Continued from 2010-2011
*3d. Teachers model and facilitate effective use of current and emerging digital tools to locate, analyze, evaluate, and use information resources to support research and learning.
(2010-2011)For all levels of Latin there is a proliferation of digital tools, some suited directly to the text, which students have been introduced to in order to facilitate the learning of incidence and vocabulary.
Opportunities for research have been supplied through jstor and project muse. Nevertheless, care is taken to further analyze these sources critically.
My personal content knowledge has been used by accessed online databases and some of these articles have also been used in class.
University podcast have been used in class and outside of class to supplement instruction.
QUIA quizzes have been used not only as assessments but also to help the students work on vocabulary ion their own. This has been extremely effective for the motivated student. In order to help the unconvinced students, QUIA quizzes were regularly assigned before written quizzes. This demonstrated their efficacy to the students. Afterwards, QUIA quizzes were used solely as assessments.
*5c. Teachers evaluate and reflect on current research and professional practice on a regular basis to make effective use of existing and emerging digital tools and resources in support of student learning.
I attended seminars at St. Stephen's school in Austin to learn about new digital tools, blended learning and the flipped classroom. The flipped classroom has payoffs and pitfalls: while it is an excellent cultural indicator of our media involvement, too often the practice completely does away with the text instead of providing as very utile supplement.
Many new apparatus for the blended classroom. It was very challenging to understand the different systems offered and it seems that at least for the first trimester of a blended course, sc. BLENDED LATIN AT PARISH, students will need much attention and a consistent guiding hand. That said, unlike the flipped classroom which seems rather passive, the interactive textbooks which seem to be a common feature of the well-developed blended course, could offer a great opportunity to guide learning outside of the classroom. The classroom then becomes more of a performative area.
2c. Teachers customize and personalize learning activities to address students' diverse learning styles, working strategies, and abilities using digital tools and resources.
This year three levels of Latin were collapsed into a single section. Not only were the sections diverse (Latin II, III, IIIH) but many of the sections, small though they were, were also highly differentiated. It became very clear that most of the work of forming a working knowledge of Latin incidence and vocabulary would have to be pushed off-campus, or rather outside the classroom. Two tools were used, QUIA and CONJUGEMOS. As above QUIA has been an invaluable tool for vocabulary formation and assessment. CONJUGEMOS was a failure. The next move in Latin instruction will be a tool that more effectively drills Latin incidence.
Another issue was the log-in. Students at all levels of responsibilty and motivation had constant issues with both logging on to two different programs (not to say the others that they must master) and also remembering how to use these digital tools. Streamlining is a strong desideratum.
In the future, I would be strongly motivated to offer students in a multiple section such as this the opportunity to take this course blended.