Share Your Goals and Needs
Take an opportunity to introduce yourself to all the other teachers taking this challenge. Please copy and paste the prompts into the comment box at the bottom of this page, then respond.
1) Where and what will you be teaching this Fall?
2) What are you hoping to accomplish in taking this professional learning / course-building experience?
3) Given what you know about yourself as a teacher, what aspect of blended instruction do you struggle with?
4) What new tools and/or skills would you most like to learn?
Challenges:
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Comments
Andrew's goals
1) I'm not currently teaching students, but for 10 years prior to joining New Visions I worked as a science, math, and engineering teacher in a variety of NYC public schools. I try to keep my work supporting digitial instruction grounded in the experience of teachers and learners, and in an abiding belief (based in my own experience with reformed physics teacher professional learning communities) in the transformative power of teacher-led / co-created adult learning networks.
2) My goals are to support the development of blended curriculum development using a blended strategy, and to work closely with school leaders and teacher teams to identify the most appropriate supports for each school.
3) I miss the urgency of classroom and school-level work, and struggle some with understanding how school networks can gain enough traction to make a difference in the lives of students. When approaching this work, I've imagined that modeling a blended learning approach with adults might better personalize the learning and support experience for each teacher and lead to cross-school practice sharing that helps move us all towards identifying more effective blended approaches. Getting this sharing effort off the ground requires lots of buy-in at the school level, and I've definitely under-estimated how difficult this is to accomplish. Looking forward to learning more effective ways of getting better at building a vibrant professional community around this work. I wonder to what extent teachers face the same problem with students. Without a strong relationship between the teacher and the learner, it seems the online space lacks the ability to create motivational buy-in...
4) I'd love to learn more about how we can get digital tools to support challenge-based model of learning. I find the 1.0 version of online learning (essentially online-textbooks) to be at odds with good pedagogy in many respects. I'm excited to find more tools that can drive deep inquiry, rich student discourse, and rigorous authentic student products.
Steve May
1) Where and what will you be teaching this Fall?
I spent the past year as an English teacher at East Brooklyn Community High School. Next year I will work as a tenth grade English teacher at Green Dot Charter High School in the Bronx.
2) What are you hoping to accomplish in taking this professional learning / course-building experience?
I am hoping to retool a unit that I have taught so that it is in line with Common Core standards.
3) Given what you know about yourself as a teacher, what aspect of blended instruction do you struggle with?
I'm a control freak, and blended learning/instruction asks that I hand some of the reins over to the students, who may not understand what I mean exactly, or may skip over some of the instruction entirely.
4) What new tools and/or skills would you most like to learn?
I'm interested in learning how to integrate screencasts into my teaching. Also I'm looking to start including an online component to my instruction. I know how to do that, but I haven't really taken the time to do it as yet.
Goals and Needs
1) Where and what will you be teaching this Fall?
I will be teaching Algebra at Olympus Academy this Fall.
2) What are you hoping to accomplish in taking this professional learning / course-building experience?
Throughout this experience, I am hoping that I will finish creating my online curriculum and learn some new online tools that will be directly applicable to teaching math and learning skills.
3) Given what you know about yourself as a teacher, what aspect of blended instruction do you struggle with?
I struggle the most with creating activity-based learning experiences in the online forum and with facilitating student-to-student interaction in the online forum.
4) What new tools and/or skills would you most like to learn?
I am learning about how to apply online tools directly to math and learning about student-friendly ways to write equations, etc. on the computer.
1) Where and what will you
1) Where and what will you be teaching this Fall?
This Fall I will be returning to Olympus Academy to teach English-Language Arts.
2) What are you hoping to accomplish in taking this professional learning / course-building experience?
I am hoping to accomplish many things while participating in this professional learning experience. For example, I would like to successfully integrate my course with technology and engaging ways to present my curriculum to our students. I would also like to create a repository of resources that can help me to improve my pedagogy.
3) Given what you know about yourself as a teacher, what aspect of blended instruction do you struggle with?
I feel that I love to engage my students with active learning. I also love to have verbal discussions with my students to evoke higher ordered thinking. However, when it comes to blended instruction, I feel that I struggle with balancing the level of technology incorporated with active discussions.
4) What new tools and/or skills would you most like to learn?
I'm interested in learning how to integrate online discussions into my classroom. I also would like to learn more about digital drop-boxes and screen-casting. I am also interested in the innovated techniques that my colleagues are using to enhance their curriculum as well.
My responses to the questions on the forum:
1) Where and what will you be teaching this Fall?
This Fall I will be returning to Olympus Academy to teach English-Language Arts.
2) What are you hoping to accomplish in taking this professional learning / course-building experience?
I am hoping to accomplish many things while participating in this professional learning experience. For example, I would like to successfully integrate my course with technology and engaging ways to present my curriculum to our students. I would also like to create a repository of resources that can help me to improve my pedagogy.
3) Given what you know about yourself as a teacher, what aspect of blended instruction do you struggle with?
I feel that I love to engage my students with active learning. I also love to have verbal discussions with my students to evoke higher ordered thinking. However, when it comes to blended instruction, I feel that I struggle with balancing the level of technology incorporated with active discussions.
4) What new tools and/or skills would you most like to learn?
I'm interested in learning how to integrate online discussions into my classroom. I also would like to learn more about digital drop-boxes and screen-casting. I am also interested in the innovated techniques that my colleagues are using to enhance their curriculum as well.
Response to Questions
1) Where and what will you be teaching this Fall?
I teach US History and Government at the Academy for Careers in Television and Film in Queens.
2) What are you hoping to accomplish in taking this professional learning / course-building experience?
I a hoping to develop my ability to use online resources to enhance my instruction. So far my regular use of instructional technology has only extended to GoogleDocs, PowerPoint presentations, and emails. I am aware of the benefits a class website can provide and I am looking forward to creating a place where information, curriculum and discussions can be accessed quickly and easily by my students. I'm hoping this will improve studying and communication for my classes as well as help me organize and update each unit.
3) Given what you know about yourself as a teacher, what aspect of blended instruction do you struggle with?
I feel that with regards to computer technology, I am a slow learner. It does not come naturally to me. So my biggest struggle will be familiarizing myself with the steps needed to create and update my website.
4) What new tools and/or skills would you most like to learn?
I would most like to learn how to create the screencast.
1) Where and what will you be
1) Where and what will you be teaching this Fall?
I will be teaching Art History this Fall at the Academy for Careers in Television and Film.
2) What are you hoping to accomplish in taking this professional learning / course-building experience?
I am hoping to more smoothly integrate technology into my classroom and take advantage of how positively it can affect instruction. i have created class websites before but have never been able to integrate them in a way that fully utilizes all they have to offer. I think that it has the potential to engage students not just in the classroom but from whereever they may be.
3) Given what you know about yourself as a teacher, what aspect of blended instruction do you struggle with?
I have struggled getting students on board when it comes to blended instruction. I am hoping to learn how to create something and present it in a fashion that will get the students excited.
4) What new tools and/or skills would you most like to learn?
I am looking forward to learning how to create a screencast. I am also looking forward to learning how to get the students to really own the site and use it to their advantage.
Goals
1) Where and what will you be teaching this Fall?
I will be teaching Geometry, Algebra 2 and Trigonometry, and a Senior Math Class at the Academy for Careers in Television and film.
2) What are you hoping to accomplish in taking this professional learning / course-building experience?
I am hoping to create a web environment that can be used as an out of class resource for my students for reviewing prior material and learning new material. My ideal model of blended learning is not the flipped classroom blended learning model from the Kahn Academy, but one where instruction through the technology component and in class component compliment each other in the following way:
I would like to be able to show students a video at home of a pattern relating numbers, maybe a natural phenomena, maybe a geometric relationship, but something that will get students actively thinking about a topic before we teach the topic in class. Here is one example: Show a video of measuring the interior angles of a triangle and then those of a quadrilateral. Show that the angle measures add to 180 degrees in the triangle and 360 degrees in the quadrilateral. Next show an image of a pentagon (do not measure or add the angles). (To me, the goal here is not to have the teacher ask a question, but to have the students come up with questions.) The goal here is that the student automatically wonders: "How many degrees are in the interior angles of a pentagon?" Maybe they try the experiment at home, maybe they think "Is there a way for me to figure out without measuring?" Even if they do nothing, there brain has processed the motivation for the lesson without having a teacher be the one to ask and then answer the question and they have done this all before class.
Video media is especially adapt to this task as a short video can provoke a lot of thought if done correctly. The benefit of having the students think about the problems (aims) of the day before coming in, is that instead of posing the question and the answer in the same chunk of time, students have time to digest the problem, think over it, and build up curiosity. This anticipation I believe will lead to more buy in, higher level thoughts regarding the material, and increased problem solving ability.
I also see creating videos of procedural problems as a great way to have students review challenging topics (such as geometric constructions).
3) Given what you know about yourself as a teacher, what aspect of blended instruction do you struggle with?
Blended instruction will take a lot of time to develop, so I am concerned that I will be overloaded as I attempt to develop lessons for in class and out of class instruction.
4) What new tools and/or skills would you most like to learn?
I would like to learn how to edit videos, insert simple devices like timers into videos, and create the media necessary for blended learning.
Goals
1) Where and what will you be teaching this Fall?
I will be teaching at East Brooklyn Community High School. I will be teaching Government, US History A, and US History B.
2) What are you hoping to accomplish in taking this professional learning / course-building experience?
I want to sharpen the techniques I already use and I want to learn other techniques to enhance my classroom.
3) Given what you know about yourself as a teacher, what aspect of blended instruction do you struggle with?
digitial assignment tracking
4) What new tools and/or skills would you most like to learn?
Digital assignment tracking and something like a twitter feed.
Jared's Goals
1) Where and what will you be teaching this Fall?
I am teaching 9th grade English, 12th grade AP English, and a College Now "Thinking Critically" course at the Academy for Careers in TV & Film.
2) What are you hoping to accomplish in taking this professional learning / course-building experience?
I am hoping to acquire new tools to enhance my somewhat limited online presence as an educator. I have developed a few blogs and wikis for classes or projects and would like to find something less cumbersome for student-teacher interaction online. I also look forward to learning from my colleagues through these forums.
3) Given what you know about yourself as a teacher, what aspect of blended instruction do you struggle with?
As an English teacher most differentiation is text-based (i.e. leveled texts). Since this has been the default strategy in my former school, I have found myself struggling with differentiating process, especially for reading instruction, which will be extremely important for my ningth grade classes
4) What new tools and/or skills would you most like to learn?
As I state in prompt two, I would like to enhance my web design skills and utilize them to promote a healthier (more frequent) form of communication between teacher and student than I have currently.
goals
1) Where and what will you be teaching this Fall?
I will be teaching at Olympus Academy. I will be teaching global 1-4 as well as several electives. Exactly what I will be teaching will be determined by student need.
2) What are you hoping to accomplish in taking this professional learning / course-building experience?
This year I am hoping to accomplish a greater degree of differentiation and student ownership. Rather than creating a curriculum that is set in stone I want to design multiple pathways for the student. The work the students do will be determined on what skills they need to develop and their interest.
3) Given what you know about yourself as a teacher, what aspect of blended instruction do you struggle with?
Finding a balance between teaching content, literacy skills and technology skills. This can be particularly challenging when creating projects that require students to use technology. I am contemplating creating a wiki page with a bunch of screen casts. For example, how to create an I movie or prezi. This way the students would have an easy to access reference.
4) What new tools and/or skills would you most like to learn?
I would like to learn how to use prezi better and some basic html
Clayton's Goals
1) Where and what will you be teaching this Fall?
I am teaching four sections of 10th grade English and one CTT section of 11th grade English
2) What are you hoping to accomplish in taking this professional learning / course-building experience?
I want to build a highly-useful interactive website for my class. I am also hoping to create dynamic ways to use my footage and data from the "Fund for Teachers" sponsored trip I made during August
3) Given what you know about yourself as a teacher, what aspect of blended instruction do you struggle with?
I struggle with follow through - I'll often set up a system for various aspects of teaching, such as keeping track of areas of reading/writing where students struggle, or providing clear visual aids in the classroom to help students keep track of key ideas, but I'll give up when I get overwhelmed or fail to come up with a consistent way of keeping up with the system.
4) What new tools and/or skills would you most like to learn?
Screencasting, Clever and appealing website layout, setting up useful links, combining technology and traditional teaching methods.
1) Where and what will you
1) Where and what will you be teaching this Fall?
I am returning to ACTvF to teach a combination of AP Calculus and Integrated Algebra.
2) What are you hoping to accomplish in taking this professional learning / course-building experience?
I am hoping to hone my Google Apps skills, gain knowledge about blended instruction and ways in which it can be meaningfully implemented, and learn some new digital skills.
3) Given what you know about yourself as a teacher, what aspect of blended instruction do you struggle with?
I thrive on the interactivity of the classroom, and a lot of my teaching, I think, relies on trust-building and relationships that develop in the classroom or through direct interaction with students. It will be an interesting challenge to tease out of that some standalone digital components that will still be instructionally meaningful.
4) What new tools and/or skills would you most like to learn?
I would like to build some screencasting skills and video creation skills, or learn the digital tools involved in these. I don't have much experience in this area, but given the focus of my school, I should!
1) Where and what will you
1) Where and what will you be teaching this Fall? I'm teaching 9th and 12th grade English this year.
2) What are you hoping to accomplish in taking this professional learning / course-building experience? I'm hoping to increase my knowledge of website technology in order to use in my classes this year.
3) Given what you know about yourself as a teacher, what aspect of blended instruction do you struggle with? I typically do things in the "old school" manner rather than take the time to learn a new tech skill, as I am hoping to save time in the moment.
4) What new tools and/or skills would you most like to learn? I would like to learn more about automatic test grading possibilities, and other ways to automatically create/analyze data from student assessments.
Dave L's Goals
1) Where and what will you be teaching this Fall?
I'll be teaching at East Brooklyn Community High School. I'll be Teaching Integrated Algebra and Personal Finance.
2) What are you hoping to accomplish in taking this professional learning / course-building experience?
I'm hoping to learn more on how to implement different technologies in the classroom and how to use technology to deliver lessons that will have a positive impact on student achievement.
3) Given what you know about yourself as a teacher, what aspect of blended instruction do you struggle with?
I usually like to try things that are time-tested and have been proven to raise student achievement. If the technology is new, I hesitate to implement it since I feel that I have no time to experiment on my students.
4) What new tools and/or skills would you most like to learn?
I want to learn how to make better videos using iMovie or screencasting where I can show vocabulary in one section, a math problem being worked out in another, and a section where I'm teaching. Basically, I know there's more than just Jing.