ASHLEY HIMAN: PORTFOLIO SHOWCASING TECHNOLOGY AND EDUCATION
Showcase
Through my past two years in Michigan State's Master of Art in Educational Technology, I have learned about a few very important ideas that I want to continue using in my classroom. The three main ideas I learned throughout my master's program is the importance of a student centered classroom, collaboration, and being able to further my own learning to help others on their journey to using technology in their own classrooms.
Student Centered Classroom
A student centered classroom is one where the students are in control of their own learning and the teacher is there as the facilitator, coach, or mentor. I learned more about the student centered classroom through re-designing my classroom so it is more student centered, the use of Design Thinking to creating a student centered classroom, and by rethinking what it means to truly teach.
Collaboration
Throughout this master's program, I had many opportunities to collaborate on various projects and through this I realized how important it is to have students collaborate as well as it will teach them important lifelong skills. By learning about the importance of MAKER education, I learned that students will gain lifelong skills from this such as collaboration. Collaboration can also happen digitally through the use of a Personal Learning Network (PLN).
Furthering My Own Learning to Help Others
My goal since the very beginning of this master's program was to be able to gain more knowledge about educational technology and be able to apply it to my own classroom as well as helping other teachers implement technology in their own classrooms. In order to do this, I had to first rethink what it means to teach, learn about TPACK and then I was ready to spread my knowledge to other teachers through my role as a Technology Coach.
