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| Bangkok, Thailand - 2008 |
Hello All, my name is Tara Miller. As I write my introduction, I sit in a warm cafe, on a cold, rainy day in Portland, Oregon. I have been teaching technology education as an elective class in middle school for the past 6 years. I am currently on an academic leave from my school this year to work on the MET program. I have been in a very unique position in my teaching, where I have had the opportunity to fully designed my own program and curriculum, based on my personal skills. My background and undergrad is in filmmaking and animation. I have worked hard over the years to create a multifaceted program for my students to gain a number of technology based skills, with the primary goal of opening more possibilities for creativity and success in their "core" classes. My other goal has been to give students experiences with a variety of multimedia tools that could also be a spark for personal interest or future career pathways.
I realized a couple of years ago that as a full-time teacher, I never had the time to really delve in to the upcoming tech trends and tools that my students need to be exposed to. Unfortunately, our school does not provide students with any other technology training opportunities or give them many chances to use the tech skills they do gain. My hope is that after working through this program, I can bring a new set of skills for my teaching and for my students to utilize. I also want to create more technology training opportunities for the teachers in my district.
I am interested in EDTECH 513 because I use multimedia in my teaching, with no real training or research to support or enhance my methods. I firmly believe that the use of multimedia in my teaching allows all of my student to be more successful in grasping and working with the content. My classes contain the spectrum of skill levels, special needs and language acquisition. I believe that moving beyond the traditional modes of teaching via lecture, textbooks and worksheets, allow more students to truly learn the material, based on their own personal learning styles. The use of multimedia, when well designed, both engage and motivate learning. As a bonus, it can help to create a more fun and creative learning environment for both teacher and students!
Tara,
ReplyDeleteWhat do (or did) you teach your middle school students? I am curious, because I am currently designing a K-8 blended program that will integrate with our 9-12 program currently in place. They will both be blended or hybrid programs. K-8 will meet T and Th on campus for group activities and work online at home on self-pace academic skills development. 9-12 will do the same except they will meet on M W F and work independently T Th.
Did your middle school classes consist of 5th and 6th graders? If so, what did you teach them and how?
Hi Larry,
ReplyDeleteI teach 6-8th grade in a f2f computer lab classroom. I have created a different program for each grade level. 6th is a focus on keyboarding, basic research and software skills. 7th moves in to more research, some keyboarding, graphic design, product creation, video editing, and digital audio production. 8th grade is a focus on filmmaking skills, including: cinematography, editing, soundtrack design, storyboarding and production.
Your programs sound really interesting. I look forward to learning more about your programs! I am interested in designing a blended program when I return to work next year (unless my position is cut!!)