"No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent" (John Donne).

This quote resonated with me in a number of ways.  First and foremost,  I think this quote encapsulates how I feel about learning in general.  Learning has two identites...a very individual, solitary side as well as a collaborative, relational side.   I enjoy both aspects of learning, and feel that they are equally important when reflecting on how and why we learn.   

The lone islander also summarizes how I felt about my first online class experience.  At times, technology does seem to isolate individuals.  Working on a computer, it is easy to habitually become absorbed in whatever activity one is doing.  Not seeing or talking to classmates regularly can also give a false sense of anonymity that can be somewhat misleading.  As the course developed and I started to work collaboratively on projects and respond to my peers' posts, I did feel a sense of community that grew over time.  By the time that our last face to face meeting took place, I sensed that no longer was I alone on my island.

Finally, the idea of being one part of something bigger,  makes sense to me as I think about authentic assessment.  Individually, a student is charged with a goal or objective that he or she is held accountable for.  The nature of authentic assessment, however, encourages students to get feedback from one another, change, grow and demonstrate progress, making collaboration a key component. In my authentic projects, progress and change are noted and valued, making the process as important as the final product. 

As I think about what type of teacher I am and strive to be, I realize that philosophically, I support and believe in authentic assessment.  I do still see the advantages of using traditional assessment in certain situations and would by no means completely abandon the use of it.  I think that a blended approach may be the right balance of collecting data that can be used to help drive instruction, while also encouraging self-reflection and metacognition.

The way that we were able to use technology to support authentic assessment, really made me see how practical implementation could be.  The creation of a wiki or blog for example, is no more cumbersome than other projects or assignments that a teacher would require in class.  By experiencing the process of creating these tools from the ground up, with little or no guidance, one can't deny how powerful this could be in a classroom setting.  Beyond that, authentic assessment does not mean reinventing the wheel everytime you want students to demonstrate knowledge and skills. As a participant in this class, we were able to create different types of wikis, with different partners, making each project a unique learning experience.

Without a doubt, I look back on my experience as a seventh grade teacher and think how these tools would have been a powerful way to support learning in my classroom.  I also think back to my days in front of the copy machine, and wonder what I was doing there!  To my credit, the building was just being wired for Internet my first year, so the Web 2.0 technologies that are quite accessible today were not as accessible nine years ago. 

I think that my experience with online  tools was extremely positive. I also believe that if I return to the classroom (once a teacher, always a teacher), I would be very comfortable weaving these tools into my pedagagoical practices.  I would also strive to remember that an island is connected to something greater, and  to share these strategies and tools with colleagues and teams so our enitre school community could benefit from them.