Contributions to Learning Summer 2023

In the Summer of 2023, I had the opportunity to start my Masters journey with Lamar University. Currently I served as a Special Education teacher in my district, and in the future, I hope to serve as an instructional technology coach for special education students and teachers. I was enrolled in two classes in the Applied Digital Learning (ADL) program. The first course was called Applying Educational Technology ePortfolio, where I was able to build the starting point of my authentic ePortfolio. The second course I took was called Disruptive Innovations in Technology where I was able to build an authentic innovation plan. My innovation plan is called ePortfolio in the ABLE classroom.

Self-Reflection: Applying Educational Technology ePortfolio

Score: 94/100

Throughout my entire educational journey, I have always enjoyed assignments that included creating something due to my creativity and enjoyment for doing so. With that being said this summer was no different, and I had found myself relating back to this course and focusing on my ePortfolio rather than other assignments I needed to be working on. I was not able to be as involved as I would have, for example responding to discussion post that my peers had created. I was able to create my own discussion as the summer went by, but I could have left more responses for my peers on growth and feedback of their learning. As I continue my educational journey and career ahead being able to build on something that I am able to create and design will be my motivation to continue to grow and expand the authentic project that I was able to start this summer while providing my peers feedforward on their personal educational growth.

Self-Reflection: Disruptive Innovations in Technology

Score: 42/50

Being an autistic adult, I am a big advocate and supporter for children and adults with different abilities. Everything I do is to help this population of individuals become better and more adaptable to the society we live in. When I first started the disruptive innovation course, I was asked to come up with a topic that I would like to explore deeper. My first topic was involving being more involved in the learning for homebound students. After talking with my professor, I started thinking about a resource that my students can start in my classroom, and can build on through their educational journey into adulthood. I came up with building an authentic ePortfolio to assist them in communication beyond the classroom.

While I loved the ePortfolio class I did this summer as well, I feel that I gave more attention to the ePortfolio than I did my innovation plan. I could have done a better job with my time management, and giving more attention to my disruptive innovation course. The Fall 2023 semester I am hoping to make a more detail schedule using my calendar to give equal time to all of the courses I am taking instead of putting more attention to one class.

During both of my classes I had a collaboration community where we shared ideas, projects, and stories. In this group we were also able to give each other feedback/ feedforward to each other on many assignments, projects, and life obstacles. My collaborative community included Katie B., Ashley K., Paul S., Jane B., and myself. I was able to communicate meeting time ideas, created meeting schedules through the Zoom platform, suggested meeting at a place at the midpoint of all members, and creating a thread that was accessible to all community members through GroupMe. Katie had volunteered to be our note taker when we met as a group where she used Google Docs. Ashley was always there to keep our members up to date with websites that could assist the other group members and I in ways to improve our writing and projects using APA. Overall, the members of my collaborative provided a positive and helpful environment.