Willing to become lifelong learners

I ran across this statement awhile back on a blog maintained by Karl Fisch.

"If a teacher today is not technologically literate - and is unwilling to
make the effort to learn more - it's equivalent to a teacher 30 years ago
who didn't know how to read and write."

Wow. My first instinct was maybe a bit of an extreme statement. But as I continue to think on this I believe it is so true. Especially the "unwilling to learn" part of the statement. This is the key for me. Educators should by nature be lifelong learners. We expect our students to continually evolve as leaners so why shouldn't we? Teachers who refuse to learn technology and how it can impact their students are cheating their students. Period. Not that we should all be technology experts. That is not feasible for anyone. But teachers need to willing to learn how to teach today's students utilizing technology as another tool in their bag. I believe the majority of teachers are starting to understand that today's learners are different. I applaud their willingness to learn, change, adapt. I can only imagine where I would be today if my former teachers didn't know how to read and write!

Powered down students

I am most intrigued by the thougth of students "powering down" to come to school. This should truly cause educators to take a long hard look at how we are teaching today's students. My own children, ages 8, 6, and 4 are all intuitive digital learners. Hand them an ipod and they can find anything quickly without your help. Leave your iphone unattended and watch out. Avatars, downloading, digital cameras and video are all standard to my own young learners. Students today are capable of high levels of work utilizing every technology that is available to them. They can be great facilitors of technology knowledge to teachers if only allowed to do so. We must change the mindset of how we use to teach. The industrial age students are long gone. In fact they have been transformed themselves into digital immigrants. Let's Power UP!!

Using Blogs in Teaching and Learning

Capitalizing on emerging technologies: a case study of classroom blogging
Summarized by Melissa Motes

Educators are beginning to discover the power of blogging as an education tool with our media literate students. This case study involved a high school math teacher and his students as they used blogging in their classroom. This study's findings support the concept of using blogs as a teaching tool.

This case study explores the focus of a high school calculus blog to provide a snapshot of ways support learning through blogging in math and science classrooms. The problem as stated by the authors is as follows : "How does one high school mathematics teacher, Mr. K., capitalize on blogging to enhance classroom-based instruction?" The authors focused on teacher intent, classroom use and perceived value to the students.

Mr. K had each one of his students take turns at being classroom scribes that recorded what happened in class each day. Students posted class notes, example problems and highlights of class discussions. They also reminded each other of possible pitfalls in problems. The student
scribe would also post the assigned scribe for the next day. This was a fun way of making sure all students checked the blog daily. Mr. K also had students blog reflections on their learning in each unit before taking a test. Posting a game or problem on Sunday nights was another practice by this teacher. Mr. K had students post to a del.icio.us accounts to keep up with relevant resources for the course and linked these to the classroom blog to allow students quick access to resources if they needed them. Students commented in post study interviews their learning was clearly being supported by the classmates' posts to the blog.

I found this study quite interesting. I believe the this was a very thorough case study that provides a great example of a learner-centered classroom. Students were the authors and thus took responsibility for their own learning. I absolutely love the idea of a daily classroom scribe entering a blog. I would also like to see teachers use the blog similarly to this study in posting reflections. This allows students to again take ownership of their learning. I would also build upon the idea of the blog as an enrichment tool to post additional resources not given in class time. I have long believed that peer review is one of the greatest motivators for students as opposed to turning in work for the teachers eyes only. Blogging accomplishes this perfectly and allows students and teachers to build relationships as described in by the author. Another way that I would instruct teachers in blogging as a classroom tool would be to design activities that create interactions with other students' posts. I have been guilty of posting isolated assignment post that only require the user to answer my discusion question. I would use blogs in every subject area similiar to Mr. K in this study. So often I am asked how do you blog math. This is a prime example. A slightly different situation that I would apply some of these strategies mentioned in the study would be to have teachers blog highlights of professional development sessions. Every teacher that posts gets entered into a drawing for a small prize to be delivered to your mailbox post training. Everyone wants to win, that is the nature of human beings.

I feel that this teacher did an outstanding job of using blogs a tool to extend the learning in his classroom. The examples provided will be an invaluable resource to me as I work with faculty members this school year in the area of classroom blogging as a teaching tool.

Capitalizing on emerging technologies: a case study of classroom blogging.(Case study)Publication: School Science and MathematicsPublication Date: 01-MAY-08Author: MacBride, Robyn ; Luehmann, April Lynn