812 TechQuest Draft 1

TechQuest
Draft 1

According to Dr. Yong Zhao, when it comes to technology integration in the classroom to address a particular problem, the problem has to be “mine.” One problem I have in my classroom that I would like to address is reading comprehension, more specifically reading comprehension when it comes to informational text. It just doesn’t stick in their brains and it drives me nuts! The majority of the students in my school are below, or significantly below grade level in the subject of Reading. We are constantly trying to improve in that area and midway through last year, we hired a Reading Specialist for our building. I teach fifth grade and have a class of thirty wonderful students. Ten out of the thirty are Special Ed and have IEP’s. Twenty out of thirty have failed at least one time. Obviously, I have many challenges When reading narrative text, for the most part, my students comprehend very well. They can summarize, retell, respond to questions, etc pretty good…probably because narrative text is more “fun” to read. However, in the areas of Science and Social Studies…not so good. I am a very hands-on, visual person and as I mentioned, love my Promethean Board, so of course I incorporate all of those aspects into all subjects especially Science and Social Studies. Often, I pair my students Hi/Low when we read from our Social Studies and/or Science texts. According to Brophy, pairs and small groups aide in student learning and achievement. I agree with Brophy, but I feel bad making all of my high level students read with low partners because they really want to do their own work and I can tell they get bothered always having to be a helper. Also, my low level students have to be able to read independently because obviously, they won’t always have a partner in the real world. Unfortunately, reading informational text is a very important life aspect and can’t be ignored or brushed aside. In conversation with other upper elementary teachers in my building, they share my struggles. Our main question is, “What can we do to increase informational text reading comprehension that our students will be on board with?” In 810, I designed many learning aides with Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, and Excel for this problem. In 811, I designed a StAIR for the Revolutionary War. The materials from both classes aide to an extent, but there is still something missing. For my TechQuest, I plan on incorporating Raz-Kids.com to aide in informational text reading comprehension.

Raz-Kids.com is a website for grades K-6 designed to improve students reading skills by allowing them to listen for modeled fluency, read for practice, record their reading, and check their comprehension through assignments and quizzes. Students can either choose books in the bookroom and read freely or read books assigned by their classroom teacher according to their DRA level. As students read fluently and comprehend, they earn stars. With the stars they earn, they can purchase parts to construct their own rocket and move up in the Raz Rocket Rankings. Raz-Kids.com also gives educators choices such as being able to listen to books read aloud, read with vocabulary and pronunciation support, read without support, and track student reading progress through assignments and quizzes over fluency and comprehension. There are many varieties of story types, genres, and themes to choose from. New books are added regularly and all stories are animated. This website must be purchased. The cost ranges between $50.00 and $70.00 per classroom. This tool can be accessed anywhere where there is internet access. Parents and guardians receive a letter giving an overview of the website. The letter also supplies them with a username and password for home use. According to “Teaching” by Jere Brophy, “students learn more when most available time is allocated to curriculum related activities” and he also stresses the importance of curriculum alignment “to create a cohesive programme for accomplishing instructional purposes and goals.” I plan to use this tool at least once a week during our scheduled computer time.

End of the Class (811) Reflection

During this course, I learned that different teaching strategies need to be used interchangeably to reach maximum student potential. Many teachers think that using the deductive approach will get the job done but it won't. Everything I learned from this course I want to incorporate into my classroom-blogs for parents, creating various webquests, and the StAIR project. I now feel very comfortable in creating a StAIR and I am excited to create more for my students. Being able to view other peoples blogs, webquests, and StAIRs helped me critique my own and give me knowledge what quality/effectiveness should be when it comes to them. What I wanted to get out of this course was new ideas involving technology that will strengthen the skills for my students and that has been accomplished. I now have so many new tools, ideas, and skills I can use and I even think I can get my anti-technology coworkers to try some of them out. I want to keep continuing learning new concepts and approaches to make myself better and I know this will happen as I continue on with this masters program at MSU.

Online Learning

WebQuests are something I am for sure going to create and integrate into my classroom. I think they will help tremendously with Science and Social Studies, two subjects my students struggle with the most. My students also need help with following directions and navigating the Internet, which WebQuests will assist with as well. Two types of pedagogical strategies I want to use with my students with these Webquests would be Problem Solving and the Deductive strategy.I also think my students could benefit with Online Field Trips, especially since I have an enormous Promethean Board in my classroom:) Its hard to leave the school to learn sometimes so this way the learning could come to us. Educational Blogs would be tremendously hard to do with my students. I teach in a very economically challenged environment. The majority of my students do not have a computer and if they do they don't have Internet. The class I have now is the most challenging class Ive had in my five years of teaching. Most do not have proficient keyboarding skills, which is something we are working on now. Socially, they have a really hard time getting along, working together and respecting each other. Unfortunately, I fear my students would use the blog to post inappropiate comments that were not school related.

Google Presenter

Google Presenter

Google Presenter is a web-based 2.0 application developed by Google in the fall of 2007. Google Presenter allows people from different locations to look at, comment, and work on a project. Everyone in a group can login to Google Presenter and upload a slideshow they are working on or create and start a new one. This application allows people to work from different locations and different computers without constant e-mailing back and forth. It saves presentations every time they are updated. Now this application allows PowerPoints to be uploaded. Group members of the presentation can either just "view" or "view and edit." There is also a sidebar for group members to talk about the presentation.

For students to be able to use this, they would need to have a Google account and knowledge of how to use and navigate Google Docs. They would also need to have experience with Presenter to be able to view, edit, and communicate with group members. As stated above, Presenter is an application to collaboratively work on a presentation with group members so items either uploaded or created are constantly being viewed by everyone working on the project. This application, I feel, can be used with students regarding any subject involving group projects assigned in class or outside of class. Students can use Presenter to work on group projects at home for in class projects or with other teachers/support staff and in different places in the school. Presenter can also be used for group activities assigned outside of class and each student can work from where they choose. The teacher can have a Google account to "view" the presentation and see who is doing what and also communicate/offer suggestions with the group in the sidebar option. The main idea behind Presenter is to allow groups to collaborate on a project when they can't physically be together to work on it. If a teacher decides to use Presenter with group activities, all students obviously need very good knowledge on how to use Presenter as well as reliable Internet/computer availability. Also, if a teacher chooses to use this, they need to check each groups presentation often to see if work is happening, if everyone is participating, etc.

Blogs in the Classroom

With the level of my students, I don't know about blogs in my classroom with my students but I do see them useful when it comes to communicating with parents and colleagues. It would be good with fellow colleagues when it comes to what is going on in each others classrooms to coordinate lessons/ create cross-curricular lessons. Also, to share ideas, lessons, resources, websites etc. I think a blog just for parents would be cool. Talk about assignments, give homework help, communicate regarding class activities/parties/field trips etc.

Screen Shot

Ok, I feel like a moron! I took a screen shot of my school Wiki. How to I attach it to my blog post!

My school Wiki/My Wiki

I knew my school wouldn't have a Wiki, so I made one. I just put our general information that is on our website on it. I am going to mention it to my staff at our next staff meeting and hopefully we can all add to it.

ABT Elementary Wiki: http://allysondewar.wikispaces.com/ABTElementarySchoolDearbornMi



My personal Wiki is located at http://allysondewar.wikispaces.com/