My GAME plan was two separate parts and the first was to set
up a learning community within my school and help the teachers move towards a
more technology-infused base for their lessons. Many teachers need help with the simple tasks with
technology and I wanted to create a presentation to offer up a few examples of
how they can integrate different technology tools in their lessons. I met with our principal and the tech
coordinator to set up a time I could present to the other teachers in my
building. Being the end of the
school year, most of my plans were put on hold until the fall, but I have a
presentation ready and a date set.
The other teachers within my department helped me come up with some
basic uses of our Mimios (similar to SMART boards) I will present to the rest
of the staff.
The second part of my game plan was to improve the morale of
our staff. To often the day-to-day
drama bogs us down and my goal was to provide little reminders of why we
started teaching in the first place.
I also am setting up a day to have a cookout in August to start our
school year off on a good note. I
work with a lot of wonderful people and I know we could do a lot better in our
own classrooms if we relied on each other just a little bit more. Here’s hoping next year goes better
than this past one!
This GAME plan setup is a great one to keep you continuously
thinking of how to reach your goal.
To know you need a goal and some kind of action to follow through with
is a great start, but also creating a monitoring plan with an evaluation is
something we should definitely be teaching our students. It’s a great method to follow anytime
we are problem solving.
The two main
things I am taking away from this course is a new desire to incorporate more
problem-based learning rather than lecture. I think it is a remarkable way to have students teach
themselves throughout experience rather than just giving them the information
and asking them to just practice over and over until they understand. I will try to incorporate as much
technology as possible, i.e. blogging or using online collaboration with these
problems, but that depends entirely on how much access I can get to computers
at my school.
The other huge part I am taking away from this course is the
importance and possibilities associated with social networking. I can use this to my benefit in many
ways in my classroom and of course the students will be very appreciative that
I am incorporating something they are familiar with. There are so many wonderful plans I have for next
school year and I’m glad I kept a log with all of my ideas so I can sort them
out over the summer. Incorporating
new technology not only makes a class more enjoyable for the students, but it
also reinvigorates me and adds new life into lessons I have taught over and
over again.
So here’s to another class finished and so many great ideas
for this next school year!
-Kate
