TEACHING MODULE
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How to Integrate Technology
Finding the right tools to implement in the classroom.
Handhelds Go to Class:
Teacher Josh Barron and one of his students often go through the strange-looking rite of "beaming" information to each other.
Students often become engaged learners when technology is a seamless part of their curriculum. Technology integration changes classroom dynamics, encouraging project-based learning and constructivist thought.
Think about what you are doing in the classroom with your students: What projects are they working on? What resources are they using? What tools are being used? Is technology use transparent and varied?
If your answer is 'No,' then how does technology integration begin? It begins when teachers and students use technology because it is the right tool to use. It is students using the Internet to do research. It is students creating Web sites to teach others about earthquakes and disaster readiness. It is students creating multimedia presentations and presenting them to their classmates, parents, and community.
Rural Washington Students Connect with the World:
Pupils in Kristi Rennebohm Franz's classes have used the Internet for a variety of international exchanges and collaborative projects.
Credit: Kristi Rennebohm Franz
Technology integration begins when a teacher has her students illustrate a Kindergarten alphabet book using a paint program. The students publish their work. They print out their pages and create a class book that is sent home for parents to view. Technology integration is students making slideshows using their alphabet drawings. It is the students recording their voices and saying the letters of the alphabet and the names of objects they drew.
Technology integration happens when second grade students use the computer to look up information on the Internet that will answer the question: "What did dinosaurs eat?" They download pictures of dinosaurs and create shadow boxes showing how dinosaurs lived. Technology integration promotes collaboration among students in several classes. Older students create digital stories about dinosaurs, sharing information or inventing tales. In Dinosaurs Before Dark, students created a claymation movie for their language arts project.
Maybe you already use technology for personal use. Take the survey below. Depending upon your answers, where will they take you?
Technology integration is fourth-grade students creating slideshow presentations about the latest books they have read. In their presentations they include hyperlinks to Internet sites reviewing the books. Technology integration is fifth-grade students making movies about the Oregon Trail and westward expansion. It is when sixth-grade students at Echo Horizon School participate in the Mars Millennium Project and discuss what it might be like to live on Mars. Read how it is done when you visit Legends of Mars 2030. See how technology facilitates their exploration. Technology integration is using digital cameras to make movies explaining scientific principles, such as the Flight of the Painted Ladies.
The International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) has established national technology standards for teachers. These standards have two competency skill areas: operational and integration. The standards encourage teachers to use technology for their professional and personal uses. The standards recommend that teachers access and exchange information using the Internet. Teachers who embrace technology and recognize its use can integrate it into their teaching practices. However, recognizing when and where technology fits into a lesson, project, or curriculum is really the first step. Too often, a teacher shies away from using technology because he/she doesn't know how to use certain applications or devices. When this is the case, turn to the 'expert': the student. In "Turning the Tables -- Students Teach Teachers," elementary, middle, and high school students help veteran and prospective teachers integrate technology into their lessons to enhance student learning. Technology allows for the student/teacher roles to be interchangeable. Students love to teach teachers how to use technology!
Tech integration
Submitted by cbrooks (not verified) on June 27, 2008 - 17:53.
For my math classroom, I would like to introduce and use more technology. The problem is computer access is virtually not there. We have one computer lab for 3 middle school grade levels to share and I only have my computer in the room. So where do I start?
Keyboarding Skills Are Important
Submitted by Diane Demee-Benoit on February 20, 2008 - 20:59.
Patsy Lanclos wrote two blog posts on keyboarding that are very helpful. Have a look at:
Keys to the (Online) Kingdom: The Importance of Basic Computer Skills
and
Keyboarding and Word Processing Basics: Part II
Where's the Keyboarding?
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on February 20, 2008 - 09:31.
The first step in any technology integration has got to be keyboarding. All the projects listed are wonderful, but have you thought about how long these projects will take if the kids don't know how to keyboard efficiently? Touch-typing (as it used to be called) is essential for students and is a life skill we can give our students at an early age.
Once students get to about 3rd or 4th grade, they should be taught keyboarding in a controlled environment by a trained instructor. This is where technology integration should start and where it can really begin. For more of my reasons, see p. 13 of http://www.iceberg.org/site/files/2006-issue3.pdf
Typing....Texting
Submitted by Jennifer Condon (not verified) on February 21, 2008 - 11:49.
Did I miss a texting class? Many students can text faster than I will ever text, and no school offers that class.
How many of us actually type better now with computers than we ever could on a typewriter? Please don't misunderstand; I agree that keyboarding is key, but when do those skills develop and is a class the only way to develop that skill...just some thoughts!
I liked the survey so I can
Submitted by Gayelynn Whitmire (not verified) on February 2, 2008 - 13:33.
I liked the survey so I can get more knowledge about areas of technology that I not well informed about.
Beginning to integrate technology...
Submitted by Jim R. Moulton (not verified) on January 12, 2008 - 15:38.
Joshua -
The important thing is not what you do, but that you start. You are teaching screenagers, so you must meet them where they live. So bravo for looking for a beginning!
Here are some easy ways to get started:
1) Use web-based resources to support more kids in understanding complex concepts. I bet you will find some high quality interactive tools that will help more kids succeed with your established curriculum here:
A. http://www.iknowthat.com/com/L3?Area=Science%20Lab
B. http://www.learningscience.org/
2) To make full use of your lab time, build a simple teacher web page that you will pre-load with quality links. Use one of these tools:
A. http://poster.4teachers.org
B. http://edublogs.org
C. http://www.portaportal.com
3) Use online tools to create products that demonstrate student competency - let the technology be a true tool for assessment. Try this one out for making brochures on any topic... The "flyer" is a one pager, and so perhaps better for you:
A. http://www.mybrochuremaker.com
And of course, this goes without saying, keep coming back to Edutopia for ideas, inspiration, and help from colleagues! Cheers, .
Jim
5th Grade General/Science
Submitted by Joshua Stolte (not verified) on January 11, 2008 - 21:42.
I need to learn more about how to integrate my technology. We have limited computer time, and enough computers in the school that I should be able to give my students enough time to be valuable, but I still can't seem to fit it into the curriculum. Where do I start? How do I take what I'm already teaching and use technology while still teaching what my school district maps out? Do I have to create it myself, (that would be very time consuming and impractical) or is there some program already in place?
How to integrate technology
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on March 4, 2008 - 01:32.
Hi Joshua,
I think if you are trying to add technology into your classroom curriculum as an extra you are missing the key point.
The point is that technology is a teaching tool to use in everyday classroom curriculum.
Technology can cater for many learning styles because it is kinaesthetic, visual, aural as well as being musical or literacy or numeracy based, etc.
Technology can be the best tool to use for particular learning tasks. It is much more meaningful to:
1. use a webcam to see inside a volcano rather than a 2D picture or diagram.
2. take a virtual tour of a rainforest/olympic village/mangroves/etc.
3. chat live with a war veteran/author/musican
4. use a GPS to navigate around the local area and create your own map
5. create a game in a specific genre eg comic strip narrative or game rules in procedural text.
The list is endless where technology is the best tool to use for student learning outcomes.
Technology integration teaching module
Submitted by Alfred Low Hon Loon (not verified) on June 2, 2008 - 23:06.
Hi Joshua,
A voice from across the oceans. Good reflection of mapping technology through learning styles. Err..I'm a new kid on the bloc here but allow me to provide one additional perspective from the readings that I have done. Current research on technology integration tells us that we can begin to integrate technology into the classroom by observing the following steps, broadly (I'm sure as a teacher you already know this at the back of your mind):
1. Think of classroom teaching as a collection of activities and tasks. One may think of activities as student-initiated actions, and tasks as what the teacher has planned for the students to do. There are many types of tasks: assimilative, communicative, information-gathering, adaptive, productive (LittleJohn & Pegler, 2007; Conole 2007) to choose from. Bernie Dodge has a typology of tasks as well: journalistic tasks, retelling tasks,compliation tasks etc.
2. Choose a pedagogical approach for each activity and task, by locating the task's properties along three continuums: individually - in groups; rote - disvovery; non-reflective - to reflective. The model I just mentioned is known as the Octahedron (developed by Conole, Oliver, Dkye & Seale, 2004). A task that is very skewed towards rote instead of discovery, non-reflective instead of reflective, and individually instead of group-based reflect associative (or behaviouristic) pedagogical approach; the opposite reflects more social constructivist methods.
3. After locating the pedagogical profiles of each task, one can categorise the available and accessible technologies into group, such as, assimilative, information-handling, adaptiv, communicative, and productive. It is important to remember that technology tools are like cast on the stage in a given lesson; they can assume one or more purposes. For example, a Wiki can be a presentation tool in assimilative activities. At the same time, a wiki can be a communicative and collaborative tool in communicative and collaborative activities; a productive tool in productive activities Alot of alien terms here but googlethe authors' names to fine out more or go to ERIC.
What we have now is a lesson plan that maps activities /task to technnology tools. And yes..it is robotic but I have found these steps helpful and use it in my undergraduate class.
The tough part though, is this: the ability of the teacher (in planning the lesson) to perceive and take up the "affordances" (i.e. the relation between the features and functions of the technology and the teachers' intentions)is important to make up what a piece of technology can do to help students' learn better. I mentioned "ability" and there is a term coined by Dr Mishra called the "technological pedagogical content knowledge". His model is a leap forward in describing the skills needed by teachers in technology integration. A earlier model is called the K3P3 model of pedagogical knowledge base given by (Kolis & Dunlap, 2004). Try googling these to fnd out more.:)
Please feel free to comment. Cheers from Singapore!
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