Assignment #1 Monday July 6, 2015

The readings were interesting to me, and could make some connections a teacher, a mom and a future educational leader, while there is no “valid” research, I can easily look to my own kids, the ones at home and in my classroom to see there is a huge difference in how I grew up, and my own tech. challenges and how easy it is for my kids to figure things out and how second nature it is for them to do so! It has changed their classroom experience for sure, especially in the upper grades, where most have a phone/computer in their pockets that they use constantly! (my own high school daughters do, anyway!)

First when reading Prensky’s article I thought of something that happened about a week ago, our whole family was in the car, and we were having a discussion (love the captive audience) and my eldest said something like: “Would you all quit talking so slow? You sound like you are in slow motion!” It made my husband and I laugh, however I quickly attributed that to her love of being online… all the time watching videos, snapchatting, tweeting… she is used to very quick, instant responses.

Second, I thought about my classroom of kindergartners who LOVED to earn their time on the 1 computer in our classroom. My “behavior” kids were so engaged working on Starfall.com or IXL.com and it was honestly a nice break when they did earn their time.

As a future educational leader I feel like there is so much kids can learn from technology, although our resources will always be limited, there are ways and means to get what you feel is important to your school. A connection to NETS A Standard 5 and providing equitable access: in this quick example, when I taught at Firgrove, here in Puyallup, we had a PLC meeting, with an instructional coach in our building, and we were trying to figure out how to more effectively run our reading groups without more para support. An idea was born to access more computers for our classrooms to allow students to use Imagine Learning as a rotation while we ran reading groups. (our principal had already bought the program and had a computer lab set up for us to have that opportunity as a specialist) Two DAYS later I had 6 brand new laptops set up in my classroom, which I was able to keep all year, and that gave me 8 working computers in my room for my students to work on! That wasn’t easy for the principal, but she recognized a need and the value, and made that happen. While upper grades might not have seen this as “equitable” access, helping those upper grade teachers understand the learning that was happening will be beneficial to them when those students move into their grade level is helping them…. also there were computer carts that the older students had access to that were much more cumbersome to have a kindergarten teacher try to get 26 kids to get plugged in and set up and put away each day.

Another connection to NETS A Standard 5 providing access and modeling the use of technology is by using technology during staff meetings or professional development is a way to model responsible use of technology.

I felt like after reading Prensky’s article, like I am not a software engineer, nor do I have access to computers this year in my classroom, like I have in the past. I do agree that digital learning is highly engaging and have used my smartboard in very successful ways, along with videos, and games that engage my kids and help them learn at the same time! If teachers are struggling to learn how to use digital tools in their classroom, I feel like it is a matter of teaching them how and getting them excited about the possibilities that will make a difference in their teaching and the student learning.