The adventure into technology and the learning community of a junior high math teacher has begun. As a “digital immigrant” who jumped into the digital age in its infancy I have discovered over the course of the last 5 weeks that I am woefully behind in understanding and utilizing twenty-first century technology in the learning community of a classroom and a campus. As a teacher (algebra 1 & seventh grade math), coach, parent and grandparent, I am well adapt at using Office, district provided management tools, curriculum tools, cell phones, PDA, computers (PC & Mac), and more. I have a Myspace, a facebook, and now two blog sites. I’ve even written a poor attempt at a wiki. However, my eyes are beginning to be opened to a vast array of technological tools that I have previously been oblivious to.
It is my hope and desire as I traverse through this coming year, I learn how to integrate technology more completely into my classroom. I hope that in some small way I can collaborate with colleagues to provide quality learning for students we are preparing for, and in, the 21st Century.
In this day of high tech connectivity collaboration can still be difficult. I am currently developing a wiki for my master’s course. The difficulty has come in the waiting process. After sending out over 15 invitations to colleagues only two have responded. In an earlier course I had similar results while trying to use google docs. Part of the difficulty seems to be lack of familiarity with Web 2.0 technology tools by many teachers.
As I finish the summer I find myself passing the level of intrigue and entering the level of “gotta make this happen.” After reviewing the Texas 2020 Vision, websites and Campus Star Charts, watching CyberSmart Videos, reading Warrick and Prenske, and more integrating technology into my classroom has now moved onto my must accomplish goal list for this next year.
Collaboration online, while slow going, I hope will become reality this next year on the campus that is my learning community. I believe that if we are to assist our students in becoming ready for the global market that is the 21st Century. So, as I advance toward this year I’ll be reading, practicing, ‘playing,’ and learning continuously right along with my students. And hopefully somewhere along the way contributing to a productive blogging and wiki learning community.
The University of Kansas Altec Project designed “4teachers.org – Teaching with Technology” to assist teachers with integrating technology into the classroom. The site was created in 1997 as a part of the project and through its parent site provides a short newsletter with some limited information about technology updates for technology integration. It offers links to online tools and resources. The focus of the tools includes professional development, program support, special need resources, and assessment tools. Using the critical evaluation tool provided by EDLD 5352 at Lamar University the site scored 81 on a 100 point scale.
4Teachers provides fourteen tools developed by project participants. Much of the focus of these tools is on EC-6 or 7 for both teacher and student. The fourteen tools include a quiz builder, rubric wizard, calendar wizard, poster wizard, a parent note builder, two for research, a video tutorial, three project building/managing tools and a skills games page. While the tools are helpful they are limited in scope.
Further investigation of the site revealed that the links to tools had no connection to the parent page and opened automatically in new windows making navigation a little cumbersome. Many of the sites links were old and in need of update, while others were no longer in functional.
The Arcademic Skill Builder, education games can be beneficial to early skill development. Despite the focus on basic skills, the math games could be used to assist even 7th and 8th graders who have limited operation skills. Finally, the educator’s resource links did provide some benefit.
Overall this site has limited application and should be used at best as a basic introduction to technology integration.
