I recently took a MOOC – Massive Open Online Course – given by Shelly Sanchez Terrell, an ESL educator and tech guru. The course was Goal-Minded Teacher and talked about learning theories, gamification and more, all with technology integration. For a look at my coursework, please visit my Goal Minded Teacher blog.

Why did I take the course?

• I have a lot of respect for Shelly Sanchez Terrell and the ideas that she shares with teachers.
• I wanted to delve into new ideas for tech integration.
• I wanted to set some goals and reflect on my own teaching practices.

It was actually more work than I anticipated, and a bit of a challenge to keep up with the tasks. But I managed, and enjoyed every bit of my learning. I’m hoping to put to use some of the tech integration ideas next year, such as gamification and awarding of badges.

The one area that might be potentially problematic is the collaborative planning that I did with two other teachers – one in Italy and one in Spain. We were going to ask students to create posts on artists of our own regions. The problem lies in certain restrictions that we may have in terms of avodah zarah and others. It would be difficult to explain to fellow teachers that my school had certain requirements that they might not understand. I would consider collaborating with another religious school with the same hashkafah as ours, however. As always, teaching is an interesting journey.

The badge that I earned for this course can be viewed at: Goal Minded Badge Post