7 smart ways to use technology in the classroom

This article discusses how technology can be utilized to produce the most effective outcomes for student learning. Something that was emphasized was to embrace the age of technology and stop trying to limit student interaction with a resource that will be such a substantial part of their adult life. Whether we like it or not technology is here to stay and we need to embrace it in our classrooms. Perhaps the most alluring suggestion was to not use technology that does not 'transform' your classroom. If it is something that could be done using a paper in pencil it is not a piece of tech that will be highly beneficial to learning and other avenues should be pursued.

The article also discussed how technology can be a tool to encourage student leadership and motivation. When we allow students to take control of their learning we are instilling in them self-efficacy and responsibility. Technology also presents the opportunity for educators to learn from their students. With so much new innovation we are bound to gain great insight from the tools are students are using on a daily basis. Most importantly, we should allow technology to grow our classrooms not inhibit them.
https://ideas.ted.com/7-smart-ways-to-use-technology-in-classrooms/

'How Technology is Moving Arts Education Beyond the Classroom'

'How Technology is Moving Arts Beyond the Classroom'

I chose the article, “How Technology is Moving Arts Education Beyond the Classroom”, which overviews multiple programs being implemented across the country which aim to engage students in a more participatory art classroom using technology and various other sciences. Art has a reputation for being interdisciplinary and bonds quite well with technology which is what we are seeing happen inside and outside the classroom. Students today are born in to a time in which technology engulfs their everyday lives and schools are finding various ways in which to integrate it into daily curriculum.

The first program in which author Barbara Ray examines is based in Pittsburgh where students are engaging in the process of developing and shooting their own movies with the use of Super 8 film. Program mentor Maria Mashyna says “Learning about film helps them understand the current digital world more.” These class offer a number of ways in which to engage students in the use of digital tools, which is what these programs aim for.

Further reports mentioned in the article take a look at cloud based social learning networks such as ‘Remix Learning’ and ‘Digital Youth Network’ are allowing for students to connect, share, and give feedback to their peers through their art making. These programs allow for students to post what they are making or doing to a network of their peers and receive real time feedback, in which mentors are able to monitor and model what it looks like to give constructive and positive criticism.

Another way in which art and technology is being utilized in the classrooms is through the STEAM program, where science, technology, engineering, art, and math being joined together to encourage students to control and take charge of their own learning. It’s exciting to read and find more ways in which art is being embraced and not cast aside due to it being seen as expendable to many districts. I see these programs as a chance to really showcase what art can do for student’s learning and how it will greatly impact our future.

Virtual Reality in the Classroom

http://blogs.edweek.org.proxyweb.doane.edu/teachers/teaching_now/2018/05/virtual_reality_how_can_teachers_practically_use_it.html?qs=technology

I just finished reading the article 5 Ways Teachers Can Use Virtual and Augmented Reality in the Classroom By Kate Stoltzfus.  Kate spoke with Jamie Donally, who is an advocate to using some virtual reality in the classroom.  As a younger teacher, I do use some VR in my classroom.  We have some headsets available in our media center, and I check them out for beginning or ending of our science units.  I can see why Donally runs into hesitancy with teachers- if you aren’t given training or support of how to use something new, it is a lot more work on your end!  I have helped my team use our provided VR technology, as well as some books in our library that come to life, and once they had a hands on experience with the virtual reality, it was easier for them to find a time when they could fit this into their teaching.  I totally agree that we had to have conversations with students about appropriate amounts of time on technology, and that is something we teach at the very beginning of the unit.  The first time my classroom gets to see and use a VR headset is with our rocks and minerals unit.  We use the VR world to explore caves, canyons and glaciers.  It is really cool to get to see the children get excited because they are no longer seeing just a picture, but feel they can actually explore!  Overall, I plan on using VR technology in my classrooms, and hopefully we continue to receive the newer versions of this technology as they become available.

A Response to "The Deconstruction of the K-12 Teacher"

I selected this article, “The Deconstruction of the K-12Teacher”, because it ran in The Atlantic, which is a favorite publication of mine. Despite this, I have to say this article clearly falls into the trap of alarmism. The main idea of the author, veteran English teacher Michael Godsey, is that in less than 20 years—perhaps as little as 5 to 10—traditionally trained teachers will be completely replaced by online and screen-based instruction. Further, Godsey theorizes that the adults in the room supervising this instruction won’t even be “teachers,” but instead “techs,” paid $15 an hour to provide classroom management in classes of as many as 50 students.

            If you think this sounds ridiculous, believe me, I agree. However, Godsey attempts to make a convincing case for this future. Throughout this article he provides quotes from seasoned educators who bolster his ideas, including superintendents: "I ask teachers all the time, if you can Google it, why teach it?" principals: "We’re at the point where the Internet pretty much supplies everything we need. We don’t really need teachers in the same way anymore," to high school teachers like himself: "I don’t ever write my own lesson plans anymore. I just give credit to the person who did." While I’m sure these educators are telling the truth as they see it, I believe that Godsey’s imaginings of the future of education are far-fetched at the very least, and that if they came to pass it would be to the absolute detriment of our students, our culture, and our society.

            Let’s begin with the basis of Godsey’s tech-centered classroom. To support his idea that students will just be herded into a room and deposited in front of screens pre-loaded with professionally-developed videos, worksheets, games, and assessments, Godsey points toward the booming industry for lesson-sharing websites (Teachers Pay Teachers, Kahn Academy, Edmoto…), as well as the rise of teaching trends such as student-centered learning, flipped learning, and problem-based learning. What all of these trendy new learning techniques have in common is that they rely on technology as a replacement for the instructor rather than an enhancement of instruction. However, a brief examination of John Hattie’s 2016 meta-analyses of factors that relate to student achievement reveals that problem-based learning methods have an achievement effect size of .26 and student-control over learning only has an achievement effect size of .02. For reference, an effect size of .40 is the average of all 196 interventions Hattie’s meta-analyses looked at, and is thus Hattie’s “hinge point” of positive effect. If, as Hattie’s research suggests, these technology-as-replacement techniques really are not any more beneficial than positive student-teacher relationships (achievement effect size of .52), explicit teaching procedures (achievement effect size of .57), or—most ironically—direct instruction (achievement effect size of .60), why would an expert educator even consider implementing them on a broad scale?

            Hattie’s findings on positive student-teacher relationships do not show an extraordinarily high achievement effect size, but a rate of .52—again, above the hinge point—does beg the question: if all teaching will eventually come from a computer, where will these relationships come from? As instructors it is not just our job to know content, but to know out students. Even when only using outside resources occasionally, it is the instructor’s job to be especially cognizant of their individual students’ backgrounds when selecting a resource. For instance, are my students at Lincoln Northeast High School going to enjoy a video featuring John Green as much as my friend’s students at Lincoln East would? My majority Hispanic/Latino and Middle Eastern students may not even know who John Green is, much less trust him to teach them about Romeo and Juliet. And why should they trust this random YA novelist to decode Shakespeare for them? He hasn’t been in the classroom with them all semester debating Rinaldo vs. Messi vs. Neymar or helping them understand the scary voicemail LPS left on their parent’s phones warning about “hurt a Muslim day.” The danger of handing over our classrooms to mass-produced pre-curated content is that we lose respect for the individuality of our learners, and in turn they lose respect for learning itself.

            Now, in the end, this vision of the computer-run classroom is not a happy picture for Godsey. In fact, he notes that his one “firm line” is that there is “a profound difference between a local expert teacher using the Internet and all its resources to supplement and improve his or her lessons, and a teacher facilitating the educational plans of massive organizations.” This line, Godsey posits, is what must be protected and defended at all costs; I agree with Godsey here. Where I disagree is in the idea that in just five to ten years teachers and public school districts will have unknowingly abdicated their role as instructors to the extent that this “firm line” no longer exists. If that were to happen, then maybe Godsey’s hellish dreamscape would become a reality. Technology is reshaping learning—of course it is—but so long as educators and administrators rely on data-collection and research-based learning methods when designing instruction they will never conclude that herding children into a room and letting a computer run the show is the best way, or even the right way, to run a school.