Final Reflection: Teaching with Technology

I know technology is an integral part of teaching these students in the 21^st century but the most important aspect is using technology to support learning objectives. Technology offers alternate ways to assess students and “we are able to more accurately evaluate both student performance and the processes that underlie that performance” (Rose 2002). In our trainings the focus is on engagement and the fun technology brings to the classroom. The real support for technology for teachers is the way we can better monitor their progress and help fill in the gaps. After this reading I will be looking for more projects and collaborative assignments to help me measure their progress rather than just games or one time individual assignments. As James Paul Gee said have students “ work in group where the group is smarter than the smartest person in the group.”  Collaboration and meeting objective goals with technology is how we are going to move our students forward in the global work force and “today’s teachers need better tools to address this growing problem”(Solomon 17).

My approach in this assignment was to use all of my facts and combine them with the group knowledge. I have learned each time I work in a group I find the strength of the group and how it drives my learning experiences. I like to be the leader in assignments but know it is more important that the person with the most experience in the area should take the lead. I felt I contributed fairly an accurately and once I felt more comfortable I started taking the lead towards the last few weeks. Once again I was in a group whose goals and objectives were the same and we really turned to one another for help and ideas. We all took the collaboration piece seriously and this is evident in our final site.

The growing trend for our students to work collaboratively also applies to teachers. Working in groups produces more solutions and better results so I will be pushing for a more team based unit at my school. These group projects will help me to become a better leader and follower in my groups at school. I am interested in seeing if we could form a core subject group where we would have one teacher from each core class work together and see if we can produce more cross curricular assignments.

 Edutopia.org (nd). Big thinkers: James Paul Gee on grading with games. Retrieved from http://www.edutopia.org/digital-generation-james-gee-video

Solomon, G., & Schrum, L. (2007). Web 2.0: New tools, new schools. Eugene, OR: International Society for Technology in Education, 7-44.

Rose, D., & Meyer, A. (2002). Teaching every student in the digital age: Universal design for learning. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. Chapter 7. Available online at the Center for Applied Special Technology Web site. Retrieved from http://www.cast.org/teachingeverystudent/ideas/tes/