The Game Plan

As a teacher, and life long learner, I am constantly setting goals for my students and myself. I have found staying focused, taking action, monitoring my progress, and reflecting on my learning to be challenging. I have the type of personality that runs with every good idea I hear about as often as possible. This is always exciting for myself and my students, but is not always the most effective when it comes to using my time effectively to have the most impact possible on my lesson teaching and learning objectives. So as I read over the performance indicators, I value the focus they give to the self-directed learner that I am, and my instructional plans.
Standard 1:B states, “Engage students in exploring real-world issues and solving authentic problems using digital tools and resources.” I believe it is vital to use real world issues to engage students in their learning. I would like to develop more ways to include technology in this process. Using tools like VoiceThread and Tweeter to engage students in discussions in which they ask the questions and find the answers together. I plan to use techology tools to create scaffolds for my students as they explore their questions in inquiry based learning projects. An example would be to set up a data base of important website links that they would find useful in class projects.
Standard 2:D states, “provide with multiple and varied formative and summative assessments aligned with content and technology”. The most important thing I do everyday in class is find out what my students need to learn, based on my informal and formal evaluation skills. Differential instruction is key to me being a successful teacher, but as teaching modalities vary, and student products vary with choice, I at times find it hard to assess learning. My plan is to share student products with my grade level team as to tap into to their experience in the evaluation process.