Our second class meeting is taking place entirely beyond the walls of UNIV 443 (although that is where I am parked). Your group should accomplish by noon the posting of your chapter presentations by noon. At this moment, I don't know how this will take place - yet! Thank you for your patience with this.
Let me remind yo that each of your chapters should have an online assessment. The purposes are to press your audience to thoughtfully engage in your presentation, for you to get feedback ("formative assessment data") as to the effectiveness of your presentation, AND to explore options to do this assessment online.
To restate the week's online classwork: Complete Part II of Assignment #2: Web-Based Jigsaw on Text Rethinking High Schools. Go to the "Assignments" section of WebCT and report that you completed the 2 parts of this assignment with a simple note, like "done with Chapters 8 & 9!".
I made an error in the assignment instructions posted to WebCT. I asked you to provide authentic feedback to 2 groups in one bullet, and then 3 peers in the next. My correction: Please provide this feedback to at least 2 distinct chapters (that is, at least 2 distinct groups).
Homework for next week, Feb. 8 follows:
- Read the paper about Ethnography, found in the WebCT "Required Readings" folder.
- Find another interesting school, online, written about in another book, or ? (maybe begin here). Learn enough about it to share & answer questions about its interesting features.
- One & two will be followed by this week's Reading Reflection, for which more careful instructions will be posted in this blog.
- Complete the survey in the Feb 1. post titled "School & Tech Survey".
- Add a photo to your class blog and your Twitter account.
- Reminder, send out one tweet this week, the next random thought or experience that connects with our class.
REMINDER: I will leave you with a question at the end of each weekly blog post to build community and to ensure you have read the blog. Answer by leaving a brief "comment" just below (not on your own blog).
This week's question: What impact do you think networked and inexpensive "laptops", like Apple's iPad, will have on the classroom experience--teachers and/or students--in the next 5 years?
How do you want us to respond to the "week's question"? In our own blog? As a comment to yours?
ReplyDeleteAlso, where do we leave feedback to two of our peer groups for the jigsaw activity?
Thanks!
Jacque - thank you for asking this. I would like for you to reply, very briefly, in this comment section just underneath the post. So right here, not on your own blog.
ReplyDeleteThe portability of these new tablet PCs definitely increase the likelihood of online textbooks. I also think there is a possibility that pencil and paper note taking could become a thing of the past. I sometimes feel that education is one of the last fields to embrace and utilize tech advancements, but it will be very interesting to see where this takes us.
ReplyDeleteWell since I have read predictions that 50% schools will be totally online in the next decade, I definitely think that innovations such as the iPad will be seen much more often. You can virtually do everything online now, so why not bring this technology into the classroom?
ReplyDeleteIn all honesty, we like to think of the future as very technologically drenched, however, we have had these thoughts since the fifties, that in 50 years we'd have flying cars. In my honest evaluation of the question I do not believe that in 5 years there will be a drastic change in how schools use technology. It's moving a lot slower than our imaginations like to think, and we can't forget that these tools take money, which schools don't currently have. There might be brand new schools in affluent communities utilizing these high tech devices, but the schools that already exist would have to undergo serious overhaul to rid themselves of the books they own, and technology they have to gamble with new teaching methods.
ReplyDeleteIn the next five years I imagine that many of the students in my classroom will be using such technology. I also imagine I will own one ; ). I completely agree with Bryan in that I believe the likelihood of online textbooks will be a thing of the near future, especially with budget cuts as they are.
ReplyDeleteI hope that this will mean that more students have their own individual ipads or netbooks that they can use at school. My fingers are crossed for online textbooks to become the norm soon too because not only would it possibly help with budget cuts and student access to resources, but also reduce paper usage and waste which would help the environment.
ReplyDeleteI think, like Tim said, that we like to make predictions but we're not living in an episode of the Jetsons quite yet. I think that technology is definitely growing at an exponential rate and that it will be adopted perhaps more quickly than in the past, but schools have been pretty slow to pick up on it. I would love to see textbooks online, etc, both for cost reasons and the interactive possibilities. I think it's more likely that students in our more affluent areas will have iPads and the like in the next few years and that it'll take a little longer for them to become prevalent in more schools, kind of like cell phones and iPods.
ReplyDeleteI would love to see iPad technology in the classroom ASAP. The implications and opportunities available through such technology are far and beyond what I can even imagine right now. However, I do see Tim and Sarah's point. All of the changes we are hoping to make in education are going to take time. I believe that eventually these kinds of technology will work their way into the classroom, but I think five years will come and go a lot faster than we're expecting.
ReplyDeleteI think the impact will be huge. Specially if they are inexpensive. You see today, students and adults are always watching out for "what's new" with technology. I think as educators as Dr. Stall would say, "need to hop on the train." We need to start familiarizing ourselves with a variety of technological devices and feel comfortable enough to use it in a valuable way to teach our students. Cheers!
ReplyDeleteI think that the impact has the potential to be huge but is likely to be slow. In California's budget unless we get a government bailout there is just no way that we can afford to supply students with this tech. That means as Sarah said that in the affluent school it may happen soon but in the poorer communities five years is just not enough time.
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ReplyDeleteI think that the new technology to come will be a great impact on the students but I have to say that it could take away some basic skills that students have. For example, if the schools change to all computers (i.e. researching, submitting assignments and taking notes) then when do the students physically print/hand write on paper? As it is students penmanship is terrible so this art will be lost. Don't get me wrong, I like technology but I don't think that every part of school should be on a computer. I have to agree that it will be a slow process when the schools finally have computers.
ReplyDeleteIn the next five years, I believe that more and more students will have technology like the iPad and use it for educational purposes outside of the classroom, but I do not think we will see them used in very many classrooms. Teachers will be reluctant to allow students to use this type of technology in their classrooms because it will also distract the students.
ReplyDeleteI think the impact will be slow the first five years. Some teachers and classrooms will incorporate them, but the technology will just be getting fine tuned. I figure after five years, this will be a staple in the classrom, but for the next few years, no major impact.
ReplyDeleteThe potential uses in education of ultra-portable devices like the iPad are huge. Online content accessible from anywhere might mean students could choose when and where they want to get their learning done, and have contact with the their teacher at any time. You can see lessons becoming virtualized in the future. Oh, if only every student's family could afford one (or two, or three)!
ReplyDeleteA sort-of meta-comment here: thanks all for reading my blog! I hope that through my instructions here & our interactions, we can improve our communication. Regarding the topic I posted and your responses: My student teaching experience happened as pagers were the rage and cell phones no longer were limited to the bricks--remember that first Motorola (?) flip phone? So, schools had signs saying these weren't allowed and would be confiscated. (These signs replaced the Walkman signs.) That was 1992. Where are we now with cell phones and learning? So I am excited but tentative for 5 years...
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ReplyDeleteI think the introduction of the iPad is a reminder that books will become an endangered species as everything is going digital now. The implementation of iPads within the classroom is something I see happening within 10-15 years as the technology becomes more accessible to all areas of the public and much less expensive. This makes it easier for the students and teachers to interact and participate in the classroom.
ReplyDeleteI think that the impact will be that all students will have access to technology, helping to close the achievement gap for the socioeconomically disadvantaged kids. I imagine that in my subject area, English Language Arts, that each students' ability to access this technology in class every day will make writing assignments more enjoyable and less time consuming, as well!
ReplyDeleteI agree with Tim that our imagination might be getting the best of us. Computers have been around for quite a while now (remember the old Apples with the green screens?) but we certainly don't see that technology being utilized fully in the classroom. Though it might be cool to think that an Ipad (which hasn't even been released yet) could be used in classrooms in the next five years, we might be jumping the gun. The money doesn't exist to pay teachers, much less buy cutting edge computer equipment.
ReplyDeleteI think technology like the iPad would definitely make online textbooks more possible in the classroom. I agree with many of you, however, with the slowness with which this technology will reach schools. Digital readers are a recent piece of technology already in the market, yet barely any of the students in my class at SPHS own one.
ReplyDeleteI feel that this new technology will serve to further the achievement gap. At Vista, my cooperating teacher, confined to a wheelchair, could only gain access to a transparency projector in a room and school from what I gathered that was not wireless. La Costa Canyon, blah, blah blah you get it. If there are no initiatives to redistribute educational capital then technology will only serve the more affluent schools. I think it is pretty presumptive to suggest that "inexpensive" laptops will start showing up with many of the students at Vista HS.
ReplyDeleteI like the idea of using technology in the classroom, especially the idea of the iPad, but it will come down to money. It's going to be awhile before we have enough money to start putting cutting edge technology in the classroom. I still see teachers, and have professors, who use over head projectors. If that is still going on then PowerPoints still rule the classroom. Until there is a surplus in California, we wont see any crazy technology in public high schools.
ReplyDeleteI believe such forms of technology as apple iPads will afford students the opportunity to utilize resources that are more conducive to their learning style. However, for older adults not accustomed to such new forms of technology there use might be less appreciated. In the next 5 years I believe that students will really benefit from these advances because it will allow them to access different forms of educational materials through one resource ( i.e. books, articles…). ?
ReplyDeleteI think tech like this could revolutionize the classroom experience for both students and teachers alike. In the next 5 years though I do not really see much happening in this vein, as funding to put a tablet/netbook in every students hands is not available.
ReplyDeleteKindle, eBooks, iPad, what is next? Maybe it is just me, but I am finding more and more students gravitating towards a more technological way of reading and note-taking than ever. I have seen online journals (such as our blogs), students no longer write down their homework, they just go on their teacher's website and read it there. This is because communication is so much faster this way, reading can be summarized, and yes I will say it, skimmed faster if it can be scrolled down. Plus, less things to carry and lose at school. When it is on the web, it is easily accessed through any computer.
ReplyDeleteEt tu, iPad?
ReplyDeleteI had trouble posting here on Sunday, so I'm trying to post my response again here. (I originally posted it on my blog at http://millie530.blogspot.com/
New technologies are forever shaping our classrooms, but I always wonder if the dependence on technology is healthy. Can students retain as much, or more, than they did back in the chalk and blackboard days? Or are they hopeless unless they have their computers and keyboards? And what about the trickle down theory? Does technology like iPads help the elite most? So far, I haven't seen Elmos and SmartBoards trickle down to schools in need. Orange Glen HS in Escondido, for example, doesn't even have regular overhead projectors. What is the trade off? What skills do we gain? And lose?