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Intro to Digital Citizenship - Week 4 Reflection and Resources

Early in this course, we were asked to respond on the difference between citizenship and digital citizenship. This activity gave me the opportunity to really reflect on the topic and my own perspective. Through this I realized that to be a good citizen is to be a good digital citizen. Technology is a part of everything we do either directly or indirectly. I bring this all up because I made a similar realization this week on the topic of cyberbullying. Cyberbullying is bullying, in today’s world, there should not be a difference, and it is up to the adults in education to prioritize student’s understanding of the magnitude and ramifications associated with all bullying.  In Monica Lewinsky’s TedTalk, The Price of Shame, she mentions her mom’s reaction to the loss of a young boy who experienced cyberbullying and took his own life. I thought about how in the time before social media existed, that boy may still have been tormented and bullied for his actions, but the reach of that coul...
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Intro to Digital Citizenship - Week 3 Reflection & Resources

Copyrighted material is an important matter with serious associated ramifications; however, it is critical that persons working in education consider the value-added in sharing intellectual property through communities and networks of professionals. Education is a quick-changing, adaptive economy that thrives through relationships, sharing, and knowledge. When those three things come together effectively, we have seen monumental shifts in education. The effective use of copyrighted materials in the teaching and learning process is critical to continued transformation and improvement in education.  Education is all about community. We know that teachers do their best when they are in a supportive community. Whether that be a physical, digital, or professional community; we know that community makes a huge impact on the success of teachers and students. One could argue that education has grown and transformed so much since it first began, though, through the use of copyrighted materi...
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Intro to Digital Citizenship - Week 2 Reflection and Resources

Can learning happen where there are no schools?” a quote by Nicholas Negroponte, 2002. COVID-19 brought on many obstacles, but this quote encompasses one of the most challenging of them all. During the spring and fall of 2020, schools across the nation and the globe had to figure out how to continue learning when schools were no longer a place that students could be. As a huge proponent and advocate for educational technology, it made me feel good, during this pandemic, to be able to offer training, support, and resources to my colleagues to help them engage and motivate their students using technology. However, as we review STAAR data from 2021, one thing is very clear: COVID-19 only impended learning for the students struggling the most.  It is easy to try to say that technology made things possible because in many ways it did. We were able to accomplish and overcome things during the pandemic that I never could have dreamed would be possible. But, the fact that data shows that o...
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Intro to Digital Citizenship - Week 1 Reflection and Resources

Terry Heck defines digital citizenship as “the self-monitored habits that sustain and improve the digital communities you enjoy or depend on” (2018). Mike Ribble defines digital citizenship as “the continuously developing norms of appropriate, responsible, and empowered technology use” (2017). And, for this course, lecture defines digital citizenship as “the norms of appropriate, responsible behavior with regard to technology use” (Meeuwse, 2021). In reflecting on all of these definitions, I have determined my own definition of digital citizenship is as follows: Digital citizenship is responsible, equitable, and appropriate interaction with the digital world and its people.  Digital citizenship is a broad and, in my opinion, undervalued in my district. To open up the conversation and help my colleagues see the importance and value would be difficult, but it is necessity and a conversation I hope to lead in my organization very soon.  If I were to explain what digital citizensh...
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Final Week EDLD 5318 Reflection

 INTRODUCTION I currently serve at the Blended Learning Specialist at Uvalde CISD. In this role, I provide support for the blended learning intiative at my district through professional development, coaching, job-embedded support, and program management. The course I have designed is called Blended Learning 101 and it will serve as an introduction for teachers new to the district on the Uvalde CISD Blended Learning model. Instructional Design Theories  I believe that every instructional design theory could lend itself to the development of online learning environments given the right context, audience, and purpose. For Blended Learning 101, I used the constructivist theory to drive the design of my online learning environment. Blended learning is complex and involves many moving parts, so I felt that this set up was ideal in helping the learners/teachers connect the moving parts in the ways most relevant to them. For this reason, I included project-based applications for stu...
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EDLD 5318 - Week 4 Update

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Two courses in my district that could be redesigned into online courses are The 4Cs in the Virtual Classroom, and Schoology = Success: Setting Up Schoology to Set Your Students Up for Success. The 4Cs in the Virtual Classroom course is one that many teachers seek out, but it is hard to reach everyone that wants the training with our current set up of offering the course once a month throughout the school year. I think this course would lend itself perfectly to the online environment, especially since we utilize Schoology district-wide now and the instructor(s) can utilize the same tools and strategies that our teachers have access to in their virtual classrooms.  Schoology = Success: Setting Up Schoology to Set Your Students Up for Success is another course that I have offered virtually through Google Meet, but I think would and could be much more effective if it were an online course. Through this course, I could model for teachers how things can be designed in Schoology with the ...
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Online Course Design EDLD 5318 - Week 3 Reflection

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I have decided to "chunk" my course content into modules, based on the levels of understanding the learners need to build upon to reach mastery. For example, the foundation of blended learning truly is data-driven instruction, but in order for a teacher to understand our DDI cycle, they have to first understand our learning framework so they understand how to build the DDI cycle into their lesson planning. So, the teacher would need blended learning basics, then the learning framework, then DDI, and THEN, finally, they should have the capacity and knowledge to understand true blended/personalized learning as we have envisioned it for our district.  Each module will begin the same way, following our learning framework, with a thought-provoking discussion tied to a short video or quote to "Captivate" the learners, then it will move into "Discover" where the student gets the opportunity to learn more about the topic asynchronously through a series of videos a...
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