Final Learning Journal Prompt:

1. What three things did you learn about teaching and learning that you did not know before?

-Lesson plans; I'm sure I have heard the term before, but it never meant anything to me. I did not realize that curriculum and teachers have very specific goals for student. It is starting to make sense; all the monotonous things we had to do in high school English actually meant something, a benchmark was (hopefully) being met.
-Resources; through out the semester, I was able to gather several good resources from student 'show and tell' sites to sites included in chapter presentations, as well as web pages presented by the instructor. And not only did I learn about these site, I was introduced to Delicious, a great way to bookmark all the pages.
-Google; not just a web browser I learned. Learning about google doc, google presentations and google sites was probably the best web tool I took away from this course. My family members ask to see my work, and Ive never had a good method to show them, but now I do. I used google site as a tool to show my creative work as well as my educational portfolio. Now my family can go online and see what I've been doing.

2. In what ways has the content in this course effected your views of teaching and learning?

-It made me realize that a lot goes into the planning of teaching. It sometimes took me hours to create a lesson plan, and to think that you need 5 a week seems a but overwhelming. I've always known that I clam up when speaking in front of a group of people, but I learned that as look as you act like you know what you're doing, most of the time, the students wont have a feeding frenzy on your insecurities.
-Also, it's not as easy as I thought. It's easy for me to say I want to be a teacher, but it's another to actually do it. Learning about different methods of teaching, kids of school and ways of learning have made it easier to imagine myself in the school system.

3. What questions do you have about integrating technology into the curriculum?

-How do you know what you are "allowed" to do? If I wanted my student to use their cells phone as a polling tool during class and an administrator found out, what would happen? When kids come to school, they are told not to use their phones, computer or games because they are a distraction. If a teacher allows the use of these devices, will they be seen as enabling poor behavior?

4. What did you like most about this course? In what ways can the instructor improve this course?

-I liked the casual, open format of the course. I never felt as though I was being lecture at; it was more conversational. I liked having freedom with the assignments; a guide was given of what should be included in the lessons plans, but I was free to create it about whatever I wanted. I also liked the philosophy "know when to break the rules". So often, teacher mark down for not following instructions exactly, but sometimes, certain methods work better. As long as you can justify the rule breaking and there is a good reason, I think it's ok not to follow them.