Teaching Teachers about Technology

I had an interesting conversation yesterday with a teacher about technology in the classroom. She told me that recently her elementary school began encouraging the incorporation of iclickers into the classroom. All teachers were given access to these clickers and attended a brief information tutorial explaining how to use the clickers. Even though she attended a short information session, she thought she understood how to use the clickers. But, on the day she incorporated the clickers into a class lesson, she realized that she did not really know that much about their operation. She then told me about how the clickers did not work properly and that she was unable to diagnose the problem. The lesson ended up turning into a disaster and she use unable to teach either iclicker use or social studies that day. I think this story offers an important lesson for technological integration, if teachers do not know how to properly operate forms of technology, then their use in the classroom will not be effective. Therefore, more emphasis needs to be placed on teaching teacher to use technologies so that they are able to usefully demonstrate their importance in the classroom.

Technology in the Classroom

Today, it seems like technology and its role in classroom instruction are commonly discussed topics. Its as if everywhere you turn there is something being said about the need for more technology, better utilization of technology, or even how technology is more important than ever to students in our tech driven society. However, simply crying out for more advanced technology does not necessarily result in students that understand how to effectively use technology. I think it is important to realize that simply incorporating powerpoint into classroom instruction does not guarantee that your students understand its importance or how it should be correctly used. While teachers are doing their best to keep up with demands for more technology based lessons in the classroom, it seems like we are forgetting that technology in and of itself is not helpful to students. Therefore, only when it is paired usefully with interesting lessons and explained throughly does it offer any value to students.