National Technology Standards

I believe that when it comes to technology and the implementation of it into the classroom, it is difficult to incorporate all of the different national standards for technology into the lessons. After looking through the different standards for both students and teachers, I have learned that a lot of the standards go hand in hand. It is the teacher’s job to accept responsibility for the standards and therefore promote student curiosity, innovation, communication, collaboration, research and information fluency, critical thinking, problem solving,  decision-making, digital citizenship, and the understanding of technology operations and concepts. I believe that as teachers of all different areas and from all different backgrounds, it is difficult for us to all be on the same page. Teachers who have been teaching for years, do not like how technology has taken over their classroom instruction, and they strongly believe in doing as they have been for numerous years. As far as I go, as a fairly new classroom teacher, I believe that technology is an amazing opportunity for students to demonstrate their learning. I strongly believe in all of the different standards for students and teachers and I believe that students can learn so much from technology that most people wouldn’t even realize. I have participated in numerous professional development opportunities both in my school districts and outside of school to learn more about technology, and one of my biggest concerns about technology is that I go and get trained to use these technology programs or different activities, and I go back to school so excited to implement them some way into my classroom instruction, but then I do not have the resources to do so. We have a computer lab at our school, but our school is Pre-K to 8, so there are a lot of different classes that need to schedule computer lab time. Something that would be so wonderful would be to be able to use a smart board for most of my lessons. When we go to the computer lab, my students are hands on with the smart board and they enjoy learning. The only pieces of technology that I have in my classroom are 4 computers, an overhead projector, and a tape player. We do have portable laptop carts which we can sign out and use whenever we want, but there are again, restrictions on those, due to other class uses.

            Some questions about the standards that I have are How can a school district with limited materials be able to implement technology to the extent represented by the standards? How do we get those teachers who are stuck in their own ways of teaching from the past 20+ years, to take a risk and try out technology and what it has to offer?

New Literacies For New Times Ch.1 Blog

After reading chapter one from New Literacies for New Times, I was able to access a variety of resources that could help me out in my every day teaching career. I was able to spend a lot of time exploring the different links and checking out the various sources that were available to me. It is amazing that there are just so many different resources throughout the internet. The resources that were most helpful to me were the Math Forum and the Math Resources by Subject. These resources offered me a list of different professional development opportunities for mathematics concepts, as well as different resources that I could use in the classroom. I loved how the math resources hyperlinked webpage was organized. I was able to click on a specific category and then be directed to a bunch of different activities having to do with that topic. I explored different ways for teaching just discrete mathematics: I was able to gather different games and activities that I could implement into my classroom math instruction. This is great for me, because I have a class that learns so much better through hands on activities. I am constantly looking for new and different ways to approach the teaching of different mathematical concepts, since our math program is so confusing. Everyday Mathematics, the program we use in our school district is a spiraling program, where it hits on a topic and then comes back to it weeks later. This type of program works for some students, but for students that need repeated practice, this program doesn’t do justice.

                Another resource, which was very beneficial to me, which I have had previous experience with using was Starfall. I have used Starfall a lot, in all of the different districts I have worked in. It is a great literacy resource for students of all ages. This resource provides students with interactive reading opportunities and allows students to explore literacy concepts in various ways.

                The last resource that I really enjoyed exploring was the National Geographic for Kids. I did not even know that there was a way for students to access National Geographic online. I think that if I could spend even more time getting used to the webpage then, I could start implementing the website into my classroom and allowing my students to learn and explore the site as well.

                Overall, after reading this part, I learned that there are so many different resources out there, to help us in our teaching and therefore in our students’ learning. I also learned that it is so important to allow students opportunities to explore using the internet, obviously in a safe and comfortable way. I would love to incorporate some of these resources into my school webpage, so that my students can begin exploring and learning how much information is out there.

                As far as questions go, my concern about learning about all of these valuable resources, is time for implementing and sharing and showing these to the students. Another concern I have is how do you get your students more involved in wanting to explore the internet and what it has to offer? I have students who are just not motivated to even try anything new or different.