Noelle Fleszar

The MAET Program Leads to Educational Change

 

       When I began this program I wasn’t sure what to expect. A new teaching opportunity had sparked my love of technology and I was thirsty for more knowledge on how to incorporate it. So, I began my journey through the Master of Arts in Educational Technology (MAET) program. This program has equipped me far more than I imagined. It challenged me to desire educational change that leads to better learners. I am no longer satisfied with the status quo for education, but rather desire to create a learning environment that strives to instill 21st century skills into students such as: collaboration and teamwork, creativity, critical thinking, and problem solving. Technology has the power to change the face of education and I am excited to be a part of that change. This program has impacted my thinking about education in so many ways, but specifically has reconstructed the way that I view assessments, technology integration, and online learning.

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       Working through this program has reminded me about the power of assessments. Since beginning my teaching career in 2013, assessments and standardized testing became more of a meaningless data point rather than being used to inform learning for corrective instruction. Through this program, I was reminded of the importance of formative assessments and how to use them to impact student learning. Through my courses in the MAET program, assignments were often iterative. This was a new take on assessments for me, yet it had a powerful impact. More learning occurs from receiving feedback and creating revisions then simply receiving a final grade. Meyer, Rose, and Gordon (2014), say that “when students get timely feedback on how they are doing, they are more engaged with improving their learning and more motivated to take action to improve their learning” (p. 75). When students are given an opportunity to apply feedback given and create another iteration, more learning occurs which should be the main outcome of instruction. Wiggins and McTighe (2005), describe how “understanding with the goal of performance requires an iterative curriculum that focuses on overarching questions and explicit tasks, with varied approaches to teaching as dictated by the needs of learners to master such questions and tasks” (p. 252). Teachers need to not only allow multiple iterations for deeper learning, but they need to use the assessments to inform instruction and learning. Teachers “need to be involved in reviewing and reflecting on this data and in taking action to help students close the learning gap” (Nicol and Milligan, 2006, p. 10).  Assessments are not meaningless data points, but rather value information used to guide and form future instruction.

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       Not only did I learn about the power of assessments, but I learned about different ways to assess students. Assessments do not always have to be basic tests and arguably do not have to be tests at all. Students can show their learning just as well if not better through projects, creations, presentations etc. Tests have their place, but it is more difficult to assess students’ ability to transfer knowledge to a new activity through the use of a multiple-choice or short answer tests. This program has changed the emphasis I place on test grades and encouraged me to incorporate different types of assessment into my classroom instruction.  It has also pushed me to examine how I assess students transfer of knowledge. Shephard (1997) says, "Good teaching constantly asks about old understandings in new ways, calls for new applications, and draws new connections" ( p. 2). Before, I was satisfied with the multiple choice tests provided by the curriculum. However, after my work in this program, I am challenged to find or design assessments that require students to apply what they have learned to show their depth of knowledge about the given content (Shephard, 2000, p. 102). One way I work to create more application based assessments is by way of integrating technology.

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       To many people, technology integration used to mean using technology to complete the tasks that you previously did via paper and pencil. This program disbanded the belief that turning the same basic paper pencil projects into online assignments was considered integrating technology. The concept is about transforming education, not digitizing the work we did with paper and pencil. It is about utilizing technology as a tool to do things we otherwise could not do in the classroom. Integrating technology in the classroom should elicit a change in curriculum and assignments that lead to higher thinking, student ownership, and increased collaboration.  

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       Working with one-to-one Chromebooks for the past three years has shown me the power of technology integration and how it can transform how we teach. The MAET program equipped me with the knowledge of tech tools, resources, and online learning communities. The skills and knowledge I gained within the course were immediately transferred into my classroom as I saw the transformative nature of utilizing these technologies. Integrating technology into my classroom led to increased student engagement, longer exposure to relevant class content, powerful differentiation, high-order thinking skills, creative thinking skills, and student ownership over their work. By integrating technology, I was able to give students more exposure to the content in a variety of ways and differentiate in ways that I only dreamed about as an educator. By integrating technology, it allowed me to individualize instruction and truly differentiate for a wide variety of needs and learners. Leaving this program, I feel more equipped to transform my classroom into a technology integrated learning space that fosters deep thinking, creativity, and differentiation. Creating an online learning community is one way that I have worked to transform my classroom.

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       Utilizing Online Learning Communities (OLCs) has been an educational passion of mine. By taking my masters program exclusively online and having one-to-one Chromebooks in my classroom for the past 3 years, I have seen first hand the effectiveness of online learning communities. Throughout that time, I have also researched the positive effects of online learning and implemented the Learning Management System (LMS) “Schoology” into my classroom, with very positive results. LMS’s like Schoology allow teachers to differentiate in a way that was unthinkable in the past or would have required multiple teachers aides to perform. With online learning, instruction is at the students’ finger-tips. This allows students to work through instruction at their own pace, provides a challenge for the advanced students and creates time for the needed intervention for struggling students. OLCs also allow teachers to provide quick and prompt feedback on tests and assignments. The feedback can be more personal when utilizing technology tools that allow teachers to record their voice or create a feedback video. Furthermore, OLCs lead to higher student engagement and involvement (Agosto, 2013, p.100).  Online learning allows for instruction to be given in several different formats and incorporate tools to enhance student learning which in turn leads to better engagement. Throughout my courses in the MAET program I have seen time and time again the positive effects OLCs can have on learning and classroom instruction. I look forward to continuing my implementation of online learning and will work to develop my skills as an online learning facilitator.

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The Courses that Lead to a Lasting Impact

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       The MAET program is littered with courses that challenge your thinking and push you to become a better educator. The courses that impacted me the most were Electronic Assessments for Teaching and Learning (CEP 813), Technology and Leadership (CEP 815), and Learning Technology through Design (CEP 817).  

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       Electronic Assessments for Teaching and Learning challenged the way I viewed assessments. In this course, I was tasked to design a rubric that could be used to assess quality assessments. As I researched and created this rubric, I realized that many of the assessments that I was currently using in my classroom did not live up to the expectations of the rubric I was assigned to design for the course . This thought was eye-opening. I began to reevaluate and closely examine my assessments so that I may redesign them to create a more effective assessment. In addition, I worked to create new assessments that tested students on their ability to transfer knowledge and that were iterative in nature. I learned that assessments were more about the journey of learning than the receiving of a grade. A grade is a meaningless data point if a student is not given an opportunity to learn from what they did and work to improve it for a deeper understanding. This course reminded me of the importance of providing students feedback and how that leads to better learning. This course had an immediate effect on my classroom instruction and will continue to affect the way I give and design assessments in the future.

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       Another course that had a great impact on me as an educator was Technology and Leadership. My future goal is to one day become a technology coordinator of a school district. Before this program and specifically this course, I felt ill-equipped to do so. However, the Technology and Leadership course gave me situational experiences and opportunities to think like a technology administrator. This course had such an impact on me that I shared one of my leadership ideas with my school principal. Being a part of a one-to-one Chromebook piloting program in my school, I have already begun to slip into a leadership role amongst my peers. This course has better equipped me to serve as a leader in technology integration and I am eager to share all that I have learned in this program with other educators.

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       One of my favorite and most impactful courses was Learning Technology through Design. This course opened a world of educational creativeness in me that has infiltrated my classroom and third grade team as a whole. In this course, we were charged to utilize the Design Thinking Process to come up with creative solutions to educational issues. It was during this course that I brainstormed and began developing a cross-curricular community-based learning year-long project for my third grade class. My third grade team and I began developing this project with the use of Design Thinking to transform the way we teach Social Studies and Science to better engage our students with the content and lead to more impactful learning. This coursed pushed me to think outside of the box with regards to transforming education. I am excited to work through the implications of this course to develop more engaging and powerful curriculum for my students.

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       Another meaningful impact of this course was the design of the grading system. This course was completely iterative in nature and all students began the course with a 4.0. If anyone was beginning to fall behind the curve, the professors would provide them feedback so they could work to redeem their grade. This way of grading was completely new to me, but had a positive result on the learning process. Because this course was a design course and worked to utilized Design thinking, it required much creativity. Design thinking is a continuous process that leads through the steps of brainstorming, creating, prototyping, and testing. Sometimes the testing phase led to a failure and required the designer to go back to the drawing board. The grading system of this class blended perfectly with the design requirements. Failure was not looked at as a poor grade, but rather as an opportunity to learn and improve. The iterative nature of the course provided a freedom to create, try, fail, and recreate if necessary. This grading system design lead me to reevaluate my project designs. It has caused me to think about how I can incorporate Design Thinking into the classroom and encourage students to not be afraid of failure, but rather learn from it.

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       The MAET program has made a lasting impression on me as a teacher. It has permeated into my classroom and caused me to reevaluate my teaching processes. I have become a better educator because of this program and will continue to learn and improve due to the content that challenged me to rethink education. My goal is to use what I have learned in these courses to transform my classroom and impact my school body as a whole. This program marks the beginning of learning, innovation, and transformation for myself as an educator. I am eager to apply what I have learned and will continue to strive to create a learning environment that elicits change and transformation.

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References:

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Agosto, D., Copeland, A., & Zach, L. (2013). Testing the Benefits of Blended Education: Using Social Technology to Foster Collaboration and Knowledge Sharing in Face-To-Face LIS Courses. Journal of Education for Library and Information Science, 54(2), 94-107. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org.proxy1.cl.msu.edu/stable/43686938

 

Meyer, A. Rose, D.H., & Gordon, D. (2014). Universal design for learning: Theory and practice. Wakefield, MA: CAST.

 

Nicol, D. & Milligan, C. (2006), Rethinking technology-supported assessment in terms of the seven principles of good feedback practice. In C. Bryan and K. Clegg (Eds), Innovative Assessment in Higher Education, Taylor and Francis Group Ltd, London. (pp. 1-14). Retrieved from http://www.reap.ac.uk/reap/public/Papers/Nicol_Milligan_150905.pdf

 

Shepard, L. A. (1997). Measuring achievement: What does it mean to test for robust understanding? Princeton, NJ: Policy Information Center, Educational Testing Service.

 

Shepard, L. (2000). The role of assessment in a learning culture. Educational Researcher, 29(7), 4-14. Retrieved from https://d2l.msu.edu/content/US15/CEP/813/US15-CEP-813-734-97FDJS-EL-14-204/Shepard2000_TheRoleofAssessmentinaLearningCulture.pdf

 

Wiggins, G.P. & McTighe, J. (2005). Understanding by design. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. Retrieved from https://web-a-ebscohost-com-proxy1-cl-msu-edu-proxy2-cl-msu-edu.proxy1.cl.msu.edu/ehost/ebookviewer/ebook/ZTAwMHhuYV9fMTMzOTY0X19BTg2?sid=5f84293f-04bb-4344-8356-4fc150dd823b@sessionmgr4010&vid=0&format=EB&rid=1

 

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