There have been major changes in technology in my lifetime, and I am fortunate to be able to grow up with the changes. My family would make Turkle proud though because my parents raised my sister and me to have those technology free moments. When cell phones became an item in our lives, there were certain times that we were not allowed to use them because my parents wanted us to have conversational skills.
At the time of being teenagers, I think that my sister and I both hated those rules. But today, I am so thankful that I had a "device-free zone" and learned how to have those face-to-face conversations with people around me. As far as my education growing up, technology was just starting to become a tool that was used by teachers. The rolly VCR cart was still used to show movies, which as students there was no aspect of surprise, overhead projectors were still used, in the sense that each transparent sheet would need to be cleaned in order to use it again, and desktop computer labs needed to be reserved by the teacher if they wanted to use it.
But it is not the technology that I remember about my education. It was the hands-on projects that I completed that helped me dive deeper into content and learn. I remember in 6th grade when we were learning about body systems, my teacher wanted us to do more with our knowledge. In groups, we traced a body and had to glue each part of the system onto our body and write about it directly on our body. We then each presented our bodies to the rest of the class. It was these engaging moments that helped me fall in love with school, as a student, and reinforced the fact that I wanted to be an educator when I grew up.
I don't remember wanting to be anything other than a teacher growing up. I would play school with my sister, with myself being the teacher of course. I even remember being that young and trying to come up with interesting and engaging ways to teach her because it was those moments that would help her remember things and actually learn. Looking back now, I believe that this is where the beginning of one of my beliefs of how students learn stems from.
Princess Ana says that love is an open door, but I think that education is an open door. Education is a journey to find your why. I still believe that I am walking through that open door trying to hold down my why. I believe that students learn from investigating and determining a connection between why and how things are. For me, it is important to recognize that every student learns differently, but when students investigate with the material, they are able to learn the content in a way that makes sense to them.
With the opportunity to teach 5th grade math, for the first time ever at my school, I want my students to have time to investigate with fractions and understand why things work rather than just get told an algorithm. Students deserve to know the WHY behind what they are learning, but in order to understand the WHY behind what they are learning, students need a safe space to be able to ask questions and learn from their mistakes.
Students also learn best when they have a complete support system that is informed to encourage their learning. At this point in my career, entering my third full year of teaching, I would say that I am a techno-traditionalist on my journey to becoming a techno-constructivist. But, I keep in the back of my mind that it is not necessarily about the technology that is used. Technology is a tool that assists the learning.
My beliefs have helped me determine some steps that I can take to get students to that point. In my opinion, these steps are the what and how that Sinek discusses in his Golden Circle.For the 2018-2019 school year, I have created a class website. This class website has a few different goals attached to it. One major goal is that I believe that parents should be involved in their child's education.
My school has an amazing family engagement committee and does a great job of keeping parents informed and involved, except for on an individual classroom level. Our school has an open door policy and parents are always welcome into our classroom, which is amazing, but it does not mean that they are informed in their child's education in regards to their individual classes.
Parents will get an introduction to the class website when they attend orientation in August. On this website, parents will have access to what students are learning in class each week, homework assignments, and links to resources that may be helpful for them in regards to their childn's education. Parents will also have access to sign up for Talking Points.
Talking Points is an application that will allow me to contact parents directly and vise versa. I'm excited to use this application during the current school year because I will be able to have that connection with parents. There will be no language barrier between the parents and myself because Talking Points translates messages into different languages. It also has a feature where multiple family members can be included on a strand.
My hope is that my website and Talking Points will allow parents to have open communication with me about their child's education and that together, we can support the student's learning. For students, my goal is that the website will serve as a "home base" in my classroom. During student orientation week, I am going to have the students bookmark the website into their favorites so that it will always be available for them. In the past two years, I have seen how much time students "waste" trying to find the correct website. Since I have such a strong belief on how students learn, students should not be wasting their time trying to find the correct website to be on.
My goal for students with my website is that it will be a one-stop-shop for them. All of the websites that they will use in my classroom will be under an important links tab along with any hints for username and passwords. By using this website for that purpose, I hope that students will be able to have more time investigating and using the technology as a tool for their learning.
Like Boyd, I believe that youth need opportunities and time to develop the skills and knowledge to engage with contemporary technology effectively and meaningfully. But, students will not get the time and opportunities if they are stuck trying to get to the right place.
After thinking back on this course and all that I have learned, Kelly Reed keeps being at the forefront of my mind. A conversation with her helped me realize that as educators, we need to bring the joy back into learning. Learning should have some fun in it without always worrying about the outcome.
This upcoming year, I want to help students find that joy through investigations and engaging creatively in learning. As I continue my journey as a techno-traditionalist, I think back to Moana, "One day I'll know, if I go, there's just no telling how far I'll go".
Overall, thinking back on this course, I truly enjoyed being able to actually learn. I was reminded, as both a student and teacher, that learning is a process. The school system has become so bogged down in grades that everyone is forgetting what it is like to learn. I will forever hold these concepts close to my heart and I know that myself as a person, as a student, and as a teacher have been changed. I'm looking forward to putting these new concepts into practice in the fall and enjoying the journey.
