Vision of Technology Integration- Sandi Garofano
I
remember when I was in fourth grade, our teacher asked us to write about and
draw how we envision out future with technology. I, much like many of my peers, wrote about
living much like a popular cartoon at the time called “The Jetson’s.” I wrote
about my home built high off the ground sphere like in formation, flying cars,
and moving walkways to take me to school; another sphere shaped building set up
with rows of desks but our teacher was a robot and she stood in front of a
large TV screen that fed us lessons each time she pressed a button on her
chest. Our desks were high tech with
buttons to push to answer tests. We
still had homework and books, we were “fed” information through lectures and
watching the big TV screen. We still took tests to prove our understanding, and
the classroom environment was the same.
Now, forty six years later here I am asked almost the same
question. What I see and understand is there
is an infinite vision that knows no bounds. The world has progressed into a
global community. Even the structure of
our education system is moving beyond the traditional pedagogy of lectures and
direct instruction to interactive and collaboration.
Thomas Friedman, a
New York Times columnist explains in a you tube presentation at Yale University
in what he calls the “Flat world theory”, www.youtube.com/watch?v=53vLQnuV9FY,
where he details the phenomenon of the leveling
of global economics. Freidman explains
there are three eras of globalization he catoragized as the thread of
globalization:
1.0: From
1492-1800’s, that shrunk the world from large to medium with the dynamic agent
being the countries globalizing
2.0: From the 1800’s -2000, that
shrunk the world from medium to small with the dynamic agent being companies
globalizing
3.0: From 2000- to the present, that
is shrinking the world from small to tiny with the dynamic agent being the
individual and small groups.
Why is this important and
what does this have to do with the vision of technology integration in the
classroom?
In short, with the introduction to the the Dot
Com, internet and fiber optics era, our communication and interaction in the
world has taken on infinite possibilities. Also, with billions of people
connecting and competing in Friedman’s “flat world theory” the playing field
has grown. Leaving America, as proclaimed in Friedman’s presentation, as not
ready. With new global order it puts
creative, entrepreneurial individuals in the driver’s seat and possesses new
challenges and opportunities and our students need to be prepared.
In my view, I see that the
student is already equipped with beginning tools to compete in the ever
flattening world due to their pre exposure to the internet, and many devices
that their parents are already buying and exposing their children to and can
probably teach the teachers how to use these devices. But, many teachers are afraid to use
computers and the internet because they are still learning themselves. In an ideal classroom teachers should have an
open mind while providing an interactive and student-teacher, peer to peer, and
global collaboration to learning.
A draw back to
experiencing an ideal classroom technology experience is that many of the
educational institutions are still teaching in as if we were in the industrial
era. The educational institution was
designed to get students ready for the workforce, however the workforce has
quickly changed since the computer age and the work force is demanding
high-level thinkers, problem solvers, creativity, and ability to
collaborate.
Don Tapscott author of “Grown up
Digital” elaborated in an interview with Alistair Craven, stating that in
today’s working world collaboration is important because work is more cognitively
complex, dependent on team-based collaboration, social skills and time
pressure. Thus making work reliant on technological competence and mobility and
companies are bridging teams across the world.
(Emerald group publishing p.6)
Tapscott also suggests that educational
institutions look to change teaching strategy to develop strong world workers
such as moving from a teacher-centered model to learner-centered. Thus centering the learning on the individual
and allowing for a more interactive, creating an environment with student to
student collaboration, research, discussions. With the goal to teach student to
navigate, learn and think and individualize to the learner. (p.4)
I am seeing more and more
of the importance of technology integration in all schools and especially in
the lower economic educational institutions.
Students will need to have the exposure both at home and in school in
order to prepare them for the future complex work force of the present and in
the future. I believe that to become a high achieving school and one that can
help the individual students reach their full potential to directly compete for
global employment more resources need to be invested in providing our education
systems and teachers with the trainings, technological tools and ability to be
collaborative learners as well as the students.
I envision all schools
beginning from pre-K to establish an environment rich with various
technological tools such as individual ipads and laptops, interactive mobile
devices and networking capabilities.
Students will work in small groups and individually, create/develop real
world solution within content, teachers will be active learners and
collaborators and guide the students. Students
will research in real time, connect with others from various parts of the
world, share learning experiences, exchange ideas, and continue to build their
knowledge. Most importantly the students
will become invested learners because learning is more interactive and they are
already interested in technology!
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