Gatin's presentation revolved around technology and changing learning theories. I thought that Glen's explanation of the "traditional" teaching style was excellent! He described the teacher as pouring information into students and then testing to see how much they had retained using a dip stick. The image that I had in my mind about the cup and dip stick kept popping back into my head, and it made a lot of sense to me! The new way to do things involves co-operative learning and student-centred classrooms. It is now the teacher's job to teach the kids how to teach themselves!
Students are most engaged when they are passionate about what they are doing, so we cannot ignore the informal learning that students do outside of the classroom. We have to get creative in finding ways to engage our students, and technology can be an excellent tool for creating engagement! Technology is always changing and we have to be flexible. This class is a great place to start in finding tools to be flexible and effective in our classrooms.
On a side note, I loved the instant chat conversation that we had during the presentation. I thought this was an excellent tool, and something that I would love to use in my classroom at some point... i'm just not sure how yet! I am excited to see how the bring your own device theory plays out... the future looks very exciting to me!
I also really enjoyed the instant chat Nicole. I think it will be a very useful tool in the classroom. One reason being that students can create nick-names to use that only they and I would know and they may contribute to a whole group discussion more willingly and honestly. I also like the fact that the chats can be saved and questions and comments can be addressed at a later time. I hope I get opportunities to try this out in MY classroom!
ReplyDeleteNicky, I agree that technology is a great way to engage our students. I think technology seems to grow and change even faster than our students do, which is why I think it appeals to them so much. There is always something new to learn and figure out with the technology itself, as well as the information that technology can present. A student could read a textbook cover to cover in one year, then visit that same textbook 5 years down the road and nothing inside it will have changed. But, google something one minute, and then again 5 minutes later and the information could be different! I think that is fascinating for students (and for me, too), and we should take advantage of that engagement in any way we can.
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