Guiding Principles Revisit

My initial Guiding Principles are copied below:
Then:
1. I plan to teach students more how to use the internet before I assign them an assignment that requires them to use the internet for research. I think I take for granted what they already know, and I need to make sure that all students know how to appropriately use this vast resource.

2. I intend to better teach how to use data collection probes and software. I need to make sure students know their purpose and function before we use them with a lab. I want to write more labs for my students to incorporate this great tool.

3. I want to make better use of an LCD projector besides showing video clips, presenting ppts, working through worksheets together with it on the whiteboard, and presenting student ppts.

4. I plan to utilize more online databases such as those listed in "Partnership for 21st Century Skills". I think that my students would learn a lot from analyzing real-time data.

5. I would like to use our laptops more for assessment purposes such as online quizzes. This will prepare students for the direction many assessments may be going, at least for many college courses' assessments.

6. I want to incorporate what I am learning about blogs and twitter into my teaching so students can learn how to share their ideas and thoughts about particular subjects. I want these tools to help them become better communicators of science.

7. Overall, as mentioned in my previous blog, I want technology to help students learn how to think and analyze better so they can be better problem solvers.

Now:
I still have the same thinking about teaching with technology. Now, though, I have a variety of tools to use instead of primarily computer simulations and LoggerPro on laptops. I really do hope our lap tops are still functioning this year and the tech dpt did not take them away over the summer (happened before). I still strongly believe that I want the technology to help my students become better problem solvers and what I learned from this course will really help in this aspect. Monotony will be gone from my classroom. Students will be more engaged in not only the lab part of my class, but the communication part as well. I struggled with this part over the years, but I now am more confident I can have more post lab work completed by students. Middle school is about the ooohs and aahhs about science, and the tools I learned here will help them be a part of this. Social networking and learning from each other will be a large part of my future classroom.