ISTE Standard #1: Facilitate and inspire student learning and creativity
 
Teachers use their knowledge of subject matter, teaching and learning, and technology to facilitate experiences that advance student learning, creativity, and innovation in both face-to-face and virtual environments.

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Personal Definition: This standard specifies what is, in my opinion, the biggest and most important role of a teacher: to facilitate student learning. The standard refers to the intersection of content, pedagogy, and technology as a means to enhance a teacher's effectiveness in the classroom. The standard emphasizes the importance of student creativity and innovation, collaboration, exploration of real-world issues and problems, and reflection in the learning process.
  

 

Artifacts that Align:

• 1A, 1B, and 1D: ​Group Blogging Project from INSTTECH 5131: Exploring Issues and Trends in Instructional Technology. These sub-standards involve promoting and supporting creative and innovative thinking, engaging students in authentic learning situations using digital tools, and modeling collaborative knowledge construction virtually and face-to-face. This project is a website that offers information and tips to teachers on incorporating blogging in the classroom.

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• 1A and 1D: 21st Century Learning Project from INSTTECH 6232: Selecting and Integrating Instructional Technology. These sub-standards involve promoting and supporting creative and innovative thinking as well as modeling collaborative knowledge construction virtually and face-to-face. This project was a presentation describing a unit based on 21st century learning in an English classroom.

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• 1B: Gamification Project from INSTTECH 5153: Using Digital and Social Media. This sub-standard involves engaging students in authentic learning situations using digital tools. This project involved a gamified research paper unit that I created for my junior/senior writing class. 

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• 1C: Understanding by Design Project from INSTTECH 6240: Understanding Instructional Design. This sub-standard involves promoting student reflection using collaborative tools. This project involves an informative research paper unit for sophomores that was designed using the UbD framework.

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• 1C: Blended Learning Project from INSTTECH 5110: Developing and Directing Online Learning. This sub-standard involves promoting student reflection using collaborative tools. This project is a blended learning unit for a literature class that involved a research presentation and blogging.

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Explanation of Criteria:

• 1A, 1B, and 1D: ​Group Blogging Project from INSTTECH 5131: Exploring Issues and Trends in Instructional Technology. This project describes the importance of student voice in the classroom through the use of blogging and how this authentic writing task can influence learning. Using blogging in the classroom promotes creative student voices, is a real-world task, and reinforces collaborative knowledge construction through peer comments.

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• 1A and 1D: 21st Century Learning Project from INSTTECH 6232: Selecting and Integrating Instructional Technology. This project describes an in-depth learning experience wherein students choose a topic, film material, and edit a documentary on an issue they care about. This unit promotes student creativity through the creation of the film and involves collaboration in class and across the globe.

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• 1B: Gamification Project INSTTECH 5153: Using Digital and Social Media. This gamified unit helped make students more invested in a writing assignment and gave the unit a competitive aspect. In the unit, the students argued their opinion on a real-world topic and used research to support their opinion, which is a very authentic learning task since argument skills are so important for 21st century citizens.

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• 1C: Understanding by Design Project from INSTTECH 6240: Understanding Instructional Design. The "backwards" design for this unit helped to ensure student learning using technology tools. In the unit, students used online peer-editing, a collaborative task, to get feedback and improve drafts of their papers.

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• 1C: Blended Learning Project from INSTTECH 5110: Developing and Directing Online Learning. This unit involves a research presentation created by students on the background of a historical fiction book. It also involved the students blogging their responses to the story, making the learning more personalized and creative. Students collaborated on their presentations and by commenting on each other's blogs with responses to the novel they were reading.