Graduate School Work Sample: July, 2013
Purpose: This blog represents the synthesis of information gained during my Introduction to Educational Technology graduate school class.
Elaboration: We were challenged to "play" with three different technologies and review them here.
Rationale for Inclusion: I chose to include this site because I enjoyed creating the layout for this blog and synthesizing personal anecdotes with the content to create a site that is fun but informative. Additionally, from a professional growth standpoint, this research allowed me to internalize and apply the term "affordances" to selecting appropriate technology.
Teaching Communication Sample: May 2013
Purpose: Each teacher at The Barack Obama Male Leadership Academy at B.F. Darrell in Dallas Independent School District is required to share with our middle and high school young men about a topic that interests them and would be of help to our students.
Elaboration: For a week, I shared research on Dr. Carl Jung's research on personality types for about twenty minutes each day during our assembly time and encouraged the students to comment on our blog after each session.
Rationale for Inclusion: I included this sample because it represents the convergence of many of my favorite things--psychology, enlightening others, design and opening dialogue for meaningful discussion. Additionally, since completing this presentation, I have decided to explore pursue my PhD in educational psychology upon completion of my MEd in Educational Technology-Leadership. This blog was a stepping stone towards that decision.
Multimedia Grant Proposal, December 2013
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| Click here to watch the grant presentation. |
Purpose: For my Administration of Media Technology
Programs, I was challenged to develop a multimedia grant proposal.
Elaboration: When
I worked in public television, I literally had to raise my salary each
year. Understandable, since they are
non-profit entities funded by “viewers like you.” However, I did not realize the pivotal role
that technology teachers play in funding their programs until I actually became
a technology teacher. Although I have
experience with grant writing, I had never created a video proposal
before.
Rationale for
Inclusion: The hardest part of
developing this three-minute presentation was boiling down all of the major
facets of a full-blown grant proposal into digestible sound bites so that it
could be easily understood by viewers with no background knowledge. Technically, I learned that the microphone on
my laptop is not well-suited for all situations.
Digital Story, July 2014
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| I surfed!! Click here to watch the video of the full story. |
Purpose: I had to
write, storyboard and produce a short digital story on any topic of my
choosing.
Elaboration: In 2013, I won the Texas Instruments STEM
Teaching Award which included cash for my personal use and cash for teacher
professional development. Thank the
Lord, I found a cool robotics competition in HAWAII, and they paid for it! Thankfully, since they covered my expenses, I
was able to take my niece with me. I found
out about this assignment the day I left for the trip and saw this as the
perfect opportunity to capture that experience.
Rationale for
Inclusion: This project was the
first time I felt like an artist using technology as the medium for expressing
my emotions. I tried hard to capture the
joy we felt on our trip, the fun we had and the love I have for my niece. I think the video does a great job of
communicating all of that, yet still retaining my “voice.”
Purpose: My challenge was to create a strategic plan for upgrading the general state of technology education at my campus, The Barack Obama Male Leadership Academy.Technology Education Strategic Plan Creation, December 2014
Elaboration: The first step was to analyze my school's existing general strategic plan so that the technology plan I developed mirrored our existing goals. Next step was to analyze the Texas STaR Chart data for The Barack Obama Male Leadership Academy against the most recent set of average data results from around Texas. I quickly discovered that our campus is fairing relatively well, but we could use some additional technology training and general direction for our campus.
Rationale for Inclusion: This document represents my first formal attempt at strategically planning specifically from the perspective of improving educational technology. I assume I would write similar plans as an instructional technology specialist at a school or district, so this document allowed me to experience a bit of that type of work.
