In my Game Plan, I chose the following NETS-T.: #1 “Facilitate and Inspire Students Learning and Creativity,” and #5 “Engage in Professional Growth and Leadership.” All of the technology standards are very important and useful, but I felt these two would be the most useful in my music classroom. Through my quest of improving and excelling within these two standards, I must reflect on how they value my students.
The most important NETS-S for students in music is #1- Creativity and Innovation. Music and the Arts is about being creative and innovating. One of my main goals as a music teacher is to teach the students to learn the art of music and then expand it to their own creative likings. In the past, a musician would have to pay a lot of money to get something recorded in a music studio. However, today, with resources like Garage Band and Audacity, young musicians can make their own music, burn it onto a CD album, and even self-publish it on Youtube all by themselves. With the creation and access of these new technologies, comes the responsibility of myself as music teacher, to make sure the students can reach their full potential.
Looking over all of the NETS-S, I find that they are all very important and hopefully I can reach all of them in music. However, the main issue that haunts me is lack of time. I see my students once every six days and can only do a couple projects that incorporates technology. Students should learn how to collaborate, problem-solve, and make decisions involving technology, and I hope to find ways to make this happen within my music class. I am open to any suggestions.
One last comment about the NETS-S is the importance of #5-Digital Citizenship. As part of my last Walden lesson on social networking, I am going to take chance and use Facebook as the core platform in the lesson. This is risky because I have to get it unblocked and convince the parents to let the students use this service. However, I would rather take the chance and use something that the students will become excited about, then to have one more school project that will easily be forgotten. With that being said, it is very important that I teach the children the rules about digital citizenship, so they not only stay safe, but also respect the rights of others.
Charles Lane
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Even as an elementary teacher, seeing my students every day all day I feel the pressure and limitations of time constraints. The district puts so many requirements that it really can be stifling to teacher creativity and use of technology in meaningful ways. If you factor in all the extra assemblies and special activites that my school and principal plan in excess that take away valuable instructional time the pressure to meet all the requirements becomes that much harder. That's when the more time consumming lessons tend to take the back burner and both teachers and the students suffer.
ReplyDeleteI guess I just want to sympathize with your time constraint frustrations, we've all been there. -Christina
Thank you for your sympathy. However, one thing that we need to realize as educators is that we are educating the children as a whole. Sometimes we get frustrated by extra assemblies and other activities that take away from our instruction time, but them again we need to realize that these activities can be enriching as well.
ReplyDeleteI have a performing group and it involves me to pull the students out of a 5th grade class. One of the teachers complained and said that the students need the academic time instead. I made a comment on how top music students, although usually involved in lots of things, tend to perform higher in academics.
Christina, I agree 100% that time limits our creativity, but on the other hand we need to work with what with have.
Ashlee to Charles:
ReplyDeleteI think that you selected the best standards for you and your students while taking this course. You mention that your greatest challenge is having time with students, as you do not get to see them as often as their core-subject teachers. Perhaps if you dedicate enough time at the beginning of the school year to teach them how to properly use various technology, you can build from the skills for later projects. If you do not have much class time to allow students to have a variety of technological experiences, you can have projects for them to work on between classes. You can still communicate with them about their progress and/or questions via discussion posts (wikis) or email.
Charles with the limited time that you have with children in your music class, it is important that you form good partnership with other teachers who do the core subjects and have more contact time with them. The standards can be built in a common way so that you can contribute towards guiding your students achieving them.
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