MSU Master of Art's in Educational Technology
Annotated Transcript of Trista Teuscher
Summer 2012 - Summer 2014
When I began the MSU Master of Art's in Educational Technology program in the summer of 2012, I wasn't really sure what I was getting into. I was fresh out of my undergrad program and beginning my first year teaching. What I knew is that I wasn't done learning and technology seemed to be a hot topic in schools. What I didn't realize, was how much this program would help me grow as a student, teacher, and overall person. My Professional Learning Network barely existed living in a small town in Northern Michigan. However, upon nearing the completion of this program, I feel that I have the whole world at my fingertips. One concept I heard over and over in this program is, "It's not about the tools, it's about the learning." Well, I have learned that even though our world may seem big and overwhelming, we are more connected to each other now than we have ever been and that is a resource we cannot ignore!
Summer 2012
CEP 810
Teaching for Understanding with Technology
Instructors: Amy Pietrowski and Ben Rimes
As my first course in the MAET program, Amy and Ben were terrific role models. I was introduced to the Google Drive, twitter, and began learning what my professional learning network was and could be. I remember Amy conducting some of the class from overseas which opened my eyes to the reality of the world wide web and what is possible. By keeping a google drive notebook throughout the course, I was able to reflect on my own teaching and learning.
CEP 811
Adapting Innovative Technologies in Education
Instructor: Tammy Maginity
In this course, I learned what a STAIR (Stand Alone Instructional Resource) was and was even able to create my own using Google Presentation on identifying trees. The focus of this course was creating lessons plans that used technology but also focused on the meeting the overall learning objectives. Even though I was just out of my undergrad program without a lot of real teaching experiences, this course transformed the way I think about lesson planning. The theme, "It's not about the tool, it's about the learning," began to sink in for me during this course.
Fall 2012
CEP 806
Learning Science with Technology
Instructors: Dr. E. David Wong
This course focused on exploring and discovering. We conducted our own experiments and compared the hands on approach to virtual science. What I was able to walk away with was that there are many different ways to accomplish similar tasks. One way is not always better than the other.I remember very vividly trying to conduct an experiement for this course and remember spending ours creating a video to show the process that I went through. What seemed to be a daunting task then, has turned into what drives me in my own teaching using inquiry science.
CEP 812
Applying Educational Technology to Issues of Practice
Instructor: Carolyn McCarthy
In this course, a major project I completed within a group was building a weeebly website that taught the basics of how to use Weebly. As a group, I worked with others using Google Hangout, Google Docs, and creating screencasts. I also created a wicked-problem projects. This projects focused on identifying a need in my classroom and finding a solution to solve that problem using technology. We put this together in a format that would be suitable for grant writing. It was an enlightening experience that I was able to Blog and share about throughout the course.
Summer 2013
CEP 800
Learning in School and Other Settings
CEP 815
Technology and Leadership
Instructors: Sean Leahy and Hannah Klautke
In this course, I researched and learned about different learning styles. We dove into understand how students learn and understand concepts. I spent time producing lesson plans that focused on different styles of learning and meeting students individual needs. As a teacher, I realized that I often create lessons based upon my own personal learning style rather than looking at the big picture.
Instructors: Josh Rosenberg and Luke Rapa
This course focused on different leadership styles. We also examined different technologies and the influence they have within a certain setting. The experiences in this course forced me to focus on the importance of making decisions and being able to support those decisions with evidence. This is a course I reflect frequently on throughout my own career as I strive to be a leader and work with technology daily.
Spring 2014
CEP 820
Teaching Students Online
Instructors: Dr. Anne Heintz, Sandra Sawaya, Spencer Greenhalgh
Within this course, I evaluated different learning management systems as a tool to teach students online. I selected one that fit the need I was looking for and built an online Social Studies course for 4th grade students. While I have been a student in many online courses, I was unaware of the amount of work that goes into building an online course. As a general education teacher, I don't always think that far ahead to have a whole unit put into place before starting. When putting an online course together, it required looking at the big picture and then being very detail orientated when actually building it. This experience actually impacted how I plan units in the virtual world and in the face-to-face format.
TE 846
Accomodating Differences in Literacy Learners
Instructor: Lynne Watanabe
This course focuses on literacy growth. Throughout the course, we examined the importance of pre and post assessments, how to use the date to create lessons, and putting everything together in a case study. The case study allowed me to do a thorough investigation of a student's literacy growth. I used two assessments to guide creating lesson plans to meet the individual needs of this student. I evaluated her growth by conducted the same assessment at the end of the case study. As a teacher, this is something we do regularly as a whole class, but not always something that I do on an individual level. It was a great experience and allowed me to focus on the individual in a one-on-one setting as opposed to the whole class setting.
Summer 2014
CEP 822
Approaches to Educational Research
Instructors: Tatyana Li
In this course, I was challenged with the concepts of Educational Research. Throughout readings, quizzes, and research projects I learned to find appropriate resources, conducting research using different methods, and analyze data. All of this was put together to create a research paper of our desired topic. I chose to right about technology in schools and the differences between educational technology and entertainment technology.
CEP 807
Proseminar in Educational Technology
Instructors: Dr. Matthew Koehler, Joshua Rosenberg, Spencer Greenhalgh, and Brittany Dillman
In this final course, an online portfolio is built and reflections are made. In the end of the Master of Educational Technology, the capstone experience encourages me to reflect through essays and communicating with peers on my time spent at MSU. It was a great way to realize and express the learning that has come out of the last two years. Although it seemed to go fast, the memories will certainly last a lifetime!