Capstone Reflection 1

Capstone Reflection by Paula Trueb

KSU M.Ed. Instructional Technology, Cohort 55, Summer 2024

My Role as an Educator

My name is Paula Trueb and I have been in the teaching profession for 33 years. My

husband’s employer has moved us several times over the years, so I have had the opportunity to

see multiple perspectives of education — teaching in three states at both middle and high school

settings.

This will be my 11th year as a Haymon-Morris Wildcat in the Barrow County Schools

District, which is a semi-rural school outside of the suburbs of Atlanta, Georgia. Besides being a

member of the 7th and 8th academic teams for the last ten years, I coach the First Lego League

Robotics Team. This upcoming year I am transitioning to the CTAE Department to teach

Technology Foundations classes in 6th, 7th and 8th grade. As a charter public school, we are

required to have a School Governance Team consisting of administrators, faculty, parents and

community members. I am in my second year of a three-year term on our SGT. Faculty

representatives are recommended by their peers. I am also on the Leadership Team and Literacy

Team. As the Gifted Services Facilitator for the building, I work closely with colleagues,

administrators and registrars to ensure students are placed in the appropriate classes and are

challenged.

Professional Learning and Development of Technology at Haymon-Morris Middle School

In the beginning of the technology journey, my District created digital coaching positions

to begin a shared vison of technology using the SAMR model. I served as digital coach for five

years and worked with faculty in one-one sessions, participated in building and district PLCs to

assist with technology integration, and designed and implemented PL based on faculty input. The
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focus has since shifted, and available technology Professional Learning has not kept pace with

the need. The District Technology Integration Specialists offer limited technology professional

learning sessions as there are only three of them for 17 schools. As the district transitions to a 1:1

environment there is a renewed faculty interest in new technologies to support learning, but little

has been provided in the two years leading up to middle school implementation or in our first

year as we transition to a more robust Learning Management System, Professional Learning has

been offered but basically on the mechanics of the program and not the integration of the

technology into our lessons.

ISTE Standards – Haymon Morris Middle School

Technology integration discussions in my school do not include the language of the ISTE

standards, but there are elements of the standards that we have implemented. Digital age

learning experiences and assessments are implemented through gamification reviews in

programs such as Gimkit, Quizziz, and Kahoot! We use the web-based program Formative for

digital assessments – both formative and summative - collaborating on the design and

implementation and analyzing the data that is generated. NWEA MAP, which provides adaptive

assessments, is administered three times a year to help guide our instructional design.

Administration, Faculty and staff model digital age work and learning by using laptops

for everywhere access, ClearTouch Interactive boards, and facilitating instruction through digital

classrooms. Math teachers utilize Khan Academy’s NWEA Map recommendations program to

provide additional instruction and practice. Online simulations are modified to meet the learning

needs of students. Learning and creativity through the integration of technology is a main stay in

our advanced content classes, but it is still a struggle to convince faculty outside of my team that
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all students benefit from technology integration and especially project-based learning. We design

activities in real-world settings that integrate digital tools.

Professional Learning Experiences focused on ISTE Standards Outside of Coursework

To stay current with new technologies and develop strategies to inspire and motivate my

students through the use of technology, I have attended sessions at the Georgia Educational

Technology Conference for the last three years as well as three years before Covid. I have also

attended local and regional EdTech conferences. It was at an EdTech conference that I attended a

session with Donnie Piercey, who has been an ongoing resource. I have actively sought out

Professional Learning experiences to develop digital age learning experiences and assessments.

Curipod is an online platform that uses artificial intelligence to help teachers create and deliver

interactive lessons for K-12 students. I registered for a professional learning program to become

a Certified Curipod specialist. The ability to design lessons, assessments, create daily interactive

agenda and brain breaks is something I am really excited about and will be implementing in the

fall. I attended a session on Breakout.edu at an EdTech conference in 2015 which prompted me

to complete their webinar sessions and integrate breakouts into my lessons – in the beginning, it

was with physical kits and now I use both physical and digital. I have also completed

professional learning to design lessons for my students to create breakouts as alternate

assessments.

ISTE Standards for Educators to Support My Role in Education, Before Beginning This

Program

I began my teaching career teaching the technology portion of an integrated social studies

and technology high school class in Michigan. The National Educational Computing standards

were integral in the design of the class. NECC was rebranded as ISTE in 2010 to represent the
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shift from computer integration to technology integration. I have always offered alternate

assignments, used technology to create assessments and used data to guide progress. Teaching

advanced content classes has offered the opportunity to collaborate with students as most are

curious and adventurous and help to create an environment in which we worked and learned

together.

Change in Practice

One change in my practice has been to incorporate more ways to accommodate learner

differences using technology. This change was driven by research that helped me to understand

that my gifted students are at the opposite end of the learning spectrum and differed much more

than I realized. The capabilities of new digital tools have helped me design instruction based on

differences and has also helped them to develop their sense of agency. Another change in my

practice has been to mentor my students in safe, legal and ethical practices when using digital

tools and interacting with digital content.

Portfolio Artifacts

One of the artifacts in my portfolio I am proud of is Artifact 8, which is the engaged learning

project. Creating content that was based in real-world settings and offered my 7th grade students

the opportunity to be creative and innovative in their learning while developing critical thinking

skills and collaborative skills was challenging. The resulting products and presentations were far

above my expectations and truly reflected mastery. I am also proud of Artifact 1 that reflect

mastery of collaboration and co-learning with my students. Students have been trained to view

their teacher as the expert and guiding them through shared collaboration and co-learning with

me and their peers not only resulted in a valuable learning experience but also strengthen our

classroom community.
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Continuation of ISTE Standards to Deepen My Practice

An area of the ISTE standards that I will explore further to deepen my practice will focus

on the Designer standards – to accommodate learning differences, design authentic learning

activities, and create innovative, equitable learning environments. I am transitioning to the

CTAE department to teach the foundations of Computers to three different grade levels. I will

have 180 students in my classes during the course of a semester – the opportunity to reach this

many students is such an opportunity but also presents the need to be able to accommodate a

number of learning differences in a content area that requires critical thinking skills and logic.

Further research and networking will help me further my understanding of this standard and the

digital that are applicable to meeting each area.