Kimberly Hefty

EdTech 521-4201
Reflective Journal


Quotes from Readings and Class Tasks and
Activities*
Thoughts/Learning/Questions**
Week 1:
Self Portrait







Define Online Learning
















Interview Tool











Creating the self portrait was more
challenging than I expected. I decided to try
out a new phone app that allowed me to
collage several photographs together and
add captions. My ultimate goal was to portray
several aspects of my life: family, work and
fun.

This activity gave me the opportunity to apply
the readings and do some research. I
particularly enjoyed the book by Kerry Rice.
I was struck by statements about the level of
learner-autonomy necessary for successful
online learning. According to Rice, Online
environments can encourage learners to take
initiative in their own learning by seeking out
information and building connections (p.30).
The feedback I received by the other students
in the class was also profound and thoughtful.

This task was particularly meaningful because
I will be able to immediately implement this
in my work this summer. I am currently
mailing out confirmation letters for the fall
and have included this with my information
packets.
Week 2: What a fun activity. It really taught me a lot

Build a Beast




Community Building





















Interview Tool extended Reflection
Were the things you learned
about the student and family
important information for you
to consider while working with
them this year?
Do you feel this was a valuable
exercise to complete before
starting the school year? Why
or why not?


about good communication. It also gave me
the opportunity to use a new voice-recording
App that my son recommended. It worked
great!

Online communities such as blogs, wikis,
discussions or social networks benefit both
students and teachers. Teachers get the
opportunity to collaborate and share ideas and
resources with each other. Students in a
learning community get the opportunity to
interact with each other which provides them
the opportunity to develop personal and
educational relationships with their peers and
collaborate. Online communities are an
important part of learning experiences for
both teachers and students.



Last week I developed a pre-admission
interview tool to use before I meet my
students. I asked my two summer school
students, who start next week, to complete the
interview form (with no other instructions
except to complete the entire thing). I
discovered that I need to modify a few of the
questions. I need to be more specific. For
example, when I asked what was their
personal strengths and weaknesses, the
student didnt really understand what I was
getting at. I am modifying it to ask What
specific areas of math are you strong/weak at?
Such as solving equations, working with
geometric formulas, graphing etc.
I think this is a very, very valuable tool,
especially for me and what I do. The question
how do you learn best actually generated
several ideas on how I can improve my
structure immediately.
The most entertaining answers came from the
Family section. It was clear both senior high
school boys did NOT want me to
communicate with their parents. I think I
should have the parents also fill out that
section!

Week 3:
Netiquette Group Project

























Netiquette Rules



I had a great group for this project! We
actually started working immediately. We
began by creating a group Google doc. We
began by addressing issues of availability for
our synchronized meeting. Then each person
address the key questions:
Are emoticons and acronyms
appropriate for students to use with
their teacher in an academic setting?
Will you allow invented spellings, or
will you expect students to always use
correct grammar and punctuation
whenever they are communicating in
an academic environment?
Should the expectations be different
for discussion boards, email or chat?
In what ways can they differ and to
what extent?
Then we had to build a consensus. Overall I
think the group worked very well together!


The final netiquette rules were developed
collaboratively with my group. I was heavily
influenced by the readings of Kerry Rice,
Netiquette is the term used to refer to
etiquette, or rules of acceptable behavior on
the Internet. The practice should extend to
email, chat, and discussion boards and even
into the synchronous environment (Rice, p.
79).

Our group had to come to a consensus in
order to develop the rules. I was very glad
this was done as a group; alone I feel I would
not have been able to create the amount of
detail that the group was able to. Our group
held a synchronous meeting via a chat room.
We literally went through every line of the
document.
This lesson taught me that great things happen
with collaboration.
Week 4 This was, by far, my most frustrating week. I

Class Expectations PowerPoint

























Scavenger Hunt



had issue after issue with publishing my
PowerPoint presentation of my class
expectations. I literally spent hours trying to
get several different types of products to
work.
It was extremely helpful that I had such a
complete product to use (Netiquette Rules
from Week 3). Finally I saved it as a movie
and published it with YouTube.
I hit all the key aspects of the assignment but I
really wish I had been able to use one of the
Adobe products.


The scavenger hunt was fun to do. I
abbreviated my district. I viewed this as an
opportunity to incorporate a lot more of my
policies and the districts policies into an
activity that I could really use. I love some of
the sites I found, like We Must Stop Smiley
Face Emoticon Abuse! I also think my hunt
did an excellent job addressing the critical
issue of cyber bullying.

Week 5:
Reading: Conrad and Donaldson: Chapter 6











Reading: Palloff and Pratt: Chapter 1




This chapter focusses on peer partnerships and
team activities. Collaboratively working is a
critical skill that should be developed and
reinforced in the online learning environment.
This skill needs to be practiced more in an
online environment than in a class-room based
environment because visual and aural cues are
missing (p.67).
This makes sense! You cannot hear or see
your peers but feedback is important in
everything. Encourage teamwork and
feedback and everyone will benefit.

This chapter supports the assertions by
Conrad and Donaldson about the importance
of collaboration and teamwork. The authors
view the importance of these skills as the







CRAP Principles















Brainstorm a list of online technologies and
strategies that you feel would be best for your
learning style and for a learning style that is
different from yours. Your list should have at
least 4 technologies and/or strategies for each
learning style



hallmark of constructivism (p.6). It can
remove isolation foster a strong sense of
community which allows students to move
through the phases of development more
effectively.
The CRAP principles address issues of
repetition, contrast, proximity and alignment
when designing a lesson and webpage. I
particularly liked the statement, Any good
design must have a strong focal point. You
can create focal points using contrast and
visual hierarchy. This is a principle I tried to
really remember as I created my
Asynchronous Lesson.




Assistive technology (AT) tools for math are
designed to help people who struggle with
computing, organizing, aligning, and copying
math problems down on paper.


My personal style is definitely more visual.
Visual learners tend to learn best through
seeing. Pictures, diagrams, concept maps,
symbolism, videos and other visual
presentations are very helpful. Some online
technologies and strategies are:
Prezi or Glogster, for organizing
information visually.
Everything in Khan Academy!
Although it is not exclusively visual,
the visual step by step instructions,
demonstrated, really are helpful!
Visual Math Learning, a collection of
visual lessons about mathematics
concepts.
Mathpad allows teachers to create
documents with mathematical
expressions using a special keyboard.
It will automatically draw, re-size, and
align the mathematical expressions,
according to their content.



I know some students are more auditory
learners. Auditory learners tend to learn most
effectively through listening. Lectures, oral
presentations, music and background sounds
are examples of how to help auditory learners
comprehend and retain more info. Some
online technologies and strategies for them
are:
Podbean, a directory of educational
podcasts
Profcast, a tool that students can use to
record presentations, and also to
transform PowerPoint slides into
podcasts
YouTube Math and Khan Academy,
allow learners to hear and see all
information. One of the benefits of
these presentations is the ability to
pause and repeat as necessary.
Audacity, easy-to-use audio editing
software lets teachers or students
record and edit audio

I know some students are more physical
learners. Kinesthetic learners learn better by
doing. Projects, labs, note-taking and other
activities that allow participation and a hands-
on approach help the kinesthetic learners.
Some online technologies and strategies for
them are:
Google Sketchup, This allows
kinesthetic users to create, modify and
share 3D models
Interactives, provides activities,
strategies and other concepts that
enhance learning skills.
Education Place, is designed for young
(K-12) kinesthetic learners who want
to explore various subjects through
games and activities.

Cram, a flashcard exchange, is the
world's largest flashcard library.
Kinesthetic learners can improve their
retention ability by making flashcards

for this website.





Week 6
Self Evaluation


Overall I think I have done an excellent job on
this project. I completely redid the work from
the previous week and created an entire
website. I broke the PowerPoint into pieces
and embedded them into the overall product.
Content: My title and staff information is
clearly identifiable. My objectives are well
stated and aligned to both state and national
standards. In particular I like my checklist
page that clearly outlines all aspects of this
lesson in one easy to find location.
Learning Styles: My presentation is good;
however, I am having problems with my
audio. When I view the separate PowerPoint,
the audio is there but when I save it as a video
and embed it on Weebly it is gone!
I did a good job of repeating and showing
multiple examples which would help anyone
with learning disabilities.
Engagement: My site was easy to navigate
and is well linked (although I think I have to
fix a few of the links). My assignments and
discussions are well presented and clearly
meet my originally stated objectives. My
collaborative jigsaw activity is very
appropriate for this age group and would
certainly develop higher level thinking.
Adaptive/Assistive Technologies: My
multiple PowerPoint presentations are good
but I have to fix the audio!!! Once fixed, this
will work well for anyone with visual or
auditory difficulties. My repeated use of
examples will help anyone with learning
disabilities.

Assessment: I have both formative and
summative assessments. I also varied the
types of assessments. I included matching,
multiple choice and short answer. My
assessments align well with my objectives. I
have also included rubrics for the jigsaw
activity and the collaborative work.
Overall: I utilized the CRAP principles
throughout the overall project and the multiple
PowerPoint presentations. I have a lot of
repetition throughout. I contrasted the videos
and was always mindful of the transitions.
Both my proximity on the overall site and the
presentations were carefully developed. The
alignment was designed to be consistent
throughout every page.

The primary issue is I must fix the audio and I
need to add a page or add to the teachers
only page the specific areas where
disabilities are addressed.





* Include relevant/interesting quotes with page numbers, postings from discussions, links to
resources that you want to try, or specific tasks or activities that you have engaged in.
**As you go through the readings and activities, make notes in each column when you find
relevant issues, topics, develop new understandings, identify solutions to problems, etc.