Cindy Goodwill
Summer 2017
EDTECH 592
Artifact Rationale Statements
STANDARD 1 - CONTENT KNOWLEDGE
Candidates demonstrate the knowledge necessary to create, use, assess, and manage theoretical and practical applications of educational technologies and processes.
1.1 Creating: Candidates demonstrate the ability to create instructional materials and learning environments using a variety of systems approaches.
EDTECH 502: Jigsaw Activity
EDTECH 523: Project Design and Development
In EDTECH 502 I learned how to create web pages using HTML and CSS in Dreamweaver. This experience enabled me to make web pages to use in my class. The Jigsaw Activity I created utilizes internet linked websites to teach information about unusual math tools like Greek letters and playing cards. A teacher can use this website as a stand alone activity in any math class to help round out the curriculum. This artifact demonstrates my proficiency in using HTML and CSS to create instructional material for my math class.
Creating educational material for classes takes a lot of planning and forethought. In EDTECH 523 we had the opportunity to choose a project that we could use in our current class. The online math class I teach requires my students to create a budget, track expenses, calculate monthly payments on a house and car and make a savings plan in Excel. Many of my students have never used Excel before, and while the course includes links to Excel tutorials, the tutorials are not specific to the course or the assignment. For this project, I created a collection of videos on YouTube that I could embed in my course to help the students with their Excel projects. The planning document demonstrates all the planning that goes into a project like this including determining tools to use, developing goals and outcomes, creating a timeline for completion of the project, and making plans to include online teaching best practices such as community building, collaboration, multimedia components, and evaluation. This artifact demonstrates my ability to create instructional material using a variety of tools and skills.
1.2 Using: Candidates demonstrate the ability to select and use technological resources and processes to support student learning and to enhance their pedagogy.
EDTECH 512: Online Course
EDTECH 522: Media Rich Tutorial
The online course I created for EDTECH 512 is titled Professor Goodwill’s Good Study Techniques for Good Grades and a Good Experience at Any Good School. The purpose of this course is to help college students improve their study skills. The course I created demonstrates how I used a variety of technologies and techniques in creating this course. The course contains five modules in which I use videos, case studies, learning reflections, surveys, discussion, self-assessment, and a personalized learning project. The variety of techniques helps the students connect with the material in different ways which help to increase the student's retention of the material.
The Media Rich Tutorial created in EDTECH 522 demonstrates how I used Camtasia and YouTube to create a video for my online math class. It includes a screencast where I show the students how the portfolio projects for the class are to be organized and turned in, which helped students who weren’t familiar with the online format feel more comfortable and confident with the technology, which in turn allowed them to be more successful in the course. By creating a video, I demonstrated how I could select and use technology that will help students be successful by creating a scaffolding that helps them succeed in my class.
1.3 Assessing/Evaluating: Candidates demonstrate the ability to assess and evaluate the effective integration of appropriate technologies and instructional materials.
EDTECH 522: Comparing Courses Online Using QM Rubric
EDTECH 504: Jigsaw Group Article Review
In EDTECH 522 I was asked to evaluate two online courses using the Quality Matters Rubric, a trusted online instructional quality assessment rubric. As I am currently an online teacher, I evaluated my course, and given the popularity of MOOCs, I decided for my second course to evaluate an EdX beginning biology course. In each course I evaluated the learning objectives, assessment, instructional material, learner engagement, technology, student support, and accessibility. This artifact demonstrates my ability to determine objectively the quality and effectiveness of online courses, to compare courses, and to determine the strengths and weaknesses of an online course. All of this helps me to create better quality online courses.
Connectivism is a hypothesis of learning that some people argue should be a theory. Its main premise is that learning resides outside of us and that making connections with external ideas is how we learn. As part of a group of students, in EDTECH 504, I reviewed an article titled “Three Problems with the Connectivist Concept of Learning” by M. Clará and E. Barberát (2014). This artifact demonstrates my ability to evaluate educational learning ideas and theories. I learned from this article that connectivism cannot fully explain how learning takes place.
1.4 Managing: Candidates demonstrate the ability to effectively manage people, processes, physical infrastructures, and financial resources to achieve predetermined goals.
EDTECH 505: Response to RFP
EDTECH 503: Instructional Design Project Part 3 - Planning
In the Response to RFP assignment, I created a proposal in response to a Request for Proposals (RFP) from, a fictitious company, Far West Laboratories. Far West required an evaluation of its Determining Instructional Purposes (DIP) program. The DIP program had been created to teach administrators and graduate students skills in developing school programs. The Response to RFP explains the evaluation method that I would use if the fictitious company I created was hired to evaluate the DIP program. It also details how people and resources will be used in the evaluation process. This demonstrates my ability to effectively organize and use resources such as people, skills, funds, and time to meet a goal.
In my EDTECH 503 class, I had the exciting opportunity to participate in a service learning project where I worked with another math teacher to create a unit for a science class. The unit we created introduces students to STEM careers. This artifact shows the planning phase of the course. In the planning phase contains the rationale for the methods used in the unit, the learning objectives, the instructor's guide, the learning content which contains the learning and assessment materials, and the technology tools. I came to learn that it takes a great deal of time and careful planning to create a course. It takes careful planning to effectively use the technology that is available. The science teacher was pleased with the finished product and said she was planning on using this unit in the coming year.
1.5 Ethics: Candidates demonstrate the contemporary professional ethics of the field as defined and developed by the Association for Educational Communications and Technology.
EDTECH 502: Copyright Scavenger Hunt
EDTECH 501: Digital Divide Presentation
Students and instructors are often unaware how to use copyrighted or creative commons material for school projects, and they don’t know how fair use works. I created a copyright scavenger hunt to teach about copyright, creative commons, fair use, and how to use copyrighted material for school projects. While copyright can be a dry topic, this website makes it more hands-on by using an internet scavenger hunt. I made this webpage available to the instructors that I supervise so they can learn about copyright and fair use. This artifact demonstrates my ability to follow the AECT Code of Professional Ethics commitment to the individual and the community, in that I am committed to protect the rights of those around me and make the individual aware of how they can act ethically.
The AECT code of professional ethics requires that we “promote current and sound professional practices in the use of technology in education” (AECT Code of Professional Ethics, 2001, Section 1, #7). The purpose of the Digital Divide presentation is to provide education on what would be considered ethical practices in the use of educational technology. In it, I teach about the digital divide and digital inequality and ways that a school can deal with these inconsistencies in the availability of technology.
STANDARD 2 - CONTENT PEDAGOGY
Candidates develop as reflective practitioners able to demonstrate effective implementation of educational technologies and processes based on contemporary content and pedagogy.
2.1 Creating: Candidates apply content pedagogy to create appropriate applications of processes and technologies to improve learning and performance outcomes.
EDTECH 502: Interactive Concept Map
EDTECH 541: Content Area Projects
In EDTECH 502 I created an interactive concept map to teach the topic of piecewise functions. A piecewise function is a single function that uses different formulas depending on the value of the input. The interactive concept map gives the student the chance to click on parts of the function and then be taken to a website that explains each type of function that is represented on the graph. This website gives the students a great hands-on introduction to piecewise functions. This artifact demonstrates how I can use technology to create an interactive approach to learning math.
In EDTECH 541 I created technology-based cross-curricular units in language arts and math, science and math, and social studies and math. One of the activities on the science-math page contained a simulation of uniform circular motion. This could be used to teach sine and cosine graphs. The language arts-math page contained a digital picture book that could be used to teach the concept of conditional probability. It is very helpful to teach conditional probability using visual aids. One of the social studies-math pages used google maps to teach best-fit lines. These types of cross-curricular units help students understand how math is used outside of the classroom. This demonstrates how I use technology to create quality cross-curricular lessons using technology integration.
2.2 Using: Candidates implement appropriate educational technologies and processes based on appropriate content pedagogy.
EDTECH 542: PBL Website
EDTECH 523: YouTube Video Project
The project-based learning unit that I created with my partner in EDTECH 542 included the use of a variety of technologies. I will highlight a few here that demonstrate how I effectively use technology based on the pedagogical need. One important aspect of the course is the development of community so that the students have a place to share what they have learned and get feedback from their peers. In this course we chose, to use Edmodo for the students to connect with each other and the teacher through various learning activities. We also used Google Docs to create a scaffold to help assist the students near the beginning of the course as they get used to the format of the course. The Google Doc documents were created so the students could print them or use them online. As the project proceeded, the structure was slowly taken away to give the students a chance to learn more independently and increase their self-directed learning. Lastly, we used MyFitnessPal to give the students a way to track their calories and thereby learn about the calorie content of food. Having to track calories manually is prohibitively difficult, but using MyFitnessPal makes this easier, and the experience the students gain in the process is invaluable.
To support my students in my online math class, I created a series of YouTube videos to assist them in completing the portfolio assignments for the class. I also created video playlists on topics that students commonly struggle with like solving equations and unit conversion. Lastly, I created videos that demonstrated how to solve commonly missed problems. All of these videos were created using best-practices for creating quality instructional videos and are contained in a YouTube channel that the students can access online anytime they need to. The videos were embedded in the course, but some students choose to access them through the YouTube channel. I could tell the videos were a success when my students informed me that they had shared the videos with peers who were in another section of the class. The YouTube videos are an example of modern pedagogy used for teaching online learners.
2.3 Assessing/Evaluating: Candidates demonstrate an inquiry process that assesses the adequacy of learning and evaluates the instruction and implementation of educational technologies and processes grounded in reflective practice.
EDTECH 542: PBL Unit Evaluation
EDTECH 523: Project Evaluation Plan
The Project-Based Learning unit I created in EDTECH 542 focused on the driving question “How much fast food is too much?”. The unit includes a formative and summative assessment. The evaluations included in the unit are all project based assessments where the students demonstrate proficiency through what they do or create. The formative assessments include pretests, quizzes, project rubrics, guide sheets, peer reviews, and progress checks. The summative assessment includes a self-assessment and the final project rubric. This demonstrates the use of best practices in assessing student work and achievement.
In EDTECH 523 I created a YouTube page which contains videos that will support my online math class. As part of the project, I created an evaluation plan that included a formative and a summative evaluation of the project. The formative evaluation consisted of an online survey completed by my students to assess the effectiveness of the videos I had created and how often they were viewed. For the summative evaluation, I created a rubric that combines ideas from the Quality Matters rubric and the iNACOL National Standards for Online Courses. I included relevant material from each of these standards in the evaluation plan of the project. This artifact demonstrates my knowledge and application of recognized standards of online course evaluation.
2.4 Managing: Candidates manage appropriate technological processes and resources to provide supportive learning communities, create flexible and diverse learning environments, and develop and demonstrate appropriate content pedagogy.
EDTECH 503: Instructional Design Project Part 2 - Analysis
EDTECH 501: RSS in Education
In EDTECH 503 Instructional Design for Educators, I developed a unit for a high school science class that introduced STEM careers to high school students. The result we envisioned was that the high school’s students could learn about STEM careers that piqued their interest and that, perhaps in the future, they could pursue a STEM career. We used the ADDIE model in our instructional design. In the analysis phase of the ADDIE model, I looked at the purpose of the project, the needs of the students, the context of instruction, and the content and scope of the project. This was done through interviewing the science class teacher, surveying the students, and doing research on the school and the community. The needs analysis directed what educational material and teaching methods would best be used for the unit we were creating. As this unit was being created for high school students, we wanted to give them as much flexibility and choice in the process as possible. This artifact demonstrates my ability to manage learning communities and create flexible and appropriate learning material.
A big part of educational technology is staying up to date with the latest teaching technology. In EDTECH 501 I learned how to use an RSS Feed, and I began following numerous educational blogs and professional communities so that I could continue to learn about the most current information in regards to teaching, pedagogy, and technology. I have made reading the posts in various blogs an important part of my day.
2.5 Ethics: Candidates design and select media, technology, and processes that emphasize the diversity of our society as a multicultural community.
EDTECH 512: Course Design Part 1 - Front-End Analysis
EDTECH 542: PBL Course Student Learning Guide
In EDTECH 512 the online course I created included a Front-end Analysis. As part of the Front-end Analysis, I looked at the problem being addressed, the context of the course, learners, course goals, course outcomes, and the learning objectives. This gave me the opportunity to determine the needs of the students and create objectives to meet those needs. I determined that the students who would take this online course would come from a variety of backgrounds and would need to be given learning activities that the students could adapt to their own needs. As part of the course, the students are given a self-assessment, they share their own experiences and how they can improve their study techniques, and at the end of the course, they create their own personalized study plan. This helps students reflect on how they can improve and adapt what they learn to their own lives. This demonstrates how I structure my teaching to meet the needs of students with varying backgrounds.
In EDTECH 542 my partner and I created a project-based learning unit about fast food, ratios, and the science of healthy eating. The guiding question for the project was “how many calories is too many.” The students were allowed to choose what direction they wanted to take this project and personalize the learning according to their own needs and interests. In the Student Learning Guide, the teacher is provided with directions on how to differentiate learning for English language learners, how to adapt the lesson for students who are on the wrong side of the digital divide, students who have special needs, and for classes with mixed levels of learners. In this way, the teacher of this course can adapt to the needs of the students and give them the best educational experience possible. This artifact shows how I can adapt my lessons online and in the classroom to meet the needs of all of my students.