Before talking about how can technology integration and educational change help teachers in instruction, we need more awareness of the concept called Digital Citizenship (For more information, please click here). I like the explanation of digital citizenship that it is a way to prepare students who are now technology users for a society full of technology. Simply speaking, both teachers and students should gain more knowledge in how to appropriately use technology and be a good citizen in digital society.
Thanks to the professor of the Math class, we attended the Long Island Mathematics Conference last Friday. At the conference, several useful math websites had been shared. One of the best websites would be Illustrative Mathematics (Click Here). In this website, standards from K-12 has been clearly presented and relative tasks can be easily found by searching by Grade or Category, which I believe is a very helpful for math teachers. During the observation in a classroom where the general math teacher and a special ed teacher were co-teaching, the math teacher shared a website he frequently used when planning. The website is called JMAP (Click Here), which offers teachers in New York plentiful free resources.
Speaking of current technology on iPad, I tried some of the Top 50 free Education Apps our professor gave us. I think these two Apps- Preschool Memory Match and Learn and ABC Alphabet Phonics are great Apps for kids at their beginning level in exploring technology. They can literally learning for fun by "playing" with iPad. There are some other Apps I'd love to share which I learned from the Mathematics Conference. The session's called "The perfect Apps". MyScript Calculator is a tool that can turn our handwritten math equations into a functional calculator. It's one of the Apps I would say students are going to love it, they can learn to be independent and they can check everything on their own through this App.
The fact is technology such as iPad, Smart Board are now widely applied in the real classroom. However, the problem is lack of teacher's appropriate support. Even though it is said at the beginning of Chapter 4 that even teachers with relatively little technological skill can provide useful instruction, I still think we as teachers should to the largest extent prepare ourselves to be more professional in order to use technology effectively to create positive change in schools.
Questions:
1. To what extent should the teacher use technology in a period of class?
2. In terms of the use of educational websites, I think we'd better ask students to write a short reflection on their experience of those websites so that we as teachers can know more about their interests and also make sure the students are in the right track. What do you think?
Questions:
1. To what extent should the teacher use technology in a period of class?
2. In terms of the use of educational websites, I think we'd better ask students to write a short reflection on their experience of those websites so that we as teachers can know more about their interests and also make sure the students are in the right track. What do you think?
Lily, nice blog. I like the Apps you shared. Unfortunately, I do not teach Math, but I will definitely pass the information to my friends who do teach it. I don't think there is a limit to how much technology is used within the period. As the teacher, you make the choice. I guess questions to consider are, How effective is the technology in teaching your concepts? Are students able to interact in or out of the classroom? Technology is just a tool to enhance the information that you are looking for the children to understand.
ReplyDeleteI think you have a great idea for your second question. Educational web sites may be helpful to some students, but not for all. As you mentioned, asking students to write a reflection, or complete a survey at the end of a lesson, or unit would be an effective way for critical review (positive and negative reinforcement). It allows a teacher to adapt his or her lessons to the students' interests and better preparation for future classes.
Lily, to anwer you first question, chapter 4 stated “technology integration is more about how technology is used by teachers than about the amount of technology a teacher has to use” I persoanlly believe that even if technology is being used only for ten minutes each day, as long as its appropriate and the students gain something valuable then its great! I personally believe the more technology the better, but it all depends on the classroom and the teacher along with the demands of the curriculum.
ReplyDeleteThank you for posting those recommended apps. I will definitely look into it as it will be a good help for me to use in my classroom. i think your idea for question 2 is great. it would surely be a great idea for students to write a reflection of their experience using the app. not only will it allow the teacher to know about their students interests but also it will help teachers know their students perspective of using the app. teachers do also have to be careful to make sure they don't like the app for all the wrong reasons for example if its an interactive game that is not really educational or on their academic level. we need to judge apps wisely and consider what best fits our students.
ReplyDelete