Partnership
for 21st Century Skills. (n.d.). A report and mile guide for 21st century
skills.
Washington
DC: Author. Retrieved from http://www.p21.org/
Richardson,
W. (2010). Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for
classrooms (3rd
ed.).
Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin.
