Farewell for now!

Wow, welcome to my last blog entry of the term! My first year of education has been a great experience! I have learned a lot from both my professors and wonderful classmates that I consider myself very fortunate to have met. In one week, my classmates and I will embark on our second pre-service teaching placements and for those classmates reading this I wish you the best of luck!

Education has been such a different experience than my undergrad degree. In education, as students we received the opportunity to actually practice what we learned which has been truly incredible. In ICT we used an eBook for a class text, that not only explained how to do certain things, but provided examples in the form of video, pictures and memos. It was also really cool to interact with the author of the "text" book herself, Kathy Cassidy. I have no doubt that the information I have learned from this book will be put to great use in my future classroom!

I learned how to create a website; creating a classroom and a professional online portfolio. I definitely plan to use a classroom website in the future, it is a great platform to organize information and connect and involve parents with what their child is learning about in the classroom. In ICT, we edited photos, created videos, and Powerpoint presentations. I was exposed to some great tools, some of which include: Wallwisher, Wordle, Symbaloo, Animoto, Prezi and Evernote.

My favourite thing we did in class would have to be creating videos on iMovie and Movie Maker. They were as fun to watch as they were to make. I think it would be really engaging for students if I  incorporated video in the classroom. This term I really learned a lot about the concept of digital storytelling, in both my ICT and ELA Across the Curriculum classes. In my upcoming placement, I really hope I get the opportunity to help students create a digital story in my 4/5 multilevel classroom!

I guess what I am trying to say is I will definitely use and incorporate technology in my classroom - no matter what the grade level. I can't think of any reason not to, not only is technology easy to use, but with technology students can have a global perspective of the world. At the beginning of the semester, I was very uneasy with the term "technology" and "blog", but now I think it will be weird going without blogging for awhile. I really enjoyed blogging, for both my own personal reflection and to share my learning with others. As a teacher, it is great to work together to share resources to maximize student learning!  Thank you to my ICT professor Mike Nantais, for teaching so many great ways I can use technology in the classroom!



Farewell for now!