Blog: How has my opinion of technology integration changed in the past 10 weeks?

I believe that my opinions about technology integration in the classroom have become more realistic in the last 10 weeks. Before this class, I saw web 2.0 technology as being on its way to replacing the teacher in the classroom. Now, however, I would give the opinion that web 2.0 technologies are allowing teachers to be more efficient, deliver a greater diversity of materials, better meet the needs of the students, and increase communication between schools and families. A computer can't replace teachers, only supplement them.

During the past 10 weeks, my personal feelings towards new social and educational technologies has improved; I had never tweeted, blogged, heard of a Webquest, watched an online conference, or seen an electronic whiteboard, and, now, those technologies have become an arsenal of potential tools to help me deliver content to students in an interesting and meaningful way. Very Exciting!

If I could say one facet of Web 2.0 technology impacted my opinion about the online world in general, it would be the way it brings disparate groups of people together and brings them together as a single community. Whether it is teachers and students collaborating across oceans and continents, or new teachers being able access the lesson plans and pedagogic techniques of experienced educators, the Internet is now allowing any group of similarly interested individuals to pool their intellectual resources together to provide a better educational experience for students.

Technology integration into the classroom is absolutely essential. Web 2.0 tools are going to be part of the essential job skills that today's learners in K-12 will need to be successfully employed in the future. Before this class, I would have said integration is essential, but I would not have had as clear an understanding about what integrating technology in a classroom means. Integration is about more than simply having high speed access and laptops for every student; integration means that the lessons themselves integrate technology in a meaningful way to offer students a more comprehensive, higher quality educational experience than was every possible before.

Literature Review 2: Webquests for English-Language Learners: Essential Elements for Design

Sox, A., & Rubinstein-Ávila, E. (2009). WebQuests for English-Language Learners: Essential Elements for Design. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 53(1), 38-48. Retrieved from EBSCOhost.

This article examines essential elements for creating and using webquests for the instruction of English language learners. The author believes that Webquests can be highly effective tools to, "integrate technology, content knowledge, and comprehensible input for secondary Ells". In this study, the author evaluates eight examples of Webquests using a rubric based on (SLA) second language acquisition theories and (NLS) new literacy studies, breaking them down by their linguistic, multimedia, and organizational features.

The article describes what a Webquest is, and it asserts that Webquests have great potential for educating ELLs because they combine teacher-centered and student-centered attributes, develop academic language skills, provide opportunities for higher order thinking, and encourage students to interact with information technology in a meaningful fashion. For ELLs, opportunities to engage effectively with information technology can be particularly beneficial because many ELLs are considered "low users" of technology. Additionally, Webquests present content in multiple media, which can be helpful for language comprehension, i.e. pictures and video offer context for the text.

This authors' study selected eight Webquests which were highly recommended for use in a Secondary classroom and evaluated them on their suitability for ELLs according to their linguistic, multimedia, and organizational features, assigning them values of 1-4 (1 being ineffective, 4 being very effective). The author summarized the findings halfway through the article and claimed, "our analysis revealed potential concerns pertaining to the linguistic, multimedia and organizational features and their appropriateness for meeting the needs of ELLS. Basically, the Webquests were good but required some modifications to be suitable for ELLs, and the author uses the remaining article to examine each category and suggest how each could be improved.

The linguistic features of Webquests can be improved for ELLs by avoiding complex sentence structures, phrasal verbs, colloquialisms, and indirect commands. Language that defies direct translation can be very difficult for ELLs, although it is common in regular usage, for example "back up your argument" is much more difficult to translate than "provide evidence for your argument".

The multimedia features of the eight Webquests were varied, but mostly contained one or several illustrations per page and were found to relate well to the topic at hand. The author points out that one of the Webquests offered links to primary source documents that allow the student to examine diverse perspectives about the topic; in this case, the link accessed British and American documents describing the American Revolution. On the whole, it was found that even when the teacher designed the Webquests to be comprehensible to ELLs many of the sites which were linked to were "text heavy, without visual support to help create comprehensible input for ELLs". In addition, none of the Webquests offered first language resources, bilingual dictionaries, links to sites with translation services, or any other accommodation for non-native English speakers.

The organizational features of the Webquests were found to be fairly adequate, most containing features which "scaffolded the learning process". Some, however, had links that offered no explanation as to the nature and content of the site they accessed.

In closing, the author summarizes some points that a teacher designing a Webquest with ELLs in mind should be cognizant of: being selective and limiting the number of visual elements, writing clear and comprehensible instructions, connecting the information to content standards, and making readily available links to services that support ELLs such as online bilingual dictionaries.

http://web.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.snhu.edu/ehost/detail?sid=d3d21392-13ee-457b-af53-b3241469240b%40sessionmgr115&vid=1&hid=119&bdata=JkF1dGhUeXBlPWNvb2tpZSxpcCx1cmwsY3BpZCZjdXN0aWQ9c2hhcGlybyZzaXRlPWVob3N0LWxpdmU%3d#db=a9h&AN=44054568

ETT # 243: Teachers Teaching Teachers

I started listening to my first ETT this morning. I must say that I am enjoying this somewhat less than the K12 online conference presentations. This format is longer, more rambling and something I would definitely listen to in a car, rather than sitting at a table being attentive... This episode features Alice Barr, from Seedlings, and Donovan Hohn, author of Moby-Duck.

His book actually sounds pretty good, it's titled: Moby-Duck: The True Story of 28,800 Bath Toys Lost at Sea and of the BeachCombers, Oceanographers, Environmentalists, and Fools, Including the Author, Who Went in Search of Them. Mr. Hohn was a high school English teacher in New York City, and every summer he assigned himself a writing project. During the school year, he taught a literary journalism class, and he asked his students to pick an artifact, anything fom oranges to bath toys, and a students project became the basis for his book. Mr. Hohn alludes to, and draws from, Mobby Dick and how "Ishmael searches for whales and for the meaning of whales." Apparently, container ships traveling from Asia to America lose cargo all the time, and several "great" spills happened in the 90s, Nike shoes and computer monitors most famously. During research for this book, Mr. Hohn was invited to beachcomb in Alaska with an oceanographer, and they found all manner of junk.

Alice Barr is making a guest appearance, and she is monitoring a chatroom, which asks: what are you doing this summer? Several people were attending conferences, camps, or participating in national writing projects. The first 30 minuted centered mostly around discussion of Mr. Hohn's book; however, it was noted that many ETT shows close down for the summer.

Frontline: Digital Nation

The idea presented in "Digital Nation" that interested me is the proposition that human beings are actually altering how our brains function through our immersion in the digital world form a young age. Looking back at my psychology classes, I distinctly remember discussing neural culling, which is the tendency of the brain to expand frequently used neural connections and discard less used connections. As a person interested in English, and language in general, the way technology has impacted the way students today write is an issue that I will eventually confront as an educator; honestly, I'm not sure if writing in paragraphs, versus a longer more integrated work, is necessarily worse writing, maybe simply different. In Eats, Shoots  and Leaves, Lynne Truss offers the idea that in an age of Facebook, blogging and instant messaging, young people are actually writing a great deal more frequently than the students from the paper-and-pencil generations.

The epidemic of Internet addiction in South Korea, however, was quite sad, but unsurprising. I remember when the first large online multi-player games arrived; I played Ultima Online for about a year, and I found it to be an addictive experience. Many times I played through the night until early into the morning, and I frequently thought about the game when I was supposed to be occupied with other tasks. I really pity what those children and their families must go through; where can you escape technology and the Internet in today's world?

The success of the school which featured the integrated use of technology, reading scores up 30% and math up 40%, is a testament to the necessity of making learning techniques relevant to digital native students. For better or worse, our students are now in a world which is shaped, guided and defined in terms of technology, and it is futile to think that we can ever take the classroom back to a pre-digital world and successfully instruct digital students.

The most disturbing topic was probably the military recruitment centers in the mall. The modern disconnect between accepting risk by participating in warfare and dealing risk fundamentally alters the nature of warfare. When I hear about drone strikes in Pakistan or Yemen, it really makes me wonder if we will someday live in a world where drone strikes will be conducted on us from far away places, and the kind of terrifying lifestyle that must engender for the populations affected.

Literature Review: A Sociocultural Framework For Understanding Technology Integration In Secondary School Mathematics

This article was written by Merrilyn Goos in 2010; It claims that, "the paper proposes a framework for analyzing relationships between factors influencing teachers use of digital technologies in secondary mathematics classrooms." However, I found the "framework" to be somewhat less than I had anticipated when I began reading. The article argues that simply evaluating technology integration on the basis of a teacher's access to technology, institutional support and school educational policies is insufficient for understanding why some math teachers integrate technology more successfully than others.

This article proposes an adaptation of Valsiner's Zone Theory of Child Development, which seems similar in both structure and terminology to McRel's Knowledge Taxonomy discussed in EDU 533, to evaluate areas of pedagogic philosophy as it impacts technology integration. Valsiner's zones are: zone of proximal development (ZDP), zone of free movement (ZFM), and zone of promoted action (ZPA). These zones are used to examine the relationship between the teachers pedagogic philosophy, classroom environment, and beliefs about applying technology to the learning process.

The study included four Australian math teachers, and the results are presented by "telling the story" through two fictional case studies of teachers named Susie and Brian. Their stories were deconstructed and elements of Valsiner's zone theory were applied to demonstrate how different behaviors, beliefs, and practices fell within the domain of each zone. Brian was an older, experienced teacher who had headed a math department and took a job in a new school. He found that technology wasn't being applied coherently across the curriculum, and the school culture was lethargic about promoting technological use. Brian, with the support of the principal, encouraged the department to design a new, more technology rich environment and arranged to get classroom orders of graphing calculators through loan programs offered by manufacturers. Susie is a new teacher in her mid 20s, and she is very comfortable with a range of technology. She runs a tech savvy class and spends more time discussing the potential of mathematics with her class and less time actually calculating.

Goos' research method involved collecting information about each teacher through several tools. Each teacher was given an interview discussing their knowledge, beliefs about technology, and professional development training in regards technology. Each teacher took a Mathematical Beliefs Questionaire designed by Goos and an associate: Bennison, in 2002. Lastly, each teacher was observed and video recorded several times throughout a year. Afterward, the findings were analyzed and catagorized by their relationship to each of Valsiner's zones.

While reading this article, I was struck by how teachers all across the world seem to be struggling with what integrating technology into the classroom looks like. In a world where machines can do the calculations for the students, is it more effective to teach mathematical calculation or how to apply programs to the real applications? Although I absolutely agree that spending more time applying math to real world situations is more educational than endless practice problems and "doing it by hand", I still wonder if separating learners from the calculating aspect will create a distance between knowing math and knowing how to apply a tool to do math for you.





"A SOCIOCULTURAL FRAMEWORK FOR UNDERSTANDING TECHNOLOGY INTEGRATION IN SECONDARY SCHOOL MATHEMATICS." PNA 5.1 (2010): 173-182. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 26 Apr. 2011.

http://web.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.snhu.edu/ehost/detail?sid=849f250d-cb15-4632-addb-4950f84aea72%40sessionmgr114&vid=1&hid=105&bdata=JkF1dGhUeXBlPWNvb2tpZSxpcCx1cmwsY3BpZCZjdXN0aWQ9c2hhcGlybyZzaXRlPWVob3N0LWxpdmU%3d#db=a9h&AN=55507192

K12 Online Conferene: Digiteens

I just finished watching an archived presentation called: Digiteens: Digital Citizenship by Digital Teenagers, posted by Elizabeth Helfant. The digiteens project involves teens by asking them to research current trends in digital citizenship and examine diffent ways the digital world impacts lives. The teens then collaborate on a Wiki, using Ning in this case, to post their findings. This presentation was a collection of short videos including: driving while texting, digital safety and security, an open sim named digital island, explaining the nature of digital literacy, and the dangers of e-commerce. These presentation were produced by students and were, for the most part, pretty good, a few speakers were difficult to understand.

How can I provide equal access to the digital world to all learners:

Unfortunately, in a broad sense, I don't think that it will ever be possible to provide every learner with equal access to the digital world. Inevitably, children from wealthier backgrounds will have access to newer, more cutting edge technology in their homes and personal devices. In the classroom, however, it should be a priority for both the individual teacher and the school to mitigate this disparity and attempt to provide the most access possible to each learner.

Teachers and schools can provide the best possible access to the digital world by, first and foremost, having wireless, high speed Internet access in every classroom. In a perfect world, schools would be able to provide a laptop to every student. If that is beyond a school's means, providing computer labs and sufficient time for students to utilize them is probably the next best option. However, merely possessing the technological hardware isn't sufficient by itself, each teacher must also be cognizant that the lessons they offer utilize the digital world in a meaningful way.

As a future teacher, I can best help provide each learner with access to the potential of the digital world by understanding and utilizing that world in my classroom. I don't believe that providing access to the digital world simply means making the technology available, but, rather, it means demonstrating how the digital world can be used as a learning tool that brings communities of learners together and provides access to virtually limitless amounts of information. Lastly, in a world of finite resources, providing equal access may mean identifying those individuals who do not have access at home and attempting to rectify that deficiency on a case-by-case basis.

K12 Online Conference

Yesterday I watched a presentation from the archives of the K12 online coference. The presenter was Mathew Needleman discussing copyright laws as they apply to content used in the classroom. He made a number of excellent points: content costs money to develop, free to use doesn't mean free, and that one person violating copyright laws is no big deal, but when millions infringe, it's a problem. The gist of his presentation is that teachers are not exempt from copyright laws, but they are often allowed the privledge of using content in the classroom; the line is drawn at posting copyrighted content on websites where others can access it. For example, I could show a brief movie clip to my class, but I cannot put that clip on the school website to be viewed by the public.

My Philosophy About Integrating Technology Into The Classroom

According to our textbook, I am part of the Millennial generation, although just barely. I grew up still using card catalogues at the library and printing with a Dot Matrix. It has been fascinating, over the course of my life, to see how technology has changed the way people interact and communicate with each other. Some changes I have adopted, such as shopping or researching online, others, like social media, have simply passed me by, until now. In current and future classrooms, I believe technology should be used copiously, yet judiciously.  Classroom technology should enhance the presentation of information and allow students with a wide array of learning styles to access education in a way best suited to their particular needs and preferences. Educational technology should not, however, replace the teacher. Although technology offers many new ways to interact with information, I firmly believe there is an integral human to human component in education; teachers not only instruct, they also provide opportunity for intelligent, intellectual discourse in a supportive atmosphere that students may not experience at home.

Introduction

Hello! I'm William Humphrey, and this is my first semester at Southern New Hampshire University. In 2008, I graduated from Keene State College with a B.A.in English and a minor in European history. I am seeking certification as a secondary ed. English teacher. Learning Through Technology and Exploring Principles of Education are the first courses I am taking in an effort to realize that goal. I have never worked in a school before, but I am excited about the prospect; I have always loved school, education and, most of all, listening to myself talk, so hopefully this career will be a good fit for me.  

First

Hi