EDT Final Reflection Paper

Looking over all the previous reflections I have done, it looks like there are many

common themes throughout. The first is that if I were to start over, I would not have

procrastinated so much. The second theme is that I should have asked for help from peers sooner

and asking the teacher the questions I had instead of waiting, hesitating and not asking, so I

didn’t always have clarity. The third is that I had not considered the source in a real-world use

until asked at the end, causing much thinking. I have also found that time management in general

is a crucial piece of projects and assignments in college, especially when given two weeks to do

them. Wasting time can be fun in the moment but detrimental to projects and grades. I was not

surprised by most of what I learned, except that I was not awful at everything technology related.

Some of the problems I encountered were all my fault or lead back to my

miscommunications. I did not always ask for help as soon as I should have and did not always

take into consideration my peers or teachers’ advice fully. I also did not always remember every

due date or assignment, but it ended up working out in the end, with the teachers help. I have

also found that balancing the schedule of homework from many classes at once can be hard,

especially when they are all due on the same day. Time management truly is necessary and hard

to figure out. One of my other teachers gave me advice on this several weeks ago, when I was

stressed and depressed with all my workload. She said that multitasking is not the answer, start

with the easiest assignment and get it done, then move on to the next one and the next one. It

calmed me down and I got to work, I ended up completing all that I had to and most of the

assignments ended up being sent in early (and I got A’s on all of them). I think that it is

important to take others advice when it is helpful and good.

 Originally, I thought learning with technology would be impossible, no way and no

chance I would understand any of it. Then I thought it was going to be simple, then back to

impossible. Now that I am at the conclusion of the semester and this class, I believe that

technology can be very useful and helpful with the proper guidance and patience, but that it can

also still be very challenging. Not everyone is good at every type of thing, like baseball or music,

it is the same with technology.

In the beginning, like I have stated previously, I procrastinated a lot, waiting until it was

almost too late to ask for help. Now, when I get stuck, I am much more willing to ask my peers

and the teacher for help. I also start further in advance, which helps with better quality work and

time management. Stress is common in all assignments and due dates, but it has been much less

with the more experience that I have gotten and does not show up as obviously in my work.

I have been very impressed with the quality of the work of my classmates. Isabel and

Citlalli and I have peer reviewed almost every assignment of each other’s. I have seen that they

might struggle in verbal presentations but pass with flying colors on slide shows/power point

presentations. They use unique and colorful decoration choices, making each slide in each

presentation look diverse, but they unify them at the same time. I would love to be able to do a

project with them to find out how they do what they do. They also added lots of cute little icons

or images that relate to their topic which helps visually make it ascetically pleasing.

My favorite project was probably the construction module. The purpose of the

assignment was to help a user come to a decision on the topic of your choice. I picked the topic

of whether to donate to charity and if so which one. I gave the user the option, then it took them

to six choices of my main favorite groups that not only take donations, but some accept and need

volunteer work too. Before the assignment I had not known how to make a power point
interactive in that way. It was really neat, and I plan to apply that to projects and other

assignments of the future.

For next semester my goal is to not be as scared and determined to avoid the professor. I

plan to start my work long before it is due and give it my best effort. Another goal for next

semester is stressing less. I tried to remind myself throughout this semester that all I can do is my

best and that must be good enough, you can’t worry about it past then. I did not always follow

my own advice, but when I did, I felt much more together, less scrambled and stressed.

Some of the assignments in this class were harder than others, however something can be

learned from each one and experience. This has helped my experience with technology probably

double from what it was and has opened a metaphorical new door to my curiosity about

technology. That was what I gained the most from this class.

This semester overall went well and even better than expected. Procrastination was a

problem at some points, but much less than it has been in previous years. This class has started to

teach me new skills that may be helpful in the future and or as a future educator. I had not known

how to use excel or weebly.com or audacity, I hadn’t heard of two out of three of them, now I

understand some of the basics. I have also learned more about different styles of teaching and

technology and over all how to use helpful advice. Additionally, I have discovered that asking

for help can be scary and so can having to make adult decisions, but that we must in order to live

this life. Technology can help better our world if taught and used properly but can be a challenge

and must be brought about the right way.