Reflection

I feel that I have been incorporating 21st Century skills into my classroom without actually realizing it. However, I feel that it is important to make a conscious effort to integrate it on a daily basis. Teaching these skills will not only push me as a teacher, but it will also allow me to serve my students in ways that will prepare them for their future. Our world is an ever changing place, and attempting to use the same methods that I used as a student will not meet the needs of my students. As an educator, it is my duty to prepare my students for the future in the best way I can. 

As for professional development, I feel that this particular class covered so much in such a short amount of time. I do not feel that I was able to spend nearly the amount of time I have been able to in other classes in order to reflect on what was presented and learned. I really appreciated the opportunity to work collaboratively with my coworkers though, I think that alone makes online professional development valuable and feasible. I am a people person and learning in a group setting is something I truly enjoy and find effective. I think that a professional development course that offers teachers opportunities to find new tools to use and apply in their classroom while reflecting upon how it was used would be appropriate.

Generation differences

My students have no concept of what it is like to grow up without the amount of technology in their life. They have nearly all grown up with computers. From the day they were born their life can be tracked through Facebook, blogs, or similar. Facebook is something that did not become popular until I was in college. I remember growing up and having to use dial up to access the internet and even then it was not very often because it took so long. Another experience that many of my students might have no concept of is being able to freely play outside with kids in the neighborhood. Living in a small mountain town I would have to say that perhaps more kids have experienced that here than students living in either city or suburbs would. My own nephews in Denver are not allowed to play out front unsupervised. I understand the need for safety, but it is something that I really enjoyed doing as a child, but our culture has changed so much that there is a fear of allowing children to play unattended.

Likewise, each generation changes from the last. I do not have a concept of what life without a television is like. So much of my free time is spent watching tv shows and movies. Although technology is great and can be quite entertaining, I feel that my generation has had a more difficult time finding ways to entertain themselves without the use of media. Another experience I feel that I don't fully comprehend is communicating at the push of a button or click of the mouse. Communication now is so instant. If I can't get ahold of someone within an hour, I may begin to get frustrated. Whereas back a couple hundred years people did not have this need for "immediate interaction" A letter would be sent as communication and people had to wait until the letter was received, responded to, and once again mailed. Times change and it is important to realize how. There are so many positives that have come out of the rise in technology, but at what point do we forget about how things used to be? There were many positives regarding the way life "used" to be.