Progressing with the GAME plan

As the year goes on, I find that I am incorporating the GAME plan in to many aspects of my life.  The ironic part of this is that I am not, nor have I ever been, a great planner.  Because of this, I surprised myself by becoming a teacher.  Who would have known that understanding how to plan is great start to becoming an effective person?  Because my goal is to become an effective teacher, I realize that my planning must come with action (Cennamo et al, 2009).  Unfortunately, I have been guilty of dreaming of wonderful ideas, without developing a GAME plan to help ensure that my goals would be reality.  Therefore, as a part of my original GAME plan, I aimed to incorporate more creativity with usage of new technology in order to enhance learning.  I also aimed to model some of the skills needed for students to be successful by learning about some new software to enhance the business courses. 

By analyzing my progress thus far, I realize that I am finding some information about the resources I need.  As stated earlier, I wish to incorporate video conferencing or Skype into my Careers course so that students can communicate with students from other schools.  This form of technology will help to improve their sense of character and creativity because they will be performing a role play by portraying the character of a career of their choice.  This portrayal could easily be demonstrated in front of the class, but students may be more engaged by communicating with students from other schools.  I have also never used video conferencing or Skype; therefore I met with the school media specialist to plan a time in which I can learn how to use the equipment.  Collaborating with helpful people in the school could create a level of comfort and assurance when planning to use different forms of technology (Cennamo et al., 2009). 

As I continue to take the steps to ensure my GAME plan, I am realizing that I may need to make a few modifications along the way.  Originally a goal was to incorporate programs such as Publisher and Photoshop into the curriculum so that students can create personal business logos and letterheads for their business letters.  However, I realized that students may be challenged more if they create their letterheads from scratch.  Using templates will not require many skills.  Therefore by allowing students to create images, design logos, and personalize their headings, their sense of creativity will be enforced.  Thus, reiterating the original plan to promote creativity by using different forms of technology.  When allowing students to create their own logos in the past, students took more pride in their work, and seemed to create a better end product.  With these changes enforced, students will be demonstrating the fact that creative work may inspire masterpieces if teachers give the tools necessary for them to be successful (Laureate, 2010b).

Throughout this GAME plan, I have learned so much about my style of teaching.  Like many other categories of my life, I must work hard to reach a goal.  This has nothing to do with my ability to learn.  I am quite effective and efficient if I develop a definite plan of action.  With this action, I realize that communication is vital.  During some self-assessments, I realized that collaboration is not always an opportunity that I enjoy.  However, without reaching out to some of the helpful resources in my school, I would not have realized how helpful they could be.  I also learned that setting goals is not the only part of a GAME plan (Cennamo et al., 2009).  In order for the plan to be effective, teachers should include steps towards action, and methods of monitoring and critiquing the process (Cennamo et al., 2009).  These factors have been important to understand while going through this process.

Though the progress has been a learning experience so far, there are still a few questions that could be answered.   Though I am excited about this plan, I am still trying to think of more types of technology that I could incorporate to enhance the students’ creativity while they are performing their interviews.  Does anyone know if any websites in which students can upload videos and blog?  I would love students to critique their performances.  Also, does anyone utilize the portable keyboards in the classroom?  I would like to modify another aspect of my GAME plan by modeling this form of technology in my classroom.  Any thoughts about either of the questions would be helpful.

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.

Laureate Education, Inc. (Producer). (2012). Assessing student learning with technology. [DVD]. Integrating technology across the content areas. Baltimore, MD: Author.