From+My+Heart

 From My Heart

Creating my wiki has been a fun and educational experience! I put in a lot of hard work, effort, and time every week to complete each assignment, widget, and wiki page. This class has been very rewarding because I feel that it will be very helpful when I become and elementary teacher, because I have the knowledge of so many more technological tools that will captivate my student's attention. Today, children are constantly using technology for play and education. I feel that it is crucial to use tools that will engage students to the fullest degree. Students want to play on the computer, and I can not think of a better way to use that desire then for homework assignments. I honestly can say that I have never been so interested and excited about doing homework and projects in any other college class. Even as a college student, I am more motivated and excited to do assignments using new tools on the computer rather than on paper. I have always known that I am creative, but now I am very excited to use my creativity to enhance the curriculum. Before taking this class, I did not feel very knowledgeable when working with the computer. Now, I feel that I have learned many tools such as embedding widgets, creating a website, and linking websites. Writing a unit is no easy task, and must be given extensive thought. I learned that I truly enjoy writing units and organizing daily lessons, which is great because as a teacher I will be spending much time on class preparation. Knowing how long it takes to write a unit, I think that it would be wise of me to begin writing out my lesson plans during the summer months.

I am very proud of several of my assignments and tools that I created for my wiki. I think I did an exceptional job on the word documents which included the scavenger hunt, learning document, and teaching document. I loved creating colorful word documents that look professional but fun at the same time. I also enjoyed learning how to embed sounds and internet sites into the document. Another assignment that I am very proud of is the podcast series about mountain men. I took a good deal of time to research the mountain me, write a script, and complete the podcasts on audacity. Audacity is a neat tool that will be fun to use in my classroom for many assignments! Next time I create a wiki and unit of instruction I think I will force myself to spread out the work. I have a hard time not finishing an assignment once I start. Next time, I will force myself to take breaks and step back and think about the assignment for a day or two, to figure out what could be improved. Overall, I really enjoyed creating my wiki, and I will definitely have a wiki page when I become an elementary teacher !

