Assessment One: Final Task - Reflective Synopsis

Assessment One: Final Task - Reflective Synopsis

    ~Goodbye, goodbye, good friends, goodbye, and now its time to go. But hey! I say, well that's okay, 'cos we'll see you very soon I know...~

    Fingers to the keyboard once more, for - in the words of Bear from the Big Blue House - it's time to go. Alas, this week marks the last mandatory weekly blog post for this course. But, in an effort to retain information (my nickname should be Dory) and reflect upon my learning ready for the next assessment, I will attempt to keep posting. So if my quirky humour has entertained you thus far, perhaps you should check in for the rest of term?

    Nevertheless, onto the final blog post and it's topic - a short reflection of the past seven weeks. With it's plethora of technology and screen time, I am about ready to pick up a book, simply to touch printed papers; however, at the request of the course, I formed a familiarity with technology that, once upon a time, had no place in my own previous schooling experience.

    At educators' fingertips are the new tools of technology that previous generations never had and a few new favourites with a revamp; all these tools are part of a vast tool belt at the educator's disposal - the question then becomes, "which ones do I use?" And that's the bottom line - what do I use and how do I use to best to benefit my students? 

    SAMR, De Bono's Hats and Bloom's taxonomy are efficient pedagogies with which to judge the technology the educator has selected. SAMR ranks the technology on a scale that translations from basic to complex with the technology moving through substitution, augmentation and modification to redefinition. This digital pedagogy is not only essential but highly effective when adapting current or creating new lesson plans with technology. Placing your technology upon this scale can demonstrate your adeptness with technology and how to develop it further.

    De Bono's Hats is a activity as old as time itself that has had a recent revamp into modern education. De Bono allows the individual to split up their erratic thinking patterns into more manageable chunks - feelings, pros & cons, creativity etc. Whilst commonly used more in primary and early secondary education originally, it's comeback has found it a place within later secondary education now too. Using this activity within a lesson or unit could benefit easily benefit the students' work.

    Bloom's taxonomy, after a re-arranging revamp, uses modern action verbs to class whether the technology - or activity - is of higher or lower order thinking. Bloom's taxonomy is good for rating the level of your activity - e.g. filming falls under create - but is also good for finding apps that combine together well - e.g. filming and script writing fall under create, studying film scripts falls under analyse etc. - creating a lesson plan that uses all of Bloom's taxonomy. Problem-based learning also falls under Bloom's taxonomy. 

    Problem-based learning is a higher order thinking process in which authentic problems are used to challenge students into thinking for themselves, solving situations and then evaluating their solutions. This form of teaching allows students to develop their reasoning and problem-solving skills in a fun and informative way. Problem-based learning should happen often, but in moderation. Try perhaps for once or twice a fortnight?

    Collaborative and co-operative group learning with the ability to interact with the wider world of people using technology benefits the student and teacher alike. With technology such as GoogleDocs, students can collaborate on pieces of work and assessment with each person's addition able to be tracked. The benefits with collaborative and co-operative learning are limitless, depending on the amount for free range you allow the students.   

    Overall, an exemplar lesson plan would include one or more of these digital pedagogies combined with normal pedagogies, and factors such as student participation and behaviour management. If you would like any information on the technology discussed over the past seven weeks, please refer to my other postings.

    However, with advancements in technology, there must be advancements in internet safety. Whilst the benefits of the internet often out-weigh the downsides, as educators we must keep an eye on our students. This includes protecting them from items such as pornography, R-rated materials, bullying, cyber-bullying, cyber-abuse and vicious acts online.

    So how as educators do we do this? We can't simply lock down all the sites like we have in the past, nor does anyone have the time to individually unlock and lock certain extensions of sites. A better solution has to be found, especially in the age of technology. Teaching internet safety is one of these solutions, but the message does not always sink in.

    In conclusion, this course as it has been so far, has opened my eyes to the uses and downfalls of technology I had never seen nor heard of before. And I'm looking forward to the next few weeks of term!

So have you got time for a goodbye song?