POST #1: Introductions and Sharing Your Past Experience

This is my 8th year as a public educator in Iowa. While I spent my first 5 years as a 4th- and 5th-grade Science and Reading teacher at the elementary level, I am currently serving as a 6th-grade Science teacher at Washington Middle School in Washington, Iowa. Throughout my years of teaching, I have used several resources that the AEA offers, but they were limited to renting DVDs and supplemental curriculum, and attending trainings, mostly for our FOSS kits. I thought I was familiar with the AEA and its educational resources; however, I was unaware of the wide variety that the AEA offered despite my preconceived notion coming into the course. I saw this course offering, and decided that I should become more familiar with the resources that the AEA has, and how I can take advantage of them in my class. What I discovered was a plethora of new resources that could potentially be used!

I am a Family and Consumer Science teacher at ACGC Schools (Guthrie Center High School) and currently teach 9-12 grade.  I have been with the district for almost 28 years and am always looking for fresh, current ideas to add to my curriculum.  Through past inservice meetings, our district has been good about bringing in AEA resources.  Through these, I have picked up a few bits of information regarding online resources.  When signing up for this course, I was looking for new and refreshing ideas for my students.  Although I totally agree technology needs to be used, I also struggle (because of my content area) with creating a balance of hand-on projects and computer/technology projects within my classroom.  We are a 1:1 school and I know many of my students LOVE the latest technology so I feel it is my responsibility to teach them the right way to use it.  I also took this course because I think it is important to keep up with younger staff members and stay as relevant as possible.  

    I am a Family Consumer Science teacher at Columbus Catholic High School in Waterloo. I teach 9 trough 12 in Foods, Clothing, Independent Living and Child Development. I have been at Columbus for 18 years. I started my teaching career right out of college but then but was detoured to a banking career for 20 years. by the time i returned to teaching there were many changes including technology.
    I appreciate the AEA online learning to use for recertification, it is a very assessable and affordable option. I was considering retirement this year but because I love my school and students I have decided to continue teaching, but I have to get my credits finished and AEA online has made that very doable.
    Technology has always been a challenge for me, in the classroom I have so many hands on learning activities for my subject area I always opted for those instead of incorporating more technology than my school required. We have I-pads for all students and this year I have a huge Apple TV to use with my Laptop and I-pad. I have made Keynote presentations for all subjects and units and have imbedded some Learning 360 resources. I also took the Pinterest Online class which I enjoyed very much and have incorporated it into all my subject areas. It works wonderfully for Foods and Nutrition - organizing recipes and resources and Clothing - researching projects to complete. I am trying hard to try new ideas, and this class has so many great resources. I have to say my wonderful students help me quite often with tech problems so we are both enjoying the journey.

I am currently the high school art teacher at ADM High School in Adel. For the previous five years, I was the 6-12 grade GATE teacher at ADM.

My past experience with Iowa AEA Online Resources was using online research tools to help the GATE students I worked with research topics for National History Day. The bulk of that work was probably 3-4 years ago.

I am interested to see what is available as far as Art resources. I use a lot of images and video but would like the students to access history and research as it relates to art. I know that literacy has an important place in Art so I include speaking and writing in assignments as well as creating art. The historical, social, political and cultural implications of art are also important. I also think cross content learning is important. We have One-to-One computers starting this past fall so now that each student has consistent access to technology I would love to use more academic resources in my teaching. I also want to teach them about copyright by example.
I also use research based practices in my work so I was very happy to see those resources available through GALE’s Educator’s Reference Complete. It is important to educate those out of the art field about the importance of art in education as well as the impact on student learning overall.

I am a retired Teacher-Librarian.  Having spent 38 years teaching just about every subject at my school, I have returned to serve as the licensed teacher-librarian to fulfill the districts requirement for the state.  I am able to work whenever I choose. Fortunately, the district has hired a certified teacher who is being paid as a paraprofessional, who is super capable and handles all of the duties for our districts 3 libraries.

I have made use of the AEA's resources throughout the years I was an active teacher as well as the two years that I have been retired serving the role of the state license requirement.  I have always found that the free resources offered were timely and very useful.  It was always my goal to try to make all staff and students aware of these resources.  I think that is perhaps one of the most important goals of all teacher-librarians.  However, I have found with the staff reductions due to funding cuts, that this is sometimes a struggle.

This course interested me due to the fact that I felt a little out of touch since I had been retired for 5 years before returning to work.  A refresher on all the resources that are now offered was a positive for me. I also needed a recertification credit and therefore this class accomplished both objectives.

  For the past 2 years I have been the Pre-K - 12 Library Assistant for the IKM-Manning Schools's 3 libraries. My duties include the usual, customary duties of a person working in a library. I have a Standard Iowa teaching license but do my duties in the capacity of a Para-educator, because I do not have a Library Science Degree (endorsement) attached to my license. The Librarian I work with has been an invaluable resource to me; teaching and sharing everything she knows.

  My past experiences with the Iowa AEA online resources include iClipart, SIRS and Brittanica Online. I used those resources with my students at another school that I taught Reading/Language Arts at for 11 years.

  The topic of this course interested me because of my job as the Library Assistant. I think there are so many under-utilized resources that the AEA provides. I knew my knowledge was limited and figured if I were going to be able to share the resources, I'd need to know more about them.

I have been teaching 2nd grade for the past 11 years.  I teach all subjects and have a wide-range of student abilities in my class each year.  Before I was a 2nd grade teacher I was a reading teacher for one year and taught Kindergarten through third grades.  I have used the AEA online resources for BookFlix in the past, but I haven't used many of the other features that were mentioned in this course.  I was interested in taking this course because it is a free resource that is offered and one that many of my colleagues use and one that I wanted to know more about.  I’m amazed at how many resources are on the AEA website and ready for our use!  I appreciate all the hard work that was put into it and also the time/energy/money that it takes to keep it going.  I look forward to using TrueFlix and iClipart the most with my second graders!

I  teach Pre-K in Dubuque. I have been teaching this grade level for 19 years and have remained in the same school for all 19 years. I have had the privilege of teaching all five of my own children. I loved being their first teacher in a school setting and I wouldn't have changed it for anything!

I haven't had a whole lot of experience using the Iowa AEA online resources. I have a SmartBoard in my classroom, and have had one for many years. I do use it for calendar time, weather, graphing during large group time. I have used it during story time, but find any stories that I use on you tube. I also use the SmartBoard as a center, during center time using ABCya. This is why I was interested in learning more about the online resources through AEA. I had heard about BookFlix but had never used it or saw how it was used. From taking this course, I am now excited to incorporate this resource into my lessons!

I currently teach general music for 4th-8th grade at Fort Madison Middle School. A couple of times I looked up some videos to use in class from Learn 360. I was trying to find some student friendly videos about composers’ lives. I found a couple of things that would work for the younger students but would have been laughed at by the 7th and 8th graders. I think if I had spent some more time searching and using better search techniques, there would be a lot more for me to use. I am always trying to find ways of integrating technology into the classroom, as well as giving students experiences of music from around the world. We can’t go in person, but we could certainly visit virtually or see authentic videos of how music is presented around the world. I was interested in finding some resources that would help me expand my classroom while providing age-appropriate and copyright safe media for the classroom. I think this class gave me that opportunity to see what all is available and how I might use it.

I am currently a 5th grade Reading/Language Arts and Social Studies teacher in a small school district in New London. This is my 18th year of teaching, and I have taught a range from K-8th grade. I am the only 5th grade Reading and Language Arts teacher in the district. We have been lucky in the past to have some really great AEA librarians that have come and shared resources with the students. We do a lot of research projects in 5th grade, and research is something that the students really struggle with. I would like to become familiar enough with the AEA online content, that I can share it with them more comfortably. Also, I feel like the content is always changing, so I wanted to see what all there was on the website. The navigation has also changed a little. There are some really great resources, and I think it would make some of our research a little easier.

I have been a teacher and coach for the past 27 years.  I teach History and Theology.
 I was introduced to AEA online resources by our Media Specialist to use on some of the
projects I was doing in the classroom.  I think they have been beneficial to my projects.
I wanted to take this course to become more familiar to more of the resources that AEA has
to offer.  I enjoyed learning about the resources that I have not used and plan on incorporating
 them into my classroom

Hello!  My name is Grace Curren and I am a 2nd grade teacher at Harlan Community School District.  This is my sixth year of teacher in Harlan and my eighth year of teaching overall.  I have taught Title I and Special Education prior to teaching in the general education classroom.  The online course caught my attention because I know that the AEA offers a multitude of free resources to educators that are accessible across grade levels and content areas.  I desire to utilize these in my classroom to enhance student learning.  This course has given me a “tour” of what the AEA has to offer digitally.  As an educator, I can also be confident that the sites being endorsed contain legitimate information for students because they have been investigated by the AEA.  This is my first self-paced online course.  I appreciate how I can watch tutorials and explore the websites discussed at my own leisure.

My name is Chris Hull and I teach in the Tipton Community School District.  I am finishing my 12th year of teaching, the first 6 as an ECSE teacher and the last 6 as a teacher in a state fund preschool program.  Throughout the years our school media specialist has kept us informed on the various online resource offerings through the AEA.  Since I teach 3-5 year old students, I have tended to use the less heavy resources such as Bookflix.  I use Bookflix for read alouds in a large group format as well as a center during our choice time.  I was interested in this course to help further my knowledge of the resources available to me and my students.  I really enjoy using technology in my classroom and I wanted to make sure I was using what was available.  

     I am Lori Collingwood.  I teach at HLV Community School.  I have taught here for 35 years always in a self-contained fourth grade classroom except for one year when I was in second grade.   Generally our classes are single section with an occasional double section.  
     I have had two brief introductions to the AEA Online resources during professional development throughout my career.  Our past librarian supported our staff by working with students during their library time to teach them how to use some of the various resources.  She would ask the classroom teachers what we were working on in our classrooms so what she was teaching during library class would tie into what we were learning.    Recently she left our district, and we don't have anyone serving in that specific role.
     I know there are a wide variety of resources available, but didn't have time or take the time to explore more.  A professional goal of mine is to enrich and stimulate the classroom environment with more technology so I felt this class would be a great starting point.

I am currently teaching 2nd Grade at Spirit Lake Elementary School.  I have taught here for 10 years and love the district and direction we are going.  I teach Reading, Language Arts, and two classes of Science/Social Studies.  I have used Iowa AEA Online in my classroom for years.  My students each have a device so they will use BookFLIX and TrueFLIX daily for Listen to Reading stations.  They love the stories to watch and read along with.  I also incorporate them into mini lessons throughout the year.  I have also used Learn360 in my room.  I decided to take this course because a friend/co-worker had mentioned it to me and said they had learned some good stuff.  I found it to be helpful and refreshed me on what Iowa AEA Online has to offer.

When I completed my teacher education program and student teaching computer use in schools was in it's infancy.  Online resources like those provided by the AEA did not yet exist.  My introduction to online access was several years later when the school I taught at acquired a dial-up modem and allowed limited use of the internet .  I have spent the past 25 years working in private business and have become quite proficient in the use of technology for business and personal use.  I recently had the opportunity to return to teaching and had no experience with the Iowa AEA Online resources.  I was curious about what was available to enrich my classes.  I was amazed at what was available to me that could be used within guidelines at no cost.  The content is on many levels better produced and much more user friendly than most of the content I used at my previous job.  An added bonus in I now know how to access information that can be used by my own middle and high school aged children to enhance their education!

I am a teacher librarian at an elementary school.

I have used BookFLIX with my k-2 students to teach the differences of fiction and nonfiction.  I also use the James Marshal fairy tale book videos for an author study.  I have used Culturegrams and Brittanica the most with my 4th graders in doing research.  

I was interested in taking the course because I feel I haven't used the resources as much as I could.  There is so much to these resources and I needed a course to learn about them all.  

     I retired two years ago after a 43 year teaching career.  During most of this time I was a middle school teacher.  I taught TAG, English, social studies and 21st century skills.  Believe it or not, I am bored with retirement (!) and will go back to teaching half time in high school.
     I so wish that this had been available when I taught the TAG program years ago.  I think SIRS and GALE would have been particularly useful for students independent studies.  Also, it was difficult for them to find primary documents.  Culturgrams was GREAT for teaching social studies.  Students made some of the recipes for countries we were studying, we listened to the music and they really enjoyed seeing the stats of where the United States ranked among other countries in different areas.
  I will be teaching American literature, World literature, film study, and technical writing.The information on copyright will be very useful in all of these subjects.  I will also make use of the 360 films and Brittanica.