Day 28...The Worst Advice We've Ever Heard About Technology in the classroom
It's just after 7 on day 28 and I have been thinking about this topic all day. For the life of me, I could not think of any specific advice I had been given about using tech. I am one who has embraced tech and often ends up teaching other teachers how to integrate themselves.
At my current school, we have a computer science department (because we are a CS school) who for the most part are working on an entirely different level of tech than most of us. I have great aspirations to let better at tech- at least learn some basics of coding so I can talk more with our students about what and how they are doing- but finding the time to sit down with Alice or some version of Scratch is overwhelming for this old lady. Eric, graciously spent time with me on two occasions teaching me-or trying to teach me- how to use Doctopus but my brain just can't wrap itself around that one. I do have my mainstays: Skedula (that has improved so much over the last 5 years) and I wish our school used more of it's features, but it's our online grade book. I also use Teacher Dashboard, a lot. It is on my top 5 digital teaching tools ever.
I guess for me, the prompt should really be: what misconceptions did you/do you have about tech in the classroom.
Here are three:
1. All tools work for all teachers, because they are teaching tools.
One of the most frustrating parts of EdTech- is that there are so many tools and administrators want to try new things, get on board with what will best help students move forward, support teacher development, and provide the all important data to support positive instructional outcomes. I stand by this: do a few things really well. REALLY WELL. Not two dozen things half way or sort of. I feel this way about lots of school related things.
We are not all excellent at everything. I can be proficient, even ok- but who wants to be just ok? I want to be HIGHLY EFFECTIVE. There are been a few things over the years that I just couldn't figure out. I don't push myself to master all the nuances (like with Excel) but I also don't have cause to use it very much because I teach English.
3. More experienced (read: old) teachers can't learn new tricks.
It's all about what an individual clicks with- don't assume talent coaches.
It's now almost 9. Cooked and eaten dinner. Still have a PPT to make for class tomorrow- thankful for this tech that will let me quickly, prep, save and get to go to bed.
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