I can not believe that this course is coming to a close. This being my first grad course, I was beyond nervous and anxious to get back into school. I have learned so much from the discussions, projects, textbook, and my peers. Looking back, I didn't know how much my lessons in the classroom lacked in depth use of technology. Now I am equipped with some valuable resources for future use with my students. I've really grown from taking this course and I know I will build on this new, solid foundation.

I have a touch screen smart phone. I love to look for applications to download on my phone to make life a little easier to deal with. For example, I have all of the financial institutions I use downloaded on my phone so I can check balances and transfer money without stepping foot into a bank. Recently, I decided to look up Educational apps and I came across one for Blackboard. I was a little shocked to see the app, however, I downloaded it not really thinking it would work. To my surprise, it did.

This app allows you to view post on discussion forums, post and reply to discussions, and view my grade, syllabus, and assignments. This is a wonderful asset to using Blackboard because when I am not near a computer I can still get my work done. This is yet again another wonderful way of integrating technology and education!

*The only stipulation is the app must be enabled by your college/university in order to work and can only be used if you have Sprint as your provider. 

While typing my response to this week's discussion about cyberbullying, my mind brought me back to December 2009. The 2009/2010 school year was my first full year of teaching. Feeling overwhelmed by the demands of my awesome career, I felt that I could not physically and mentally take on anymore challenges. Then one day one of my students told me she was being bullied and has been for weeks. Hearing that come out of her mouth literally had me gasping for air. Here I am trying to develop a warm and safe environment for my students and she is feeling beyond uncomfortable.

She told me it went on in her Science class, gym, lunch, and sometimes during my class. Again, I gasped for air. How could I have been so oblivious to one of my students being harassed??? I told her I would handle the situation. How? I didn't know but I was surely going to do whatever it took to make her feel safe. I did not sleep at all that night. The next day, I told my monitor what was going on and he offered to walk beside me in the fight against bullying. I was so relieved to have support from a faculty member. I didn't get the same support from administration. I had to handle the situation the best I could.

Parents were notified of the incident and punishments were handed out. Although I met some resist from some parents, I think my students (the perpetrators) learned something from the incident. The students who was being bullied no longer was the meek young lady she once was. Towards the end of the school year, I noticed she participated more and she even socialized with the two young ladies in her group. I didn't know if I made much of a difference or any difference for that matter. The one thing I did know is that this experience made me realize I had to be more observant of my classroom environment and the well being of my students.

I feel so accomplished! I THINK I just finished my digital story. I underestimated how challenging this last project would be. Now, I have an idea of what movie productions go through, lol. Next time, I will definitely will incorporate more audio.   Finding the right font, color, image, and timing proved to be a struggle for me. However, I am proud of my work. I will definitely use digital story telling as a project for my elective this year.

The past two weeks I have worked on a webquest. For those that do not know, a webquest is an online lesson in which all of the materials/resources come from the internet. In the very beginning of this project, I felt so defeated before I even started because of all the components that required detailed information/explanation. However, once I got deeper into the webquest the more I liked it. The webquest is an innovative way to teach students a lesson you would normally just make copies of and hand out to them. Everything the students need are literally just a click away. I definitely plan to use this when I return to work in September. I love my 1st graduate course!!! It consistently informs me of alternative ways of using the internet to teach my students. 

I recently read an article from Edutopia.org. The article lists ways a Language Arts teacher can integrate technology in lessons and activities. One of the tools that were mentioned was a video dialogue. Students can use a video dialogue to create an autobiography or the like instead of using a journal. Or, they could create a fictional conversion between two characters they are reading about. I love this idea because it is really engaging and it would make the assignment fun and showcase's students' creativity.  

Another example is Give-and-Take Storytelling. Students can collaboratively create stories using Google Talk. They will be able to add elements to the story and keep building from that. This will work better as a rough draft because you can't really take things out of the story.

The author, Sara Benard, also created articles for other subjects. I will post the link to my resources page. Check it out!

I used to think creating a blog was tough. I am familiar with blogging now because during my senior as an undergrad I had to create one to communicate with my classmates. Creating a website, however, is a whole different story! It took me roughly a week to get the hang of it. After hours of editing, deleting, and frustration; I can finally say "Yay!, I did it!"