The Thrill of New Technology

I have to come clean ~ I have never blogged before and am thrilled at this moment to have even figured out how to post something new to our class blog. (At least it looks like this is going to work.) This feeling reminds me of how timid some teachers are of trying something new with technology and is an excellent tie-in to what Kathleen Tyner wrote about in our readings for this week.

Tyner points to little research having been done in the area of educational technology. Many teachers rely on gut feelings about what might work with students, and offer different experiences for students that address preferred modalities for learning. Howard Gardner's work in recognizing different strengths or intelligences in students can be a springboard for teachers to continue to experiment with ways of using technology to address learners who are more visual, auditory, logical/sequential, etc. The more opportunities for a student to work with material the greater the chance for mastering it.

Having been an educator for over twenty years at the elementary and middle level, I marvel at the opportunities students have to learn material. UnitedStreaming videos bring topics alive in short segments that can be incorporated into a lesson with ease. Students participate in Online Classrooms through Moodle where they post comments about lessons and share ideas for projects. Wireless Internet access allows for movable labs so that Web Quests can bring students to Web sites specific to their studies. Most of all, the LCD projector and SmartBoards have widened the opportunites for teachers to provide more visual and tactile experiences with their oral lessons.

Advancement in incorporating new technologies in the classroom has the greatest chance of success if access to the right equipment, training and opportunities to practice occur at the same time. Once all of our classrooms were equipped with mounted LCD projectors, our teachers wanted to create lessons that used this equipment to its full advantage. We all know how easy it is to attend a workshop, get excited about learning something new and then return to work never to use what we learned because we didn't have access to equipment or software.

Tyner quotes David Thornburg, "It took twenty years to get the overhead projector from the bowling alley to the classroom" (47). Technologies are changing rapidly now and schools need to address how they can afford these new technologies, get them in the teachers' hands quickly and provide staff development. Many students' access to the latest technology is far greater at home compared to what is available to them at school. If schools are to stay current, budgets for technology have to grow.