Enriching Content Area Learning Experiences
There is so much talk about falling standard of education and high school dropout rate. Things have to be done differently to make a change in this unhealthy situation in schools. Technology offers a very potent means of increasing efficiency in the classroom (King-Sears & Evmenova, 2007). Technology engages student in active learning, offers lot of resources in different mode of presentations to meet student learning stylesand diversity (Laureate Educational Inc., 2009). It also helps student to become an autonomous learner as he takes more responsibility in his own learning. However teachers that were not educated in the technological times will find it difficult if not impossible to help students learn using technology despite the opportunity it holds for enduring learning in class. The National Educational Technology Standards (NETS-T) has outlined some performance indicators for teachers (NEST, 2008). Two of the performance indicators from NETS that I will like to strengthen my confidence and proficiency in is to engage in professional growth and leadership and use the gains in this to facilitate and inspire student learning and creativity (NEST, 2008).
In other to satisfy these performance indicators, I will need to have the knowledge of technical skills and how to help the student use technology to learn content (Laureate Educational Inc., 2009). The GAME PLAN (Cennamo, Ross & Etner, 2009) will provide a frame work of setting my technology goals, plan of action to achieve the goals, a plan of monitoring and a means of evaluating the progress and efficiency of the plan thereby improve my technology skills and its use in helping my students to be an authentic learner by being self directed and creative. My goal as stated earlier will be to improve my knowledge and use of technology to help my students learn more efficiently. Several actions that I will take include changing my belief that technology is difficult to use and a waste time. Instead, I have learned in this class that technology has expanded the tools and resources that can be use to expand students learning and I need to be confident that failing in the use of one technology tools should not be a discouragement. To strengthen my confidence, I am going collaborative with teachers in my district who teach same subject with me. Already, we share teaching strategies I am going to be more willing to ask questions and support others. I am also going to join a learner’s community online to keep abreast of recent happenings in education. Lifelong learning is going to be my rule. In the classroom, I am going to design and model more ‘of technology supporting content learning experiences to address student’s individual learning styles and diversity by incorporating technology skills and software appropriate for content learning. I am going to give students more autonomy as they make a choice of how to learn content using technology resources and tools in the way they find comfortable and engaging so that they can be critical and creative learner. Monitoring and evaluation of the progress in achieving the goals will be done both formally and informally as I watch the students collaborate and grow in their problem solving skills and the state standards, open myself to learn from others and ready to change when necessary. Modification of the plan will be made to improve proficiency, avoid boredom and produce effective learners.
Technology in conclusion has a great potential on the hand of students and teachers to change our teachers, student and the world when it is relevant, appropriate and real to life.
References
Cennamo, K., Ross, J. & Ertmer, P. (2009). Technology Integration for Meaningful Classroom Use: A Standards-Based Approach. Chapter 1, “Digital Tools That Support Learning” (Laureate Education, Inc., Custom ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.
King-Sears, M., & Evmenova, A. S. (2007, Sep/Oct). Premises, principles, and processes for integrating TECHnology into instruction. Teaching Exceptional Children, 40(1), 6–14.
Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2009a). Program One. “Enriching Content Area Learning Experiences with Technology”. Integrating Technology Across the Content Areas. Baltimore: Author.
National Education Standards for Teachers (NETS-T) (2008) located at http://www.iste.org/Content/NavigationMenu/NETS/ForTeachers/
2008Standards/NETS_T_Standards_Final.pdf
Hi Flo'sidea,
ReplyDeleteYour post shows your willingness to be a lifelong learner. Through your learning at Walden, you have made a conscious decision to not only accept technology but to "learn from others and [be] ready to change when necessary" (Oni, 2010). I admire your courage to let go of your old thinking, being willing to step out of your world of knowns and step into the world of being a 21st century risk taker! Your students will follow in your footsteps if they see your new confidence in technology which Peggy Ertmer notes (Laureate Education, 2009).
I wanted to offer a suggestion to help you attain your goal. You mentioned that you wanted to collaborate with other teachers in your district who teach the same content. Since you already are kind of aware of blogging, maybe you could create a new blog for these teachers. You can invite those teachers, and you can make the blog private if you wanted to discuss things that only pertained to the teachers in your district. This is one way that I became more confident, just creating a new blog that was not a Walden requirement and used it daily. Blogging with these teachers over the summer might be a great way to just play with the technology. Then when you begin the 2010-2011 school year, you might even feel confident enough to begin blogging in your classroom if you have not already.
Thank you for insight into your goals.
Flo,
ReplyDeleteI really like how reflective you are about recognizing how your attitude and actions in regards to technology is making you a better teacher. Your emphasis on lifelong learning and student autonomy will certainly payoff.
By communcating honestly about your growth in integrating technology your students will see how a true lifelong learner goes through the process of aquiring new skills. Your commitment to becoming proficient at teaching with technology may inspire your students to overcome challenges in their own personal and academic lives.
Paul