CEDO 530 Entry Two

As of right now I am thinking of two very practical purposes for digital stories: delivering content and assessing student learning.

There are times as a teacher that it can be tempting to feel a need for a sense of control by delivering much of the content personally. What I have been finding out is there are times in which there are other far more powerful ways to deliver a message or content and that I need to step aside and let it happen. Digital stories can be a very powerful way to deliver information. On the first day of my history class I showed this clip and was very happy with how engaged the students were as it explains the importance of history better than I could:

Although there is still a place for teachers in delivering and explaining content there is not doubt that digital stories are at time a very powerful tool.

I have and plan to use digital stories as a way to assess student learning. Creating a digital story is a great way for students to produce a meaningful and authentic product. It also allows them to exhibit some creativity by customizing their story. My one experience with digital stories created by students did not go perfectly but the creativity shown in many of the stories sold me on the whole idea. 

Continuing to find great resources for creating digital stories is my main goal for this course. 

CEDO 530 Entry One

Of all of the classes that I have taken in this cohort from what I can tell thus far this seems the most interesting. Being a history teacher much of what I am doing is telling a story from the past. Getting students interested in history can be a great challenge at times as many simply see it as "a bunch of boring old stuff". The best history teachers I had were able to engage students with their story telling. I am looking forward to learning how to improve my story telling, take it to the digital age, and hopefully become a more engaging teacher.
Improving my presentations is probably what interests me most. I remember a couple courses back taking a look at the "Death by Power Point" presentation and that encouraged me to reform my presentation practices and it appears that Presentation Zen teaches many of the same lessons. It has actually become painful to see bad  Power Points and hopefully I can help lead a presentation revolution to rid the world of bad power points.
From what I can tell I am very excited about CEDO 530 and think it will help both me, my students, and my school.

CEDO 525 Entry Six

Reflecting on the Course:
After each course that I take, and after in-services or professional development experiences, one of the things I always try to do is reflect on how what I learned can be useful. In regards to technology in education it is common to hear, "you need to integrate technology into your lessons" but what often does not get discussed is specifically how to align technology with teaching strategies. Technology is be no means the end-all be-all of education but is a great tool. The phrase that should be used is "integrate technology to improve your instruction not simply just to do it".
This course has led me to align technology tools with specific instructional strategies rather than simply just using it. What I have found in a short amount of time is that being a little more structured and systematic about how I use technology has made it more effective. Rather than students simply thinking "we're going to the computer lab to do something", there seems to be a better understanding of what the tool is supposed to accomplish.
It is very evident to me that my use of technology use in the classroom has improved. As I hope to become a technology leader in my building I believe that teaching my colleagues to use technology tools for specific instructional strategies will make integration more effective in my school.