8.1
Reflection: iNACOL Standards for Quality Online Teaching
What have I learned? How have I changed?
What do I still need to work on?
How will I keep learning?
Standard A – The
online teacher knows the primary concepts and structures of effective online
instruction and is able to create learning experiences to enable student
success.
As I near the completion of my Leading Edge Certification,
I feel confident that I am able to apply the current best practices and
strategies in online teaching. I
pride myself in keeping up with the latest and best practices and finding ways
to incorporate these practices in my current curriculum. I am always searching for a variety of
ways to create a rich and meaningful experience for students by introducing
them various sites and apps that can enhance what they are learning.
I work diligently to find ways to allow students to collaborate on
projects and assignments with each other and with global communities across the
continents.
I believe all students learn in individual ways and I continue to
use a flexible interactive experience for each student where delivery methods
are aimed at individual needs.
One aspect I plan to explore further is to expand the use of
global learning for my students.
Allowing them to access information and people from other parts of the
globe and to learn from them. I
will need to work on mastering the skills of video conferencing and wiki
projects with others outside of our own community and boundaries. I plan to incorporate more projects
that will connect us with others across the globe to enhance our learning and
understanding of the world around us.
Standard B – The
online teacher understands and is able to use a range of technologies, both
existing and emerging, that effectively support learning and engagement in the
online environment.
There is nothing more thrilling as a teacher than to come
across a new lesson, a new strategy, or a new way of teaching. With today’s access to the Internet,
this is even more exciting! As a
teacher for almost two decades, I feel I am a leader in engaging students in
what they are learning, but using technology adds another layer of engagement and
experimentation. I spend many
hours each week, searching for and mastering the use of instructional
technology in order to bring it to life in an online, face-to-face, and a
blended environment.
As technology advances, I will need to work on ways to help
others use this technology effectively from the aspect of the online
learner. I will need to work on
ways to help a student through communication that is not hands-on or
face-to-face. Working in a
strictly online setting will take added practice and skill with both the
technology component and the communication from the teacher to the
learner. Through this
certification, I have become much more familiar with tools such as screen casts
that will enable me to walk a student through the various troubleshooting
scenarios that may arise.
Standard C – The
online teacher plans, designs, and incorporates strategies to encourage active
learning, application, interaction, participation, and collaboration in the
online environment.
The Leading Edge Certification has been excellent in
helping me to improve my preparation for online courses. It has been a tremendous asset to my
current knowledge of the strategies for getting students to feel part of a
learning group and creating that sense of collaboration among that group. As I grow as a learner myself, I will
be able to transfer what I have learned through this course and the many other
courses I have taken online, to help move my planning forward.
As I continue to practice my planning and designing, I will
need to work on my questioning abilities.
How do you ask the right question to get the students to reach the
answers you were looking for? I will be spending extra time reviewing
questioning techniques presented by Bloom’s and will reflect back to my
learning as a GATE certified teacher to make sure I am always reaching for
those higher order thinking skills and able to guide students to answer their
own questions as they learn online.
In
order to be successful and productive in a face-to-face classroom, the
instructor must set clear expectations.
Students learn through regular feedback that happens in a systematic and
prompt way. Success in an online
or blended classroom also depends on clear expectations and feedback. By participating in Leading Edge
Certification, it has been made clear as I go through each module, these clear
expectations have been demonstrated.
Objectives have been defined, concepts clearly developed, and learning
outcomes carefully and strategically planned out. This model of planning and organizing a course has been
essential in my learning of what a successful course looks like.
When
working with students in a small group sitting at my back table in my
classroom, I can quickly and easily see where their learning is headed and
where and what type of intervention is needed. I will need to work on how to develop this type of
intervention and structure while developing an online course. What will I do when a student is
struggling and how will I help?
This is an area where I will need to be diligent in my research and
reading of professional articles to overcome this obstacle. This is also a question I have posed on
many of the professional blogs and learning communities I am involved with in
order to collaborate with others and receive my own feedback to help me become
a better learner.
Standard E – The
online teacher models, guides, and encourages legal, ethical, and safe behavior
related to technology use.
As I begin each school year, I have a number of lessons
geared towards elementary aged students regarding the ethical and safe use of
technology in our classroom, our school, and at home. Students are familiar with the dos and don’ts of online
behavior and how to keep their digital footprints small while still accessing
all the information they need to be successful. I have thoroughly immersed them in the downfalls of
plagiarism and have used plagiarism sites to show students how “borrowing”
someone’s work without properly giving them credit will not be tolerated. Teaching an online course will take
this to another level.
I have read through the FERPA, COPPA and CIPA guidelines and
still do not feel confident that I fully understand all that is necessary to be
successful with this standard. I
feel confident as an example of the legal, ethical, and safe behavior needed in
an online setting, but I will need to do more to pass this on to my students. I need to not only become more familiar
with the details of these guidelines, but how to instill their principles to
the students as an online leader.
Standard F – The
online teacher is cognizant of student academic needs and incorporates accommodations
into the online environment.
In a face-to-face or a blended classroom, I feel confident
that I am aware of different learning styles and the need for modification for
those individual learners.
Modifications are always on my mind as I work with Gifted and Talented
students, English Language Learners, and students with special needs. I am skilled at modifying for IEPs and
504 plans and working with student’s current CELDT levels, but how will that come
into play in an online course?
Connections will need to made with the students early on in
the course to ensure the student feels comfortable and safe asking for help
with the course guidelines or accessibility issues. Leading Edge Certification has greatly enhanced my
understanding and ability to incorporate strategies for all learners,
especially those with hearing and visual special needs. As I continue to design courses for the
online community, I will be ever conscious of the needs of all learners and do
what I can to allow them access to all the course offerings.
Standard G – The
online teacher demonstrated competencies in creating and implementing
assessments in online learning environments in ways that ensure validity and
reliability of the instruments and procedures.
In today’s world of test, tests, and more tests, I am well
versed in formative and summative assessments. I really love the use of classroom response systems as a
means of formative assessment in part, because I can see results immediately
and give feedback right away. The
immediate feedback is critical to get students on the right track and clear up
misconceptions before they become engrained in the students learning. Although I though this would be more
challenging in an online or blended classroom, I have found there are so many
ways to assess students it is just a matter of using the available technology
while still giving immediate feedback to the student. Summative assessments have been created online in my
face-to-face classroom for a number of years and Leading Edge Certification
gave me the added edge of making sure all students have access to the
information to be successful on these assessments.
I will be doing more research and talking to colleagues to
see what types of assessments can be used in an online setting. I often feel that students know the
subject matter; they just may need alternate ways to express their
learning. There is so much more to
learning and understanding a concept than just bubbling in answers on a
test. This course has made me
eager to learn new ways that students can show their understanding of the
subject matter besides taking a test.
With the shift to Common Core, my district is re-assessing their
curriculum and the assessments embedded within it. I will be working with a committee at my grade level to help
incorporate technology skills within the Common Core curriculum to assess
student knowledge and application of these skills.
Standard H
- The online teacher develops and delivers assessments, projects, and
assignments that meet standards-based learning goals and assesses learning
progress by measuring student achievement of the learning goals.
Aligning curriculum to state standards seems very mundane
as I have been at the same grade level for over 12 years and have them memorized. Every lesson and every project must
address these standards and the student objectives needed to reach them. Common Core standards will allow for a
broader umbrella of learning standards that will allow students to demonstrate
their individual proficiencies in a variety of ways.
I will continue to reflect on my Leading Edge Certification
when planning, organizing, and delivering online lessons to a variety of
learners. One thing I loved about
this course was that we had clearly defined objectives for each assignment, yet
our outcomes were all completely different. We were allowed to work within our own comfort zones to
display our knowledge of the topics and although we all learned the same
objectives, how we learned them and we showed what we learned was different for
each one of us. This is the beauty
of the online environment.
Standard I – The
online teacher demonstrates competency in using data to form assessments and
other data sources to modify content and guide student learning.
Data
driven instruction is a topic that comes up over and over in education. We have all had numerous trainings and
professional development opportunities to learn how to use data to drive our
instruction. I will continue to
use the training I have received along with the new Leading Edge Certification
training to continue to analyze the results of assessments to create new
learning opportunities for my students.
I will also continue to allow students to always learn through
self-reflection and will use this data to modify online instruction and
assessments if needed.
Knowing how to analyze results of assessments online will be
more of a challenge for me than it is in a blended or fact-to-face
setting. I will need to remain
familiar with different assessment techniques and how those can be used for
online teaching. I will need to
keep up with the latest trends and practices and work to incorporate these into
my online lessons.
As a face-to-face teacher, collaborating with colleagues and the chance to learn from each other and share ideas increases the chances for success for all that are involved. This holds true for blended and online classes as well. Reaching out to others in the field and drawing on their expertise is necessary in all aspects of teaching. I am very effective in my interaction with parents in a face-to-face setting and enjoy this as a way to all work together in the best interest of the student. In an online only setting, this will be a challenge.
The use of web pages, email, blogs, and even text messages are currently used in all of my classes, but will be even more prevalent in the online class. Working with parents in especially important so that everyone involved understands the objectives and goals of the online learning that will take place. There will always be those who don’t have access to the technology needed for this type of communication, so I will still need to make phone calls and hold meetings when necessary. The ultimate goal is the success of the student and we will all need to work together in whatever manner needed to make sure this happens.
Standard K – The
online teacher arranges media and content to help students and teachers
transform knowledge most effectively in the online environment.
You know when you have an idea about what you want to do in
your classroom or how you want to teach something, but you never quite find the
time to perfect it they way you want?
Leading Edge Certification has helped me to take what I knew, add to it,
and now be able to share it with others.
I had media and lots of content, but they weren’t organized in a structured
teaching way. I now have the
skills needed to use all of the media and content I have filed away on thumb
drives and in folders and put them to use in an online course format. This course has helped me become
confident in my abilities as an online instructor.
If I had to choose one aspect of this course to begin to work
on improving right now, it would be the use of a Learning Management System to
organize and create my online lessons.
My district does not have one defined system in use and it is
frustrating when each instructor or professional development opportunity uses a
different LMS. I am hoping to work
with our district to choose one system for all teachers to use, but until then,
I will use what I have available to me as I work on enhancing my online
curriculum.
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