CEP 812: Wicked Learning Project

My educational need that I was looking to meet was a way to allow for students to better understand the content that they are reading in the blended science program, particular students that are struggling readers and ESL students.

For my wicked problem of needing a good program that can read and translate text for students I actually chose 2 programs, White Smoke and Natural Reader.  I chose these two programs because together they achieve my goal and offer both free and paid versions of the software.

I chose these programs enhance any student’s learning because they offer many different options for facilitating learning of content.  These programs work with multiple types of students with multiple needs.  For students with ESL needs White Smoke provides translations for all types of text including more complicated texts that can occur in high school courses.  It also gives all students another way to proofread their work.  Natural Reader in its free edition of the program offers a basic reader that works well with many text based programs such as Microsoft Word and Adobe.

Both of these programs help supplement teaching strategies that may already be in place in a lesson.   They can enhance teaching strategies that involve reading text out loud to students.  It will allow students to have materials read to them multiple times without a teacher or para-pro that would normally read text to them.  It will also help students better analyze texts for content and for research purposes.

Overall, both of these programs enhance any student’s learning of content because they offer many different options for facilitating learning of content.  While using these programs the learner will be able to experience material on more levels because of the options that both programs provide.  It can enhance their experience by offering pronunciations of words that may be difficult and translation for ESL students they still are struggling with English.

At Union High School (where I currently teach) we get a lot of refugee students from Africa that speak French and a lot of Hispanic students that know very little English, these are the students I had in mind when trying to solve this problem.  Feel that they will benefit the most intellectually because they will be able to understand the content even if their English isn’t the greatest.  The other students I had in mind while trying to solve this problem are my struggling readers.  Science curriculums are full of new vocabulary terms and words that may look and sound “weird” to an inexperienced student.  Natural Reader can help both my ESL and struggling readers (and most of the time they are one in the same) with pronunciations.

Here is a link the screencast of the Prezi about my project.
Here is the Prezi itself.

CEP 811: Final Reflections

1.    What are some things that you have learned about effective teaching strategies when integrating technology?

This course has taught me a lot about the different ways that I can create lessons and resources online.  I learned a lot about ways that I can provide feedback to my students when creating an online lesson and how I can offer several different options for my students to learn content.  I really enjoyed the STAIR project because it helped me look at online lesson planning in more detail and re-evaluate many of my current lessons.

2.    How did integrating web-based technologies help you think about and evaluate uses of technology?

Integrating web-based technologies helped me think about how much i really knew about integrating technology into my lessons.  I have learned a lot about creating lessons online that I did not know before.  I spent last summer helping develop the biology Moodle curriculum for my district and came out thinking I knew it all about online lesson development.  This class has opened my eyes to what real online lesson planning is.  It helped me take a step back and look at my current lesson to see how I could improve them in the future.    

3.    How have you met your own personal goals for learning about technology integration?

I feel that I have met many of my goals for learning about technology integration through increasing my knowledge in online lesson creation, especially with the STAIR project.  The STAIR project broadened my knowledge of creating lessons in Moodle, it also raised my confidence in using the program.  Learning about MERLOT has been a great addition to my arsenal for lesson planning for my blended courses and enhancing my lessons.  I think through the introduction to MERLOT I will be able to learn more about what is being done with technology in the classroom.

4.    Do you have any new goals? What are your plans for reaching your new goals and your long-term goals after this course is over?

     My new goal is to put together more resources that I can use to add to my blended curriculum.  I want to create a wiki page for my classes next year along with a few Webquests.  I would also like to look into more ways to accommodate my special education students and ESL students.  Some plans that I have to achieve these goals is to continue my learning of education technology by working towards my masters.  I also plan on doing more of my own exploring of technologies through going to conferences (MACUL) and using MERLOT.

CEP 812: Personal Learning Plan

Through reflection upon my Personal Technology plan I have found I have made progress towards my goals but I am still learning and growing.  I have found that my confidence and abilities have grown in using technology in teh classroom but I want more than that.  I would like to gain more skills in teaching my colleagues how to use technology in their daily lessons and to help them build there confidence as well.

Here is the link to my PLP that I created using Prezi (a Web 2.0 tool that I have fallen in love with!)