Chapter 5 Reflection

In Chapter 5 of Teaching with Technology, we start to see how classrooms and students change when they use technology more and more.  Technology really encourages a more constructivist or collaborative classroom.  Technology cannot be used effectively in a traditional lecture style of class.  As the teachers started to settle in with the technology and let the students do more and more with it in their assignments, the more and more they saw that their classrooms were changing, and changing for the better.  Students were becoming more active in the lessons and the learning/ teaching of the lessons. Even those students that were not known as the exceptional students were finding a specialty in relation to technology or what could be done with technology.  Teachers started using students to teach the classes where students researched topics then presented them to the class, instead of the teacher just lecturing on the topics.  In this, however, teachers were beginning to see how their traditional ways of assessing students on knowledge was no longer going to work.  Because the students were learning differently and applying what and how they learned in different manners, standard testing would no longer work.  Teachers became worried about how to assess the students knowledge, especially those teachers that were not working on the ACOT program and really did not know how to use computers.  I found it a little humorous that no one in the book outside of the ACOT program really knew how to use technology.  When you look at today's world where everyone knows how to use a word processor, boot up a computer, and type emails it is hard to remember a world without the world wide web and with individuals who did not own a home computer or have one in their classroom or at their disposal.

I love that with the use of technology comes an increase to move classrooms in a collaborative direction.  I think that students who collaborate and constructively put together their learning environment find a better understanding of the knowledge they are gaining.  The application and deeper thinking associated is critical for successful learning.  I also think it is interesting how classrooms were changing not only for the use of technology but in general.  Even assignments where technology was not centrally focused (like a chemistry lab), the teachers were still taking advantage of the different types of teaching and learning that technology had presented.  I have been in classes that have used several of these types of teaching - most common the learn a subject and teach it to the class, become the second expert (next to the teacher) and instruct the class.  While it is definitely more work on the students part (and less on the teacher), it helps students grasp what is being learned in a fully manner as researching helps one better understand.  I definitely got more out of units I put together and taught then one that a teacher handed out an article and lectured on.  This is incredibly encouraging seeing that colleges seem to be the last to convert to this style of teaching since traditional a college class is known as a stuff lecture style approach.  I am excited to see how the increase of technology due to Common Core and Common Core testing continues to change the landscape of our classrooms.