550 Review

   As the class comes to an end I have had a chance to really look at what it is to be an online teacher.  It is a world I have always wondered about especially with how it all would work.  It was great to get to hear an experienced online teacher talk and share experiences.  It was also great to hear that my opinions about the lower grades with online schooling are ones that others share.  It is tough to hear that some think our elementary grades could develop socially with online learning.  It is schooling that allows our students to learn the social protocol and develop friendships that are practice for the rest of their lives.
    Reviewing Web 2.0 tools was a challenge as we have done this many times throughout the course.  It was nice to find new new tools though.  Overall the course was the exposure I needed to really grasp what online teaching and learning is.  I am now able to say that I have some idea of what I could be getting into in the future of education as I will be certified to teach online in the near future!

The Future of Online Learning

    Predicting the future is hard for me as to often I do not know what is in the works right now.  Also the future of technology is always changing the minute something new comes out.  Point and case.  I bought the Iphone4 and they announced a week later the 5 was to come out sooner than later.  I feel as though I am always just one step behind.
    With these courses we have taken though I have gotten some in site into what online learning can be and where it can go.  I personally am not sure how I feel about 100% online learning.  I do like the blended format and feel that we will be seeing a lot more of these type of schools popping up in the near future.  It will be hard for students to avoid any online learning in the near future.
    With the way education conforms to the needs and changes of the "working world" technology and online collaboration will soon be a required part of education in my mind.  We have had trends where we pushed math, reading, science more so than the other topics.  Technology and collaboration with it will be at the forefront soon.  Students will need practice with this and the best way I feel is a blended online learning format.  A blended format is much like many work environments today and if we educate our students to be successful in the "real world" is there a better way than this blended learning exposure?

Web 2.0 for Formative Assessments

There are many tools that a teacher can use to administer formative assessments.  It is not surprising to me that after looking around the web a person can find them just about anywhere.  There is a lot of technology in my own classroom that I even like to use for it.  Our school has activ board and the remotes that allow for student response.  Activ Inspire has a quick quiz poll that allows for a teacher to set up a question allowing for a number, text, or letter answer.  Once the teacher has posed the question and allowed time for student response the program records the student response. Teachers can see a class bar graph showing answers.  What I do as  formative assessment is basically a pretest, mid unit test, and review.  The questions are posed and the students submit answers.  I monitor the answers form the class alone.  As a class we discuss what was the right answer and why the others are wrong.  We share our responses and thoughts as a class.  Once we are done with the entire quiz I am able to print out the individual answers, pre graded by color of each individual student.  I am able to see which students need greater instruction or if there is a common problem that needs to be retaught to the class as a whole.  Formative assessment is great for the teacher to do a check on their teaching as well as their students understandings.

4 Roles of the Online Coach

This week we were to look at the roles of the online coach and see what we need to improve on as a future online coach.  I found that there is a lot I am comfortable with as we have developed a big bag of tools and tricks in this program this far.  I chose to rather than make a simple box for this, go with a new website easel.ly.com.  It is actually a very easy tool to use and make things look professionally done.  I must give credit to Nate for sharing the site in our group meeting this week.  Below is the graphic I created and my thoughts on the 4 roles of the online coach.  

(I apologize for the image spreading outside of the text area.  I want to make sure the text in image is readable.)