October 1, 2009
Dear Parents of Room 55,
Welcome to my blog! I am thrilled to welcome your children to the 6th grade and to begin a year of wondrous discovery-making and adventurous learning. As we embark on our studies of ancient Egypt in Social Studies, plant reproduction in science, and literary analysis of Animal Farm in Literature, I cannot help but stress the need for certain technologies in our classroom. Our school is willing to fund a small part of these purchases, but in order to make our classroom truly exceptional and in doing so propel our students’ learning processes, donations from the PTA are needed as well. Several of you have already donated, and for that the 6th grade thanks you! For those of you who’d like to get involved, but don’t know about what we aim to do, read on.
Though it is true that “no technology is a panacea for education,” as the authors of the book Integrating Educational Technology into Teaching state, technology can provide powerful learning opportunities by acting as supplements which “directly support the curriculum objectives being assessed” (Roblyer & Doering, 2010, p. 11, 15). While you may feel that your child spends enough time using technology like video games and computers for fun at home, studies show that educational technology can “influence student academic performance [and] improve student motivation, attitude, and interest in learning” (Roblyer & Doering, 2010, p. 13).
Two prominent theorists regularly cited in the field of education are Robert Gagne and John Dewey. Both theorists have relevant beliefs in the way of technology being integrated into education. Gagne believed that “learning is shaped by providing optimal instructional conditions.” The speed of being able to find out the answer to a question is a factor that influences just how optimal the instructional conditions are.
One technological tool that I feel would greatly improve our instructional conditions is the SMART Board. “The SMART Board is a large whiteboard that uses touch technology for detecting user input (e.g. scrolling interaction) that are equivalent to normal PC input devices, such as mice or keyboards. A projector is used to display a computer's video output onto the whiteboard, which then acts as a huge touchscreen” (Smart Technologies). If for instance, in a social studies lesson we are reading from our textbooks, and a student asks a question seeking to further the topic in ways the book cannot support, then we use the SMART Board to access the internet and look up the answer, researching as a class, active in our learning as a community.
John Dewey believed that “growth is fostered through hands-on activities connected to real-world issues.” The SMART Board would, by way of its interactive touch-screen, provide opportunities for the students to truly get involved in their own learning. For instance, if we were studying plant reproduction, we’d be able to access the internet to play an educational science game as a class, having different students come up to the board to actively choose the right answers by tapping on the website’s buttons.
Another wonderful piece of equipment is the ELMO Document Camera. The newer version of the company’s old projectors, now is able to zoom in and out of an actual regular piece of paper and project it up on the SMART Board. The ELMO would be great for lessons or assignments which require me to carefully look at a page full of text with the class. Instead of holding a worksheet full of grammar exercises and pointing to the number I wish to focus on, I can zoom in, and have the entire class clearly see what I am referencing, or even watch as I model a few examples. This too, as Gagne stated, provides the optimal instructional conditions I would love to have in our classroom.
Lastly, I would love for the students to each have an electronic dictionary for easy word definition while we read our current literature novel, or come across difficult language when watching a documentary video in Social Studies. Having these would speak to Dewey’s point about growth being fostered through hands-on activities. Instead of telling them what these words mean myself, I will ask my students to be detectives, seeking out answers and knowledge individually – really activating their independence and confidence to learn!
Please know that I enthusiastically welcome comments and questions on the blog, and I encourage discussion about this topic. Hope to hear from you soon!
Sincerely,
Miss Azouz
6th Grade
Room 55
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