I am currently doing my field experience in a fourth grade classroom. This classroom has four computers that are available to students whenever they are given permission to be on them. Also, this class takes frequent trips to the computer lab. Each child, in my opinion, is very savvy when it comes to internet researching, typing, and Word documents. One day we had the librarian come in to have an instruction period on how to research for their Native American projects. But this research time was different: it was going to involve the school's set of laptops! The students were ecstatic. There were very firm rules put in place while using the laptops, and if any student was not following them, their privileges would be taken away. As a pre-service teacher, I understand the importance of rules, but in my mind I was thinking to myself, "These kids probably know more about laptops and the internet than I do." This is considering the fact that fourth graders have never known a time without a computer.
On a different note, I have been very interested in the many types of technologies Karen has been letting us view and experience in class. The blogging was so exciting to me, but it didn't end there. This is when I got to thinking about a new form of technology that is not very well known to students (or teachers for that matter) but could aid a classroom's literacy and writing skills through multimodal communication. The idea is to have iPads in the classroom!!
I had the idea of how great it would be if I could get a grant to incorporate using iPads in my classroom! Students would have access to the newspaper, books, textbooks, writing applications, the list goes on and on. As I began to research this idea, I found out that some other teachers had already beat me to it (haha) but I was very interested as to what they had to say.
Evan's point of "[H]ow often do we integrate their [student's] interests into the school curriculum...?" This reiterates what we, as a cohort, have been learning in all of our methods classes this semester: in order to engage a child in content you need to peak their interests personally. By incorporating such forms of technology in the classroom (which is what this generation is interested in) we can accomplish more learning.
Just because we might not know as much about how to function certain forms of technology should not stop us from learning; that would be sending the wrong message to our students.
As my partner and I were shuffling through hundreds of worksheets for our first graders, I predicted to my cooperating teacher that in twenty years from now, most American schools will be paperless. I also envision school children of the future taking home their ipad every night in place of mountains of worksheets and loads of books!
ReplyDeleteSo funny! When I originally had this idea I thought, "wow this would also be great for the environment....more trees!"
ReplyDeletePaige, I had the same thought when I first beheld the amazing iPad. Sadly, people have been predicting a paperless future for so long now I've stopped believing that it may happen in my lifetime. And I'm the gal who reads all our e-reserves on my laptop screen!
ReplyDeleteIf you like the iPad there are so many other cool technologies out there. Many of them are just really good ideas that used existing technology for a purpose different than the original intent. As weird as it sounds to say about technology, it's a great way to get creative.