1) Review your semester goal video on YouTube and discuss what you have accomplished. Think of your next goals based on this semester’s performance.
Based on the video I created for this class here were my goals for this semester and my progress thus far: 
Get all A's - not so sure about this one yet. Two of my classes are portfolio based therefore I have no grades and won't have any until after my final portfolios are turned in next week. Terrifying, right? But I have a fairly good feeling about both of those. I will probably not end up with an A in Language Studies for Educators because that class is solely grammar and well, grammar is the worst. It's practically math and as an English major, math and I just don't see eye to eye.
Balance school/work/social - I think for the most part I have accomplished this. Trying to keep up with this hasn't killed me thus far!
Survive Poetry- this class has created a new kind of challenge for me, some days I feel like I have learned a great deal but other days I'm not so sure. I believe the grade for my twenty six page portfolio will be the real judge of whether or not I survived.
Pick classes I'm interested in - major success, as far as English is concerned I'll be in History of the English Language and Chaucer next semester. I'm pumped.
Find more time to read - this goal was a joke and a half. I managed to read one book for pleasure. One. But I'll catch up on that over break.
Figure out what I'm doing with my life - semi-success: I have decided to go to graduate school but that's mostly because I still don't know what I will do afterwards. I'll figure it out eventually.
Marry into the royal family - seriously, going to happen any day now. 


2) Review the first blog that you wrote. After you used iPads in this class, do you think your perception (i.e., whether you want to use iPads or not) and knowledge (i.e., how you want to use iPads in class) have changed? If so, in what ways? If not, why do you think nothing has changed?

It would be safe to say that my knowledge of iPads has increased because of this class. I have gained a far greater knowledge of the various iPad applications that can be used for educational uses. Despite this, my opinion of iPad usage has not changed. I still recognize the merit of using an iPad in educational settings, and definitely think that it is an excellent tool for supplementing learning but, since my desire is to teach at schools in lower income areas, the reality of iPads is not something I should count on. But by using the iPads all semester it has definitely cemented my opinion that iPads would be useful in a classroom.

3) Suppose that you are asked to be the technology committee chair at your school. Your job is to recommend most appropriate technology learning environment  in your school. Money is not an issue at all but your principal wants to make sure that the technology environment would be most helpful to you and your students. The committee has following ideas.

a) laptop carts that can be checked out when needed
b) iPad carts that can be checked out when needed
c) Provide each class several laptops, so students can use them at any time
d) Provide each class several iPads, so students can use them at any time
e) Provide each student a laptop
f) Provide each student an iPad
Which option would you recommend and why?

 I'm conflicted with this question between options A&B and E&F and here is my reasoning:
Using iPads would be excellent for student mobility and the various opportunities that iPad applications provide. But, it is incredibly difficult to type longer assignments on the iPad, the flat screens are not conducive to typing hands which would make laptops a better option, especially for an English class where students will be expected to write longer assignments. And, laptops offer the same level of mobility as iPads but do not necessarily provide all the applications. So really, either one would be useful in my eyes.
I am also conflicted with whether the student should be able to temporarily own the technology. Owning the technology would promote a familiarity with the device, which has both benefits and downfalls. Familiarity with the device cuts down on having to learn various usages in class but it also would allow students to use social media and games outside of class. Forming a habit of doing that outside of class could easily turn into a habit of using them in class. Using a cart system somewhat eliminates that and would allow for greater supervision of technology use, but having the devices transported around and used by several different people during the day would probably lead to a faster degradation of the device.
So I don't have a conclusion. There are so many different options and pros/cons for each type of device that I don't know what to choose.

4) Discuss three most important lessons that you learned in this class.
     1) Podcasts - learning to use a podcast for a creative writing assignment was particularly helpful, it is something I plan to use in my English classes.
    2). Lesson plans - until this class I had never written a lesson plan before so this was both a good learning opportunity and good practice for the future.
    3) ALEX website - having access to all of those lesson plans is definitely a good resource for the future, and I probably would not have known about the site if it weren't for this class/

5) Are there activities that you would like to recommend the instructor to continue or discontinue next semester? If so, what are they and why you liked or disliked the activities?
 I liked most of the activities in this class. I think learning to use iBooks grew a little redundant and less time could have been spent on that. But otherwise I thought everything we learned could have an application later in life.
 I think in the future it might be helpful to work with students on creating websites that are geared towards use in the classroom, for instance building a website for a teacher's future class that way students can use what they build in EDMD in the future. Also, I have noticed an influx of portfolio based classes and so learning to use portfolio websites (like Wix) would be useful both for college classes and for use in secondary education classes.