POST #1: Introductions and Sharing Your Past Experience

I am a first grade teacher at a Catholic school in Monticello, Iowa.  I have taught first grade for ten years.  I have used Book Flix in my classroom but I haven't used the other Iowa AEA online resources.  With my class, we would discuss and compare the different books on Book Flix.  I would also incorporate some of the stories into science and social studies.  After taking this course, I have learned about other features of Book Flix which I am excited to incorporate in to my classroom.  This course has also taught me about some of the other online resources that I am excited to share in my classroom.  I am excited to use some of the resources to show videos in my classroom.   This will come in handy for science discussions.  I also love the idea of receiving credit on my own time and at my own pace.

I currently am an elementary talented and gifted teacher. I am split between 2 buildings. I service students K-5.
In the past I have utilized some of the AEA resources. I have used Culturegrams with students to research countries and I have used bookflix for background knowledge. I have also used Britannica online for research purposes.
I wanted to take this course because I wanted to learn about all of the resources and I felt this would give me an overview of them and how I can better use the resources.

Presently I work at Parks Marina/Okoboji Boats during the summer and on weekends during the school year.  During the school year I sub at Harris-Lake Park, Okoboji, Spirit Lake, Estherville, Emmetsburg, Ruthven, and Graettinger-Terril. In those schools I sub in preschool through 12th grade.  Before that I taught and coached in Graettinger, then Graettinger-Terril.  At PM and OBW, I have a wide range of tasks that I perform from driving the Tiki Bus to building dock. In the school systems that I sub in, my role has been a sub for the day to a long-term sub.  I have also subbed as a coach and driven the bus to events and as a substitute driver.

While teaching at Graettinger and Graettinger-Terril for 20+ years, I did use the AEA services.  Early in my career I used films, videos, and book boxes.  When Graettinger-Terril went 1:1, my use of AEA Online Services was sporadic at best.  I remember using clipart, but my memory fails me to other uses.  Since I started subbing, this is my third self-paced class.  While subbing, teachers have left videos for me to show their students and various projects using clipart, AP Images, and the Digital Library to work on.

I presently have an opportunity to get back into teaching full time.  This class interested me for two reasons.  I needed renewal credits quick, on my schedule and I needed to get myself educated as to what the AEA Online has to offer.  In order teach in today's classroom, the AEA Online Services discussed not only need to be used, but also used as described. Plus, taking it now gets you thinking about lessons and had several good do's and don'ts in using copyright properly.

I'm Lisa Dumler, a third grade teacher at Southdale Elementary School in Cedar Falls.  I am excited to begin my 4th year at Southdale.  Prior to that, I taught most recently in Waterloo at Kingsley and Lou Henry.  Most of my experience has been teaching third grade.  I've taught for 21 years.  

I've seen the AEA change in so many ways over the course of my career.  In my early years, it was an easy and quick source for enhancing my instruction with video, especially as I worked so close to Cedar Falls.  I've taken courses and professional development as well.  As technology changed, so did the AEA.  I knew I wasn't keeping up with what was being offered.

I decided to take this online class this summer to learn about the current resource offerings so I can offer them to my students for safe and appropriate research and to offer more reading choice.  This class has exceeded my expectations and I am excited to use other resources as well and look at new online course offerings for my future learning.

I have taught 19 years at SEP High School.  I am a Physical Education teacher.  

I have completed some of our required training on-line and have taken a blended class from AEA.    

I know that AEA has wonderful on-line resources for educators/students, and I wanted to learn more about them and possible uses for my classes.  I am also taking this class for recertification.

My name is Joseph, I am a retired community college counselor.  I worked for a local community college for over 20 years, before retiring from higher education.  During the time I worked at the community college, I taught human potential, study skills, career exploration courses.  I was also coached 5th and 6th grade football for a local program for over 20 years which I stopped during after I retired.  I have coached basketball at all levels except Division I and Division II.  Since retiring, I have been a volunteer at Williams Intermediate school in Davenport for a 6th grade math class.  From my involvement in the class, I became a guest teacher.  I have been substitute teaching now for the last three years.  I am also the 7th grade Boys Football coach, and 7th grade girls basketball coach at Williams Intermediate School.  
My initial contact with AEA Online was to complete courses needed to be hired as a coach in the Davenport Community School District.  I was not aware of the other courses offered by AEA until I had to complete two credits to renew my substitute teaching authorization.  Since I had to take the two credit hour courses, I felt it would be good to know what all AEA offered Online that I may be able to use when I am in the classroom as a substitute teacher and as a coach.  There are a lot of similarities between the two and I wanted to take advantage of what AEA has to offer that I would be able to use when working with youth.

1) I have been teaching Elementary PE for the past 7 years.
2) I do not have any experience with the Iowa AEA Online resources.
3) The reason I am taking this class is the fact that the course was self-paced and available now. After reading the course description, I thought that this course would be a great way for me to get used to online resources that are available to educators and find ways to integrate the information into my PE classes.

I have been a teacher in Des Moines Public Schools for the past 18 years.  I have taught 11 years of ELL, 2 years of 3rd grade, and 5 years of 2nd grade.  I am currently teaching ELL for all grades k-5.  During my time as a classroom teacher, I used Book Flix quite often at the end of the day.  I also had it available during reading centers so that students could listen to books independently that they otherwise would not have the opportunity to hear.  I had heard about Culture Grams, but had very little experience with using it.  The AEA has so many neat programs that, as a full time teacher and mom, I never had time to experiment with what was all available.  I needed to have someone show me and take me step by step through each program.  I plan to take what I have learned and pass this onto other teachers in my building.  My school does have a very large amount of English Language Learners, so having the access to so many visuals and videos is just amazing!  I can see me using multiple different programs to help them to deepen their understanding of books and activities happening in their every day lives!

My name is Lora Earnest and I have taught Spanish for 23 years. Currently, I am hired by the Louisa-Muscatine School District and I need to take a few classes before my license expires in December.  It is difficult to find relevant continual ed. classes for foreign language teachers, so I often take tech. classes hoping to walk away with something new to use in my classroom.  Last year, my annual "smart" goal involved implementing more technology into my instruction and I will likely focus on this goal again for the coming year.  

I have used EBSCO and GALE in the past, but I did not access these databases through the AEA website.  I have also taken a few self-paced courses (ELL training & mandatory reporter classes) though the AEA website.
As of now, I think I will use the AEA website to introduce my students to the online resource, Cultural Grams. The Learn 360 resource also continues many videos on Incas, Mayas, and Aztecs.  Many of these videos are likely available on U Tube too, but I like the filter function found on Learn 360.    

I am an Instructional Design Strategist in the Cedar Rapids Community School District.  I have worked in this role for the past 9 years, prior to this position I taught K,1,2,3 and 4th grades in the CR schools as well.  I began learning about AEA Online resources when I was in the classroom.  At that time I predominately used EBCSCO, Searchasaurus, and Book Flix.  These resources helped me support research projects in my classroom. Over the past 9 years, I have trained and supported staff with Culture Grams, Book Flix, and some parts of the AEA Digital Library.  My hope is to use these resources during our Friday PD trainings, in small doses, introducing one a week or two. Additionally, I have served both informally and formally now this year as the building technology trainer, so I am ofter utilized as a resource for integrating technology into our classrooms.

I am currently working in the Red Oak Community Schools as a 4th-8th Grade General Music/Choir Teacher. This is my first year of returning to full-time teaching in 8 years, as I chose to step away from teaching after 13 years to become a stay-at-home mom.  

Prior to taking this course, I have had no experience to using Iowa AEA Online resources, but a colleague of mine was extremely excited with what the AEA had to offer through these resources, and I made the decision to take this course to help expand my knowledge base of what the AEA has to offer.

Outside of my colleague's suggestion to take this course, I decided that this course interested me because it would hold some great suggestions into incorporating music technology into my classroom during the course of this school year.  

* My name is Sindy Kafka and I am currently at Kindergarten teacher at Roosevelt Elementary in Council Bluffs, IA. My role includes not only being a teacher for the district but also being a model for the district, specifically in math.
* I have only worked with the green hills AEA and have ordered books from them. I anticipated learning more about what they have available. I have not had much experience with AEA online.
* As I stated above, I thought this was specifically about GHAEA and not the online resource.

I am currently  teaching special education at the Solon Community School District. I have been teaching special education for over 20 years.  Solon is my third school in Iowa that I have taught at. I have taught level one to level three students with many different disabilities.
I have not taken many courses over the past years from the Iowa AEA on line. I have taken the Mandatory Reporter, and Giving Medication classes recently. I enjoyed their self-paced classes. I value that I can go at my own rate.
I have always tried to incorporate media into my classes, but was unaware of all the material that is available. I was amazed to learn of all the media service that are available through the Iowa AEA web page. I am constantly looking for ways to improve my teaching and gaining the interest of my students.

I retired a couple of years ago from teaching at the elementary level and am currently a substitute teacher.  I am interested in finding activities (when needed) that correlate to the teacher's lessons plans. In most cases teachers have time to prepare for their leave, but I find that when leave is spur of the moment it is more difficult for the teacher to have a comprehensive lesson plan. I have also done some long-term positions and this resource would make it easier to create my own lessons as well.  Instead of finding materials from around the school I would like to be able to quickly find an online activity that enhances what the class is studying. Incorporating available technology would keep the interest of the class on the lesson. As most teachers in my district use AEA Online resources at some point during the year, the students are familiar with getting on and navigating the website. I have used some of the programs, such as BookFLIX and Britannica in the past and found them easy and interesting to use.  This self-paced course fits perfect into my busy life. It allows me to work around family, substituting, and activities without having a specific schedule.

I have worked for the Atlantic Comm. School district for 15 years as a para educator. I've worked in many different classrooms over the years and am now in the Media Center at Washington Elementary School, PK-3. (this will be my third year in the media center). My role is pretty self explanatory, I help students and teachers with finding books/resources and help with the two computer labs, and many, many more duties.  I am seeing more and more use by the teachers and students of the AEA Online resources. I myself haven't used it, but now after taking this class I can see the many advantages of it. That is why I took the class. I want to better understand what it has to offer. I have watched the classes in our computer labs use Britannica for their research papers and found it very interesting.  I have also shown my granddaughter the BookFLIX and Britannica.  She really liked the videos of animals and birds. I am really amazed at how much is available to the students and staff.  Our school may not use all of it right now but there is a lot of useful information for them in the future.

I work at BGM High School as a special education paraprofessional. I have worked here off and on for 6 years, coming back to work this year after taking 2 years off to stay home with my children. My role is to assist students in general education classrooms, as well as in the special education classroom. I needed to take a 1 credit class to renew my sub license and after looking through the options I chose this class because I have very little experience with AEA online material. AEA online material interested me because I thought that the resources may be beneficial to the special education students that I work with. I thought that it would be good to see what the AEA had to offer and I am very pleased with what I have come to learn. I love that there are resources to fit every level and that they are often presented in ways that will hold students' interest.

For the past 20 years, I have been teaching at St. Thomas Aquinas School in Webster City.  During my tenure there, I have taught grades 1, 4, 5 and 6.  I had not had much experience with AEA online until I began teaching first grade a few years ago.  I discovered Book Flix and enjoyed the pairing of fiction and non fiction children's books.  I was interested in taking this course because I am not extremely fluent with technology, and wanted to  discover ways to find and save books/videos for classroom use  I also appreciate being able to earn license renewal credit online and at my own pace.

I currently work at BGM High School as a special education para. My current role is helping special education students in general education classrooms, as well as in the special education classroom. I go to several general education classes and help the students in there with their assignments, note taking, understanding directions, writing, etc. Inside the special education classroom I assist the teachers and students as well. Prior to this class I did not have much experience at all with the Iowa AEA Online resources. I vaguely knew about them but had never used them. I was interested in taking this course because I wanted to familiarize myself with the resources that are available to me and the students that I work with. I did not have much experience with the AEA online resources and I thought that taking this class would be a great way to familiarize myself with what they have to offer.

I have taught for 20 years as a special education teacher and this is my 3rd year as a Title Reading teacher.  I have taught summer school for two years as well.  I have used Britannica School a little bit while helping kids with their History Fair projects every year.   I have been blown away by what resources are available.  I often help students with research papers and history fair and realize how much I have under-utilized Iowa AEA Online.  I knew there were more resources available and opted to take this as a recertification class to learn more about these resources.  

My past education history has included 22 years of experience as a PK-12 Physical Education Instructor, 7-12 Health Instructor, Elementary Principal, and Superintendent of Schools in NW Iowa.  I currently am teaching Drivers Education courses privately in the Spirit Lake, Okoboji, and Spencer areas.  I am also employed with a business located in Spencer.

My past experiences with AEA resources has been limited to films, movies, vcr and dvd's for my classroom use.  

I was interested in the course for several reasons.  I have been looking for new materials for the subject matter of drivers education such as distracted driving.  Most of the updated information of current issues are online.  I wanted to gain information how to access and be able to legally use the information in my classroom.  Another reason for taking the course is it will fulfill my renewing credits for my teaching license.
I liked this class because it gave my several ideas and ways to bring more information to the classroom rather than just lecturing.  It will add  a great deal to my powerpoint presentations by adding videos and resources for future assignments.  I was really amazed to all of the online resources that the AEA has to offer.