502 Course Reflection

EDTECH 502: The Internet for Educators focused on two main skill sets.  The first, and most significant, was using HTML5 and CSS3 to design websites in Adobe Dreamweaver.  I came into the course with some prior experience using earlier versions of HTML, but most of my efforts were very utilitarian with minimal styling and I had no experience with CSS or Dreamweaver.  As a result, the pages I built in this course are much more attractive and show a greater degree of sophistication than my prior efforts.  While I'm not ready to compete with professional web designers (by a long shot), I can build a basic website and make it look reasonably attractive.

The other main aspect of this course was an introduction to various models of web-based lessons including jigsaws, WebQuests, and virtual field trips among others.  In some cases, I've seen or used lessons with similar structures elsewhere, but had not made much use of the Internet within these lessons.  Creating web-based lessons following these structures required me to become much more familiar with the Internet resources available in my content area.

One of the most powerful aspects of web-based activities I saw throughout the course was the opportunity for differentiation.  I teach a 9th grade physical science course which every student must take, meaning I see a wide variety of students in my classroom.  The range of reading levels poses a particular challenge as I have students able to read at a college level who find our textbook (written at roughly a 7th grade level) overly simple while other students read at an elementary level and find the same textbook incomprehensibly difficult.  When working on many of the projects for this course, I was able to find worthwhile resources at a variety of reading levels, giving me an opportunity to provide all of my students with appropriate texts as well as tools to scaffold struggling readers toward more challenging options.  This realization of how easy it is to differentiate a web-based lesson has me working on adapting many of the assignments I typically use the textbook for.

My ability to build basic web pages will make it possible for me to present differentiated resources, whether as links to other web sites or as content I've written myself, in a well-organized format with a reasonably professional appearance and an engaging task.  This approach will be much more straightforward than attempting to copy and distribute appropriately articles or other texts at a variety of reading levels.