My Thoughts on Educational Technology
James Rolle
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The integration of technology in education is no longer an option for schools and teachers; it is a necessity. To students today, what we call technology is an integral part of their lives. For that reason alone it needs to be more than just another feature of education; it needs to be incorporated seamlessly into our teaching, as seamlessly as pen and paper. Another reason it is necessary is that students today must be comfortable with technology in order to be prepared for life outside of school, and by comfortable I don't mean being able to use a cell phone and update Facebook; they need to be able to connect and communicate and collaborate and do research and make videos and present results. They need to have a digital portfolio of their work to demonstrate their competencies.
Technology can provide teachers the ability to do more meaningful and more frequent formative assessments and get feedback to students more quickly; personalize and differentiate instruction and allow students to work at their own pace; prepare students for work in university and beyond by teaching them the skills needed in today and tomorrow's world; provide access to all available content; help students research, evaluate, analyze, synthesize, and present information, and communicate more effectively. Among other benefits, technology:
· engages students;
· allows for the use of a wide range of tools;
· allows for greater student collaboration;
· promotes student self-directed learning;
· enhances creativity;
· provides access to unlimited resources;
· allows teachers to ‘flip’ the classroom;
· makes differentiated instruction easier;
· allows for clearer communication and organization;
· enables teacher collaboration on a large scale;
· simplifies the task of catering to different learning styles;
· allows for the ongoing creation and retention of course material;
· raises student readiness for college +.
As I have learned tool after tool, and gotten increasingly excited about using them, I always come back to the overriding idea that they are just tools, and this is the difference between instrumental and missional thinking. Too often, the focus we see on technology is on the tool. The tool becomes the focus, rather than what teachers are going to do with it, how best to use it, or how to use it to improve learning outcomes. So whenever we think about technology, we have to start with the end in mind: what are we trying to do; what is the goal? Only then can we make good decisions about the appropriate tool and how to use it.
As a result of being raised exposed to so much digital content, some observers have suggested that the brains of today's students work differently than our own. [See the book Understanding the Digital Generation, by Jukes, McCain and Crockett, 2010.] Because of this, the variety of presentation methods - audio, visual, interactive, text, graphic - afforded by technology means both that students can choose how to get the information - how to access it and what works best for them - and that the medium can be used to attract and retain their interest.
What this all leads to is students taking control of their own learning. When learning is fun and meaningful and relevant and accessible, it becomes compelling, and when it is compelling students will want to engage. When they engage, learning can take place. Many studies show that blended learning - combining traditional in-class learning with online learning - has a positive impact on learning outcomes.
For technology integration to occur requires a leader: the technologist. A technologist should be the champion of appropriate and meaningful technology use in the school, providing a clear vision for integrating technology into the curriculum. He should align technology use with the school mission and teacher goals. He should be the main technology resource for teachers and students. He should work in an ongoing manner with teachers and departments to ensure that they have an understanding of and access to the best and most appropriate technologies, and be instrumental in helping them integrate that technology. He should provide the means for teachers to pursue the use of technology in as simple, straightforward, and effective a manner as possible, so that teachers can focus on teaching and not on technology. He should create a course of professional development that helps teachers raise their knowledge without unduly burdening them, and help them move towards a level of independence in their use of technology. I created the following image using gliffy.com to explain technology integration.
Technology can provide teachers the ability to do more meaningful and more frequent formative assessments and get feedback to students more quickly; personalize and differentiate instruction and allow students to work at their own pace; prepare students for work in university and beyond by teaching them the skills needed in today and tomorrow's world; provide access to all available content; help students research, evaluate, analyze, synthesize, and present information, and communicate more effectively. Among other benefits, technology:
· engages students;
· allows for the use of a wide range of tools;
· allows for greater student collaboration;
· promotes student self-directed learning;
· enhances creativity;
· provides access to unlimited resources;
· allows teachers to ‘flip’ the classroom;
· makes differentiated instruction easier;
· allows for clearer communication and organization;
· enables teacher collaboration on a large scale;
· simplifies the task of catering to different learning styles;
· allows for the ongoing creation and retention of course material;
· raises student readiness for college +.
As I have learned tool after tool, and gotten increasingly excited about using them, I always come back to the overriding idea that they are just tools, and this is the difference between instrumental and missional thinking. Too often, the focus we see on technology is on the tool. The tool becomes the focus, rather than what teachers are going to do with it, how best to use it, or how to use it to improve learning outcomes. So whenever we think about technology, we have to start with the end in mind: what are we trying to do; what is the goal? Only then can we make good decisions about the appropriate tool and how to use it.
As a result of being raised exposed to so much digital content, some observers have suggested that the brains of today's students work differently than our own. [See the book Understanding the Digital Generation, by Jukes, McCain and Crockett, 2010.] Because of this, the variety of presentation methods - audio, visual, interactive, text, graphic - afforded by technology means both that students can choose how to get the information - how to access it and what works best for them - and that the medium can be used to attract and retain their interest.
What this all leads to is students taking control of their own learning. When learning is fun and meaningful and relevant and accessible, it becomes compelling, and when it is compelling students will want to engage. When they engage, learning can take place. Many studies show that blended learning - combining traditional in-class learning with online learning - has a positive impact on learning outcomes.
For technology integration to occur requires a leader: the technologist. A technologist should be the champion of appropriate and meaningful technology use in the school, providing a clear vision for integrating technology into the curriculum. He should align technology use with the school mission and teacher goals. He should be the main technology resource for teachers and students. He should work in an ongoing manner with teachers and departments to ensure that they have an understanding of and access to the best and most appropriate technologies, and be instrumental in helping them integrate that technology. He should provide the means for teachers to pursue the use of technology in as simple, straightforward, and effective a manner as possible, so that teachers can focus on teaching and not on technology. He should create a course of professional development that helps teachers raise their knowledge without unduly burdening them, and help them move towards a level of independence in their use of technology. I created the following image using gliffy.com to explain technology integration.
In order to help teachers integrate technology, a consistent and individualized course of professional development is essential. An ideal course would include weekly sessions with the entire faculty or departments, but that still recognizes the needs of each individual teacher. The technologist should also spend time in teachers' classrooms in order to understand how they teach, how their classroom functions, their technology needs and what will work best for them. Teachers can start by using tools to improve their own work - collaboration with other teachers (Google Docs), social bookmarking (diigo.com), wikis to assemble and organize materials (wikispaces.com) - and then start to use the same tools with their students. As teachers become increasingly comfortable with the various technologies and come to understand the affordances they bring, they will be able to start to integrate them into their teaching. Ideally, they eventually will become independent users and integrators. Part of the development work with teachers should involve discussions of the affordances of technology and models for integration, such as SAMR, LoTI, and TPaCK. Certain standards - NETS-S and the AALS 21st century learning standards - are excellent tools to help keep the use and integration of technology in focus.
Teachers should also be encouraged to create personal learning networks (PLNs), including memberships in communities of teachers, subscriptions to RSS feeds that contain relevant information, and participation in online education discussions (Twitter). However, it is not the teacher's job to keep up on the latest technology on her own; it is the technologist's responsibility to help and lead and engage the teacher.
The technologist must also demonstrate to teachers the value of integrating technology. Once teachers understand the value, and have begun to feel comfortable with the tools, then the real work can begin. Ultimately, what technology looks like will vary from classroom to classroom, but certain features of it should be consistent across a school.
Imagine a classroom where the teacher has provided students access to a wealth of materials - from universities and experts and other teachers - utilizing all sorts of delivery methods - video, audio, interactive websites, simulations, PDFs; where the teacher has chosen tools based on how they help students achieve the learning goals; where students are working at their own pace because the resources - well beyond what is available in any textbook - are all available and organized for them to do so; where they collaborate not only with their classmates, but with students in other classes taking the same course, in other parts of the country and the world and even consult with experts; where the stronger students help the weaker students; where students keep track of their own learning with learning journals that other students and the teacher comment on, and take their newly acquired knowledge and add it to the set of online course materials so that students in subsequent years can benefit from it; where the results of their hard work are authentic projects that yield tangible artifacts that they can add to their own digital portfolio (When students graduate, they have a portfolio full of examples of their work that demonstrates not only their understanding of the content but also their mastery of the tools.); where the best work becomes exemplars that the teacher shares with subsequent classes, so the quality of work improves every year. In other words imagine a classroom where the teacher makes meaningful and appropriate use of technology and where students are in control of their own learning.
To summarize, meaningful and appropriate technology integration necessitates a technologist and includes having a comprehensive plan based on school mission and teacher goals, professional development, ongoing support for teachers and students, consistency, an understanding of the affordances of technology and the tools available and making both broad and deep use of them, and a reimagining of the teaching and learning process.
The technologist must also demonstrate to teachers the value of integrating technology. Once teachers understand the value, and have begun to feel comfortable with the tools, then the real work can begin. Ultimately, what technology looks like will vary from classroom to classroom, but certain features of it should be consistent across a school.
Imagine a classroom where the teacher has provided students access to a wealth of materials - from universities and experts and other teachers - utilizing all sorts of delivery methods - video, audio, interactive websites, simulations, PDFs; where the teacher has chosen tools based on how they help students achieve the learning goals; where students are working at their own pace because the resources - well beyond what is available in any textbook - are all available and organized for them to do so; where they collaborate not only with their classmates, but with students in other classes taking the same course, in other parts of the country and the world and even consult with experts; where the stronger students help the weaker students; where students keep track of their own learning with learning journals that other students and the teacher comment on, and take their newly acquired knowledge and add it to the set of online course materials so that students in subsequent years can benefit from it; where the results of their hard work are authentic projects that yield tangible artifacts that they can add to their own digital portfolio (When students graduate, they have a portfolio full of examples of their work that demonstrates not only their understanding of the content but also their mastery of the tools.); where the best work becomes exemplars that the teacher shares with subsequent classes, so the quality of work improves every year. In other words imagine a classroom where the teacher makes meaningful and appropriate use of technology and where students are in control of their own learning.
To summarize, meaningful and appropriate technology integration necessitates a technologist and includes having a comprehensive plan based on school mission and teacher goals, professional development, ongoing support for teachers and students, consistency, an understanding of the affordances of technology and the tools available and making both broad and deep use of them, and a reimagining of the teaching and learning process.