Group items tagged

Frequent technology users place considerably more emphasis on developing students' 21st century skills--specifically, skills in accountability, collaboration, communication, creativity, critical thinking, ethics, global awareness, innovation, leadership, problem solving, productivity and self-direction. Frequent users also have more positive perceptions about technology's effects on student learning of these skills--and on student behaviors associated with these skills."

Given the primacy of instructional technology in today's college classroom, it is important to understand how faculty use these tools, especially how they adapt specific tools to meet the unique needs of particular faculty or instructional situations. Instructional designers and policymakers face the challenge of introducing innovations into established patterns of tool use and educational practice. As a result, when interventions are designed and implemented without a working understanding of existing practices and workplace conditions, incompatibilities between the demands of the innovation and the constraints of the local setting may result. Instructional designers need robust accounts of local practice, which can ground the design of new initiatives and provide insights into why initiatives are encountering resistance or undesirable adaptations. This brief presents findings from an empirical analysis of course planning and classroom teaching related to instructional technology with the specific aim of providing actionable evidence for policymakers and practitioners. In particular, this analysis focuses on describing the types of instructional technologies faculty consider as part of their local resource base, the specific decision-making "pathways" related to the incorporation of technology into lesson plans, and how faculty actually use technology in the classroom.

We present an analysis of a longitudinal case study whose aim was to understand the processes of integration of a face-to-face and networked collaborative learning technology and pedagogy into a secondary school history-geography classroom. Students carried out a sequence of argumentative tasks relating to sustainable development, including argument generation, sharing and elaboration, debate using a computer-mediated communication, and organization of arguments in a shared diagram. Students' interactions and diagrams were analysed in terms of degree and quality of argumentativity, as well as "catachresis" ("getting round" the software to perform a non-prescribed task). Results run counter to positive systems of ideas and values concerning collaborative learning and its technological mediation in that the scenario did not meet its pedagogical aims, having to be abandoned before its planned end. We discuss possible explanations for this "failure story" in terms of the articulation between everyday, technology-related and educational discourse genres, with their associated social "milieux," as well as the social structure of the classroom. The relevance of these aspects for future attempts to integrate such technologies is discussed. In conclusion, we discuss a vision of learning that takes into account students who do not accept to play the educational game.

As teachers, I think we’d all agree that communication is pretty important. In fact, it’s a necessary component of education, livelihood, and basic functionality in our society. It’s also fairly obvious that there are two main ways to communicate, although more obscure forms exist. Basically, we talk and we write. That’s how we let other people know what’s going on, and it’s an important skill to have. Just about every student can talk, but how many can truly write well?

Writing is not for turning out cookie-cutter essays in AP Lit & Comp. It’s not for texting friends, keeping diaries, or even for getting a better SAT score. Writing is important because it’s used extensively in higher education and in the workplace. If students don’t know how to express themselves in writing, they won’t be able to communicate well with professors, employers, peers, or just about anyone else.

Much of professional communication is done in writing: proposals, memos, reports, applications, preliminary interviews, e-mails, and more are part of the daily life of a college student or successful graduate. Even if students manage to learn the material in their college classes without knowing how to write well, they won’t be able to express their knowledge to the people who are making the big decisions. Potential employers won’t know whether or not head knowledge can be applied to everyday demands unless it’s through a spoken interview. Even the majority of certifications and licensures require basic writing skills to obtain. The inability to write makes for a stillborn career.

At its core, blogging -- or Web logging -- is a method of online journaling. Take a look at any blog and you'll immediately see the connection between it and a traditional diary. Often arranged in calendar format with the most recent post first, blogs contain rantings, wishes, commentary and anything else a writer thinks about, often with graphics and perhaps even with audio and video elements.

A blog is a Web-publishing concept that enables anyone -- first graders, political pundits, homeless people, high school principals, presidential candidates -- to publish information on the Internet.

A blog (a shortening of weB LOG) has become a journalistic tool, a way to publish news, ideas, rants, announcements, and ponderings very quickly, and without technical, editorial, and time constraints. It essentially makes anyone a columnist. In fact, many established columnists now publish their own blogs.

Web distribution of their work motivates students to put their best foot forward. "My Web site has been viewed in all fifty states and eighty-seven foreign countries," Coley says. "I use that to my advantage. When I show the kids statistics and recent visitor numbers, it tells them that I'm not the only person who is going to hear what they're doing. People in Australia and England are going to hear it."

With minimal technology, Coley gives his students a global audience. And he's not alone. Teachers across the nation are helping their students produce an impressive array of downloadable educational material.

The portability of digital content available for MP3 players such as the iPod and Microsoft's Zune (9) player boosts instructional time by making course content available anywhere.

Learning through projects while equipped with technology tools allows students to be intellectually challenged while providing them with a realistic snapshot of what the modern office looks like. Through projects, students acquire and refine their analysis and problem-solving skills as they work individually and in teams to find, process, and synthesize information they've found online.

The myriad resources of the online world also provide each classroom with more interesting, diverse, and current learning materials. The Web connects students to experts in the real world and provides numerous opportunities for expressing understanding through images, sound, and text.

students are more likely to stay engaged and on task, reducing behavioral problems in the classroom.

when technology is used as a tool to support students in performing authentic tasks, the students are in the position of defining their g

When students are using technology as a tool or a support for communicating with others, they are in an active role rather than the passive role of recipient of information transmitted by a teacher, textbook, or broadcast. The student is actively making choices about how to generate, obtain, manipulate, or display information. Technology use allows many more students to be actively thinking about information, making choices, and executing skills than is typical in teacher-led lessons.

The teacher's role changes as well. The teacher is no longer the center of attention as the dispenser of information, but rather plays the role of facilitator, setting project goals and providing guidelines and resources, moving from student to student or group to group, providing suggestions and support for student activity. As students work on their technology-supported products, the teacher rotates through the room, looking over shoulders, asking about the reasons for various design choices, and suggesting resources that might be used.

21st century classrooms are different from the traditional high school classroom. The teacher is not the focal point of learning and the students take the lead role. Technology integration is a major component to this shift in teaching style. The inclusion of technology into the classroom and how it influences teaching practice and student engagement was researched for this study. The Director of Technology and building administration from a suburban high school in Southeastern Chester County implemented a grant from Pennsylvania's Department of Education called the "Classrooms for the Future" (CFF) grant. The teachers of English, math, science, and social studies teachers were recipients of the grant and received the Smart Classrooms. The grant allowed for an influx of technology, staff development, and online courses to enhance the teaching and learning process. Teaching practice and student engagement were studied to make a determination if technology use created a positive change. Longitudinal and cross-sectional data were collected from a variety of sources including the student body and teaching staff that participated in CFF. The results indicated that there was a positive relationship between teaching practice and student engagement as well as technology use and student engagement. Recommendations of further implementation and future research studies were discussed. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission.

As newer technologies become increasingly more popular, a desire to incorporate them as learning tools will begin to mount in the name of good “instructional technology” practices. As a result, the selection and integration of these technologies into the college classroom can take many forms and directly impact the effectiveness of student instruction. Also, like most other aspects of education, technology is susceptible to a variety of complementary factors that influence its level of success such as adult learning principles, curricular limitations, pedagogical strategies, as well as personal, institutional and societal barriers. Identifying how faculty members are using technology in the classroom may prove to be invaluable in developing a catalog of current practices and new opportunities for integration that can span fields of study, as well as enhance new ways of learning

The impact technology has on learning often impacts the success of both the student and instructor. Consequently, attention may be paid to what teachers need to know in order to incorporate technology in the classroom…but little attention is paid to how. Mishra and Koehler (2006) introduced the “Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge” (TPCK) framework that compensates for this lack of focus on the how, and “goes beyond merely identifying problems with current approaches” and instead “offers new ways of looking at and perceiving phenomena and offers information on which to base sound, pragmatic decision making” (p. 1019). TPCK which incorporates “Technology” as a third emphasis in Shulman’s already widely popular “Pedagogical Content Knowledge” framework is described as:

In order to effectively integrate technology into the college classroom we must consider the student and their requirements as adults, and as millennials.  The challenge for us as faculty is to align these learning theories with the ingenuity of ourselves and others to maximize the learning experience for our students.

Many online tools that connect teachers, students and parents have been introduced into the classroom to help them collaborate from anywhere and at any time.

Technology develops students’ social skills, research skills and communication skills.

It’s a great way to implement their use in education as it has been already proved that technology improves students’ learning, communication, creativity and problem solving skills.