The End is Just The Beginning...

This is the last blog entry for Teaching With Digital Tools, but it is not the end of blogging.  By using this blog, I have discovered a few things: 1) I need a topic to write about; though I am an English teacher, I am not a journaler. 2) It is no fun to write when you  don't have readers.  I will keep this in mind as I have students blog.  Being sure that different students commented on different blogs kept blogging interesting in this class.  I looked at blogs I may not have been originally drawn to just to follow directions, and I was happily surprised that it was more the style of writing that I enjoyed (the personality behind the info?) rather than the specific topic. 3) You need to do it to teach it.  I couldn't really have my student blog effectively if I hadn't tried this on my own.  Seeing other people’s blogs gave me a good idea of how different people use this medium.

Teaching With Digital Tools was an added class, one I didn't need to take and only at the last minute decided to take (even with the idea of dropping it if it got to be too  much!).  Interestingly, it is the first class that I was able to actually implement what I learned, even before finding a job!  This course has made me aware of what kids these days are doing to communicate.  I don't see the fact that they spend so much  time texting and on Facebook as necessarily bad, they are communicating.  In my family we share YouTube videos we enjoy, share photos uploaded from mobile devices, and I am following my daughter on Twitter.  My youth group 7th and 8th graders have their own wiki page (complete with each members own page) to use to communicate and share.  We post videos, discussions, and they all seem to love to write what is going on in their lives.

I am still  looking for a job; not knowing what district I will end up  in makes it difficult to know where my new found knowledge and experience with digital tools will go.  I do know that I have great ideas that I am excited to use, great knowledge to help me at interviews, and most of all, I am a digital immigrant that can now say I am, at least partly, assimilated into the world of digital natives...

Lastly,  this course has also taught me that there are so many tools out there to use, that you need to keep it organized and under control.  As much as I  have LOVED this course, I have also been frustrated.  Many  times  I felt that the content was chaotic and hard to follow.  I wasn't sure where to find assignments; do I look on the wiki, thinkfinity, school web?  Where do I submit the assignment, or do I just post it?  I will use this to help me as I go forward and use these tools in my  own class environment.  I think this is one of the growing pains felt as we use and learn about so many tools.  I know that a main issue we are always discussing as Youth Leaders in church is how to get information to students and parents-there are just too many ways available!

LEARNING FROM LACKING

Wow, not having power for about a week, and then my computer totally not working, has really made me think about the role technology has in our lives.  On the one hand, having my whole family spend days trying to stay warm in one room was very nice.  We did have a generator to run the fridge and a couple lights, and of course the TV (which didn't have a signal half the time because of the down trees), so it wasn't as bad as it could have been.  Again, having older children, we don't spend that much time all cozy together in front of the fireplace.  On the other hand, keeping my  house warm with wood, and constantly having to feed the fire was not easy, especially as I am trying to recover from back surgery.  So, the lack of technology did bring our family together, that is for sure, but I am not ready to sell everything and move to Lancaster just yet!!!

Interstingly, technology was also a way to know what was going on during the storm a few weeks ago.  My husband spend time on Bridgewater Patch looking at and posting to sites such as these.  http://bridgewater.patch.com/articles/trees-down-power-out-tell-us-and-your-neighbors-in-this-live-blog#photo-8290306

How does all this work together with  professional development? Well, I used to think I would love to live on a farm with not electricity, have a family who worked together to survive, and that would eliminate a lot of problems.  I have changed my mind.  Actually doing it, or at least a little bit like that, showed me what it was really going to be like.  So, I feel that the only way professional development for technology will work is the same idea, the teachers must "do" the technology.  In order for that to happen, the people in charge of professional development must also use technology.  Which brings me to this class.  When I first started reading Leading 21st Century Schools, I was confused.  Was this a class for administration?  I have no experience with that, but then it started to sink in.  Someone has to begin things.  In the district I was in, the person in charge of professional development hadn't been in a teaching position in many years, and they also were not tech savvy, so not much development happened. Shrum & Levin suggest having Technology-Planning Committees and Teacher Leaders (p 111).  We had a few teachers who were interested in technology, used it in their classroom to enhance instruction, and with a little encouragement would have probably worked their way up the Loti scale.  (see http://loticonnection.com/index.php/resources/publications/20-loti-framework for explanation).  But these teachers kept what they knew to themselves, resulting in no expansion of the mind or technology for  anyone.   Shrum and Levin suggest having teachers, administrators, parents, community, and even students for a Technology-Planning committee.  Wow, what an awesome idea!  Students!  "Begin with determining what students need to learn" is their suggestion.  Well, what better place than to start with the students.  Since they spend most of their lives outside of school engrossed in the world of technology, they really could be the innovators.  When students are included in developing instruction, they are always more active participants, which is what we want technology to do: Create learners who use technology to find information, and learn!

I have seen incredible work by students, who share ideas and communicate effortlessly through web 2.0 tools.  I have seen this not as a teacher, but as a mom and youth leaders.  We need to get the students doing life, in school.  This can't begin with administrators who don't use technology themselves.  Until taking Intro to Teaching with Digital Tools, I had no idea what was available.  We need to send our administrators to take classes such as this, and then somehow open the minds of teachers that sharing information is a good thing.  Our kids, get it, why can't we?

Technology link to other classes

Great for Special Education

While taking Intro to Teaching with Digital Tools, I am also taking two special education classes.  I am always surprised how all the classes relate.  I know I shouldn't be surprised because using technology for students with special needs was probably the first way technology was used in the classroom to begin with.  Assistive Technology for students with special needs is definitely the first time I even saw technology at work in the classroom (beyond an overhead if you can call that technology). 

Two articles that I have read for another class completely have to do with using technology in the classroom    The first is a journal article ( The Theory Underlying Concept Maps by Novak )  about using CmapTools http://cmap.ihmc.us/, a free down loadable software that allows you to create concept maps that are also linked to the internet.  The article gives an incredible explanation of how to use concept maps, especially this program that has other technological features besides "drawing", as a tool for discovery teaching.  I have used concept maps to help explain a concept in a visual manner.  About a month ago, I spoke a a leaders training weekend for youth  leaders.  I used a concept map in my explanation of how our youth group's different parts all function together.  I left out some words that I then had the leaders fill in as we went.  But I had created the map, not them.  This article is about having the students create concept maps using a focus question and some main concept words given by the teacher, and then having the student create the map.  By using concept words that students already know, and adding words that would connect to those that are needed to answer the focus question, students build on prior knowledge.  Pictures can be embedded, which adds another dimension of learning.  With these few simple (believe me, the article goes into much more detail) explanations you can see  how prior knowledge and visual learning can be a great tool for all students, but especially students with learning disabilities.  In addition, links that have to do with the concepts can be added to the concept map.  As with most technology, you  have to see it and experience it to really get it.  So go to the cmap link above and check it out.  Great use of technology!!




The second article I read was about Literacy Instruction, Technology, and Students with Learning Disabilities by Kennedy and Deshler. Specifically about what is  needed to create good instructional software to use in teaching literacy.  I was really interested in this article because it seems that there are so many interesting, interactive, lively sites for teaching science, and some very informative sites for social studies, but not so  many for literacy.  Though I found this article lacking in the explanation of the theories it tries to incorporate into its explanation, there are  some really interesting ideas of how to go about using instructional technology for students with learning disabilities.  Teachers who teach students with learning disabilities know that using visual as an aid  to teaching works very well, this article explains why.  It explains that we all have a limited working memory, or learning memory (no one has to tell me that!  especially trying to take 3 master level course while in pain from surgery, my working memory seems  to be more limited, and add painkillers to that..ooops, sorry-rabbit track).  Anyway, but essentially your visual and auditory memories have different channels, so you can basically fill each up separately.  That's my paraphrasing as I understand it.  The working memory used when reading actually fills up easier, and separate too.  So when students, who already have issues with their learning, have lessons that use all three, reading, visual, and auditory, they learn better.  This is why kids learn so well from Sesame Street,
and for those of you who are old enough to remember it, Electric Co. 


 What better way to do this in the class room than using the computer!  The article does consistently warn that the programs used must use sound research based instructional methods, as well as fit the specific learning needs of the student.  There is alos a lot of information about using individual computer based instruction for RTI, which makes a lot of sense to me.  I have seen programs used for adults that are learning to read that will determine what needs to be learned, then puts the student in a lesson for that.

There is a very interesting chart used to show what needs to be taken into consideration when designing instructional technology, but I think it can also be useful  in looking for such technology.  See page 294 of the article.

Anyone else finding technology in their other classes?

In their language...

Family, God (youth group), and teaching, these are the things that are important to me.  Whenever I can combine these, it is always a great moment for me.  This morning, while I was searching on line for a devotion for my teenage daughter, I came across a web site that seemed to have some interesting and challenging thinking.  I really liked todays devotion, which had to do with working out (another passion of mine, that has been put on hold because of my impending back surgery-though I have been able to swim a couple times a week-Thank God!).


So I copied the link, emailed the devotion to a friend of mine who runs a small group for high school boys, and also facebooked it to a boy whom I thought would really get a lot out of it (we talk about working out,  health and fitness all the time).  This is something that I do often, and in turn I am often the recipient of such online wisdom when others come across it.  On facebook we may comment, and others usually join in, or at least "like" it.  In an email, it may be a more private conversation.  Interestingly this devotion was set up so you could blog about it.  I am posting the link here, On Line Devotion, not so my classmates can be influenced by the "religious" information (though, I am willing to discuss that too), but so you all can see what such a site it like.  I thought about how quickly and easily I  used technology to connect this information to others, and what is possible on this site.  This is just what we have been talking about in our Intro to Teaching with Digital Tools class.  This site makes it possible for students to discuss topics that are important to them, with the added possibility of a knowledgeable adult, the pastor, to consult.  All of this is common to my youth group experience, as well as my "religious" experience.  The youth pastor that I work with is constantly twitting and blogging, and sending me links to such digital literature to discuss.  Friends email me links with information, questions, and quotes. I use an online study bible web site for a lot of my personal bible study.  So why are we so behind in schools?!  Why is it so hard to work technology into education?  I have been a youth  leader for almost 20 years, and I have always been told to "speak the students language" if I want them to listen.  This language has changed considerably through out the 20 years, but the need has not. My mode of conversation has dramatically changed from phone calls and notes, to Facebook and texting.  I am still sending a message of how much God and I care, but I do it in their chosen verbiage. Why do we expect students in school to speak our language, and don't try to communicate with them in their's?