One quote I found interesting in “Ten Ideas for Getting Started with 21st Century Teaching and Learning” was “The mistake some people make is believing educators instantly need to become producers of websites, blogs, wikis, podcasts, social networks etc. Most educators need to become comfortable and familiar as participants in these environments before they can feel successful as creators in these areas” (Nielson 1). As a pre eductaion teacher now I have been hearing a lot about how we new teachers will have to incorperate technology into the classroom. I myself am not a very tech savy person. The way some people talk it sounds like expect us to know the ends and outs of computers and know all their programs and function by heart. I don’t even have a facebook page and people expect me to know how to completely work a computer. It is important to know about computers of course, but you also have to be comfotable with what you are teaching otherwise your students will be sense your uncomfortableness and they wont really learn anything.
The main idea from this article is how to incorperate technology into learning. Some suggestions involove being avaliable on Facebook and Twitter, and joing school approperate blogs. These do seem like really good ideas because you can connect to students easier on Facebbok and Twitter. Being on blogs can also help you get advice from other teachers and staying up to date with new teaching techniques. I know that these are important because being avalible for your students whenever they need you is one of the most important things that a teacher can do for their students wheather it be in the classroom or online.
In a similar article “5 Back to School Must-Haves for Innovative Educators" by Dana Lawit I found another quote that really stuck out at me. “Those are my 5 must-haves that I hope will keep my students engaged, parents and families connected, and me organized. What are yours?” (Lawit 1). I found this quote important because as future teacher we also need to think of some extra things we could bring into the classroom, other than whats provided by the school. Most schools provide a computer, a overhead transmitter, and other basic types but by using the other non-provided items you could make learning more interesting.
The main ideas for this article included five easy to use technologies that can also be used in the classroom. One is a voice recorder that can be used by students before writing and to help with podcasts. Another are the google tools such as google docs and the telephone number. Also the article mentions a Flip video camara to help with assinments and others.
I’ve seen some of these things used in classrooms before. In my senior high school class for the freshman class they used a new computer program to learn basic reading and vocabularay skills. We didn’t even have to teach the entire semester. Also I know another class in my high school used the flip video phone to make a video as part of a project. Today in fact will be the first time I’ve used a google tool, I’m excited to learn about these because they seem like really good tools and it will be important to get comfortable with them so I can use them in my classroom.
There are some questions that need to be considered. How would you know if certain cites, blogs, or tools are approperate for students? How do you know if you can trsut people online? How do you keep up with all these new tools and applications online? Probably the most important however is how much technology is to much technology? The only way to answer most of these is through experance. As you go on you’ll test the new tools, applications, and sites trying them out and finding which ones work best with students and which don’t. you’ll also find more relablr sources online as you browse them all using caution. All teachers should use tools and sites before there students use them. A teacher should never ask a student to do something the teacher is unwilling to do. As for how much technology is to much that’s entirely up to a specific person.
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