Jul 28 2009
Final project – draft
Using Online Resources to Improve Instruction
I’ve posted the draft of my final project here. This has taken so much work, partly because I wanted to get down all my thinking about this class (Using online resources to improve instruction), which I have wanted to teach for a long time. But now I feel like I have a much better handle on the class, because I approached it from the point of view of objectives and assessments.
The objectives I usually have to work with (from State and national sources) to use with my 12 and 13 year olds are both too detailed (too many of them) and too general (students will utilize good grammar). Now, I get a chance to make my own objectives and tie them to the work of the course.
Although I do this all the time in my head, I don’t always take the time to put it all down, and there is certainly value in doing this. Not writing individual lesson plans, but looking at the big picture. In the past, I’ve written a narrative, but I like taking the time to tie the objectives to the assessments. Have I overused one assessment, have I forgotten to assess how well students have met one of the objectives?
I also now have a presentation that I can use to get this course approved. This is a course a lot of the teachers in my school would like to take, and I am excited to move to that next step.
Weaknesses: I am still struggling with the verbiage about the assessment being tied to the tool. It’s so clear in my own head, I’m having trouble getting it down on paper. (This is my own 7th graders’ greatest difficulty – getting it out of their heads and onto the paper.) I’m also not sure that my objectives ar specific enough.
Reading through this, I can see that using the Ning, while creative, isn’t the ideal platform. I really need to put this on Moodle, if I can 1) find a place to host it, and 2) find somebody who will help me with the administration. If I can’t do that, I’ll use the Ning, since it’s free and immediately available.
This is part of the creative work that I love about teaching – figuring out what I want to teach and how I want to teach it.
