Educational Philosophy

A link to my video of my educational philosophy:



I appreciated the few requirements of the project - but I found that I wanted to try more. The biggest obstacle that I had was matching the pictures to the words - which didn't work too well! I wish that I had more forethought with the pictures. I adjusted the pictures that I did have. I learned that you may want to put together the project and then schedule time to come back and fill in what pieces that you may want to adjust. I felt fortunate that the audio worked out well - I realized that I was very lucky!

For students, I would start with something very concrete - tell us about a hobby that you have. They could take pictures of their hobby or bring in images from the Internet.

Picture Story: Blueberry Picking

As the month of August approached, I was getting excited about blueberry picking. There is nothing like interior Alaskan blueberries – sour and sweet at the same time – especially in a blueberry rhubarb pie. Being determined to pick as many blueberries as possible, we heard that blueberries were ripe on top of the local dome. On the weekend, we looked out the window and saw that it was cold and pouring. Determined, we headed out. When we arrived at the top of dome, we did not find many berries – just wind, rain, and bad moods. We soon admitted defeat.

Determined to gather blueberries, we went on our annual family pilgrimage to Fielding Lake. We roamed the hillsides – only finding bones and empty bushes. With one last possible place to try, we ventured out – not expecting to find many blueberries. Much to our surprise, we found heaps of blueberries. We were all eager to pick – even our son Alex. We all picked and picked until we had gallons of blueberries and many pies to look forward to enjoying.

Futuring: Using SabrinaJourney

SabrinaJourney offers a simple way for students to tell their own story using repetition and still images. Creating a slide show with technology is a relatively easy process now that is accessible to many students. Students could either

• create their own artwork
• use their own pictures
• take pictures to tell their story.

The story structure of SabrinaJourney allows one to individualize the content.

Futuring: Epic 2015

If what epic2015 suggests happens, then many things about the classroom will change. I can see the classroom being much more flexible and flowing rather than rigid and structured. Will curriculum exist? I believe that curriculum will be more important than every so that everyone has a common language. The way content is delivered will change. The teacher has to be the facilitator of the information. As far as podcasting, I can see individual classrooms podcasting the topic of the hour and students changing rooms that hour based on the interest in the topic.

Futuring: Assessing Student Work

There are two ways to think of how to assess these two projects – teacher perspective – was this project effective and student perspective – did I do a good job on this project.

To assess either Fox Becomes a Better Person or School Train from a teacher perspective, I would want to know how effective were the projects in helping the students understand the teaching objectives. Here are a few questions that I would ask:

• What was the outcome that was desired?
• What learning took place?
• Who was doing the learning?

If I am thinking of ways to assess the project for a student, some of the questions I would ask would be:

• Did they accomplish the objective?
• How complete was the project?
• What was the quality of the project?

A class-created rubric would help to assess the student work.

Who am I?

I am a technology teacher for the same district that I grew up in - Fairbanks North Star Borough. My teaching career began as a high school math teacher where I was fortunate to work with teachers who were forward thinking with technology in education. We worked to develop electronic portfolios with students with hyperlinks - how times have changed! I look forward to learning more ways to assess student knowledge with digital storytelling.