MIT Reflections-Mary Nisewander

In the first year of participating with the MIT grant, I definitely had more time to spend working specifically on my classroom math projects, and technology related activities. However, in the second year of the MIT grant, with the new language arts adoption, I found Treasures had an incredible impact on splitting my teacher preparation and planning time. Therefore, I tried very hard to integrate the use of technology with both curricula.

I strongly believe that the use of the document camera, laptop, camera, etc. had and continues to have a powerful affect and effect with young children in the classroom environment. The use of this type of technology has empowered my students to an entire different level of learning. I find they are more engaged and have a firmer sense of knowledge base in which ever academic area we are engaged in.

The children loved sharing with their families and our community all their projects at our annual "Project Fair": Math Trails power point presentations, photos of their completed work or written thoughts on certain math and language arts skills, and just sharing being a part of the instructional process during our learning times throughout the school year.

Overall, the children and I have learned to utilize discourse in math to be implemented throughout our learning in ALL academic areas. It has been a challenge for myself and the children, and yet the changes has brought forth for new methods and strategies us both to pave a different avenue of learning and teaching.

MIT reflection

I feel very privileged to have been a part of the MIT grant these past two years. I was fortunate enough to have been part of the MIT Palm grant earlier. South Lane School District’s participation in these grants has put us on the cutting edge of the use of technology in education. Not only do we have the opportunity to obtain technology for use in our classrooms, but of equal importance is the training provided to support our use of the technology. With the training and support we have received, the use of technology in my classroom has become as natural and as much a part of my everyday teaching as the use of textbooks. My laptop, document camera and projector, and the clickers are used on a daily basis. I now plan to start up CPS first thing in morning and start each day with attendance. If the program is running, and the students have the clickers, we’ll make better use of them.

An added bonus of this grant is the fact that it was at the same time when many of us were involved with the OMLI grant. Many ideas that we learned at OMLI were able to be put into practice through the benefit of MIT. Example: The quality and quantity of student discourse improved greatly with the use of the document camera and projector.

Our students are the big winners when it comes to the benefits of our participation in the MIT grant.

This technology journey has been an eye-opener! When we started, I was hoping for everyone to become proficient with document cameras in the mathematics classroom. My real goals centered on the benefits to supporting rich discourse with a more efficient way to share student work. I didn’t really understand the possibilities or the creativity that this project would unleash.

I followed Lynn Lary as she encouraged us to explore working with Math Trails, and Picassa, and Unitedstreaming. The creative and rich ways you all have used this technology has amazed me. I have learned way more than I planned on 2 years ago when I just thought we were supporting math instruction. It has really expanded my understanding of what’s possible today and what we don’t know about what will be available tomorrow.

The other outcome I did not anticipated was the buzz you would create with other teachers. Your immediate excitement and implementation of technology into your curriculum resulted in lots of other teachers saying “what about my classroom.” Every time Krista dropped in our workshops to watch you at work, she walked away saying we have to get this technology as essential tools for every teacher and we have to provide the right PD to support their classroom implementation. While we aren’t there yet, the vision of core technology tools in every classroom is on its way to becoming real. Your colleagues have a lot to thank you for. Your willingness to step forward, work hard, be creative, experiment and take risks has created new opportunities for them.

Digital Camera View

On a recent field trip, my student's caught this funny picture.

Leaps and Bounds - MIT in hindsight

In my classroom, the largest impact from MIT and MIT2 has been the increased amount of student participation and sharing. This has come from the culture of sharing work via the document camera/projector and the use of the digital cameras to capture work (which is later uploaded.) Information is making its way into student’s long term memory because clickers are used for warm up activities to review previous material. This also helps with the high truancy rate at my school because I have an opportunity to re-teach, or teach, as needed. I was computer literate before I began MIT, but now I am a professionally literate educator that uses technology seamlessly in my classroom. The opportunity to network and work with others in SLSD has been a synergistic event. In addition to the leaps in pedagogy, the social connections make it more fun to work in the district. I find I am a more effective teacher because I have more resources to draw on, especially when I am in the scary place of doing new and creative things in the classroom. I will continue to share with the other teachers in my building and mentor and encourage where it is appropriate.

Reflection, Valeri Rankins

My teaching practice has changed tremendously over the past 2 years. The document camera and projector alone has allowed for much more student sharing, student voice, and interaction among all in the classroom. With the increase in technology student engagement has also increased dramatically. With access to the clickers, digital cameras, and ability to stream video at anytime, it opens up endless possibilities to be creative with our curriculum. I am much more confident and willing to try new things, I don’t fear technology anymore. There is still so much to do and try. I’m really excited to play around with voice threading and want to set up a blog next year for my classroom. MIT has provided great training, resources and equipment allowing me to launch into a new world of teaching!

My Technological Journey

This grant has completely changed the way I teach math. Before we started, I spent most of the time at the front of the classroom telling students how to do the math we were learning about. Now, with the access to the technology we’ve been given I have students sharing their thinking about the math and learning from each other.

When we started the year last year my goal was just to get the students up to the front of the room. Now, I want my students to begin to use the technology to share their understanding in other ways. Learning how to do math trails, digital storytelling, and voice thread has opened the door to new ways for students to summarize their learning and teach each other. We are no longer limited to learning from people who are in the room. Now if we could only get consistent access to computers for the whole class…

Reflection - Reta Cochrane

This has been real adventure! I have learned so much!

Besides all of the technology to which I was introduced – I had the opportunity to experiment and try it out with input and ideas from other teachers. It is rare to have a chance to talk and learn from each other. We are usually in our own little corners of the world unable to really share! This was professional development done right!!!!

This technology – clickers and document camera – has really opened our minds (my students and mine)! The anonymous answers with the clickers allows us to discuss and explore different ways of looking at things. The document camera lets us look at each other’s work without breathing down necks.

My promise to myself is to keep learning about the stuff I have to use and listening to others about new ways to use technology.

Reflection - Nikki McClean

These past two years have been a great learning experience. I've learned a lot about the different technology and have appreciated the support along the way. I'm hoping that the support can continue as we use the technology with our students. I feel very confident with using the camera/projector, laptop, and digital camera, but there is still a lot that I would like to learn. I feel like I have just scratched the surface with using the clickers and the CPS chalkboard. I have a goal to keep trying new features of that technology, but perhaps we could have some refresher classes next year to help with this?

I also really appreciate the fact that I have gotten to know some more people in the district and that we have been able to share ideas on how we each use the various technology. Do we somehow have the ability to easily share with each other the CPS lessons that we have created?

Reflection MIT 2 Years - Sadie Elliott

Working together to learn how to use technology on a daily basis has been a true adventure! There are so many tools that I use every day, it's hard to pick just a few as my favorites. Although, I would have to say that the document camera is top notch. Using the document camera during math instruction has helped my students actively engage with sharing their thinking. It's fun to watch students "become the teacher" and ask prompting questions of one another as they talk about a math problem. My kids have truly come together as a class to work on solving problems rather than focusing on the individuals. In this way, we all have learned to be more focused on the process of solving problems rather than the correct answer.

As a teacher, I have learned how to plan more reflectively during my math lessons. Our time spent discussing how to best structure math lessons and questions has been highly useful. The result has been that I am much more aware of how my instructional methods and presentations impact my students learning. Now that I have had the opportunity to implement new tools and learn new techniques, I am so thankful to have learned how to plan math lessons more thoughtfully. In the future, I can't imagine teaching without these tools! Using technology incorporated with math instruction has been the one of the best chances I took as a new teacher. Thank you all so much for all of your help!

MIT reflection-Marcia Trujillo

Because of the technology I have learned to use, my students communicate their thinking more confidently and have better ways to show evidence of their problem-solving strategies and writing pieces. I am pleased that I have kept up with technological advances and have shared them with my students.

The best practices I’ve learned through MIT helps me focus on the important concepts I should be teaching and helps me teach smarter. Several suggestions from colleagues have saved me hours of frustration.

Looking back, I think it might have been helpful if homework was assigned to teachers in the same building and that our students worked together to complete a partner project for one of the assignments. However, on the other hand, maybe it is that I feel more confident to let kids experiment with the technology. Maybe this willingness is more an indicator of how far I’ve come.

Reta and I plan to partner our kids together to create voice threads on a curriculum topic.

Reflection - Deedra Huff

Oh where to begin? This past two years have been extremely fruitful in regards to my professional and personal growth. The thing that has been most surprising has been the personal connections made on this journey. A year ago I would not have been comfortable contacting a fellow MIT colleague to ask for additional insight HELP regarding their particular area of expertise. Enough time has now passed I wouldn’t hesitate calling a number of people in this cadre to request help or additional information. I look forward to meeting with Vicki in the next month to investigate video making using a P.C.

Reflection Mit 2 Konnie Garman

It has been a challenging, wild, and fun ride. I think my students have enjoyed all of the new technology and have expected bigger and better things after each inservice. I plan to turn my CPS account and computer on first thing each day so that I can easily use the chalkboard for on-the-spot lessons. Using clip art will add to the excitement and the individual clickers will encourage each student to be accountable. Teresa and Jen are quite the comedy act and yet always seem to know exactly what we need. Thank you!!!

MIT reflections - Jean Harris

As a person who likes technology, but can become lost easily, this 2 years has been an incredible opportunity to learn and grow. My teaching techniques have improved with these resources. My class uses the document camera, projector and laptop many times every day. I continue to increase the use of the CPS system. New ideas have expanded what my students choose to do in the computer lab, too.
The digital camera has so many uses, both educational and creative. Student projects can incule photos of them or of their creations. Just showing a slide show on the projector after a project is a fabulous and enjoyable way to bond and to review.
The training sessions that pull us together from all over the district have been valuable. We learn in a friendly and supportive atmosphere. Our instructors are well prepared with meaningful tasks for us. We learn and share with each other too.
Having Teresa available to come to our classrooms adds to the student learning and helps me continue when I have had a glitch. I would be thrilled if that could continue next year.
All in all, I have learned valuable information to improve as a teacher. This has been a great opportunity. I have looked forward to every training session.
Thank you!

VoiceThread example

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An overview

As a reminder, these are some of the things that we have done over the past 2 years:

• Selecting and Sequencing student work
• Math trails
• Identifying the core math
• Learning how to set-up and use doc cameras, projectors, laptops…
• Picasa
• Clicker set-up and use
• United Streaming
• Digital storytelling (Video casting)
• Voice Thread
• Blogging