Final ImagineIT Report
The design process has been exciting! It has been refreshing trying new methods of sharing learning using technology. I have been learning to be more flexible with the design process and allow for flow and change. Many of my original ideas for my ImagineIT projects have evolved or been revised during the school year to fit the needs of my students. For example, I originally planned to have them create podcasts of weather forecasts, but found that they were struggling with the changes of states of water in the water cycle. So, students are currently planning and preparing their materials for their stop motion videos on the water cycle.
I checked in with my focus group using a quick reflection after our recent Make-a-Movie project. One scholar said, “using Make-a-Movie was new for me. Instead of going to the store to buy a poster board for our project, we went straight to our Chromebooks. We were able to put our creativity on the screen little by little to make a movie. We were able to control how we wanted the screen to appear which made me feel like a real director!” Another scholar stated that “we got to put everything we learned in one movie and we also got to show it to others, so that they will know what we are learning about.” Creating multimodal projects and being able to share their knowledge with others is a very powerful learning experience.
In my teaching, I have been much more cognizant of the TPACK (Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge) model and have been becoming more adept at understanding which technology can best support my teaching methods and the learning of a particular subject. As I continue to implement and share my ImagineIT projects through the years, I can only imagine how they will evolve and grow!