While reflecting on my GAME plan, I am pleased to say that I have made quite a bit of progress. I have already attended a couple of conferences in the area, and have sat in on some webinars. All of these experiences helped me gather new ideas and strategies that I am excited to implement into my class next year. The evaluation of this goal will happen once I try these new strategies with my students. However, I realize this may lead to new goals, but I am excited to try them out.
What I realized going through my GAME plan is that I already do these steps. Now I am categorizing them into the four defined areas. As teachers, we are expected to set goals for our students and our lessons. It should also be a natural idea to make goals for ourselves. One of my goals is to receive my masters' degree. I am in the action and monitoring stage of this goal right now. I may not have specifically laid out my goal in the GAME plan format, but I am following the steps all the same. When we set goals for our students and lessons, we determine how the lesson will be executed and the assessment method we will use. This, again, follows the GAME plan format.
It would be interesting to have students create their own GAME plans at the beginning of the school year. After going through the overview of the course, students could choose an area they would like to work on specifically for their goal. This could be something simple like improving their technology skills or maybe finding ways to transfer the content we learn into other classrooms. They could come up with something more challenging, if they choose. Regardless, setting the timeframe within our 20 week course would provide students with ample time to work towards their goal, while getting through the steps of the GAME plan efficiently.They would not have to set it up as a GAME plan, exactly, but if they set a goal and determine action steps, they will be able to naturally monitor and evaluate their plan given time in class to do so.
I am very excited to enhance the technology use in my classroom. This seems strange since I teach a computer class. But I have expanded the list of technology applications that I could incorporate. For example, instead of just using PowerPoint or Google Presentation, students could also use Prezi, Haiki Deck, SlideShare, and many other applications. I really think students will appreciate having more options than I currently give, and will be able to better apply what they learn into other classes and future projects.
While I already use problem-based learning and digital storytelling in my class, I am looking forward to expanding on the blogging realm for my students. I implemented blogs into one of my classes this past semester, and had great success. With a few tweaks and updates, I think students will enjoy using blogs and will learn the value of collaboration with feedback from peers. I will continue to look at various ways PBL and digital storytelling can be expanded to provide a quality experience for my students, and am looking forward to working with my PLC to encourage more of these types of strategies in other classrooms.
