NETS-T GAME Plan

While looking over the National Educational Technology Standards (NETS•T)
and Performance Indicators for Teachers I was rather pleased with how well I am implementing each of the standards. However, I am not perfect and I could still use a little more work on two of the standards in particular. I will use the GAME plan as described by Dr. Katherine Cennamo in order to become more proficient at each of the standards.

Goals
Actions
Monitor
Evaluate

3. Model Digital-Age Work and Learning: Teachers exhibit knowledge, skills, and work processes representative of an innovative professional in a global and digital society. Teachers:

• c. communicate relevant information and ideas effectively to students, parents, and peers using a variety of digital-age media and formats
  

4. Promote and Model Digital Citizenship and Responsibility: Teachers understand local and global societal issues and responsibilities in an evolving digital culture and exhibit legal and ethical
behavior in their professional practices. Teachers:

• d. develop and model cultural understanding and global awareness by engaging with colleagues and students of other cultures using
  digital-age communication and collaboration tools

My Actions:

3c. I want to start communicating with my students parents and families using more technology. Many of my parents have e-mail access and I thought one way to communicate with them more would be through e-mail. Many times it is easier to find time to answer an e-mail rather than finding times when both the parents and the teacher are available to speak on the phone. Another idea I have is to send my newsletters via e-mail. I currently print and copy the newsletters and pass them out for the students to take home. I will still print some copies for those families who do not have access to e-mail, but for those that do have access to e-mail I will send it to them electronically.

4d. My idea is to join a site such as epals in order to find a 4th grade class in another country. Once we get connected with another class I thought it would be interesting to learn about each others cultures and traditions. In addition, when we do the weather unit in science it would be helpful to compare and contrast the weather conditions in both regions.

Monitior:

3c. I will monitor my use of technology while communicating with the parents and families by making sure that I send one newsletter electronically a month.

4d. I will monitor my collaboration with a class from another country by setting a timeline. I will research this summer to find a collaborating class for next year. I want to find a class that will be willing to communicate. Once I find a class, I will work with the teacher to set up a timeline stating when we will collaborate with each other and how often. I want to make sure that everyone is on the same page so we know what is expected.

Evaluate

3c. At the end of the year I will evaluate myself by creating a survey to give to the parents. In the survey I will ask for their feedback about receiving the class newsletters electronically. I also want to see what they thought about communicating via e-mail rather than telephone. If the majority of the responses are positive then I will continue using technology in this manner.

4d. I will be evaluating the collaboration and my students while we are communicating with the other class. At the end of the year I will poll my students to find out how they enjoyed have epals across the country. If at the end of the year the students and myself feel having the epals was effective then I will continue the following year with my next class.

References:

Cennamo, K., Ross, J. & Ertmer, P. (2009). Technology Integration for Meaningful Classroom Use: A Standards-Based Approach. (Laureate Education, Inc., Custom ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.

ISTE (International Society for Technology in Education) (2008). The ISTE National Educational Technology Standards (NETS-T) and Performance Indicators for Teachers. retrieved from http://www.iste.org/Content/NavigationMenu/NETS/ForTeachers/2008Standards/NETS_T_Standards_Final.pdf

Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2009). Integrating Technology Across the Content Areas. Baltimore: Author.