What did I learn?

I am really grateful that I have gotten to take this technologies skills class. I have never felt very confident with anything other than "copy and paste" before this class. Now I feel like I can include a lot of technology in my future classroom. This will be very helpful in my goal of not being the boring history teacher that just lectures with a PowerPoint sides the whole time. Now I can incorporate videos, podcasts, recordings, google maps, etc. Hopefully it will help me as a teacher to better reach out to all my students. Everyone learns differently and so having various mediums through which they can study and learn history will benefit everyone. I was really excited about learning how to make videos and podcasts. I had actually had a history class previously in which the professor gave us the option of doing a podcast instead of writing a paper. I had no idea how to do a podcast and he didn't explain it to us, which made me so bummed that I was stuck writing a paper. But now, thanks to the mini projects I can do it. Plus, I have realized that I can figure out how to do other such projects as well. Now I will be able to give assignments where students get to do videos, websites, blogs, podcasts, etc because I will be able to explain to them how to do it. Reading is great and so important, but sometimes doing, creating, and seeing things makes the material a lot more memorable and real. I'm glad that I now know a little bit more about how to effectively and safely use technology in the classroom.