0 Comments
Communicating With Students- Google Classroom
Communicating With Parents- Remind
Communicating With Peers- Dropbox
Communicating With The Community- Weebly
I used Symbaloo as my curation tool to organize the resources that I use during planning and teaching. Please click this here to access my symbaloo.
Driving Question: What should our classrooms look, feel, and sound like 3-5 years from now and how do we initiate and sustain this change?
I believe that in 3-5 years classrooms will look, feel and sound very different mainly due to technology. My belief is that the biggest difference will be that every student will have some form of 1:1 technology device, either a tablet or some form of laptop. Actually, in 2014 it was reported that one-third of students in the United States were using a school-issued technology device. (Nagel, 2014) I believe that due to this change, what you will see when viewing a classroom will be that every student will be using their technology to engage in more student-led instruction as the teacher circulates the room and provides one-on-one assistance. This student-led instruction may be students sitting in a desk completing an assignment on their device or standing up, working with a group, recording a video of some sort for an assignment. I believe that this is what you will see in classrooms with 1:1 technology because it has been my personal experience that when I utilize technology within my classroom, depending on the planned activity, these are the types of things that I see. I also believe that due to this change that there will be a feeling of students becoming more in charge of the pace of their instruction providing a more differentiated instruction, which I believe is very exciting. In a school that I previously taught at, we used technology to provide this type of learning experience through an online program called MobyMax (linked here). I believe that this online resource will help to transform schools because it provides students with the differentiated Math instruction that students need. Through this program students are first given a pre-assessment that determines what grade-level they fall in in regards to their Mathematical skills. Students are then placed on the Mathematical skills that they did not demonstrate mastery on and work through these skills working to score 80% or higher on mastery quizzes once completing lessons. I believe that these type of programs that provide differentiation should not replace in-class Math instruction, but used to provide interventions for students and enrich the learning of students who excel. Lastly, I think that the classroom will sound much quieter because I believe that, due to technology, much verbal conversation may be lost within the classroom because it will begin to take place through their devices. This is actually the one component that I fear of losing because I believe that engaging in rich verbal conversation is a great part of learning. Therefore, I hope to see that many teachers work to find a balance between technological and verbal conversations that occur. For example, I think that it would be interesting to see students being able to engage in conversations through online discussions as we do for this course, but also see students engaging students in in-class verbal discussions as well. When it comes to initiating and sustaining this change I believe that this change has already been initiated in regards to a district level where I work because students are being issued Chromebooks. However, in regards to initiating this change within my own classroom, I already implement the MobyMax program once a week in my classroom, but I would like to introduce more flexible assignments that incorporate technology. Flexible assignments are when students are given a skill to demonstrate mastery on, but students are able to choose an activity or assignment to complete to demonstrate this mastery. (Dunwill, 2016) I think that flexible assignments would allow more choice for my students and would be made possible through technology use within my classroom. So, overall I am going to initiate and sustain technology use within my classroom by incorporating the use of it within my classroom at least three times a week, until students receive their 1:1 Chromebooks, and then everyday. I will work to initiate and sustain this change within my school by sharing my ideas and completed work of my students with my colleagues. Resources: Dunwill, E. (2016, March 15). 4 Changes That Will Shape The Classroom Of The Future: Making Education Fully Technological. Retrieved January 22, 2017, from https://elearningindustry.com/4-changes-will-shape-classroom-of-the-future-making-education-fully-technological Nagel, D. (2014, April 8). One-Third of U.S. Students Use School-Issued Mobile Devices. Retrieved January 22, 2017, from https://thejournal.com/articles/2014/04/08/a-third-of-secondary-students-use-school-issued-mobile-devices.aspx |
AuthorMy name is Heather Thompson and I am and 8th grade Math teacher at Zoneton Middle School. ArchivesCategories |