Assessing Meaningful Learning

The first website I went to was http://www.inspiration.com/Curriculum-Integration/Kidspiration and I watched the video about Kidspiration. It sounds like an awesome classroom tool! My one concern, as someone who went to a school where we weren't taught keyboarding until 9th grade, is that if the students use the semantic mapping tool, it will take them forever to type anything. It boggles me that this program is meant for grades kindergarten through fifth grade, and they can type already! I was pecking with my index finger when I was still in Intermediate (which was 4th and 5th grade at my grade school). I see Kidspiration being more helpful for math, but maybe I'm just "old-school" and I want kids to draw out bubbles when they use semantic mapping after reading a story. (Oh, semantic mapping is when you write out characters and other elements of a story and draw lines connecting them. It looks like a web or a map when the student is done, and can be colored or filled in with art for a great classroom display.) After I realized the video for that website was 2 and a half hours long, I moved on to read about Formative Assessment. There wasn't a lot of information on that page because it wanted me to register. I think it was for a newsletter, and I didn't find any other interesting information to help me out. Here is the link for eschoolnews: http://www.eschoolnews.com/2010/08/25/formative-assessment-that-clicks-with-students/
The link for general rubrics was here: http://school.discoveryeducation.com/schrockguide/assess.html but when I clicked on it the page read "404 Not Found" So I went to the other link. http://www.rcampus.com/rubricshellc.cfm?mode=gallery&sms=publicrub It seemed much more promising. Here's a rubric I looked at: <a href='http://www.rcampus.com/rubricshowc.cfm?code=JB9W24&sp=yes'>Rubric: Play review</a>
I really like this tool because the rubric just has to be tweaked to fit the needs of the assignment I create.

As for this course, I have to say I learned a lot, even though I've been sort of unwilling to accept technology in my classroom. I'm not against it, but I know that I will not be working at a well-funded school in the future. Not every student can have an iPad or computers in their room. While it's good to use technology for education, it's a good idea to have a backup plan just in case the power goes out. Before this class I had never heard of Prezi, I wasn't sure what a podcast was, or that there were so many resources for teachers online. I am glad that I took this course to keep up with the students, but will it make me too annoying for the veteran teachers? Also, I was nervous about taking another online class, but since this uses the internet so much anyway, it really wasn't a big deal. And I am so glad that our instructor was able to reply so quickly (especially when I goofed up multiple times) and tell me what I did wrong. No doubt the things we learned in this course will be used during our careers.
So, this is my last blog for ETEC! Fare thee well, my readers, and I wish you luck in your future! I would like to sincerely thank you for reading. See you on the web!