Rachel's Magical Journey Through Education

My key take away from this course is how effective and useful digital technology can be if integrated properly into the classroom. There are so many different implications that it can have within the classroom and as a result can help to create more engaged and authentic learning experience. In terms of my own teaching pedagogy, through completing the emerging digital technologies this class, it has really opened my eyes in how I want to incorporate more technology in to the classroom. The realization that I have come to as a teacher in the 21^st century, it that am going to be educating students whom have been deeply submerged with digital technology and so I believe that it would be naive of me to disregard this reality and take advantage of this opportunity where I have this powerful tool that can be used to help scaffold student learning.

This course also allowed me to investigate my own questions and concerns that I had about digital technology. As I am a huge advocate for inquiry-based learning and it has become a huge part of my teaching philosophy, I wanted to further investigate how I can use digital technology in partnership with inquiry based leaning in order to provide deeper learning and understanding for my students. My research and finding both indicated that digital technology can significantly enhance student engagement in the classroom but also student achievement if implemented properly. One of my key take aways from this research is that teachers themselves need to be properly educated on how to use the specific forms of digital technology before implementing them into their classrooms for students to us. If there are unprepared then it can take away from a lesson or devalue the learning experience. Also if teachers cannot explain how to use the technology or resource then this can cause disequilibrium for the student. Another thing that that arose from my research was that inquiry based learning itself is a relatively new concept and teachers are still learning how to weave it into their own teaching philosophy and so in terms of how effective digital technology can be, it as all still a learning process in order to figure what works and what doesn’t.

In terms of my contributions to my peers learning, I helped my fellow pre-service teachers gather information about their own burning questions by completing there research surveys. I also think that I really helped my critical friend and my peer mentee’s learning and understanding in the class by providing constant feedback, support and suggestions throughout their various assignments. They also helped support my learning and foster professional relations as they provided feedback and supported me through my various projects. Everyone comes to class with a variety knowledge on different topics especially in the field of technology. Thus this class really helped me to realize that all of my peers are really great assets and have provided me with some really great support. But only have I learned lots about digital technology and practical implications throughout this course, but I have also developed some really great friendships.