Welcome to my e-portfolio for ETEC 565. I am excited to embark on this learning journey and know that while it can be challenging to always fit in reflection time that it is very important so adjustments can be made along the way to get to the imagined destination. Here is a snapshot of me and the path I see myself journeying along on over the next three months.
About me…
My name is Michelle Relova and I am a teacher in SD#23 Central Okanagan. I have a wonderful 5 year old son and loving husband. As a family we spend much of our free time outdoors, from ski slopes to beaches and everything in between. I cannot express how grateful I am to share similar passions with my husband and now our son.
I began my teaching career in 2006 with my first full time teaching contract at a BC off shore school in China. My husband and I were newly married and wanted the opportunity to travel and see the world before we settled down to start a family. Teaching in China was a fabulous place to start off our careers. After a year overseas we returned home to Kelowna to begin our family. We were lucky to be hired upon our return with school district 23, and I was placed back into the Middle School where I had completed my practicum. Here I taught mostly math, and became the curricular lead teacher at the school. Last year I was seconded to our districts Instructional Leadership Team. Our goal is to create sustainable collaborative systems that promote powerful and purposeful learning for all students. Through a cycle of co-planning, co-teaching and co-learning we have had the opportunity to work side-by-side with teachers on instruction and assessment. It has been a very busy, intense and rewarding year of learning.
My path…
Goals: When I signed up to complete my masters in Educational Technology I wanted to explore how educational technology could be used to support best practices in assessment as well as promote student reflection and collaboration. This course was of interest for me, as the goals which I have identified can be supported by the modules which we will be exploring over the next couple of months.
As I begin to learn more about this course and educational technology in general, I would like to explore how LMS’ (in particular MOODLE) can be used to support my goals. Over the years my assessment beliefs have been influenced by the work of Anne Davies, Dylan Wiliam and Grant Wiggins. As a teacher I believe that assessment serves two very important purposes, it informs me as a teacher for my instruction and gives students specific and descriptive feedback as to where they are and where they need to go. In Making Classroom Assessment Work, Black and Wiliam state, “Involving students in assessment and increasing the amount of descriptive feedback, while decreasing evaluative feedback, increases student learning significantly” (P. 3). This quote has resonated with me in my practice and through my own action research I believe it to be true. My question is how can I use a LMS to support me with this? Will one of the LMS we investigate allow me to set up a variety of assessments beyond multiple choice questions which will give me a true picture as to where my students are and where they need to go? In addition, will the reporting systems within the LMS be flexible enough for me to give this specific and descriptive feedback back to students?
In addition I want to explore the social/collaborative capabilities that MOODLE can offer. I foresee this aspect of the LMS helping me achieve my goal for promoting student reflection and student collaboration in a manner which is more engaging for my students. The questions I have currently are:
- What types of discussion forums are available?
- What are the synchronous and asynchronous capabilities?
- How intuitive are they to use?
When I reflect back to the theoretical framework suggested by Bates and Poole the criteria and questions from the SECTIONS model will help me determine whether or not this LMS will allow me to achieve my goals around reflection and collaboration.
I am excited for this journey, and can only anticipate a steep learning curve along a possibly bumpy path! I know that the collaborative learning that is happening and will continue to happen in this course will assist me in successfully meeting this goal. The answers will come from the experience in this class, the resources we are exposed to and the work that we are engaging in.
Bates, A.W. & Poole, G. (2003). Chapter 4: a Framework for Selecting and Using Technology. In Effective Teaching with Technology in Higher Education: Foundations for Success. (pp. 77-105). San Francisco: Jossey Bass Publishers.
Davies, A. (2000). Making classroom assessment work. Courtenay, BC: Connections Publishing inc.