Creating a joyful learning culture that effectively adapts to the technological innovations of the 21st century can be an incredibly exciting challenge for an upcoming educator. Technology can be used in a myriad of ways, from students submitting digital assignments in Google Classroom, to parents checking grades through programs such as Jupiter Education, to students learning math, science, history, and literacy concepts in innovative new ways.
I have noticed in my practicum an increased emphasis on digital productivity, allowing the teacher to streamline his assessment and planning strategy, and allowing parents to check students’ grades and the status of assignments. Personal digital devices are welcome in the appropriate context, such as looking up dictionary definitions, or accessing the high school’s app. Online safety, inclusion, stewardship, and news validity are increasingly hot topics that must continue to be addressed by parents and educators; I think this is something that teachers should continue to emphasize, and actively intend to work into my curriculum. For example, I intend to have students examine current events by printing off five news articles regarding the same event (such as from Fox, The Washington Post, CNN, The Globe and Mail, Global News), and have students analyze similarities and differences between different online news sources. Before beginning my post baccalaureate, much to my chagrin, I believed that English Language Arts and classroom technology were largely incompatible, and somewhat resisted the idea of incorporating digital literacy into my pedagogy. Books, papers, pens, and perhaps Microsoft Word were the ideal tools for young learners. However, I am rapidly being swayed to the Dark Side of technological integration with English Language Arts. For example, there is a terrific program called “Storyboard That”, which I will actually be sharing in my tech presentation. In that program, teachers can ask students to map out characters, themes, plot points, and vocabulary terms for a given text into a fun and interactive digital interface, unleashing student creativity, and allowing students to collaborate on some truly imaginative projects. Teachers can collect and assess the projects directly from “Storyboard That”, and the results can be shared with the class. Another way I am incorporating digital literacy into English Language Arts is in my Shakespeare unit plan that I am creating. In my unit plan, I will be selecting scenes from the play Othello to bring to small groups of students, along with a fun prop box. Students will have the opportunity to read through the scenes, and create their own version of central, transcendental themes and emotions of the scene using props and modern language. Students can then film their scene, upload to Youtube or Google Classroom (with parental consent, of course), and the short films can be shown periodically through the Othello unit as these key scenes appear throughout the lessons. I believe that by integrating technology, students will be able to collaborate, think creatively, personalize their learning, and take tremendous pride in their work as it is shared with others.
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