EDLD 5352 Reflection

This course was one of the easier going courses we have had thus far. I think what added to my enjoyment of this class was all of the different web tools that we researched and employed. I greatly enjoyed working collaboratively with my peers in this course. Our team worked very well together, and reading the research from the members on my team was very insightful. I thought that this class would go a bit further to increase our knowledge and skills of technology in the classroom. I think the parts of this course that contributed most to new and useful knowledge and skills were the topics covered in the weekly discussions. I enjoyed learning about the flipped classroom and livebinders. Those were both tools that I had heard of from a few teachers, but had not done a great amount of research on. I felt as though the video links and articles that were linked to the discussion board were just the pieces I needed to strike my curiosity further. I will definitely employ some of the new tools that I learned in this course for my Biology classroom this year, as well as in my future years as an administrator. I had a strong prior knowledge of the majority of the activities and lessons that we completed in this course. We had been asked to study our use of technology in the classroom in many ways in many of our earlier courses. Because those courses prepared us so well, I felt as though the activities in this course could’ve gone even a step further in exploring and using technology. 

I did not attend any of the web conferences in this course. I felt as though the explanations given for each assignment through the word documents and rubrics were pretty clear and concise. With this course taking place during summer vacation, I didn't have much of a regular schedule with time set aside to attend these web conferences. My IA did a great job of keeping information updated on the announcements page as well as correspondence and further explanations via email. 

Reflections of graduate course work

Write brief Reflections and Status Report of your technology skills and knowledge gained in this course, your progress with your Campus-Supervised Internship Activities, and your progress with your Action Research Project.

In reflection of this course, I felt as though the discussion board topics and videos were the things I gained the most new knowledge from. I had a strong prior knowledge of the majority of the activities and lessons that we completed in this course. We had been asked to study our use of technology in the classroom in many ways in many of our earlier courses. Because those courses prepared us so well, I felt as though the activities in this course could’ve gone even a step further in exploring and using technology. I enjoyed the team collaboration in this course, and found my experience to be very successful.

I have almost completed all of my campus-supervised internship activities. I have 5 remaining activities to complete, and should be able to finish those within the first six weeks of school. The internship activities have been so helpful, and I feel like I have gained so much more knowledge and insight into the world of administration. I think these experiences have definitely helped me feel more confident in my skills to become an administrator. The remaining activities and my written reflections of each activity are the only things remaining in order to complete my campus-supervised internship.

My action research project is almost complete. At the end of the school year last year, the results and final data were collected in order to assess the success of the action research. Our campus implemented the use of CoreWorks software, and had each team accomplish the four critical actions assigned by the diagnostic software. In response to these critical actions, we were looking to see if there were direct effects on raising the level of state assessment improvement for our campus. In conclusion to this action research, there was an improvement in state assessment scores for our campus, and directly for the team that I examined for action research. I have not been informed if our campus will continue to employ the CoreWorks diagnostic software again this upcoming school year.

I haven't visited my blog in quite some time...

I haven't visited my blog in quite some time. Honestly, I have been so busy with everything going on, that I haven't even thought about blogging at all. That doesn't mean I haven't been working on my action research. With teaching and all of those responsibilities, a new course every 6 weeks, and all of the work that goes into each course, and incorporating internship activities, as well as, conducting action research, I have completely lost track of writing in my blog. I am sure you all understand, because you are in the same positions!

I have had to recreate my original draft plan, because after creating this plan, I accepted a teaching position at a new district. My action research is focusing on CoreWork Diagnostics being used by our Biology team. We meet often to track our progress toward completing our outlined goals as identified by the diagnostic analysis.

5326 Week 5 Reflection

I recently changed schools and now have had to make adjustments with my action research plan. I originally planned on examining literacy and its effects on all core subjects, via examining state assessment data and comparing years prior to the year we implemented a literacy program for all core subjects. However, now I am not focusing on literacy. Instead, I am using the work that my current school asked me to participate in. I am now working with the assistant principal of science, and COREWORKS data to evaluate our science teams performance. We are looking into our current practices and redefining what we should be doing better, what we are already doing well, and how we can improve our success. The COREworks program is something I have never worked with prior to this year. How it works is the team members individually answer a survey and the responses are recorded, but remain anonymous. Then the teachers met as a team to examine the COREworks initial survey response. We went through and evaluated each question as a team. Then we met again and examined our results. The results revealed areas of strength and areas of weakness. It also identified things that we should start doing, and things we should stop doing, in order to become more successful. I feel that this has been a very helpful tool for the teachers. As well, the students will reap the benefits of the teachers implementing these changes. One of our main areas of focus, after evaluation results, is to really focus on using formative assessments more often. 

Reflection (5301)

I found that the videos throughout the course were very helpful. They allowed a “tone” to be applied to the work for the week, and created more of a classroom atmosphere for the online course. I greatly enjoyed the videos in conjunction with the assignment information, and felt that they answered questions that I would have had with the assignment sheet only. The assignments themselves were very straight forward. I was able to look at the rubric and determine where the emphasis was being placed on the task, they were broken down into individual (usually four) parts, and were always graded in a timely manner.

I learned very much, and enjoyed much, from the Dana text, Leading with Passion and Knowledge. My favorite part of this text was the nine passions. I felt like those intrigued me, and lured me in to want to know the answers to the questions asked in the book. I can see how developing a passion in each of those areas can enable your inner leadership qualities, and motivate you as an administrator.

I used the Lamar library to create a folder on literacy action research programs that have been done in the past. I really looked to these for insight when trying to create my draft plan. I have archived several articles in those folders, and will have them to look into whenever I may need to pool more resources.

The assignments were intriguing, and created a wonderful outline of the expectations. I was able to look at the rubric to determine the emphasis for the task. I liked that they were broken down into parts, because that made them seem easier to complete rather than overwhelming. The activities were sometimes hard to do, though, ONLY because it is summer break and timing has not been opportune. First, I changed schools. Then I changed schools, again. I went out of the state on a summer vacation that was planned long before this course date was set. Upon returning, in the final week of class, the 4^th of July holiday has allowed for the entire school office to be closed for the week. That being said, in the future, this class may not be as compatible with students and administrators schedules during the summer.

I felt like at times the discussion board was very helpful. I enjoyed being able to discuss the tasks, concerns, and questions with other students. However, once we began blogging, I don’t understand how both were beneficial. I think the discussion board, or the blog, would’ve been great separately. When put together, it creates monotony, and makes things seem tediously like busy work. If the discussion board post, and two responses are required, then why are the blog and blog comments also required?

I enjoyed blogging! There were times that I had much to say on the blog, and other times that I did not. I enjoyed looking through the blogs of the other people in class, and seeing their work. I think I will try to incorporate blogging into my classroom at some point this year.

Concerns

There are a few challenges that I think could arise. Nothing ever goes perfect, but hopefully with enough planning things will run smoothly. 

My project require all core teachers to participate, and implement the new vocabulary program into their classes. This will take a group effort, and will only be as effective as the presentation of the material. EVERY core teacher must be using this tool in the same way, and allowing this change to enter their classrooms. I am afraid that some teachers will resist the change, some will not use the program at all, some won't use it every day, some won't implement it in an effective way, and some will do everything they are supposed to do at first, but slowly fade away. I've seen this happen with the staff at my campus, and I am fearful that it will happen with this program as well. I hate to say it, but some teachers want to do what they've always done and not change a thing.

If the teachers do not take whole part in this project, the data will not be correct. 

Students must also see this as a POSITIVE change in the school, and not as more work. I am hoping that the motivation and creativity that is instilled in all of our educators will shine through to the students and they will cooperate. 

STAAR is new and we are still figuring things out with it. I'm sure there will be changes made in response to any new information we receive about STAAR.

Draft Plan

I've created a draft of my action research plan. I'm sure that plenty of changes will be made, things will be added in, and things will be taken out. But, it's nice to have a starting place.

Action Planning Template
Goal: Determine if students will show improvement in all courses after implementing a new vocabulary plan and focusing on literacy in non-ELA courses.
Action Steps(s):	Person(s) Responsible:	Timeline: Start/End	Needed Resources	Evaluation
Initial Data gathering	Curriculum facilitators for each subject	Prior to 2012-2013 school year	Data from previous year’s STAAR & TAKS	Identify point of origin to provide for final comparison
Presentation of action research plan, guidelines, and how to implement new programs	Bethanee Sales Principal Janis Williams	First faculty meeting of the school year. During professional development prior to students returning. August 2012.	Presentation prepared for faculty	Teacher’s feedback on plan of action. Time to identify concerns, answer questions, and handout materials
Implementing vocabulary, reading, and writing activities	All teachers	First six weeks of school	Access to new literacy program available on database	This will provide the students with the new curriculum incorporations
Collect benchmark data for all courses (other than ELA)	Curriculum facilitator for each subject	December 2012	Access to this benchmark assessment data	Make any conclusions on implementation plan’s success so far. Identify students who qualify for tutorials.
Teacher interviews	All participating teachers	December 2012	Set up interview times	Feedback, questions, concerns
Twice weekly required morning tutorials for “bubble kids”.	Rotating teachers in each subject	February-May 2013	Access to literacy program, individualized student results, and additional materials relating to known weak TEKS.	Students who need extra assistance will be given the opportunity to work in smaller groups with many different teachers.
Collect STAAR data	Curriculum facilitator for each subject	May 2013	Access to STAAR data	Compare to data from last year’s state test assessments and identify margin of improvement.
Student surveys	All students	May 2013	Survey on surveymonkey.com	Feedback from students about the literacy program.
Teacher surveys	All participating teachers	May 2013	Survey on surveymonkey.com	Feedback from teachers about the literacy program.
Present conclusive data	Bethanee Sales Principal Janis Williams	May 2013	Teachers must attend final school board meeting. Conclusive Presentation prepared.	Conclude the research plan and identify success.