Ed Tech Overview

            I went into EDU560: Integrating Technology into the Curriculum with a pretty rosy view of technology’s role in 21^st century classrooms. In my year and a half working for Oak Park Public School District 97, I have incorporated iPads, Notability, News2You, Book Creator, Sketchbook Pro, Flocabulary, and other tech tools into my work in the classroom, and I have had positive experiences with nearly all of them.

            With my preexisting enthusiasm for technology in the classroom, this course didn’t particularly change my mind in any way. Instead, it provided me with a wealth of new technology options for me to use when I receive my teaching licensure and take over a classroom of my own. I don’t think that there are any tech tools that I encountered in the course that I definitely would not use, but there are a few in particular that I found particularly useful.

            Open education resources (OER) has been the most exciting new discovery for me. The amount of freedom of access to learning materials that comes from OER is unparalleled, and it opens up the academic landscape in ways that were never possible under the monopoly of major textbook companies. I also found digital stories, infographics, interactive images, and web quests to be excellent tools to engage students and still hit many Common Core state standards.

            As we move further into the 21^st century, technology is going to become increasingly deeply embedded in our classrooms. There is no way around this. Technological literacy is already necessary for adult success in much of our global society, and tech tools can be tremendous boons for instruction. Technology allows students to exert greater agency over their own learning and free teachers to create innovative, engaging lessons. By embracing technology—though not unconditionally—I will be able to provide the best possible educational environment for my future students.

Data Mining and Students' Technological Literacy

            Like most people in my generation who have access to the internet (I’m assuming), I have Googled myself and other people in my life, more out of curiosity and boredom than anything else. Since my Facebook is private, I have no criminal record, and I’m not a homeowner, I have found that there is not much information on me online outside of my LinkedIn and two Twitter accounts. Since they generally cost money, I have never searched for myself through one of the more elaborate services available online, but I’m willing to bet that the results wouldn’t be too much different.

            That said, my Googling of myself and a few others has always been cursory at best. Having to data mine a stranger, as we each had to do during class this past week, was much more in-depth than I am used to. Frankly, data mining a person I had never heard of, including looking through her Instagram account to figure out her kid’s name, was creepy and made me feel gross. I wasn’t surprised that I was able to find that bit of information, as well as her current and former addresses, parents’ addresses, salary, and home value online, but I was surprised at just how easy it was to do so. My partner and I found a tremendous amount of information on our subject in just fifteen minutes. On the other hand, I didn’t find much more on myself while doing a more in-depth search during class.

            Considering the cultural and technological environment in which we live, it is imperative that we teach students about digital tattoos as part of a comprehensive curriculum that promotes technological literacy. As time passes, more and more information about us is being stored online and access to this information is only getting easier. It is crucial that children and teenagers are aware of the digital tattoos that they leave behind so that they can better control and manage their online web presences in the face of mountains of information available online that they cannot control.

Tech Tac Toe Web 2.0 Tools #3: QR Codes

After the incredibly time consuming process of making an infographic, constructing an assignment around QR codes was a relative breeze. Working within the same Russian Civil War unit as my last two Web 2.0 tools (see the last two posts on this blog), I decided to make a reading response assignment that would have students work on their reading comprehension and critical thinking skills.

I found two short articles on communism. The first, from Ducksters, is expressly written for middle school students, and gives a very brief overview of communism and its implementation in Russia and China (for the purposes of this assignment, students will ignore the part on China). The second, from How Stuff Works, is longer and slightly more difficult, but provides significantly more information for the students. I made QR codes for each on qrstuff.com, and put them together on one document, along with a QR code for a Google form. This Google form asks the student to fill in their name and the class period, and respond to the following prompt: explain in your own words the basic ideas of Communism and how it might have worked in the Soviet Union. This document could be projected on the board and students could use iPads to access the QR codes and complete the response assignment.

Having worked in a school where I am constantly fishing paper out of the trash and moving it to recycling bins, I am distressed by the amount of paper used in schools. While much of this paper is necessary, there are many ways in which we can reduce the amount of paper used in the classroom. QR codes are a tremendous asset on this front. Readings and response sheets will no longer need to be printed out, saving hundreds of sheets of paper per response assignment. If no other reason than how green QR codes are, I plan to use them frequently in my own classroom.