Hayam+Arafa


 * Name: Hayam Mohamed Ebrahim Arafa**

__**Project Experience**__
When we were asked to do a project, I was very frightened as this was the first time to do a project in my life. In our schools and colleges we were used to having a test at the end of each term. Tests were easy as they depended on memorization and recalling information. I was nervous and confused as I didn't expect to achieve any progress or success. First, we were divided into groups. Each group consisted of four members. I was lucky to share my project with three excellent colleagues Niveen, Hanan and Abir. The project was to design a unit plan applying the backward design. We had to choose what the unit will be about after thinking we decided that tourism would be an excellent subject. It is one of the subjects that are related to students' daily life. We read an article about the backward design it wasn't an easy article, so **Dr. Mervat** kindly explained it in details. We began to understand what is meant by smart objects and we had universal standards for our educational objectives. The second step was to use the wiki. To tell the truth I had no idea about the wiki although some of my colleagues know it well and use it. This made me very desperate and hopeless but luckily one of our lectures was cancelled because of the disorder in Tahrir square. We had to have an online lecture; this was my first step to recognize the wiki. Although some colleagues didn't like this lecture but I was as happy as I used the wiki, it was a practical lesson to me. I could use the wiki before working on the project. * Then we began to work on the wiki. We had to write everything. Then we chose the best of our work and agreed on it after our discussions then we finished. I believe that every one of us respects his colleague's point of view. That's why I think we are a good team. I think that stage 1 was the most difficult stage. It needed more effort than the other stages writing our established goals and essential questions were not easy. After writing those three or four times, we modified them to be smart. Sometimes we go back and do something again and again. I think that stage 2 and 3 were easier to handle, Maybe because we got used to. I really liked the way we organized our work. I believe that one of the main purposes of the projects which is to work collaboratively and we used one type of technology tools (wikis) for planning for teaching: The most important of all is that we are able now to plan a teaching unit based on the backward design and apply active learning strategies. I learnt that planning out how we do things before doing them is something essential in any projects. I also learnt to take notes to save time. Frankly I believe this project was a very valuable experience personally and professionally. It was a great way for me to apply everything we read about and everything we learnt in class in a real situation.

**Reflection on digital natives and digital immigrants** == Marc Prensky used two metophors which I think were so smart. He called young students "generation" as "digital natives" and called old people as "digital immigrants".== * He talked about two gaps. The first one is between the curriculum and the students who changed completely and therefore the curriculum doesn't suit them any longer. This gap happened due to the fast "rapid" dissemination of digital technology in the last decades of the 20th century. ==The second gap is between the old and the young. The young now grow up with the new technology – they spent most of their time in front of the computers – they know and use all tools of the digital age. That’s why Marc Prensky called them digital natives.== Today students think and get information differently from us. This means that their brains are different from ours – they used to get the information so fast. They preferred games. They have new skills which we haven't acquired yet. He referred to us as "digital immigrants". We are learning new technology as a second language not a native one – We are speaking an outdated language and trying to teach people who speak a totally new language. For natives the learning of technology equals fluency – No translation is needed, while immigrants have to struggle hard to use the new technological tools. Digital immigrant teachers think that they can use the same methods that worked in the past with their students now, but they are mistaken because students now are different, so we should change our methods to suit our digital natives otherwise we would lose their attention. == **For me, I think that I am trying to learn the technological tools. I know I am not as skillful as my students but I am trying hard to remain a competent professional. I know that I will be always a step behind in dealing with digital but one step is better than three. That's why I joined this diploma to improve myself and to know new technological tools which I really begin to acquire. I wish by the end of my study in the AUC I would be able compete my students.** ==

Marc Prensky asked a very important question:
"Should the digital native students learn the old ways or should the immigrant educators learn the new?" of course our students couldn't use the old ways, so we have to learn the new ways to integrate with them. We should also modify both our content and Methodology. We should learn their language to strengthen our relationship with them. == **Teachers need to have adequate training to use technology in classrooms. You know some immigrants are frightened of even touching the technological tools. This fearsome shouldn't last. Every teacher should pass ICDL test and have training every now and then.** == I believe in the statement the article made about students being able to learn 100 pokemon names. I suppose this proves that by relating information to a child's interests they are much more likely to retain information. It is a good way of transmitting information. I agree with Marc that we have to change our methodology to meet our students' needs. Immigrant should also be able to teach the "Future content" which includes software, hardware, nanotechnology …… etc. But are immigrants able to teach the future content. This won't happen unless we acquire the technological skills. The future content shouldn't be separated from the "legacy content" which contains reading, writing, arithmetic, logical thinking ……etc. We need to teach both contents in the language of digital natives. The gap between us and our students should be closed. **I think I am teaching legacy content plus future content but I need more trainings to be skillful in the future content to share my students their language "The language of their age".** ==

== __ **Hayam E-portfolio** __ ** The cover **Name: **Hayam Mohamed Ebrahim** School: **Mohammadia experimental language school** **Job:** English teacher   **Years of experience:**19 years

Welcome to my E-Portfolio page, these are examples of my trials to apply active learning. I know I am not the best but I am trying to apply modern technology in my teaching methods to cope with the technological revolution. I know that we have problems and difficulties such as the packed curriculums and parents who only care about grades and marks in the final exams. We also have "minds" which don't accept new or creative ideas.

But I think we should change all this by hard work and patience. We should show evidence of integration of knowledge and skills through various demonstrations of performance. We should try for the sake of the next generation. I chose these six artifacts which I hope you would like. 1. My philosophy about teaching. 2. A power point presentation. 3. Certificates and awards  4. Lesson plan. 5. The question performance. 6. A Debate





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== ** Lesson Plan ** ** The problems of tourism In Egypt ** **__ Objectives: __** ====== 1. To read different texts to demonstrate understanding and critically interpret the main factors for having neglected places in Egypt. ====== 2. To compare between tourism before and after 25th Jan revolution. ====== 3. To encourage group and pair discussions about the obstacles of tourism. To be able to ask and answer questions about tourism and participate in full-class discussion. ====== 4. To plan different projects to attract tourists to visit Egypt using technology to search and collect data. **__ Material used: __** ====== Pictures/PowerPoint presentation and a video from you tube. **__ Procedures: __** ====== - ** Warming up **. If you were the minister of tourism, what problem would you solve first? **Activity 1** ====== To distribute pictures for touristic neglected places and other famous places. To discuss the problems facing these places and why these places don't attract tourists and what are their recommendations. ====== Other groups discuss why the other places attract tourists. **Activity 2** ====== Groups have reading texts about the obstacles of tourism then after reading the text. They have to write invitation cards to tourists. They also can design a brochure and sent it with the invitation. **Activity 3** ====== Students work in groups. They talk about some of the tourist attraction in their area. ====== E.g. a museum, a park, zoo …. Etc. ====== Everyone in the group chooses one attraction (E2), and then each one writes a report about his opinion. ====== * Students read their reports and other students decide whether they agree or disagree (R, E2). **Activity 4** ====== Students watch a you tube's video about the problems of tourism after 25th Jan. revolution (E). ====== Compare tourism before and after 25th Jan revolution. ====== Describe two suggested solutions for tourists' problems which can help to encourage more tourists to visit Egypt. **Assessment** ====== 1. Students exchange their invitation cards and brochures and decide the best invitation. ====== 2. Students prepare a PowerPoint activity about a place they would like to go mentioning the advantages of it, the possible obstacles and possible solutions.