Obstacles

After reflecting on my participation in the E2T2 grant this year I've found that there were a few obstacles to creating/implementing exemplary 21st Century projects. The top two obstacles I encountered and still struggle with are lack of time and lack of resources.

I'm looking forward to summer to be able to do more personal research into project-based learning ideas. During the school year it is so hard to keep up on all of the "have-to" stuff much less investigating the myriad of online resources available for teachers. I have an extensive list of web sites to peruse this summer while planning my units for next year. I have fully bought in to the idea of project-based learning and hope to incorporate it better each year. I especially want to figure out a way to connect my students with students from other places and cultures. I did not manage to do that this first year.

The other obstacle was the lack of technology resources for the classroom. We have 3 computer labs at our school but they fill up quickly and are hard to get in as much as I would like to. Fortunately, I did have access to a set of ipod touches third trimester and used them quite a bit. However, I didn't have enough time to figure out how to sync them with my laptop or research additional apps to use in lessons. At least we got started with this tool and can use them more appropriately next year. This summer I plan to find apps and methods for integrating them into next years' units. Our school also has no video or digital cameras for student use. I found this to be a stumbling block, especially for my theme speech video project.

Obviously, there is much room for improvement in my school and in my classroom to incorporate 21st Century learning. But I do feel that through participation in this grant I have received awareness of the many resources to research and ideas for incorporation into my future lessons.