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Look at the front of the classroom from the students' perspective. What do they see? In schools where it is feasible, they see a tech rich experience for the teacher: a computing device, an IWB, a projection device pointing at the front. Perhaps we see a teacher with an iPad, an iPod, or a doc camera. Regardless, we see a very tech rich experience for the teacher - a teacher-centered technology environment. Now flip it. What do educators see when looking at students? Paper. Pencils. Print texts. Notebooks. Pens. What an absolute disconnect!

I'd rather see teachers improving their ability to create contexts for powerful discussion, engage students with diverse approaches, facilitate project-based learning, etc. I'd rather see teachers open the doors to the kids getting their hands dirty with technology. I'd rather see teachers focusing on transformative aspects of the classroom than minor upgrades.

In fact, I'm not sure when it comes to EdTech, you need all this technology to teach better. Where its purpose is strongest is in the hands of students as they create their path and connections. It isn't when they watch from the seats this high-tech, fun flashy devices and hardware

all a teacher can do – is work with students to create a classroom culture, a climate, a curriculum that will nourish and sustain the fundamental inclinations that everyone starts out with:  to make sense of oneself and the world, to become increasingly competent at tasks that are regarded as consequential, to connect with (and express oneself to) other people. 

I once sat in on several classes taught by Keith Grove at Dover-Sherborn High School near Boston and noticed that such meetings were critical to his teaching; he had come to realize that the feeling of community (and active participation) they produced made whatever time remained for the explicit curriculum far more productive than devoting the whole period to talking at rows of silent kids.  Together the students decided whether to review the homework in small groups or as a whole class.  Together they decided when it made sense to schedule their next test.  (After all, what’s the point of assessment – to have students show you what they know when they’re ready to do so, or to play “gotcha”?)  Interestingly, Grove says that his classes are quite structured even though they’re unusually democratic, and he sees his job as being “in control of putting students in control.”

The Three Stages Of Reading strategy involves teaching students to delve into text. The Before Reading stage provides a scaffold for new concepts and vocabulary, promotes engagement and provides a means for prediction. The second stage, During Reading, allows students to integrate the knowledge and information they bring to the text with ‘new’ information in the text. The last stage, After Reading, allows students to articulate and process their understanding of what they have read and to think critically about the validity of the text.

Before Reading Stage

One of the purposes of Before Reading is to acknowledge the different experiences and background knowledge that students bring to a text, influencing how they will read and learn from a particular text. By knowing what students bring to a text the teacher can provide students with appropriate scaffolds to make links between what is already known and new information presented in a text.