Final Reflection for EDU 505

•                What were your favorite discoveries or exercises on this learning journey?

My favorite discoveries throughout this learning journey would definitely involve the blogging activities. I truly enjoyed learning about blogs and how to create them. I will certainly be using them more this year with my 6^th grade students. In the past I’ve had a classroom website. I was getting pretty good at updating my teacher site and communicating to parents through the site. For me using blogs is still new so I know that it will take me a little longer before I am completely comfortable using them, and I know I will continue to learn more and more each time I explore the technology. Therefore I foresee blogs becoming an important part of my instruction and communication between school and home.

•                How has this course assisted or affected your lifelong learning goals?

It is my goal to give each and every student what they need to be successful in whatever they choose to do with their life. I want to empower my students and engaging them in 21^st century digital literacies is going to be imperative to their future success. At the current time the types of technologies we’ve been exploring this semester are just in their infancy, but in the future, students are going to be engaging much more in a digital world and it is our job as educators to prepare them for the world.

•                Were there any take-aways or unexpected outcomes from this course that surprised you?

I was surprised with the ease of creating a blog. I thought it was going to be much harder. On the contrary, I thought creating the wiki would be relatively easy, but I ran into several obstacles that I had to overcome in order to complete the project. With that said, I do not think I’ll be using wikis right away with my students, not until I’m more comfortable with them, but I will be starting my blog before the students even walk through the door.

•                What could we do differently to improve upon this course’s format or concept?

I was always a little leary of taking an online course so I was hesitant to enroll in this one. I think one of the things that would help improve the student experience is to add a one time meeting for the students, perhaps at the very start of the course. That way the professor can provide a syllabus and a tutorial regarding the online content that we will be completing over the semester.

• If we offered another discovery program like this in the future, would you again chose to participate?

Having participated the Web 2.0 technologies course I would be comfortable taking another online discovery course.  It was an effective way to independently engage in material and earn college credit at the same time.