GAME Plan – Final Reflection

Cennamo, Ertmer, and Ross (2009) say that, “the GAME plan enables you to customize your approach to learning tasks, to develop relevant skills that are important to you, and prepares you for lifelong learning” (p. 3 - 4). I think that I enjoyed going through the steps of my own GAME Plan. Although I haven’t reached my goals completely, but it was nice to set goals, monitor my actions trying to reach those goals, and then evaluate the progress.

The goal on which I most focused throughout this course was to learn new technological tools that I can integrate into my classroom. While working toward this goal, I learned about some nice tools that will have a great impact on my teaching practice. GeoGebra, Geometer’s Sketch Pad, Digital Storytelling, and Online Collaborations are wonderful tools that will change the learning environment in my classroom. By using Digital Storytelling activity in my lesson plan, students can create video presentations. This will allow students to create a product that connects what is going on in the classroom with what students may see outside the classroom and in their day-to-day life.

One adjustment that I need to consider in my teaching practice is to have a back up plan when my lesson requires technology access. As fantastic as technology can be in any classroom, it can easily go wrong. Internet connection could go down, websites could be down or blocked, or any other unexpected technological problem may happen.

Cennamo, K., Ross, J. & Ertmer, P. (2009). Technology integration for meaningful classroom use: A standards-based approach (Laureate Education custom edition). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.

Using the GAME Plan Process with Students

As educators, one of our major goals is to create self-directed, life-long learners; individuals that continually seek new experiences, knowledge and skills. Learners that “engage in three key processes: planning, monitoring, and evaluating their learning activities” (Cennamo, Ross & Ertmer, 2009, pg. 3). The GAME Plan provides an outline and directions for learning that puts the responsibility, evaluation, and extension of learning directly in the learners hands.

Throughout the time of this course, I have tried to find out the best way to implement the GAME Plan with my own students. Although I was overwhelmed because of the speed with which we were moving forward, however, that has provided me with a good sense about the pacing to consider when applying this strategy with my students.

According to the International Society for Technology in Education’s standards, students must be able to demonstrate creative thinking and innovation, communicate and work collaboratively, demonstrate personal responsibility for lifelong learning, use critical thinking, problem solving, and decision making skills, use digital tools to research and use information, understand and practice legal and ethical behavior relating to technology, and transfer current knowledge to learning of new technologies (ISTE, 2007).

Applying the GAME Plan to reach proficiency in these standards supports the accomplishment of our goals. It will also allow students to set their own goals and then plan for their actions and then monitor, evaluate and extend those goals. This way we create within each one of them a self-directed and a life-long learner.

References

Cennamo, K., Ross, J. & Ertmer, P. (2009). Technology integration for meaningful classroom use: A standards-based approach (Laureate Education custom edition). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.

International Society for Technology in Education. (2007). National Educational Content Standards. Retrieved February 17, 2010 from http://www.iste.org/AM/Template.cfm?Section=NETS

Revising my GAME plan

The progress on my GAME plan continues. So far, I have learned few things that can help in integrating more technology in my classroom. I have learned new features -to me- when using the graphing calculators, and I have also learned about wonderful software, GeoGebra, which I feel that it is more user friendly than the Geometry Sketch Pad. In addition, I was able to connect math lessons to real life situation and using real life examples more often in my teaching practice.

I believe that learning new technological tools should be a lifelong goal that every teacher needs to work toward through everyday in this career, because there are always new tools out there that educators need to learn about and incorporate in their classrooms to improve their instructional practice.

My new learning goal will be based on NETS-T 4b: Teachers address the diverse needs of all learners by using learner-centered strategies and providing equitable access to appropriate digital tools and resources (National Education Standards for Teachers, 2008). To be able to differentiate instructions in order to reach all learners in my classroom, I will meet with teachers form special education department and from ELL/bilingual department during the common planning period to discuss different strategies and any available technologies that may help addressing the diverse needs of my students.

Reference:

National Education Standards for Teachers (NETS-T). Retrieved February 10, 2010 from http://www.iste.org/Content/NavigationMenu/NETS/ForTeachers/2008Standards/NETS_T_Standards_Final.pdf

Evaluating my GAME plan progress

One of the initial goals in my GAME plan is to learn new technological tools that I can integrate into my classroom. I have been using graphing calculators for many years in my classroom, but this week, it was the first time I get the students to discover something new on their own using this technology. They used pre-learned skills to explore equation of a circle and they were able to come up with the standard equation of a circle without my help. I have tried to use that application “CabriJr” in classroom many times, but it was not interesting until students were able to actually see the benefits of using it, and I heard someone saying: “This is cool, I like it.”

I have learned over the past few weeks that the available tools are more than one could ever imagine. All we need is to look for them. I have also learned that students are ready and willing to learn new technologies. It just needs to be well presented to them, because they always think that educational tools are boring.

I still need to learn how to get students engaged in exploring real-world issues and solving authentic problems using digital tools and resources. I think that this week’s resources and what we are learning about problem-based learning will address this issue, but it will need some practice in classroom until one can be comfortable using this method on a regular basis.

I think I need to take time to think about what is truly important to me and my students right now. What can we actually use, that is beneficial, practical, and supportive of their learning.