Laura Piper

Within the Master of Arts in Education Degree program, I was able to choose a concentration area of my own interest. Upon entering the MAED program I was teaching first grade where literacy learning is of utmost importance and vital to the growth in all subject areas. During my undergraduate work I completed teaching minors in math and geography. With these two areas of concentration I felt slightly unprepared teaching literacy at such a crucial age. I had spent much of my first year teaching educating myself and seeking advice from colleagues about instructional strategies to support literacy learning. I had developed a passion for teaching literacy at the primary level and yet had much to learn to become an expert at it. It was obvious to me that my concentration of choice should be literacy. It was valuable in my position as a first grade teacher and of definite interest to me. Knowing first hand the importance technology plays in education today, I recognized the opportunity with electives to become educated in the realm of integrating technology into the classroom. I am grateful for taking advantage of this opportunity. I feel that with teaching minors in math and geography, adding a literacy concentration and technology knowledge has made me into a well rounded integrative teacher.

The first semester I was enrolled in the MAED program I chose to register for TE849 Methods and Materials for Teaching Children's and Adolescent Literature. It was within this course that I came to the understanding that reading was so much more than phonics and fluency. Throughout teaching first grade I had began focusing far too intently on phonics and fluency, and this course brought me to the realization that I was forgetting the goal of reading: comprehension. My read aloud time within my classroom changed drastically while I was enrolled in this course. My goal for read alouds morphed into entrancing students, finding literature that captivated their attention and reading literature which could scaffold discussions. I read Heckedy Peg, by Audrey Wood, to my students after renting it from my local library for this course. They instantly knew the witch was a “bad” character. They spoke to the literature saying “Your mom said not to let anyone in!” and “No! No! Don’t do that!” I thought to myself while reading, “How interesting, they are responding similarly to how people respond when watching movies unfold”. It wasn’t until the story was completed and students started discussing Heckedy Peg without my probing that I realized this story entranced them. They found it worth speaking about because it had spoken to them. They were able to relate it to their lives at home, and rules their parents have told to keep them safe. This story taught them an important lesson, without that ever being my intent. I also learned an important lesson from a combination of this experience and the course in general. Literature should speak to my students. If it does not, then I have not done my job in showing them how to converse with it.

I completed TE842 Elementary Reading Assessment and Instruction during fall semester 2013. At my previous school of employment the focus for assessing literacy and school wide growth was based solely on the use of DIBELS (Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills), an assessment program used commonly throughout elementary grades. Additionally we were required to use running records for our own knowledge of student reading levels. Apart from these two assessments I had very little knowledge of assessments. This course greatly broadened my options when it came to assessing struggling readers during a long-term substitute teaching position I had at the time I was enrolled in this course. I was able to use the Informal Phonics Inventory which monitors specific skill acquisition allowing me to specify areas in need of support. Furthermore I became familiar with the Fountas and Pinnell Benchmark Assessment System so widely used in districts around my area. Most importantly, this course pushed me past collecting data and to identifying the instruction needed. As mentioned above, the goal of reading is comprehension. In this course we studied the skills that lead to successful comprehension: fluency, phonological awareness, vocabulary, and strategic knowledge. After leaving this course I am able to pinpoint the skill students are struggling with and plan instruction to allow them to become successful comprehensive readers.

The value of the course TE831 Teaching School Subject Matter with Technology is immeasurable in my development as a technologically confident teacher. I left this course with a large “toolkit” of online resources and tools as well as ideas gained through first hand experiences of how to successfully use technical tools and resources in my classroom. The SAMR (Substitution Augmentation Modification Redefinition) Model, developed by Dr. Ruben Puentedura, is one of many important ideas that have stuck with me from this course. This model shows a progression that adopters of educational technology often follow as they progress through teaching and learning with technology. As a result of learning the SAMR Model I now try to push my use of technology in the classroom from enhancing to transforming lessons and instruction. A large project in this course was to create a Repurposed Lesson Plan. The concept of this was to transform a previous lesson plan using technology. This concept of using technology to transform education will be applied throughout my career and relationship with technology integration. Another impressionable aspect of this course was the time spent researching classroom websites and teacher blogs. It set up a vision and goal for my own online representation of myself as a teacher and of my classroom. A select few of the resources I am eager to use as a result of this course are: vodcasts, Class Dojo, Jing, Edmodo, KidBlog, and TodaysMeet. The wealth of resources available online are never ending, because of this course I have found a craving to continue discovering more.