In our Curriculum and Literacy classes we discussed how technology is becoming more prominent in classrooms as a tool for learning. Though 1:1 technology initiatives give students the ability to access a wide variety of educational resources, we as educators must also be aware of the risks of each student having devices. In groups, our education classes created a letter for parents informing them about implementing a 1:1 initiative in our fake school, and a contract for students and parents to read and sign that they understand the guidelines. You can view our letter and contract here.
Through this project we considered all the pros and cons of technology in the classroom. The pros were quite obvious about how technology can enhance student learning and understanding, especially through educational apps, access to online databases, and knowledge of digital citizenship. There are a variety of ways that technology can help personalize students' learning as well, as discussed in this article here.
Some of our arguments against 1:1 technology initiatives is directly related with our concern for students' internet safety. It is outlined in our letter and contract that students are not to reveal any personal information on the internet and that students are to use the technology for anything related to academics but not for personal reasons such as social media or gaming. In addition, this gives us as educators an opportunity to teach students about digital citizenship and have class discussions about the dangers of the internet.
This meets performance criteria 9.1: Continuous Professional Learning and 10.1 Collaboration to Ensure Learning. Through a thoughtful examination of technology in the classroom, we learned about the most useful ways for technology to help support student learning. One thing that we established was to teach students research skills and how to evaluate if a source is valid. If students are researching, we want them to understand that not everything on the internet is true, that way the use of technology is not counterproductive to their learning. Considering the depths of a 1:1 initiative helped us to become more equipped to work with students using technology at our placements and prepare us for technology use in our future classrooms. It is also extremely important for teachers to be on board with technology assisting students to become more independent learners and for their learning to be personalized. Teachers must use technology to collaborate with students and help guide them in personalized learning in a way that students can explore their interests through various school subjects.
As a future math teacher, one thing I'm concerned with about technology is students building a reliance on calculators. At my placement, I've seen many students have MobyMax math homework open on one tab and a calculator on the other tab. Sometimes this is okay, for example when students are doing problems on unit conversions or word problems. This is not okay, however, for the students who are working on long division problems, where they must learn the process of long division, but instead they pull up a calculator and plug in the numbers. Students can build a reliance on calculators because it is simple to plug numbers in and let a machine do the work for you, however it is counterproductive when it takes away from them remembering basic operations they need for everyday use. As a math tutor to students at Saint Michael's College, I have worked with many college students who have relied on their calculator to compute basic multiplication for them. Calculator reliance is a bad habit for students to get into because when they use it as a crutch, they lose their fluency in basic computation and basic graphing skills. Sure, calculators are an excellent tool in math classrooms in many ways, and they should be used for math exploration and problem solving and reasoning skills. My main concern I have about technology integration, however, is that students would rely on their devices to compute for them, because they have easy access to it with the 1:1 initiative.
One thing that would better prepare me for technology integration in the classroom would be professional development about when and when not to allow students to use calculators as well as learning about math education tools. Throughout the past few years, I've accumulated many math education tools through my education classes, placements, and keeping in contact with many local math teachers. I'm very excited to continue to grow this collection of technology resources and learn how to best integrate technology into math. When many people think of teaching math, they tend to think writing out your work in paper and pencil, so learning technology tools for math is a great way to keep math exciting and appealing to students.
