Course Reflection ED 5366

The knowledge that I feel I gained from this collaborative group assignment will assist me in working with other groups in the future. I have worked with several groups on assignments throughout my master’s classes however; I feel that this project had the best outcomes for everyone in the group. In the past, I felt that I needed to keep the ball rolling to make sure the assignment was completed. I would take on additional pieces of the assignment, more than some other members, to ensure completion of the assignment. With this assignment, I relaxed and pick the element that I wanted to focus on. I also stated that I would do more if needed. The other group members took the elements that they wanted to focus on, and my stress level was lessened for this assignment. I was able to focus on the tasks at hand for myself and let other members complete their roles without me stressing over them. I offered my services to anyone that needed me to step in and assist them with their design element. I also found that I was not the only one that had additional knowledge within this group. In other collaborative groups, I have felt that I needed to support the entire group with the use of technology. Within this group, I had an individual that had as much, probably more, experience working with technology. I found myself relying on her to help facilitate our group. I asked her many questions about different pieces of the process that she had a firm grasp on. There were also many opportunities for me to assist her as well. It was a great collaboration between her and I. I had not had that type of experience in the master’s course work thus far in the program. It was a very refreshing experience from this group project. I will use the information that I gained from this group project to engage others in the collaborative groups that I work with, to discover new information that they have acquired, and use this information to increase my knowledge base. I will use websites in my classroom to assist me as I teach my students. I will be attempting to “flip” my fourth grade classroom this year. I have researched this concept for a number of years, and attended workshops on how to implement it into the classroom. Most of the research is based on high school classrooms. I want my students to have the same experiences no matter the grade level. I will use different websites for my students to access information as we explore Science and Social Studies through technology. I have discussed the use of websites with my peers at my campus. I have shared my ideas for the use of websites as a teaching tool, as well as how I plan on changing the way information is given and received in my classroom this year. I will also be sharing different technology tools that I use in my classroom at faculty meetings this school year to assist other educators in embracing teaching in a digital world.