My GAME Plan

I had the opportunity to take a look at the International Society for Technology in Education standards and performance indicators. As I read through them, I noticed that I am more comfortable with some of the standards compared to others. I have made two goals for myself relating to two of the standards.

The first standard that I feel I could use more work with would be Facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity. My goal for this standard is to create lessons that inspire creativity, problem solving, and collaboration. I want to create lessons that will motivate my students and I will incorporate different technology tools to help me achieve this goal. I will first need to look at my lessons that I teach right now. I will need to ask myself how I can best incorporate technology into my lessons to increase student learning and creativity. Then, once I have planned out my lessons, I will use them in my classroom. For the monitor section of my GAME plan, I will need to observe my students. I will check for their understanding of the topic and will need to observe to see whether or not there was higher student motivation and creativity during each lesson. My observations will help me to plan for future lessons. Finally, to evaluate my teaching and student learning, I will need to think about my lessons and what went well. I also need to think about whether my goal was achieved and if not, think about ways that I could change for the next year. To extend my learning, I will continue to learn about new technology and continue to read professionally in order to find strategies and tools that will benefit my students.

A second indicator that I feel I can strengthen my confidence in is Model Digital Age Work and Learning. Before starting my masters in technology, I did not use much technology in my classroom. This is why I picked this as a goal. I hope to learn, practice using, become an expert in, and use new pieces of technology each year. In order to achieve this goal, I am going to take the learning from these classes and incorporate my learning into my lessons. Before having my students use them, I will make sure to practice using them and become an expert so that I am ready for my students to use them. To monitor my progress, I will reflect on my teaching throughout the year. I will think about which pieces of technology I used and how they worked. I will also think about how I can incorporate technology through the rest of the year. If I notice difficulty from the students, I will think about how I can change and improve my modeling and teaching of the technology tools. Finally, to evaluate at the end of the year, I will think about what pieces of technology I used and which ones I would like to incorporate for the next year. I will also need to reflect on my teaching and think about how I could improve the modeling and facilitation of these tools in my classroom. To extend my learning, I will also stay up to date on new technology and try to use the resources and coworkers around me to keep learning.

By thinking about these standards for teachers, my students will only benefit. My students will be motivated, will have a chance to be more creative in their learning and will in turn show more understanding of the topics covered.