Week 3- Equal Access For All Students?

I think it would be close to impossible (well I guess if a school district won the lottery it would be entirely possible) for teachers to provide equal access to the digital world for ALL students. Sure, teachers may be able to provide equal access to the digital world within the parameters of the classroom, but some students will always either be at an advantage or disadvantage when it comes to equal access since teachers cannot control their access at home. Those who have more access on a regular basis will always have an edge over those that do not. Moreover, teachers do not have enough resources to make up for the access some students might not receive when they leave their classroom.

Still though, teachers should be responsible for providing as much access to the digital world for all their students as much as they are able to. Just because they do not have all of the resources in the world, it does not mean that they should give up on technology (as I see many teachers opting to do). Instead, teachers should think outside the box and gain knowledge and methods to provide the access to the digital world that the students of today need in order to do well in the digitally centered world that they live in. It is not something that can just be forgotten.

Week 2- Collaboration

Collaboration between educators is essentially working as a team. Technology allows this to happen on a far larger scale than ever before. It is bringing ideas, talents, resources, experience,s, knowledge, and networks all together to benefit the education world as a whole. Likewise, the benefits of collaboration have many forms.

Teachers collaboration with each other leads to more informed teachers, and the potential for teachers to use more effective practices in their classroom. In turn, this collaboration leads to a better quality of education for all learners. Still though, on a more simple level, collaboration can also mean that teachers learn from the mistakes of others, and even ways to save time and do in things more efficiently in their classrooms.

Collaboration between teachers and parents is another obvious gain from collaboration. In this high paced world, technology allows for greater chance for collaboration between parents and students. Likewise through that collaboration, it has the potential to lead to greater educational support at home. Also, through parent collaboration teachers may gain better insight to the whole child, and also be on the same page about things such as homework with their parents.

Lastly, there is a quote that says "It takes a village to raise a child" and collaboration between educators and collaboration between educators and parents allows for a better chance for that to happen.

Week- 1 K12 Online Conference Session

K12 Session: Keeping Literacy in 21st Century Literacy

I listened to this session on the K12 conference site. It quickly caught my attention since it involved literacy, a subject area I am very interested in.

Through the speaker's discussion (Drew Schrader) and his correlating video, I was able to be introduced to three tools designed to aid in developing literacy for students.

He proposed that by using Screentoaster, a type of tool that records the screen you are using as well as voice and video, teachers could capture and document read aloud discussions. Since it allows students to go back to conversations that would have been otherwise lost I think this could be quite useful for reinforcing concepts, and also useful for accommodation/modification procedures. It is also very handy that you can save the "videos" you make to your computer or upload them to youtube.

He proposed that by using Diigo, a social bookmarking site that allows you to highlight and make sticky notes on text, teachers could help develop more solid comprehension in their students. I like that the text was already highlighted for the students, and especially that teachers could have their personal dialogue for students be in the form of sticky notes for students. This means that students could hear about concepts and comments immediately while they are reading the material, and not have to wait until they are finished to discuss it maybe that day or the following day. It seems like students would be given more opportunity to construct their meaning of the material in a more immediate fashion (which research finds to be key in developing solid comprehension skills) and that would be a tool teachers could really capitalize on.

Overall, I think this website is a great professional development tool for teachers. It seems to be another world of information that they do not have to wait until they sign up for a workshop to get. How great is that when they have the time, teachers can log on (perhaps even daily) and expand their knowledge base, which in turn creates a more promising learning environment for students. Quite simply stated, I guess it adds a lot of tools to the toolbox, without the cost and the trip to the store to buy them. I am excited to keep looking!

Week 1- The Essential Questions

Technology should be incorporated into lessons for many reasons. Nonetheless, there are two reasons that I find to be most important. I believe technology should be incorporated into lessons because it helps prepare students to adequately function in today’s technologically driven society, and also because research shows that incorporating technology is an effective way of keeping students engaged in their own learning. Likewise, if we do not provide technology integration we fail to prepare students for being successful in life and we fail to provide them with effective instruction to maximize their learning potential.

As for the purpose on integrating technology into learning, I believe it is two fold. As stated above, it provides students with opportunities to prepare themselves to enter the technologically driven workforce, and it also provides a means of maximizing their learning across all content areas.