Marks,+Alyson

Hi. My name is Alyson Marks and this is a collection of work that I did for ISTC 201 with Mrs. Wood in the 2010 Fall semester.



Alyson Marks ISTC 201 Cheryl Wood

Final Exam Essay

 There is no question that technology plays a huge role in everyday life and education. I definitely see how as a future teacher, being up to date on the latest technology will be very important. Gone are classes with blackboards. Instead I’ll have to learn how to use smart boards and other tools that will assist me with my teaching. I’m sure more classes will be offered online due to its convenience. However, as a math teacher, math classes are more demanding to have an instructor present and available for questions, and online classes probably aren’t the best option for a math course if you want to get the most out of it. This class for example would have been hard to take only online because it was the direct help from the instructor that I got the most out of.

 I honestly had no expectations for this class when it first began because I had never heard of the course before. But with all courses one takes, you expect to learn something new. I learned a lot about using APA format for papers so you can say my expectations were met. Also, as I was doing research for my research paper, I found that what I had once believed or thought to be true was actually not completely accurate. It’s definitely important to do research before making decisions about educational procedures, strategies, or issues in order to make the most educated decision you can using supporting materials such as statistics, examples, or testimony. I definitely learned that when writing a research paper you should start the research early and spread the work out evenly for the paper. Having to turn in sections of the paper at different times helped with compiling the paper and made the paper a lot less stressful. I do think I approved on my skills for writing a research paper, especially using APA format.

 I really enjoyed creating a wiki page. It requires using a lot of technologies and provides the students that don’t know much about how to upload a video or make a poster collage using glogster the chance to learn how to do that. Wikis could definitely be an effective technology tool for education. I believe that this course covers important material that can be found in a lot of other classes. It is important for students to learn the proper way to conduct research and the skills learned in this class can be used in many others. So I do believe this course should be a general education requirement.