So I am from the "technology immigrant" era. To me, it seems that right when humans came out of your caves with hairy arms, faces and knees, the Internet era came along. Just when I was getting familiar with my wooden club this magic machine appears and let's me know not only how to use my wooden beat-stick better, but how to use other beat-sticks that are better than mine! On the other side of the spectrum are our modern day student-oids who appear to drop from the sky by the white-feathered stork with the blue bandana yielding a computer and a cell phone with unlimited minutes "twitting" about their sky-diving experience before they tuck the cell phone into the pocket of their onesies and land on my neighbor's doorstep!
How do we bridge that gap between the chest thumping technology Neanderthals, and the technology whiz kids of the future?
Immersion is the way I learned and I think that may be the best way for students to learn this...if they haven't already. I experienced graphs, figures and charts that depicted that technology is ever changing, and that we need to train students for success in the field where tools, jobs are not even in existence yet.
The good: 1) the students can interact more in and out of the classroom. And in this post-stone age times, it's proven harder and harder to get students involved and interested. 2) technology can bring in outside sources like teachers, other classes from around the nation, or the world even! 3) technology can be used to teach time-management, creativity, and critical thinking.
The bad: 1) technology requires an electrical outlet, a magical world traveling machine, and the big kicker....money. 2) not every student-oid has access to technology at home, or even in their community and has to strictly rely on the availability of technology solely from the school.
The bads can be counter however, and that is a case-by-case issues that the teacher needs to address and feel comfortable addressing. Teachers should allow enough flex in their curriculum to allow students more time, or further help. Cause remember, you once came out of your cave yielding an out-dated, wooden club once too.
Matt McLean
How do we bridge that gap between the chest thumping technology Neanderthals, and the technology whiz kids of the future?
Immersion is the way I learned and I think that may be the best way for students to learn this...if they haven't already. I experienced graphs, figures and charts that depicted that technology is ever changing, and that we need to train students for success in the field where tools, jobs are not even in existence yet.
The good: 1) the students can interact more in and out of the classroom. And in this post-stone age times, it's proven harder and harder to get students involved and interested. 2) technology can bring in outside sources like teachers, other classes from around the nation, or the world even! 3) technology can be used to teach time-management, creativity, and critical thinking.
The bad: 1) technology requires an electrical outlet, a magical world traveling machine, and the big kicker....money. 2) not every student-oid has access to technology at home, or even in their community and has to strictly rely on the availability of technology solely from the school.
The bads can be counter however, and that is a case-by-case issues that the teacher needs to address and feel comfortable addressing. Teachers should allow enough flex in their curriculum to allow students more time, or further help. Cause remember, you once came out of your cave yielding an out-dated, wooden club once too.
Matt McLean
First of all, I loved your "story line" at the beginning, it feels so true, which is scary espcially thinking about having to have a cell phone policy in my Kindergarten classroom! Anyway besides that I do agree with your pros and cons of technology in the classroom. One question I do have for you is can you expand more on your idea of immersion of technology in the classroom? Is that your idea of having a balance between pen and paper and the computer? My other question is in what ways do you think integration of technology into the classroom can help students with time management? Thanks for your comments and for the various ideas you brought into light through your post.
ReplyDeleteI was thinking about integration in the elementary level too. I understand that we should be integrating technology more, but at what age level should we start the integration process?
DeleteYour article poses a great question.... How will we bridge the gap between tech natives and tech immigrants, but not only that if we let technology infiltrate our classrooms, what are we going to do when certain schools or areas don't have the funding for that advance? This concerns me that if the "richer" schools promote such technoloigical advances, what is going to happen to their learning as opposed to their poorer peers. I wonder if this is only going to make the achievement gap worse? But then again, we all can agree that technology is beneficial and continually changing and we must, when we have the oppurtunity, provide our students with skills necessary for jobs that don't even exist. It is a very difficult situation to contemplate.
ReplyDeleteHi, I completely with you about making the gap between the poor and the rich worse. However, I do know that there are a ton of grants out there that can help impoverished schools gain the technology they need. The schools just need to be willing to look and apply. The elementary school I went to was fed in by government housing so it was not one of the richest schools but my teachers found a ton of grants and they now have smart boards and EEE computers and ipods in almost all of the classrooms. The poor schools do need to incorporate technology and there are grants to help with the money situation.
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