As a student in private schools for 3-12 grade, the use of technology in the classroom was minimal. The technology available to us included projectors, a few televisions and a computer lab and most of my teachers used this equipment sparingly. Heading into college, an occasional professor would use PowerPoint slides during their lectures, while the remainder preferred the room's whiteboards to scribble out equations and work through the seemingly endless series of chemical equations. In the article, "Teachers and Machines" (1986), Larry Cuban writes about how teachers such as mine, have been charged with educating their students to be cooperative, yet competitive; to be socially capable, yet creative (Cuban, pg. 2). This need to teach so broadly has led teachers in the past to "concentrate on transferring knowledge, skills, and values to students through... lecturing and questioning, while the student listens and answers, and through reading textbooks and performing... class work" (pg. 2-3). Cuban's article seems to pose the question, How does a teacher make effective use of the tools available, specifically technology, in their students' learning of such diverse topics and values?
We began our first Education and Technology class by imagining (and drawing out) what our ideal classrooms would look like, if money wasn't an issue and any technology was available. This is what I imagined:
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| My ideal chemistry classroom. |
Going from this idealistic future to the present, I wonder how my classmates and I will learn to make smart use of the technologies available to us in our classrooms. What will my ideal classroom be a year from now? Is such a room possible in the context of current school budgets? How do I make intelligent use of what is available? Realistically, I have a lot to learn about the newest commercial technologies and about the possible ways these tools can be used in the classroom. In addition to these musings, our course syllabus asks probing questions that I think will be important for me and my classmates to consider as we being our student teaching, such as:
How can new technology tools help us better align our practice with the reasons why we chose to become teachers? Can the thoughtful use of new technology enable us as teachers to be more creative within our own practice, for example, or allow our students to feel a greater sense of ownership over their education? (EDUC 504 Su2013 Syllabus, pg. 1).I look forward to considering the role of technology in my classroom and gaining experience with effective technology practices through this course.
Laura,
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed your first post! I was most struck by the last line of the syllabus you included: "allow our students to feel a greater sense of ownership over their education?" I must not have read the syllabus word for word, since I found this little sentence to be pretty powerful.
I think what still makes me conflicted about technology in the classroom is the idea of physically holding a hardcover book in my hands, or writing out a response using paper and pen or even turning in a final copy of a paper I've just spent hours thinking about and mulling over. I think that physical copies of student's work would give them the greater sense of ownership over their education and the effort they put into their academic work. It's definitely an image I love to think about as a former secondary student myself.
I look forward to reading your blog and thinking about technology in the classroom together!
Kelsey
Laura! I really liked the personal feeling incorporated into a post. It gives the reader an idea of your thinking process. There were two things that really stood out to me in your post.
ReplyDeleteFirst, it was how you asked questions regarding difficulties we would have implementing technology in the classroom. So far, we've mostly been talking about the difficulties of incorporating technology to make teaching more effective. We haven't really discussed the problems that we would face in trying to incorporate technology. What if there is no budget at the school we teacher at for technology? Are there other methods that we might consider to add technology to the class?
Second, I also liked how you made the notion that your "ideal classroom" may change in the future. New technology is being developed everyday, and who knows, we might have those holograms that was mentioned by one of our peers in class. Another thing to consider is how our own views on teaching might change over the course of this program and how that might affect what we might consider an "ideal classroom." We might discover things during our student teaching that work and don't work in a classroom.
Keep up the great work! :)
- Jonathan
Laura -
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading this post because it gave me insight into your education experience and some of the things you may bring to your classroom. I noticed you mentioned minimal technology use in your K-12 experience. I am wondering how you feel this impacted your educational experience? Do you feel that more technology would have enhanced your studies or was it the right amount for you and other students to engage in the work?
I also liked the way you tailored your classroom to a science environment. It is important to remember how students interact with different subjects differently and the tables lend themselves to group collaboration in your classroom. I would also like to echo Jonathan's comment about knowing how your views may change over time. It is important to be open to new technology and also skeptical about what works and doesn't in the classroom. I look forward to seeing what your "ideal classroom" will look like in reality!
-Rachael