Comments on: Practical Application

By: John in NC

John in NC — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 14:03:05 +0000

Reluctant teachers need to hear from colleagues they trust or quickly connect to that the technology-infused teaching activity, whatever it is, makes a difference in their own effectiveness and their students’ depth of learning. That’s the breakthrough strategy… it’s slower, needs regular reinforcement and school systems seldom have the will or the $$ or both to carry it out. But it works.

By: wmchamberlain

wmchamberlain — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 13:26:34 +0000

Maybe a better question would be, “When would a student be more likely to learn to video edit, when he is learning it in case he needs to use it or when he needs to learn it to create his own content?”

@Chris I agree with you in theory, but who has time to teach “just in case” skills? If you think it is an important skill you should be able to incorporate its learning using the content you teach in your classroom.

By: Greg Casperson

Greg Casperson — Sat, 30 May 2009 12:53:25 +0000

Sorry, made a mistake on the TPACK link. This is corrected one.

By: Jeanne

Jeanne — Sat, 30 May 2009 03:50:17 +0000

I have always felt that the best way for a student to become engaged and excited at the same time is to embed, mix, infuse technology into the currculum. The student will learn more hands on as they work toward a goal other than “hey I know how to do such and such”…think of it as teachable moment after teachable moment. Unfortunately as schools first began this trek into students and technology use it was done with teachers that were as unskilled as the students and in many cases unsure they wanted to even take that step themselves. When you toss in budget woes things just became even more mirky. I do know that we are making some changes at our elementary level next year that we hope will be a step toward infusion and seamless use. So I’m already looking forward to next year.

By: Greg Casperson

Greg Casperson — Sat, 30 May 2009 02:39:37 +0000

You are right even though its just not happening in many places yet. I used to teach the middle school tech class required of everyone before I went back to get my PhD. But I was only 1 of about 4 teachers who taught this as one of their spare sections. I argued exactly for changing it so that we'd have a full time tech person who could take care of the computer lab and then help coteach with regular classroom teachers to meaningfully integrate technology into their class. It was fought on both cost and the fact it would be too difficult for most regular classroom teachers to integrate. I think it comes down to the money and time for extra planning though, at least in our state where budgets have been tightening yearly. At Michigan State where I'm pursuing my degree in Ed Psych and Ed Tech, two professors I work with have developed and been distributing the framework they've adapted called TPACK, to help educators focus on integrating technology, pedagogy and content knowledge. It is starting to gain some traction in the academic world and many of us use it to help guide in our teaching of preservice teachers and those working on their MAs.

By: Heather Mason

Heather Mason — Fri, 29 May 2009 23:58:30 +0000

Why can’t both be used? When I try to use a new technology (like video editing) part of the classtime is spent teaching the program instead of discussing the lesson or task at hand. Most students that I teach are unfamiliar with any type of technology outside of wordprocessing and texting. If students were already exposed to either the program, the vocabulary used or the types of tasks required in a class outside of mine, my lessons would be more efficient. I could get right down to the activity at hand without so much background work.

By: Nadine Norris

Nadine Norris — Fri, 29 May 2009 21:47:22 +0000

I would be thrilled to have all the students exposed to movie making. Although I always agree with you in terms of embedded curriculum when learning to use technology as a tool for creativity and communication, I know that video creation can be a complex process. If done correctly, the students need time to carefully plan their script, create a storyboard, learn how to line up shots, and have plenty of time to re-shoot or add effects to sections. I’ve been involved in lots of video projects and you are correct – telling a story in video fits in to every content area. I just finished a project with the English teacher, and although the videos were an awesome way to enhance his unit on literary elements, it took several days (naturally…more than he had planned.) In addition, even though iMovie is extremely user friendly, the kids still needed lots of support at first. I think I might go with Chris on this one. Video production would be a great tool to learn just in case teachers want to allow their students the opportunity to create a video to demonstrate what they’ve learned – which they are more inclined to do when they know the students are experienced.

By: Sandra McGonagle

Sandra McGonagle — Fri, 29 May 2009 21:38:55 +0000

To me this becomes an issue of equity and varies by school sites, even within a district. I certainly see both points of view: teaching a skill and focusing on the learning. I see a major problem when one student spends all of middle school (6-8) in a 1 to 1 EETT classroom thanks to the randomness of the SIS system and another student gets an occasional trip to the lab to do “projects” for three years. Technology integration and Ed Tech needs to be a part of the scheduling, site professional development, school vision, and instructional design. Yes, I believe it needs to be meaningful, but it also needs to be equitable.

@smcgon

By: mr_steve

mr_steve — Fri, 29 May 2009 21:30:52 +0000

You’re not wrong. I understand exactly where you’re coming from – especially since exposing kids to something like film making is a particular passion of mine.

The just in case model suffers from a disconnect from content areas. What you are proposing, a blending rather than an add-on, would require some collaborative planning and teaching from the regular classroom teacher and the ,for lack of a better phrase, tech specialist.

This removes the burden of learning a new technology from the classroom teacher. It creates an opportutnity for a content area specialist and a media specialist to talk about what outcomes (i.e. skills and knowledge) the students need to get out of this “new” type of lesson.

Really it’s not a new idea, it’s just bringing in a new instructional output into the classroom. When teachers need to teach students how to write a 5 paragraph essay they don’t put them out into another class with a writing expert to teach them that – it’s done in the classroom and hopefully in the context of the content of a topic they are studying. The same should go for blogs, wikis, podcasts, videos, etc.

However, since these new formats are not part of the some teachers instructional vocabulary they are treated as outsiders and not validated as authentic products to demonstrate student mastery of content and skills.

By: Roger Neilson

Roger Neilson — Fri, 29 May 2009 21:25:49 +0000

Hmmm, when did we best learn, when were we most effective in absorbing learning? When we played as kids and acquired stuff in a random and serendipitous manner.

When did we learn most measurably? In school, but does the learning compare?

What’s the best learning? When its for a purpose, but its fun…….