Recent events have prompted me to re-evaluate how this pilot program is working. The question is, "How do we get kids to accept responsibility for the appropriate care & use of technology equipment and software?"
Throughout the year, I have been working hard to individually correct inappropriate behavior, and have regularly asked kids to reflect on technology and its use in class. We have regular class discussions about what is appropriate and not appropriate, and yet, two weeks ago, there was an incident where a student thought it would be funny to rearrange the keys on a laptop computer. That in itself shows me that the individual has a lack of respect for the property, but what really frustrated me was the number of students who stood by and watched & didn't do anything...not even get me... What does that say about the success of my current methods of helping students feel ownership & responsibility for the technology that has become a daily part of their lives?
To me it says that I've been mostly unsuccessful. So, again, I ask what can I do to help them get engaged in the ownership & care of technology? Well, with the help and advice of Dr. Esther Silvers and Kim Boswell, I believe we may have an appropriate hands-on, interactive, engaging activity, the final result of which could provide us with valuable teaching tools. Kim & I are designing a unit where the students are creating short "how-to" i-movies for different aspects of the care & use of technology and software.
We are currently in week 2 of the project, still brainstorming & organizing the group structure, but the students seem to have really taken this task to heart. We first told them that the movies would be used as instructional tools for next year's seventh graders, but after further thought & discussion, Kim & I realized that we could also use these i-movies to show the teachers the appropriate behavior they should expect from their students as they are using technology.
After all, the use of technology is no longer limited to a few classrooms. There are several of us who have been using technology long enough to make the management of the hardware & software standardized across the school. All we need is a creative way to share the standards. This may be it...At least we hope so.
Wednesday, March 15, 2006
Thursday, January 19, 2006
Teaching Email
Where and when should students receive and learn the etiquette for communication? How should we teach it? I was having a conversation with the Business and Information Technology teacher at the middle school today to get a better idea of what he teaches by grade level, and more importantly, what would he like to teach at each grade level.
Currently the 6th graders are NOT proficient with keyboarding --this we know and are trying to implement a plan to change status quo. Keyboarding should be proficient by 5th grade (or so the National Educational Technology Standards state). To raise the bar in our district, it is my hope and the wish of the our middle school business and information technology (keyboarding currently) teacher to have 6th graders get an introduction hardware and software and an introduction to the basic software. 7th graders would have a more intermediate knowledge set of the those same basic software applications and the 8th would learn the advanced features.
Originally I thought the high school students and the 8th graders should have email and begin working with and practicing email etiquette, but as I reviewed the QCC's for the Business and Information Technology I realized that the exact communication objectives we need to email already exist. As well, the teacher of that class felt he doesn't need to teach memo writing to the extent he did in the past because those days are obsolete--we send memos in an email.
It gets better...that list of objectives for communication is no longer present in the 7th and 8th grade!!! Meaning--we need to teach those communication objectives in 6th and move on (there's other stuff in the curriculum for 7th and 8th).
This would be so ideal for the middle school students to get their email address in the 6th grade as they enter the Bus & Information class. Then they would have it permanently until they withdraw. The registrar could enter it upon enrollment.
Teachers would know that a student has an email account and if they want to use it to communicate with a student, they simply need to provide them with access to their account within class.
From the knowledge that students are learning these technology skill sets in Business and Information Technology class, they could build upon it by assigning work that requires use of these skills.
What may change all of these thoughts (better or worse)is the state standards, which use to be the QCC's. I just went to the Ga DOE web site to pull those up so I had them electronically and noticed they are no longer the QCC's--the standards are in place.
Currently the 6th graders are NOT proficient with keyboarding --this we know and are trying to implement a plan to change status quo. Keyboarding should be proficient by 5th grade (or so the National Educational Technology Standards state). To raise the bar in our district, it is my hope and the wish of the our middle school business and information technology (keyboarding currently) teacher to have 6th graders get an introduction hardware and software and an introduction to the basic software. 7th graders would have a more intermediate knowledge set of the those same basic software applications and the 8th would learn the advanced features.
Originally I thought the high school students and the 8th graders should have email and begin working with and practicing email etiquette, but as I reviewed the QCC's for the Business and Information Technology I realized that the exact communication objectives we need to email already exist. As well, the teacher of that class felt he doesn't need to teach memo writing to the extent he did in the past because those days are obsolete--we send memos in an email.
It gets better...that list of objectives for communication is no longer present in the 7th and 8th grade!!! Meaning--we need to teach those communication objectives in 6th and move on (there's other stuff in the curriculum for 7th and 8th).
This would be so ideal for the middle school students to get their email address in the 6th grade as they enter the Bus & Information class. Then they would have it permanently until they withdraw. The registrar could enter it upon enrollment.
Teachers would know that a student has an email account and if they want to use it to communicate with a student, they simply need to provide them with access to their account within class.
From the knowledge that students are learning these technology skill sets in Business and Information Technology class, they could build upon it by assigning work that requires use of these skills.
What may change all of these thoughts (better or worse)is the state standards, which use to be the QCC's. I just went to the Ga DOE web site to pull those up so I had them electronically and noticed they are no longer the QCC's--the standards are in place.
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