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When it comes to technology in the classroom at this point in time, it’s almost impossible to not use it since it has become a gigantic focal point in our society and culture. During this class we talked about and viewed videos that showed us how to effectively use these technologies in our classroom. One specifically was the video that talked about a history classroom that used Chromebooks and Google Docs to effectively to display their knowledge on the Roman Empire. By using good web research techniques and organizing their information in the Google Doc, they were able to demonstrate a good practical use of technology in the classroom. But, aren’t there some downsides to having them in the classroom as well? Not if you are prepared and have it well planned.

I recently read an article that talks about a study done in a 7th grade class that looked into the effect on academic success of students and if the online technologies allowed the students to complete their tasks assigned to them. In the article, they discuss that in order for the technology to be effective, they need to design the classroom around them. “The digital classroom needs a well-planned classroom environment with specific features, rather than a random environment involving various technological devices.” (Ozerbas & Erdogan, Pg. 204) The main thing you need for the technology to effectively work is a server or way of all connecting them. The best sources the article talks about are websites. Websites are easily accessible and make it a click away for someone to connect and be interacting with the other students. ” The site is a well-organized education environment prepared within certain criteria, rather than a random digital environment.” (Ozerbas & Erdogan, Pg. 205) One of the best cites that I have seen used in most of my classes is Kahoot. The ability to make your own questions and giving it a scoring system makes students look at it as a game and immediately become more engaged.

Another important factor when it comes to technology in today’s classrooms is that the professor or instructor is also literate in these new technologies. An article written by two professors from Texas A&M looked into specifically technology in the English classroom and importance of technological literacy, “to meet students equally in their educational experience and for collaboration with fellow teachers in order to bolster teaching practices.” (Black & Lassmann, Pg. 620) This gives teachers the ability to easily communicate what they have been using in their classrooms and what has been the most effective. This doesn’t mean that teachers need to know everything about all technology, just the ones that can benefit their students the most. Another thing that I believe can help both the instructor and student is that if both are open to learning new technologies and learning off of each other. This relates to the my class where we all looked at new technological teaching tools and how we had to come up with questions on how to effectively use them.

As we rely more and more on technology, we become more comfortable with it and learn all of its features. In the beginning we only start off with the basics of whatever device we are using and as we get more comfortable we look to try new and creative things with it. We should take this same approach when it comes to education and technology. In Southern California there was a summit to discuss technology in the class room and teachers shared the top 10 practices when it came to implementing them. One of the principals at the summit talked about how “She created planning time for teachers to work with colleagues in different subject areas. In each session, they start with the academic standards, then get creative with devising projects that can bring lessons to life.” (Levitt, Pg. 58) She further goes on to talk about how they would describe different technological teaching tools and try to come up with new ways to use them in a classroom setting. By communicating with each other they all discovered new ways to use the tools that they had already been working with.

When all of these factors come together, you can effectively use technology in the classroom. First, plan out well what you are going to be doing and what you are using. Second, ensure that you are technologically literate with which ever device or program you use. And lastly, be open to new ways and technologies to be used and be able to learn from your students as well. Technology is constantly being updated, created, and thrown away as we look towards the future. An effective teacher should be able to adapt to the culture and needs of their students by using these as tools to only better education

 

Google Slides Video

Works Cited

Ozerbas, M. A., & Erdogan, B. H. (2016). The Effect of the Digital Classroom on Academic Success and Online Technologies Self-Efficacy. Journal Of Educational Technology & Society, 19(4), 203-212.

Black, B., & Lassmann, M. E. (2016). Use Of Technology in College and University English Classrooms. College Student Journal, 50(4), 617-623.

Levitt, M. (2017). Educators Share 10 Best Teaching, Technology Practices. Education Digest, 82(8), 56-59.

 

My idea of a good and effective teaching is when an educator is able to adapt to individual student needs if that student is not understanding the course material presented to him. Another part of effective teaching would be being able to use modern technology and culture in order to get the course material to the student in the easiest way possible for them to understand. This means educators have to be knowledgeable in current trends and innovations. In the video I watched on using Google Apps and the internet in the classroom, students were able to show their abilities in researching and how to find accurate information while at the same time finding new ways to show the teacher so they could improve.

I feel that my definition of good and effective teaching hasn’t really changed much sine the beginning of the semester. What I think this class taught me was explanations onto why students are having struggles in the classroom and giving me new tools and strategies on how to help them improve in all subjects. For example, how using backwards design to create a lesson allows for an educator to think through what they really want the students to take away from the lesson and the best ways to ensure that students are really engaged and are confident when they are being assessed.

I think the standard that this course helped me with the most was standard number four which said “Teachers know how to teach”. In the class we learned about the different instructional strategies such as teacher centered and student centered. The main thing I took away from these strategies specifically is that student centered is becoming the more modern approach. Not saying that teacher centered is bad, but in order to be an effective teacher you need to know your students so that you can choose the appropriate strategy that works best for them, and if possible, be able to use both.

The most significant thing I learned this semester was the importance of meeting individual student needs. I read an article that was talking about the concept of a charter school and why students can benefit from it. They are able to personalize each students learning environment so that they can help students who are struggling in specific areas and are able to help them speed up their learning process. This is gives them a motivation since they have such a big role in their own teaching. (www.methodschools.org)

In order to help my digital online identity, I can make myself look more professional and make sure that future employers know what I am a part of to show community involvement. This well help by showing my engagement level and interest in education so that school districts want to hire me.

Works Cited

Staff, August 27th, 2015. Why It Is Important To Identify and Meet Individual Learner Needs When Teaching Small                   Class Sizes. Retrieved from http://www.methodschools.org/blog/why-it-is-important-to-identify-and-meet-                     individual-learner-needs-when-teaching-small-class-sizes

YouTube video

 

When starting to teach a class yo u obviously have no idea what type of learners will be in that class. I believe the best way to prepare for the situation is to incorporate at least one activity a day for each type of learner: kinesthetic, visual, and auditory. Now when it comes to cultural if their is a student that is not adapted to our culture, I would research their culture and find anyways that have been proven to teach them effectively.

One difference that I may encounter could be a student who would be raised on a farm. From my high school experience, those who grew up on a farm tended to be kinesthetic learners, learners who learn by doing. If I had a large number of them in my class I would make sure to have at least one to two physical activities. Being a Physical Education teacher is a literally different but what I would do specifically is have the student do the movement or activity along with me as I did it. This way they have both a visual of how to do it correctly and I can correct them if they do it improperly. Now for teaching the other learning types, like visual I would do the same as with the kinesthetic. The only difference is I would swap out the part where I do it along with them and right it down on the board or draw. This can insure that the student gets the information and how to properly use it. In the video Teaching Strategies – Learning Styles, it talks about how highlighting keywords and terms for visual learners is key. Lastly, for the auditory learners I would try to pose a lot of questions like “Why is this the most effective way of playing this sport?” or “What are the other possibilities to playing this sport?” by doing this it causes them to understand and think of why they are doing it. Another of way I could it is have group sessions so that they can hear other ideas and perspectives to the same issue. Furthermore, another way to reinforce the auditory learner would be to repeat words or concepts that are most important so that students remember them and understand they are key.

After I have done all these different styles I would then ask all the students for feed back on what activities worked well and/or how to improve them so that they are more challenging or easier to grasp the concept.

Teaching Strategies – Learning Styles video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oNxCporOofo)

 

The difference between cognitive and behaviorist perspectives is that behaviorists look only at the outside behaviors of the person while cognitive looks at how the brain works. Cognitive goes in depth on how the brain works such as memory, psycho motor movement, etc… One of the main theorists in this theory is Jean Piaget. He hypothesized that we develop in stages and that what we learned would come in predetermined stages. He studied the mind and how we use different learning strategies to process and store information in our unconscious. While behaviorists look at what we do as humans and what causes to do it in our environments. This theory looks more at the conscious side of our brains. A good definition on found on YouTube in a video titled Cognitive vs Behavioral Psychology (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TBBXH_h1mR8) is “…A behaviorist views it as a purely objective experimental branch of natural science. (Willingham, 2007).” What it means is that it only observes actual human behavior to predict and control what a person does.

 

(Jean Piaget and Lev Vygotsky)

Applying these two theories to students in school today allows teachers different methods so they can help all students achieve a high level of success. Some students might use more processes and adapt to the environment to absorb information quickly and be able to repeat it. Other students might rely more on different learning strategies so they can use their skills in the unconscious to learn material.

Some limitations of cognitive theory are that you do not know exactly what the person is thinking and we do not have a way to confirm it, we can not physically see what is happening so their is no proof for the hypothesis. Some limitations of behavioral theory are people not respond the same to certain stimuli so you can not accurately predict what they are going to do. Their past experience may give you a different result.

I think I as a teacher would be more in the middle since I would try to teach both ways in order to see how a student would react to a stimuli. As a physical education teacher, I could use behaviorism to see how students would react to different sports like soccer, softball, basketball, etc… and then see what strategies of teaching would be most appropriate to increase their skill in that area.

I would compare myself more to the cognitive theory because I would use prior knowledge to help my understanding like find an example of a topic in my everyday life. But in regards to physical education I also see a lot of behaviorist because a few of my past teachers used this method so I see it in a different way.

I will use this knowledge in my future career to help students with different learning styles acquire the same basic knowledge for all sports and compare them to everyday tasks that we do in order to survive and correctly process the information.

A major part in how we develop and construct knowledge is how we are raised by our parents. They are such a huge part because they effect and shape how we interact with our environment and people around us. If your parents teach you to be really outgoing and friendly and have positive experiences, then you will continue to be outgoing throughout your life. We tend to keep habits and tendencies that we pick up at an early age since our brain is developing its foundation. This can be incorporated into my teaching because not only would the parents be molding the child’s behavior, but also I as an educator will be molding their mind as well. I will make it so that everyone is sociable and form it so that there is only positivity around the students so they have positive experiences and make them want to continue to use these skills. For instance, I could incorporate a game of soccer so that every time you pass the ball you then have to compliment the the person, making it a positive memory for the child.

Another way that children develop and construct knowledge is by doing things on their own. By giving a child the freedom you allow them to explore and try to find ways to accomplish tasks without help. This will build confidence in the child so that they will be willing to try and solve even more problems on their own, creating their own independence. One way I could incorporate this into my teaching is by giving the students an objective like throwing a ball into a hula hoop, but giving them a few restrictions so that they have to use their critical thinking skills and problem solving in order to follow the rules, but also complete the objective. And if possible, I could also allow the students to be able to work with a partner so that they could think of even more ways to do it faster and more efficient.

Hi, this is John LePine and welcome to my blog! After I graduate from UW-Whitewater, I would like to go back to my home town to teach Physical Education. I would prefer to teach Elementary or High School but wouldn’t mind Middle School. My first year of college I attended UW-Marathon County up in Wausau, which is where I have lived the past 16 years. I started to think about teaching Physical Education at the end of my senior year of high school. I managed my schools Girls varsity soccer team with my friend Nick Rahmlow. This is where I met the person who I can say made me decided to want to become a Physical Education Teacher, Lucas Kollross. Lucas teachers at Riverside Elementary School within the district. As head coach, Lucas was able to take the girls to the Division One state championship game, which we one. Before the final game Lucas gave a speech to all the seniors, who he had coached since they were 6 years old (12 years), that made my mind up on which career I wanted to pursue. The memories he made with the group of girls, as well as all the skills in the game of soccer and those in life, showed me what it truly meant to be a good educator. I wanted to make connections like that in my life. The speech that he gave had so much emotion to it that he even cried (sorry Lucas). But it really showed me how important the job of an educator really is and how they don’t just teach the subject they were trained to, but also about life.

I think that a good educator is someone who can relate to students and be open enough to share with them common experiences they had in their lives. Also, an educator needs to have enthusiasm for the subject that they are teaching and show it in order to try and motivate students to find something in the subject they can be interested in.

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