The Spark

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​I am a dedicated educator with 14 years of experience as a classroom teacher. For the majority of my career, I had the privilege of teaching 4th grade math and science, where I fostered a passion for innovative teaching with the use of technology. In recent years, I have embraced a wonderful change. I transitioned to becoming a self-contained second grade teacher in Tomball ISD. In these roles, I have enjoyed using innovated practices, especially ones that allow me to integrate technology to improve student achievement. Being in a state-tested grade level means there is a lot of pressure for students to demonstrate mastery of content. Over time, I took pride in developing personalized learning plans to support students' learning goals. In looking into a master's degree plan that interested me, the Applied Digital Learning program seemed to fit my interests and learning philosophy.​​​

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The Encouragers

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Historically, I have been a reflective person. Constantly seeking ways to improve, grow, and learn has played a huge part in shaping my career. While working for my former principal, I was constantly put in situations that would promote my growth. Many of these situations were uncomfortable. Despite the discomfort, I learned that living outside my comfort zone was an important and effective way to force myself to grow. It was during this monumental time that I began to see a shift in my growth mindset. My principal saw potential in me and encouraged me to work toward my next steps in education, which would mean obtaining my master's degree. I had often voiced that I wanted to work toward instructional leadership, and she continued to push me in the direction to reach my goal. 

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Impacting Learning

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Over the course of my program, I have developed several skills and initiatives. The entire foundation of my study centers around building upon my innovation plan, where I aim to provide a blended environment. Blended learning has been shown to enhance student engagement, personalize learning experiences, and foster critical skills like communication and creativity (McKoy & Merry, 2022). Although I had already been known to follow a blended learning model, my studies and learning experiences allowed me to reflect on and analyze the most effective tools for digital learning environments. My past attempts at developing a blended instructional setting resulted in sub-par learning products in contrast to what I was able to develop after learning  how to create significant learning environments. With this new knowledge, I was able to improve my strategies to instruct and design online learning. Learning should not be just about measuring how much students know, but allowing students to explore meaningful and authentic learning experiences where they are provided opportunities to create and collaborate with others.

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The Balancing Act

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With great success, also came some serious moments of struggle. The most challenging part of my learning process was navigating the difficulties of time management. There were many late nights and plenty of time spent away from my family while I worked my way through this program. It was important to develop a schedule where I could effectively work on my learning and growth while also juggling responsibilities from working full-time and needing to find time to spend with my family and relaxing to recharge. 

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Waves of Emotion​

Working through the courses of this program has led me on a roller coaster of emotions. In the beginning, I was so excited to start this journey to further my education. I immediately dove right in. As quickly as the excitement started, the feelings of overwhelm, anxiety, and self-doubt came to join! I had so many thoughts. Would I be successful in carrying out my assignments? Was I even smart enough? How would I complete everything? I started in the summer, but shortly after the new school year would be starting. At times I felt frustrated with a lack of ideas. While completing reflections on my learning, my confidence began to build as I continued to receive feedback from my learning community and instructors. As I continued and gained more confidence, I was inspired to take what I was learning and implement these ideas in my classroom to help create a more engaging environment that gives my students more ownership.

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Digital Footprint​

Although a large portion of this program is spent on creating significant learning environments by leveraging technology as a tool, there was a huge emphasis on growing as an effective leader. I learned skills like how to influence others by appealing to people’s hearts instead of only their minds and how to create effective professional learning opportunities that are given over a significant period of time, provide ongoing support, and are tailored to meet teacher specific needs.

 

With all of these completed projects, I am most proud of my ePortfolio, Elevating Tech in Primary, which allows me to share my hard work and learning with others. My ePortfolio also allows me to reflect on everything I’ve learned and show how much I’ve grown from the earlier stages of my learning to where I am now.

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Built to Learn, Designed to Succeed​

There were many aspects of this program that worked well for me. We had opportunities for live sessions with our instructors. Although I could not make all of these sessions, I was able to watch the recordings during a time that worked for me. This way I still was able to receive the instruction to guide my learning. When completing an online graduate program, you might think it would be lonely or there would be a lack of support. On the contrary, I learned the importance of developing a core group of peers that could work together and be available when needed to collaborate and bounce ideas off of. As I was reading about the benefits of collaborative work for a literature review, I was validated by the experiences of others. Students in other blended settings shared that having the support of their peers provided support by hearing that other students experienced similar struggles. Together they were able to lean on each other to grow in their learning (Loots & Posthumus, 2023).  In addition to my smaller learning group, I had access to a large group of my peers with the use of Group Me. Being able to give feedback on the work of others also helped me develop ideas for myself to improve my own work. I learned so much from them as we all took the time to share our work with each other. Please consider exploring the work of my talented colleagues.

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