Where Did This Start?

Where Did This Start

“Direction.” This was the focus of a letter of intent that I wrote for admission to the M.Ed. program just three short years ago. That letter served to defend my lackluster undergraduate grades and provided evidence that I should be included in the third online cohort that was being formed. As it turned out, what I wrote about back before I began this program is still very relevant to my educational journey today. Without direction I remained right where I was and my journey ended, but with some direction my journey would continue.

Many of my colleagues suggested that I do more work with technology, because I seemed to have a “knack” for it, but I felt as though I had a hard time keeping pace with my own children and students when it came to new innovations. I looked to this program to help me achieve the goals of growing as an educator and developing myself as a professional within educational technology. Many times a technology director is a secondary assignment for teachers at a small school, so job security in an unstable economy was also a consideration. All of these reasons helped me to decide to apply for the Curriculum and Instructional Technology program here at Iowa State, and my journey in education had a new direction.

I have always felt as though students are the most important stars on my team, and technology is the tool that is used to support those stars. Our world is technological in nature, and students thrive within the global culture of portable media, blogs, social sites, and cell phones. Teachers can either adapt to the changes, or allow the generational technology gap to increase. I wanted to learn, adapt, and stay mobile as technology evolved. I wanted to help make technology useful and meaningful, not trendy or gadget-like. I had always been intrigued by the novelty behind some of the world’s technology, but I longed for a deeper, more practical understanding of its use in the world of education.

One of my first explorations of instructional design models included a look at an alternative model, R2D2: Recursive, Reflective Design and Development. This model, based on constructivist-interpretivist theory, provided a non-linear alternative to the behaviorist ID models. This recursive and reflective concept was the ideal model for my approach to this reflective paper. Instead of taking the performance indicators in order or looking at artifacts in a sequential order by the classes I took, I looked at them from a development point of view and reflected on the growth that I saw within the program. Being a math teacher, this was new and challenging for me, but the direction it gave me has made all the difference.