The
International Society for Technology in Education have set up a series of
standards and performance indicators for teachers when it comes to utilizing
technology in the classroom. Teachers need to be proficient, knowledgeable,
engaging and model how to effectively utilize educational technology. One of
the main goals/standards is: Facilitate and inspire student learning and
creativity. I feel that this standard is the most important because it relates
to not only the technology but also lends itself to the importance of the
teacher-student relationship in a direct manner through modeling, engaging and
encouraging students.
In order to
facilitate and inspire effective learning and creativity a teacher must have a
good grasp on the subject matter in which they are teaching. They must also be
able to utilize technological tools to advance the success of students in both
a face to face and virtual environment. Teachers via example must model and
encourage out of the box thinking, collaborative thought processes that inspire
learning with others and from others. They need to engage students in a way
that encourages them to explore and come up with solutions to real-world
problems. In turn he/she must be able to encourage self reflection using tools
that promotes sharing of information and working together with their peers to
think, plan and expand the creative process.
All the
standards set by the ISTE are important; I feel as though the standard
“Facilitate and inspire student learning and creativity”, is the most important
one and the one that ultimately will assist in deeper learning for not only the
students but for teachers as well. With that said, it is a broad standard that
may pose some challenges on how to actually implement this standard effectively.
ISTE offers seminars and webinars that assist teachers in expanding their
technological knowledge base in a way that coincides with the new Common Core
Standards. https://www.iste.org/resources/product?id=3015
. As well ISTE has a very active blog site wherein educators expand on
standards and share how they implement them http://connect.iste.org/connect/recentblogs.
Monterey County in California has a website that breaks down how the standards
work into the common core framework; https://sites.google.com/site/mcoeccss/home/technology.
One
application that is very prominent in K-5 right now is “Minecraft.” This
application encourages learning from other classmates, sharing designs in
engineering solutions. My daughter actually utilizes this app outside of class
with several other students and it’s quite fascinating how they are able to
interact not only with face to face interaction as they compare what they have
built but, they also communicate virtually. ISTE has an article mentioning this
application: https://www.iste.org/explore/articleDetail?articleid=156.
Another good application that can be utilized is Goodreads https://www.goodreads.com/. Goodreads is a social format wherein people
review, create tests , bookmark and share thoughts on books with people from
all over the world. In California Renaissance learning has a program called
Accelerated Reader wherein schools are utilizing this system to text
understanding and track reading level comprehension. Good Reads is a great resource
for students wherein they can create and or take practice tests that will help
them solidify what they read.
In closing
this course and the exploration of the expectations of future and present
teachers in the realm of technology is extremely important. With elementary
students learning HTML etc…many have technological capabilities beyond their
teachers. The NETS-T standards assist teachers and propel them forward so that
they can be engaging and effective.
This
video depicts a cool new platform called Graphite that aids teachers in
deciding what apps are good and trustworthy; all in one solid
location.
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