Dave Neal, Week One, Chapter Two Reflection

Three ideas or learnings from our reading that are of interest to me:

1. John Dewey's quote “If we teach today as we taught yesterday, then we rob our children of tomorrow" is precisely the reason that I enrolled in this course. It is my hope that this course will teach me new technological resources that will help me surpass the domain that I currently teach within. The school that I teach in has been flooded with new computers and technological resources within the past few years (it has come to a quick halt with the decline of our last levy). I want to be able to capatalize on the new resources available. The challenge for me, as I stated in the first chapter review, will be to continue to stay on track with technological advances in the many years to come.
2. To be completely honest, I was not aware of the standards of technology. Coincidentally, our school's superintendent passed out copies of Montana state's technology standards, asking us to review them. It does make sense that there are technology standards, just as there are standards for every other core subject. My philosophy is that standards keep schools 'on track', so that we cannot teach 'whatever' we want to. I do not, however, open up the grand book of standards everytime I plan a lesson, or even a unit plan. I do make sure that I am aware of the standards and benchmarks at the beginning of the year, and then I go from there. Who knows, maybe this will change in time...or maybe it will not.
3. Standard VI is interesting to me and I think it could lead to an interesting discussion and project within my fifth grade classroom (I will go into how I plan on integrating this in the next section). Standard VI covers social, ethical, legal, and human issues. I believe that many teachers would consider this a standard that could be easily covered with their basic school rules (do not send offensive emails, do not search inappropriate sites, etc.). What I have been overlooking, is what a great opportunity this standard gives upper elementary through high school classes for meaningful classes revolving around this subject.

Two new ideas for integrating technology for student learning in my own classroom/content area.

1. Standard VI, covering social, ethical, legal, and human issues gives me an idea for a project revolving around this matter. The class could begin to talk about the problems (social, ethical, legal, and human) that could arise through technology. After the discussion, challenge each student to create a research-based PowerPoint presentation of the greatest technological crime in their opinion.
2. Simply put, given that I did not know (or remember) that technology standards existed, I am going to look at the Montana state standards for technology. As I mentioned earlier, I use standards as a brief outline of what I will teach throughout the year. I believe that looking and understanding these technology standards will have an influence on how and what I teach.

What is my one main concern about integrating technology for student learning after reading this chapter?

1. My main concern with standards (in general), is that some teachers may take them too seriously and attempt to rigidly teach to every individual standard that exists. I have seen teachers that teach to the standards as if they are reading a script. It is my opinion that to be an effective teacher, one must have a certain level of flexibility and creativity to go within and outside teaching standards. I would just hate to see our school system turn into a carbon-copy, cookie cut-out, program.