It has been an interesting fall with the start of the school year in remote learning. While the COVID has disrupted every aspect of everyone's lives, I am glad that I had the opportunity to take so many technology classes that I could now use in this new learning format. As with all of the previous technology classes that I have taken, I really learned alot in the collaborative technology tools class that I took this fall. You can read about some of the new ways I plan to integrate technology into my lessons under the EEND676 tab.
Reflections on Technology This Summer
During this summer of 2020, I had the opportunity to take two awesome courses on technology through the University of St. Francis: EEND679 Using Technology in Student Assessment, and EEND713 Engaging E-Learning. While it was alot to handle taking 6 hours, I really enjoyed the resources that I created and experienced throughout the learning process. I have included my reflections for each class under their respective tabs along with some of the artifacts that I am most proud of. Any comments are welcome. Thanks for reading my blog!
Genius Hour Reflection
I found the Genius Hour project overall pretty challenging. I enjoyed the final results of my efforts, but I will say this took more time than I expected, in trying to balance everything on my plate. Honestly, I don't know how some people accomplished all that they did in the time that we had. I am really impressed with all of the projects that people completed. I feel like the continued feedback from my classmates, and the opportunity to look at other people's projects provided me with motivation to keep going, but also comfort through my struggles.
Perhaps the biggest challenge for me was the time component of getting the project completed. I love cooking, and am glad I chose that for my passion project; however, I feel like it took a lot of time to get the recipes done and revised. It also took a great deal of time looking up and tracking all of the nutrition information, taking pictures, and writing down individual ingredients. These are the tasks I DID NOT enjoy completing! In fact, this is probably why I have given up on going on diets where you track food, because tracking of all of the nutrition information and food measurements is such a pain!
The aspect that I enjoyed the most with this project was the creativity portion. Being a creative person, it was fun to discover new ways to add flavor to vegetables, and cook new foods. Ideally, I would love to be able to get to the point where I can cook meals "on the fly" quickly. I don't really like looking up recipes because they take alot of time, and during the week I really want something fast. I feel like I got a good start with this through the project, and at least have a place to continue.
What I did learn throughout this project is that foods may "seem" healthy based on their ingredients, but in certain combinations or cooking styles they can become unhealthy. Many foods are touted for their health benefits, like olive oil and whole grain foods, but they also contain many calories and/or carbs, so if you are a person who is watching either of those it is difficult. I was proud of myself for finding healthier options, and in creating at least a week's worth of meals that I could fix when I get back to school. I do think I will continue modifying some additional recipes as I go, now that I know what ways I can make them healthier.
What will I take back to my classroom? I will probably take the idea of student choice and self-paced learning back to my classroom. While I don't have the ability to implement the full concept of Genius Hour in my classroom, I can probably give students more choice when we do have project-based learning. If we continue to use remote or digital learning, I can definitely design more self-paced activities for my classes. Seeing students only 25 minutes per week, twice a week (that assumes we will ever go back to something similar to this), I will have to leave the full Genius Hour experience to the classroom teachers.
I found the Genius Hour project overall pretty challenging. I enjoyed the final result of my efforts, but I will say this took more time than I expected, in trying to balance everything else on my plate. Honestly, I don't know how some people actually accomplished all that they did in the time we had. I am really impressed with all of the projects that people completed. I feel like the continued feedback from my classmates, and the opportunity to look at others' projects provided me with motivation to keep going, but also comfort while I was struggling with some aspects of my project.
Sharing
So at the end of this project, I have been able to complete a week's worth of recipes, with some ideas for some additional ones that might work in the future. Overall I would say I have been able to re-create healthier versions of my stay-at-home recipes, without a ton to clean up. The true test will be re-creating these once school is back into full swing. During this process, as I have progressed through the recipes, I have discovered easier ways of substituting ingredients and also making everything fit into 1 or 2 pans. I have learned alot from having to research nutrition information on each food. Most of these recipes are vegetarian, and contain some similar ingredients, but meat can be added very easily. Having similar ingredients made shopping a bit easier, and also provided me with flexibility for leftovers. I have included some of these suggestions in my recipe collection, let's call it.
I hope you have a chance to try at least one of the recipes I have collected. My family has been pretty pleased with the healthy, revised versions. How can I tell? They have eaten all of them with no complaints. If you do have a chance to try any of them, please leave me a comment or feedback; did you like it?, what do I need to change?, etc. I would love the feedback.
I collected everything into a Healthy, Tasty, Less-Mess Recipes document that I have shared in this link. I hope you enjoy.
| Two of My Favorite Recipes: "Farro & Apple Salad" and "Almost Baked Penne Pasta" |
We Are Learners
So this passion project has been interesting exploring new ways to create quick, healthy meals without a ton of mess. I am proud of myself for what I have been able to create in terms of healthier options and now have at least three full meal options that I can use. I am hoping by the end of this week I will have four possibly five meals, giving me a full week of easy, healthy meals that won't require too much cleanup.
What have I noticed about my learning? I love cooking, eating, dining out and watching food shows, so this was an exciting project for me to start. I also love trying out new recipes. What I DON'T like is the cleanup part. I also hate feeling guilty when I eat a really good meal and then it stays with me for at least the next few days (middle age is NOT kind to those of us who like to eat). For the most part I was able to create some tasty meals that had healthy ingredients and knew pretty much what I was looking for. What was frustrating for me was researching all of the nutrition information and tracking it for all of the ingredients in my recipes. I discovered that there is a TON of information out there on ingredients, and sometimes it is misleading. And unless you are a nutritionist or watching specific dietary needs, most people are not going to know the exact nutrition information for their fruits and vegetables. To me the tracking was the most frustrating, and this is why I have not been able to follow food tracking very well. I discovered that it takes a LOT of time and you have to be very careful about hidden ingredients in foods that you THINK you are eating that are healthy (added caramel color in balsamic vinegar for example).
In this process I have been most efficient when I have been able to organize my information. I have found Google Docs and Google Sheets VERY helpful in being able to organize my nutrition information for foods, and write out recipes. I can pull these up whenever I need and it stores automatically. Thank you Google! I also found some helpful websites for fruit and veggie nutrition information and a nutrition calculator:
Even though I AM a visual learner, I have found that I don't really need to take pictures of the recipes to see what I want to create; however, I did realize that it might be helpful for other people to see pictures of the foods if they are going to use my recipes. So it was a bit of an adjustment for me remembering to take pictures as I went along. I usually don't need pictures of foods to help me decide on a recipe if I have a specific food in mind. I mostly just look at the nutrition information. So this was something that I had to deliberately think about.
Overall the biggest challenge in this process has been TIME. Even though it is summer, there are so many obligations and projects at home that have needed my attention that if I didn't deliberately set aside time to plan and cook these recipes I probably would not be on my way to finishing this project (like many of the other open-ended projects I still have around the house). I do think I will be able to finish a whole week of recipes by the end of my journey though (YAY!) Below is a copy of my learning journey throughout this project. Thanks for the inspiration everyone!
Expect the Mutiny
OK, so I will admit that this week I regressed a little in that I didn't spend as much time on my recipes as I had planned. I started with my Hello Fresh meals but did not get to finish my revised meals. I did not finish my nutrition information for the farro apple salad, partly because I did not get a chance to revise the recipe. I got as far as finishing the meal (literally), and got caught up with other things this weekend so did not have time to spend re-creating as much of the recipe as I could. I did manage to take pictures of the ingredients and the nutrition information, which is more than I had done the previous week with the veggie pasta meal. So, this week I will be getting myself back on track by starting with a visit to the grocery store to make sure I pick up all of the ingredients to make the new, revised farro apple salad meal, as well as my third healthy pasta meal.
Cooked Veggie Pasta Bake:
So what worked this week? Taking pictures, which I had forgotten to do with my other meal. I did manage to make a healthy penne pasta meal with mozzarella and veggies, AND take pictures of it (you will see my picture posted at the end of this post). I DID also manage to take pictures of the ingredients for the FIRST farro apple salad version, which I did not like (you can see those in my last post).
What failed? The recipes! AAH! So I need to revise the ingredients in the farro apple salad. I did not like the combination of olive oil and mustard that I used for the dressing. While the picture looked pretty, the taste was not what I wanted. I also think I need to cook the farro in vegetable stock instead of water, to give it a better taste. So this week my goal is to revise the farro apple salad recipe to reflect the better ingredients (then maybe the taste will match the picture).
Farro apple salad ingredients:
Mustard and olive oil dressing
Chopped apples
Cooked farro
The third recipe I also need to revise is the penne pasta bake. I explored this recipe after being inspired by an upcoming Hello Fresh pasta meal, so I tried to recreate it in a quick, healthy way. You will see the picture below and it looks yummy, but again, not so tasty as I had hoped. Instead of sauce I used chopped tomatoes, peppers and garlic salt to try to save time, which is one of my goals; however, not being in a full sauce left the pasta pretty dry. In order to keep this recipe I will need to figure out a way to add homemade, quick sauce to keep it moist and still be healthy.
Why do I want to keep doing this? Because I know that if I can develop some simple, healthy recipes that don't take much time and don't have much mess then I know it will be completely worth it when those busy school nights start again and I don't feel like cooking ANYTHING! Hoping these two recipes will come out this week, which will give me three good weeknight recipes!
Veggie Pasta Bake Before:
Elevator Pitch
So here is my elevator pitch on my WHY? and WHAT IS WORKING SO FAR? This week I am working to tweak some of the ingredients in some of my recipes. I also keep forgetting to add pictures of my recipes, so I will try to do a better job of that here.
Here is the Veggie Farro Salad that I created this week. I am still working out some of the flavors, so I will have the updated recipe posted soon (I hope). I bought another pasta so am going to try a healthy penne pasta with roasted tomatoes (if I am able). Feedback is always welcome if anyone tries any of these recipes! Thanks!
Farro and Apple Salad with Power Greens
*Still tweaking some of the flavors...
Routines
So, I have decided to work on my healthy-ingredient, tasty, no-mess meals as my passion project. In doing this, so far my routines have been more centered around the evening when I am exploring dinner recipes. I have found some time during the day to research the recipes I am thinking of creating, which is usually on Thursdays when I am updating my Hello Fresh selections. As for finding a set time every day, this has been difficult. My goal with this project is to develop mostly dinner recipes to make the weeknight dinners easier, so naturally this makes sense for me to cook these in the evening. As for developing the recipes and ingredient lists which include calories and nutrition information, I spent a few hours on the weekend with this process, which seemed to be when I could dedicate the most of my time to researching, writing, and entering in the information. So I am going to focus on dedicating more time during these days, Thursday through Sunday.
I am starting to build a routine for my process of putting together these recipes: 1) cook the Hello Fresh meal with the suggested ingredients, 2) re-create the meal with healthier options, 3) research the nutrition information for the replacement meal, 4) enter in the nutrition information into my spreadsheet (I found a good resource on-line for calculating nutrition per serving), and 5) add the meal to my Passion project recipes Google document. So far I was able to complete this whole process with my first meal, "Tasty Veggie Spaghetti." I am hoping that each week I can try at least one new recipe, so that I have a collection of about a week's worth of meals that I could use by the end of the project. From there, who knows where this will take me?
Overall I am finding most of this routine working. It took quite a bit of time to research how to calculate the nutrition information by serving, and keep track of the nutrition labels. Originally I forgot to track the nutrition labels when I was cooking with the healthier ingredients, so I had to go back and look up the labels (I would NOT recommend this!) Now that I know to track the nutrition information as I am cooking, I am hoping this will be quicker with my next meal. Writing down the recipe took a little time, as I really had to think through each step, but was sort of fun because I could add my own ideas to it! The challenge for me this week has been finding time to actually blog about my experience, so hopefully that will become easier with this routine in place. I am including a copy of this week's meal, "Tasty Veggie Spaghetti," so if you try it, please let me know what you think! I also am including a few websites that I found helpful in researching the nutrition information. Enjoy!
Genius Hour Decision--Drumroll Please.....
OK, so for my Genius Hour/Passion Project, I thought about and spent some time deciding on which of my three topics to pursue: 1) design a series of lessons and music materials to publish, 2) refinish the kids' bathroom cabinets, or 3) develop healthy, low-carb, and tasty vegetarian meals with little mess. After really thinking about it, I decided designing a series of music materials to publish was too ambitious for me at this time if I really wanted to try to enjoy some of my summer. Then I looked into refinishing the bathroom cabinets with the Nuvo cabinet paint. While I am still going to do this project, I decided after researching more that it is not going to take as much time as I thought if I buy the kit. Most of the reviews posted on Home Depot online (which is where I bought the kit), looked like it did not take much time to complete this project. Most people sounded like they completed their projects in about a day or so. There is minimal sanding involved, and the description states that you do not need to remove the cabinet hardware, so it seems like this should be pretty straightforward to accomplish. We will see how long it actually takes me, but if this is the case I don't think it will take enough time for a passion project. I did go ahead and purchase the refinishing kit, so am excited to use it as soon as it gets here!
That leaves me with my #3, develop healthy, low-carb, tasty meals in one pot or with little mess. Since I had already experimented with modifying some meals that I had previously made, I decided to do more research to see if this was possible. There were a ton of websites that have low-carb, keto, healthy, or vegetarian recipes, but none that I found that were quick, easy, healthy, and little mess. So, I decided that this might be a good possibility. I also LOVE food, and want to find a way for nourishment without gaining a ton of weight or putting extra processed chemicals into my body. As part of my frustration with loving eating and having to really watch my food as middle age creeps in, I decided that I needed to find a way to manage my food choices to stay healthy. Last year I had really high cholesterol for the first time in my life, and was able to reduce it to a healthy level just by controlling my food choices. After this I decided that this was something that I could actually control, and I also realized that what we put into our bodies really does effect us.
While I LOVE food, I do not always like the length of time it takes to prepare certain meals, and especially NOT the cleanup. During weeknights with school, it is especially difficult and exhausting to cook healthy for my family. I love receiving my Hello Fresh meals, but they take a long time to prep and cook, and there is often a big mess to clean up. So, my plan with my passion project is to modify some of the Hello Fresh meals that I enjoy and are quick, but maybe not as healthy as I would like. Then I am going to try to create them as one pot or little mess meals (which is my goal for this project). I would like to develop at least a week's worth of quick, healthy meals that still taste good that I can use. Maybe this will lead to more recipes and maybe a cookbook? Who knows?
To kick my project off, I started with a recipe that I had already re-created, "Tasty Veggie Pasta." I wrote out the ingredients and steps and am planning on putting together everything in a Google Doc so that I can add pictures, etc. too. In doing this I realized that I also needed the nutrition information to make sure that this was truly a healthy vegetarian recipe. I found a pretty cool website for nutrition calculating to help determine nutrition info per serving size: https://lifehacker.com/how-to-track-calories-and-macros-in-homemade-meals-1809061636. So I am using the spreadsheet created as a model for all of my recipes. I was also able to find additional nutritional values of foods that didn't have nutrition labels at the USDA website: https://fdc.nal.usda.gov/index.html to help inputting nutrient information.
While this is already taking quite a long time to input the nutrition information, I am hoping it will become quicker as I add more recipes and input information into the spreadsheet, now that I know where to go for the information. I am finding some interesting information that I did not know about some of the ingredients in some of my foods. For example, in researching balsamic vinegar, I discovered that most balsamic vinegar in stores has added caramel color to it. Only pure balsamic vinegar (which happens to be extremely expensive) does not have it. So what's the big deal? Well, this caramel color is basically a toxin and is not a natural part of the balsamic vinegar. I never knew this, and in trying to remain with healthy, whole ingredients, I am considering revising some of the recipe for alternate ingredients. Who knows what else I will find in some of these everyday foods?
Genius Hour: A Reflection
In trying to decide on what to do for my genius hour/passion project, I went through a few different exercises. Initially I was confused and had no idea on what to do, so first I Googled "Genius Hour Passion Project ideas for adults." I found a ton of ideas on Pintrest for adult passion projects, which I searched through to try to wrap my head around something that would possibly work for me. This was a start. Once I had some ideas from here I was able to complete the reflection question exercise. In completing this I found some common themes that I enjoy: binge-watching Netflix, drumming, painting, cooking, organizing, relaxing in the sun, and decorating, just to name a few. OK, so this gave me a few more ideas to brainstorm. Then I came across the "tennis ball" question: the thing that you keep chasing after that keeps coming back to you over and over again. Well there were more than a few things that made this list: that scrapbooking project of our Disney vacation from 7 years ago, the project of composing musical "sound stories" to go along with children's picture books that I had wanted to complete last year, the alternative seating buckets that I had started last year for my classroom and never finished, the refinishing the bathroom cabinets project that I had wanted to complete after painting the kids' bathroom, and the making a marimba from scratch project. As I kept brainstorming I came across a few other interests that I enjoy: quick, healthy, cooking that tastes good, learning how to play the guitar, and writing a useful music curriculum that people can actually use. After this I had a ton of ideas floating around in my head.
I had to begin to think realistically about what might work. So I decided to try to think about what I really could or could not accomplish. I didn't exactly create a "list of 3" (it was more like a list of 7) but I tried to narrow down some ideas based on what was realistic and from what I had read in some of the passion project blogs. Below is a list of what I have narrowed down for now.
Option #1: Publish/create my own classroom music materials
An idea that I have been thinking about for awhile is composing sound stories to go along with childrens picture books. This is something that I have been wanting to do for the past two years, but just haven't had the time. I became inspired with this after a friend of mine who is an instructor with the World Music Drumming workshops put together a sound box of musical instruments/sound effects to go along with some books for students to check out and create their own sound story. He worked with his LMC director to provide this resource for students to use at home. I frequently use picture books in my classroom and thought this would be a great resource for kids to have outside of music class. I had thought about creating the sound story and recording it for kids to listen to and follow along with as they read the book. For one of my other tech classes I created a read-aloud sound story with the book "Drummer Hoff," and I loved how it turned out! There are several books that I would love to do this with for my classes. While this seems like a great idea to me, I don't know how different it would be than all of the other digital books that kids have access to now with remote learning. So then I thought about trying to create my own music materials for 3rd grade recorder or 4th grade ukulele incorporating my World Music Drumming knowledge to eventually publish my own book. I feel like many of the materials out there are very confusing or not sequenced well; however, I feel like this could be too overwhelming to accomplish at this point in time. Plus, there are sooo many materials out there, it would really have to be something FANTASTIC to set it apart and be worth it to publish. I don't know if I would be able to complete it in the time that we have with this class. Certainly not the publishing part.
Another, yes, school-related project that I started last summer that I still have yet to complete is the bucket seating for my classroom. I actually began this project last summer after wanting to make more space in my room and still have the ability for students to sit when we are drumming. I had the chairs in my room removed to clear out more space and thought these buckets would be great to have in place of them, but yet again, I ran out of time to complete this project. This is a project I definitely DO want to complete, I have done SOME research on already, and already have most of the materials. I am thinking this might be a feasible option for my passion project.
Option #2: Refinish the bathroom cabinets
As I have been digesting this concept of my own genius hour (yes, it is taking me awhile to process this whole idea), I started thinking "why not do something non school-related?" There are plenty of projects that I have started and wanted to complete (that 7-year-old Disney vacation scrapbook, for example) but never had the time. This Spring I repainted my kids' bathroom because it desperately needed it. I was very pleased with how it turned out. We still have the old cabinets in the bathroom, but with my daughter going to college I can't really afford to spend the money to replace them. So I did a little research on refinishing cabinets and found this very cool cabinet refinishing paint and kit called Nuvo cabinet refinishing. I have done a little research already, and based on what I have read so far, it seems like a project I could reasonably complete (the pictures look cool at least). This is something that I have been weighing back and forth whether or not to do (definitely a tennis ball project).
Option #3: Create healthy, tasty meals with quick prep and little cleanup
Finally, with staying at home more recently, I have also had the chance to cook more, which is something that I love to do, and will usually do even when I am tired. I love watching shows like "Top Chef," "Food Network Star" and "Chopped" to see all of the cool new recipes the chefs create. This year I started a subscription to Hello Fresh to try to have some sanity in my meal preparation during the insanity of the school year. When remote learning began, I continued the subscription because I really did not want to go out to the store and deal with the madness any more than I had to. So far I have really enjoyed cooking these meals and have discovered some very cool recipes. I love being able to cook the recipes from the cards, and then re-create them later with my own ingredients. While I have found these recipes tasty and fairly easy to prepare, many of them have added fat and carbs, which I am really trying to watch right now, as everything I eat seems to become a permanent fixture with me. In re-creating some of these meals I have been able to substitute many ingredients for lower-calorie, healthier options. This has solved one problem, but I have found that it still takes a lot of time to do this. Especially the cleanup part (which I absolutely hate). So one thing I have set out to do is to try to find a healthy, quick way to cool these same meals with minimal time and cleanup. OK, so this is all fine and dandy but usually when people create a healthy meal it doesn't taste so good right? So that is the OTHER part of my food mission: create healthy, quick, tasty meals with little cleanup (maybe one-pot meals?) This might not be a bad idea for a passion project...
Introduction
This is my sixteenth year teaching in District 204. I currently teach general music to elementary students in Kindergarten through fifth grade. I have taught elementary, middle, and high school grade levels of students, but I truly love teaching elementary. I love being able to explore lots of different styles of music, at many different age levels.
I have always loved music, but it wasn't until I had been out of the music field that I learned to appreciate it. I started out in music at the University of Illinois, but struggled to find its place in my education. So I decided to step back from it for a bit, and earned my degree in Health Administration. I worked in the health insurance industry for a few years and realized that something was missing. I eventually discovered it was music. So I went back to study music education, and earned my Bachelors and Masters of Music Education from DePaul University. Since then I have continued to pursue professional development opportunities, but was NOT very excited to pursue another certification, especially one in technology. I asked myself "how could I use this in music?"
After earning my degrees, I decided to pursue my Orff certification from Vandercook College of Music and DePaul University. I discovered World Music Drumming through Will Schmid's World Music Drumming workshops, where I have met some of the most wonderful people on the planet! The World Music Drumming philosophy uses drumming and multicultural music to teach social & emotional skills such as RESPECT, COMMUNITY, LISTENING, and TEAMWORK. I have used it at the elementary, middle, and high school levels and absolutely LOVE it!
With these hands-on music-making background experiences, I didn't really see a place for technology in my music classroom; however, as I have grown through my technology journey I have discovered more ways to integrate technology in my teaching than I ever imagined! I am continuing to learn many new ways to incorporate technology in music in the Ed Tech classes that I have taken through USF. So much so that I have decided to finish pursuing my Ed Tech endorsement (YAY)! I really love how technology has helped my teaching, especially now as we move towards more online and technology-based learning.
Of course I have to address that remote learning thing.....While I had been feeling pretty comfortable with my ability to integrate technology, remote learning has taught me how much I DIDN'T know. Remote learning has challenged me to discover new ways of keeping kids engaged in music without having many of the music tools they are used to. In my own exploration of resources for students, I discovered the district-purchased materials for students that I could use for music, such as BookFlix, PebbleGo, and Chrome Music Lab (not exactly ideal but engaging). Now that we have switched to remote learning, one of my favorite new tools that I have had the chance to use is WeVideo. Without the ability to use YouTube with students remotely, I have had to find a way to provide visual and auditory instruction for reinforcement (Zoom was not a possibility with 600 students). While I had been introduced to WeVideo in a professional development training, remote learning has given me the opportunity to really explore this resource and create materials that I could use with students, which I am very thankful for! I have been able to create some videos for students that I am proud of and that I can probably still use when we return to face-to-face instruction. I am hoping to continue to explore new ways of engaging students through technology, and how to more easily use it for assessment.
I live in Aurora with my husband, three kids, and black lab mix, who we just adopted. My daughter just graduated from Oswego East (remotely of course). My son will be a sophomore, and my six year old will start first grade (hopefully not remotely) next year.
I have always loved music, but it wasn't until I had been out of the music field that I learned to appreciate it. I started out in music at the University of Illinois, but struggled to find its place in my education. So I decided to step back from it for a bit, and earned my degree in Health Administration. I worked in the health insurance industry for a few years and realized that something was missing. I eventually discovered it was music. So I went back to study music education, and earned my Bachelors and Masters of Music Education from DePaul University. Since then I have continued to pursue professional development opportunities, but was NOT very excited to pursue another certification, especially one in technology. I asked myself "how could I use this in music?"
After earning my degrees, I decided to pursue my Orff certification from Vandercook College of Music and DePaul University. I discovered World Music Drumming through Will Schmid's World Music Drumming workshops, where I have met some of the most wonderful people on the planet! The World Music Drumming philosophy uses drumming and multicultural music to teach social & emotional skills such as RESPECT, COMMUNITY, LISTENING, and TEAMWORK. I have used it at the elementary, middle, and high school levels and absolutely LOVE it!
With these hands-on music-making background experiences, I didn't really see a place for technology in my music classroom; however, as I have grown through my technology journey I have discovered more ways to integrate technology in my teaching than I ever imagined! I am continuing to learn many new ways to incorporate technology in music in the Ed Tech classes that I have taken through USF. So much so that I have decided to finish pursuing my Ed Tech endorsement (YAY)! I really love how technology has helped my teaching, especially now as we move towards more online and technology-based learning.
Of course I have to address that remote learning thing.....While I had been feeling pretty comfortable with my ability to integrate technology, remote learning has taught me how much I DIDN'T know. Remote learning has challenged me to discover new ways of keeping kids engaged in music without having many of the music tools they are used to. In my own exploration of resources for students, I discovered the district-purchased materials for students that I could use for music, such as BookFlix, PebbleGo, and Chrome Music Lab (not exactly ideal but engaging). Now that we have switched to remote learning, one of my favorite new tools that I have had the chance to use is WeVideo. Without the ability to use YouTube with students remotely, I have had to find a way to provide visual and auditory instruction for reinforcement (Zoom was not a possibility with 600 students). While I had been introduced to WeVideo in a professional development training, remote learning has given me the opportunity to really explore this resource and create materials that I could use with students, which I am very thankful for! I have been able to create some videos for students that I am proud of and that I can probably still use when we return to face-to-face instruction. I am hoping to continue to explore new ways of engaging students through technology, and how to more easily use it for assessment.
I live in Aurora with my husband, three kids, and black lab mix, who we just adopted. My daughter just graduated from Oswego East (remotely of course). My son will be a sophomore, and my six year old will start first grade (hopefully not remotely) next year.
Effective Technology Integration Into Lessons and Curriculum Reflection
I really enjoyed discovering new technology tools to integrate into my lessons in this course. I updated some of my favorites in my Favorite Tech Tools and Links (check out the sidebar). For ways that I integrated them into my lessons, check out my EEND678Z Technology Integration Artifact page.
Some of my favorite new tech tools that I discovered were ClassHook, a tool for integrating short video clips into lessons. There are several categories of lessons, including music (YAY!) While I would like to have seen more video clips for music, this was a great place to start. Finally, someplace else to look other than YouTube! I loved the Jimmy Fallon videos in particular. I used those ideas to search up more resources from his other musical skits. What I love about the Jimmy Fallon videos is that he takes popular songs and plays them on classroom musical instruments. It is so fun to watch! I am hoping to integrate these more into my lessons. I had always known these were out there but never thought to use them.
Another resource that I found through this class is Wizer, a website that lets you build interactive worksheets for students (I included this in my Favorite Tech Tools and Links sidebar also). While I haven't used this yet, it looks VERY COOL! Something that I definitely would use in my classroom to eliminate all of those paper worksheets!!! I think I could incorporate this into my Google Classroom which I have just started using with my students in 3rd-5th grades. I am hoping to keep expanding on this idea!
A third VERY COOL resource that I found helpful for me is PowToon, a video creation website. In one of my previous technology classes I had become introduced to this resource, but as we know, how often do we have time to actually EXPLORE? I never had the chance to really use this resource. I took a chance with this class and created a video to reinforce some of the recorder concepts students are learning in 3rd grade music, so that my students had this as a resource to access outside of class. I found this much more user-friendly than Adobe Spark, which our district currently uses and I had used before to create a book trailer; however, I had alot of problems saving my data in Adobe Spark (not sure if this was a district problem or what), but this totally turned me off to using this as a resource. Since currently I am not a big Adobe fan, I think I will stick to using PowToon for my videos for now.
Some of my favorite new tech tools that I discovered were ClassHook, a tool for integrating short video clips into lessons. There are several categories of lessons, including music (YAY!) While I would like to have seen more video clips for music, this was a great place to start. Finally, someplace else to look other than YouTube! I loved the Jimmy Fallon videos in particular. I used those ideas to search up more resources from his other musical skits. What I love about the Jimmy Fallon videos is that he takes popular songs and plays them on classroom musical instruments. It is so fun to watch! I am hoping to integrate these more into my lessons. I had always known these were out there but never thought to use them.
Another resource that I found through this class is Wizer, a website that lets you build interactive worksheets for students (I included this in my Favorite Tech Tools and Links sidebar also). While I haven't used this yet, it looks VERY COOL! Something that I definitely would use in my classroom to eliminate all of those paper worksheets!!! I think I could incorporate this into my Google Classroom which I have just started using with my students in 3rd-5th grades. I am hoping to keep expanding on this idea!
A third VERY COOL resource that I found helpful for me is PowToon, a video creation website. In one of my previous technology classes I had become introduced to this resource, but as we know, how often do we have time to actually EXPLORE? I never had the chance to really use this resource. I took a chance with this class and created a video to reinforce some of the recorder concepts students are learning in 3rd grade music, so that my students had this as a resource to access outside of class. I found this much more user-friendly than Adobe Spark, which our district currently uses and I had used before to create a book trailer; however, I had alot of problems saving my data in Adobe Spark (not sure if this was a district problem or what), but this totally turned me off to using this as a resource. Since currently I am not a big Adobe fan, I think I will stick to using PowToon for my videos for now.
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