Final Reflection

Summer Tech Camp was A LOT! A lot of work, a lot of frustration, and mainly, a lot of learning! The independent assignments were a great way to learn at my own pace around the other demands of life and gave me time to process each activity. It usually took me awhile to decide on an authentic topic that I could use with my class, and find the information or images to utilize. Then it usually took awhile to figure out how to use the web site tools so they would work. Often, embedding each finished product into my blog was time-consuming and frustrating. It was fulfilling once an activity was completed, and a lot of fun to see what other campers were doing to share ideas and comment on their blogs.

I definitely learned a lot of new possibilities to use in my teaching. At this point I will probably utilize some of them as fun, new ways to present lessons. Perhaps as I become more confident using them and am more familiar with the technology use guidelines I will have students try some of them as a way to "show what you know." I've already used a couple of these, such as Tagxedo with my class last year. I am thrilled to have a YouTube channel since I like to share YouTube videos daily with my class on a wide range of topics. I would like to do more screen casting, and use Popplets again. I need more practice using Google Docs; I still much prefer Word and attaching it to emails for peers. The Google Forms and PollEverywhere would also be great to use again. I was disappointed in some of the web programs that din't work well or were expensive to use, such as Museum Box and TimeToast. They would have been great if they were accessible. Most importantly, I gained enough new skills to create a classroom webpage. This is something that I've wanted to do for years, and I am so pleased to finally have one! It was easier than I thought, and I hope that I can stay on top of it throughout the coming school year. Thank you Tech Camp!