I just submitted all of my research to Touro University! I can't believe I'm finally done. This past year in the Innovative Learning Program has been crazy. It was a last minute decision to join the program with my friend/coworker and I'm so glad I did! I have learned so much from  my professors and my cohort. I feel like this year really challenged my teaching skills, in a good way. I learned not only different websites and tools to incorporate into my classroom, but also how to make it enhance my teaching. I am so lucky to have had the opportunity to learn and grow this past year. Thank you Touro and all of their amazing professors who helped me through this journey! 

Saelee:
As soon as you get to Saelee's website you know the audience is teachers. On her home page in her video she addresses teachers right away by saying "Teachers, are you tired of falling behind the cursed pacing guide?" When you go a little further into her website you see that it's not just teachers but Math teachers. I feel that she had a lot of visuals and even some videos. I did feel that the first page had a lot of writing on it but then I realized that it was reflecting her video. So if you did not want to read it, then the video was there for you to watch. Overall I thought she was very effective on presenting to her audience. 

Gottfried:
On Gottfried's page, you see that her audience is high school teachers. I thought at first it was specifically her peers at her high school then realized it was also for other high school teachers who would like to incorporate blogging into their classroom. I feel like Gottfried's page is really eye catching. I think she has a lot of really helpful visuals and videos. I specifically liked the "how to" videos. I think those could be really helpful to the teachers. Overall, I also think Gottfried was very effective on presenting to her audience. 

Ellison:
On Ellison's page, you can infer that her audience is elementary teachers. Based on some of her graphs that she posted on the first page, you see her data has 2nd through 5th grade. So I assume that her target audience is teachers who teach those grade levels. Her video on her first page had me a little confused because she started out her video saying "are you ready to level up your learning?" So I thought that maybe she was going to have her audience be her students, but then she starts talking about research and how teachers should use gaming in the classroom. Also, she has a video on her page that is almost an hour long. I think she could have picked out the most important parts of that video and made a shorter more engaging video OR just put a link to the video. I feel she was effective in giving information, but not as effective as the first two sites.

​Avrukin:
On Avrunkin's page, I notice that the home page does not have as much information as the previous websites I visited. I did see that her audience is teachers, but I'm not sure what grades. After viewing her "how to" videos, it sounds like she teaches high school. Her "how to" videos are really long and wordy. I feel that she should make the videos more "to the point" and then give more explanations in the writing about the videos. That is just my opinion though. I kept skipping parts of her video because she was telling stories within her videos. I also noticed that her "Learn More" page is really different from the others. She lists what's on each page of her website where the others sum up their research. I'm not sure if this website is as effective as the others. 

I am originally from Sacramento, California. I love to read and relax with my boyfriend and puppy, Gizmo. I am also a huge Disney fan! I go to Disneyland as often as I can. When I was younger I wanted to be a doctor. I always had a goal of helping people. When I got to college I did not want to go to school for years and years to become a doctor. So, I changed my career to being a nurse. I was currently working at Build-a-Bear Workshop and my grandma always told me that she thought I would make a great teacher. Though I was sure I would never be a teacher. After my first year of college I was baby sitting my friend's children and one of them got sick and I told my friend how grossed out I was. After she laughed and laughed (she still laughs to this day) she said to me "how are you going to become a nurse?!" She was right, I hate bodily fluids! How was I going to be a nurse? Well, that began my path to become a teacher. 
Six years ago my boyfriend asked me to join him at his house in small town called Dixon. This was such a change for me. Living in a big city for most of my life and moving to a small town was rough. But I got a job in Fairfield and I thought everything will be smooth from there. It wasn't. I was a temporary K-1 combo teacher, I had a rough first year. I had a great mentor who walked me through it. Next, I became a 1-2 combo teacher in Vacaville Unified School District. This is where I found my home. I then became a 3rd grade teacher for two years after that and I am currently a 2nd grade teacher for the 2nd year in a row. 
​I have only been teaching for 6 years now, but I felt like I needed more. A friend of mine had told me that she went to Touro University to get her Master's Degree. She loved this program! I kept putting it off, even after going to a meeting about the program. Then I was sitting at a PLC training in San Jose and my boss (the principal of my school) said to me, "Alicia, this is the best time for you to get your Master's. You do not have kids, you are still young, just go for it!" Another friend was sitting with us and I asked her if she would be willing to join me on this journey. She said yes and we went searching for the perfect fit for us. We found it with Tour University.
 This was the biggest leap and most rewarding experience for me as a teacher. I feel in a year I have grown more than I have in the last couple of years I have been teaching. I have been keeping a list of all the great ideas that have been shared within my cohort and that I have tried for my own classroom. Now my students are becoming 21st Century learners.
Before this journey I have been using technology, pedagogy, and content knowledge. The program has taught me how to combine all of these things called TPACK. I have learned how to match up my pedagogy and content knowledge with finding the correct or best technology to support the students. Finding that "sweet spot" that incorporates all of these things helps increase student motivation and makes the content accessible to all students. 

Sometimes I feel my goals are as simple as staying above water, don't drown. Right now my goal is to create a list of digital tools to use for next year. I want to make sure that I do not forget all that I have learned this year during my Master's Program. Because of this goal of mine it made me realize that my audience, who I originally thought would be my students, needs to be other teachers. I want to create a resource for teachers with ideas for digital comprehension tools. I feel that is something that I have been wanting. Now that I have tried multiple tools I feel I am ready to do this. I think I would love to hear from my cohort more and what they are using and what works and doesn't work. Also, I do not have "a way with words" like a lot of my cohort does. I tend to simplify my words (into a second grade level) and sometimes I feel I need help editing my words. A thesaurus is my friend at times but having my peers help me edit and discuss would be great. I would also like to share ideas of things I have tried in my classroom that have worked to help support them. Some important group norms that I would like is being respectful to others (which I think this cohort is good at). Also, ending classes on time and being respectful of everyone's time. 

In my first round of inquiry my driving question was "How does digital storytelling affect reading comprehension?" I was interested in using digital storytelling tools to retell stories that they have read in class. At the beginning of the school year, students were really uninterested in the stories that we were reading in class. I was trying to get them excited and interact with the text but I was not sure how to do that. So after some researching, I decided to use digital storytelling tools to REtell the story (instead of creating a story themselves). After doing my first round of inquiry, I realized I wanted to not limit myself to digital storytelling tools and open up my tool box to all digital tools that would help with comprehension. So now my new driving question is: How do digital tools help improve comprehension? I'm not sure if this is the exact one I want to use, but I'm working on it. I just recently used Flipgrid to help retell the story in my classroom during my second round of inquiry. The first round I used Voicethread.