From Dr. Snyder:

Terrific article–thanks for posting.  Also, wanted to give a brief update as to Monday’s meeting.  Thanks to all who participated.  The committee agreed that we need a high school teacher as, for some reason, that level was missed.  Sean Gnat has had several inquries and will move forward with inviting an new member.  We establsihed several ad hoc subcommittees and appointed Committee liaisons to put together a cross seciton of reps to do very strategic reviews and recommendations.  These committees are thus far identified as :

Peripheral Committee, Liaison, John Bullington.   Projector distribuiton committee, Liaison, Dean Mayes
Data bases Committee, Liaison, Lisa Correa  Software review committee, Liaison, Jon Conover
Distance Learning Committee, Liaison, Sean Gnat
Online Learning Committee, Liaison, Steve Smith
VOD/Cable Committee, Liason, Brian Whitley

We will be establishing a survey of staff perceptions and needs that can be completed at department or grade level meetings.

The next District Committee meeting is November 8 at which ad hocs will report any info they have garnered.  The committee selected Dec 11 for a subsequent meeting date.  They will be 12-3–locations to be determined.

What student’s want in the classroom?

Here is a link to an article in edutopia July/August 2007 issue where students were asked “What tech do YOU want to see in class?”

http://www.edutopia.org/student-opinions-classroom-technology

An Article by Sara Kajder

I am filled with great joy this morning as I spend my time pouring over articles and books written with the specific intent of showing teachers how they can use new technologies to engage their students in learning.  The article I’m currently reading is entitled: Unleashing Potential with Emerging Technologies,  by Sara Kajder.  The article begins by exposing a very common misconception about what effectively using technology in the classroom looks like.  The author is introduced to a teacher (described by the principal) as someone who “gets how to use technology with kids.”  Sadly, what was happening in this teacher’s classroom was little more than a rehashing of a traditional English lesson.  These particular students were fortunate to have laptops which they carried throughout the day (instead of text books), but these laptops stayed closed through most of the lesson.  After the traditional ‘going on’s’ of an English class transpired the students were instructed to open a document on a network server, resave it with their initials (to avoid overwriting each other’s work) and finally to make comments on the document, referencing a book they were currently reading.  Clearly, this is a new cover on the same old book; an educational project that has been happening for at least a hundred years, but spiffed up with a superficial stamp of technology.

The author goes on to give voice to my thoughts about what we should really be doing with technology.  The power behind technology is that our students are already intrinsically motivated to use it.  Most kids chat online, many read and write blogs.  The ubiquitous ipod has lead to the phenomenon of pod-casting – where audio and video data can automatically be downloaded to a computer and then transferred to a portable audio device.    Why not hook into what they are already doing?  Kajder writes of teachers with classroom blogs, where there are no “required number of pages” or “mandatory font sizes” instead the focus is on what the student needs or wants to say.    Posts are written by the students (they must be approved by the teacher before they go live)  In one particular classroom the teacher uses a daily recorder to summarize and synthesize the content of the day’s lesson.  Then other students react to that with comments, which naturally leads to discussion and debate.   Their thoughts can easily be enhanced with photos, audio, and video or any combination of digital multimedia resources. 

Similarly there is an inherent usefulness to using pod-casts for audio intense learning.  To that end I intend to teach homogeneous classes this year on pod-casting.  LOTE teachers will be able to create vocab lists that the students will be able to hear as well as see.  Setting short phrases to music, will allow the teacher to subconsciously instill the natural stresses of foreign words into their students.  Music teachers will be able to excerpt musical concepts from classical compositions to show their students  the natural evolution of music, or illustrate a theoretical concept.  Choir directors will be able to create virtual “practice CD’s” for students to learn their parts with.  The possibilities are only as limited as the teachers’ imaginations. 

The key to approaching instruction in this way, is to listen to what are students are telling us.  How do they spend their time when they are not at school?  They are writing, they arelistening to music and to pod-casts…so how do we commandeer that for our own purposes?