Tech in Ed: A Final Reflection

When I was in first grade, my classmates and I migrated over to the St. Francis Xavier computer lab for our weekly date with the Apple IIGS bank. Before we practiced typing and crossed our fingers for a lesson involving Kid Pix, our teacher gave us a brief presentation on an exciting new development in computer technology: the CD-ROM. The large grey box attached to her Macintosh console (teachers always got the better toys) used CDs instead of hard or floppy disks, and while I didn't understand some of the words she used, I knew enough about the difference between music CDs and cassette tapes to appreciate the upgrade.

Oh brave new world, with such tech in it!

I tell this story not because it makes me feel old (although it does), nor because I'm nostalgic for Number Munchers (although I am), but because I think it offers perspective about how far we've come regarding technology in schools. Those of my generation are young enough to have grown up with emerging computer technology and a shallower learner curve, but also old enough to remember when CD-ROMs were newfangled contraptions and dial-up service made it seem like the Internet really was a series of tubes. That makes it easier for me to examine technology's place in the classroom (and my relationship with it) than, say, my younger cousins (for whom high-speed, interactive digital tech has always been a reality). However, such examination does require me to stop, take a step back, and think. Over the course of this semester, I've been exposed to various types of technology with educational applications. For my final reflection post, I'd like to give my impressions of each of them and how they figure into my future practice as a teacher.

Favorites

Blogging. That's right - you're not just reading this post because it's a required assignment! Before I decided to become a teacher, before I discovered my enthusiasm for history and social science, and even before I became a music junkie, writing was my first love. Today, the written word remains my favorite method of expression and communication, even as text seems ever more archaic next to modern visual media. Pictures and video have their place (and I'll praise them in their turn), but when it comes to articulating and sharing ideas, I still believe language is humanity's, well, first language. I'd be blogging even if I wasn't teaching, but its use as a professional tool combined with my own love of writing makes it an obvious choice for me in communicating with colleagues, students, parents, etc.

Web 2.0 Apps. The Tech-Tac-Toe assignments (which you can read about in more detail in earlier entries) in particular helped me appreciate the value of the myriad "cool tools" we explored during this semester. Wordle (word-cloud generation) and Popplet (interactive graphic organizing) in particular were easy to learn and immediately presented opportunities for designing learning activities that fit right into a lesson plan. I also very much enjoyed Glogster (graphic blogging), and though I had a bit more difficulty using it, I can see a lot of potential here to - especially for my more visually-inclined students. Sometimes I have difficulty coming up with new activities for history units (lecture, discussion, and source analysis can get repetitive), so apps like these were great additions to my teaching toolbox.

Digital storytelling. I had some issues creating my own digital story (Windows Movie Maker took some trial and error), but I think that was more indicative of my own inexperience with filmmaking than anything. With smartphones and tablets, students today probably have a better feel for user-friendly movie design than I do with my memories of using giant camcorders for middle school assignments. Digital storytelling, I think, is a great alternative to the classic performance assessment of reading at a podium with PowerPoint or Prezi. Those things also have their place, but some students may be able to better express what they've learned and what they can do with a program like WMM or iMovie. I may not be a master at this myself, but I like digital storytelling as an educational tool so much that when my partner and I included a creative component in our WebQuest, this seemed an obvious choice to give our students.

Still working on it

Web design. As my professional site can attest, this is a tech tool I still find problematic. A well-designed web site can be one of the absolute best resources you can find, but for my part, I still have trouble with the process of actually constructing one. Blogging comes more naturally to me, but I haven't decided to simply give up on web design. Consider it an avenue for future development.

Twitter. I wrote in an earlier post about Twitter's potential as a professional learning network, and while I still think it makes for a great PLN, I seem to have hit a bit of a wall with it. I don't often get the urge to tweet, and without mobile web access, there's not much inclination to log in and read information. Still, I can see how helpful a PLN can be, and Twitter is an excellent template. As with web design, I'm willing to allow for some more learning and development over time.

Thinking back to when I started taking this Technology in Education course, I do think my understanding of technology's classroom applications has increased dramatically. It's still a bit daunting to think that I'll be responsible for teaching 21st century learners when I myself can remember the introduction of the CD-ROM, but this class was invaluable in exposing me to new tools and giving me hands-on experience in their educational use. It should be noted that I do still treat technology with some (I think) healthy skepticism. The late Neil Postman wondered years ago about how exponential advances in technology would affect our society, and while I may be more enthusiastic than he was, he poses a question that I believe is well worth asking - "What problem is this meant to be the solution to?" Technology (especially information and digital tech) can expand our abilities at every level of Bloom's taxonomy, but when introducing it to my classroom, I hope to always be able to assess the following:

1. Does this technology help my students learn?
2. Does it solve more problems than it creates?
3. How can it be used ethically?

If I can find positive answers to each of those questions, this course has shown me that the possibility for technology to enhance my students' classroom experience is as limitless as their (and my) imaginations.

Ian Watts

Dominican University

December 2012

Tech-Tac-Toe Tools #3: Glogster

My final "Tech-Tac-Toe" activity was designed using Glogster, a "graphic blog" site. Glogster can be accessed at http://www.glogster.com and used for free after signing up for an account.


Grade Level: 8
Subject: U.S. History
Lesson Topic: Founding Fathers
Objectives:
- Students will know the accomplishments of the American "Founding Fathers" (and "Mothers") during the Revolutionary War, the Constitutional Convention, and the early American republic.
- Students will be able to create a "resume" for one of these historical figures using graphic media technology.
Standards:
Social Studies Common Core
- RH.6-8.2: Determine the central ideas or information of a primary or secondary source; provide an accurate summary of the source distinct from prior knowledge or opinions.
- RH.6-8.7: Integrate visual information (e.g., in charts, photographs, videos, or maps) with other information  in print and digital texts.
- ISBE-TECH.3: The competent teacher will apply learning technologies that support instruction in his or her grade level and subject areas. He or she must plan and deliver units that integrate a variety of software, applications, and learning tools. Lessons developed must reflect effective grouping and assessment strategies for diverse learners.

Step 1: Students will choose a historical figure from the founding era of the United States, and extract information from a variety of text and digital primary and secondary sources (provided by the teacher) to meet specific requirements (e.g., birthplace, duties, role during the American founding) for a biographical "resume" of that figure.

Step 2: Students will import the information acquired from lecture and their sources into the "Resume" template on Glogster, and present the resulting graphic blog to the class. The example below is a resume for my favorite "Founding Father," Thomas Jefferson. Information was acquired from biographical web sites on Jefferson, lists of his quotes from writings and letters, and one dramatization (video clips from HBO's John Adams).

http://www.glogster.com/zero1319/thomas-jefferson-s-resume/g-6l5d42rm8ei8kog6e34j6a0

I had some trouble with Glogster's interface; there was little tutorial information available right on the page, and some of the graphic functions were finnicky in responding to commands. That said, the templates are excellent, and a little more exploration of the site would probably assuage any issues I had with getting it to execute what I wanted. I'm intrigued by the idea of graphic blogs (though I'm admittedly much more at home with a text-based blog like this one), but I'd need to do a little more experimenting and troubleshooting before I'm confident using it as a classroom tool.

Tech-Tac-Toe Tools #2: Popplet

The second of my "Tech-Tac-Toe" activities relied on the use of concept maps as an instructional tool. Here I decided to use Popplet, a Web 2.0 map generator we experimented with early in our Tech in Ed course. The tool (available after creating a free account at http://popplet.com/) is very user-friendly and despite its fairly basic Flash interface, can yield some impressive mapping results for the creative teacher. Since my field is secondary social studies, I decided to use Popplet for a lesson on government - a subject that definitely lends itself to concept mapping.

Grade Level: 11-12

Subject: Government/civics

Lesson Topic: U.S. Constitutional amendments

Objectives:

- Students will know the basic provisions of amendments to the U.S. Constitution and how they affect American government and citizens.

- Students will be able to connect individual Constitutional amendments to their underlying concepts, such as civil liberties and federalism.

Standards:

Social Studies Common Core

- RH.11-12.7: Integrate and evaluate multiple sources of information presented in diverse formats and media (e.g., visually, quantitatively, as well as in words) in order to address a question or solve a problem.

- RH.11-12.10: By the end of grade 12, read and comprehend history/social studies texts in the grades 11-CCR text complexity band independently and proficiently. 

Core Technology Standards

- ISBE-TECH.3: The competent teacher will apply learning technologies that support instruction in his or her grade level and subject areas. He or she must plan and deliver units that integrate a variety of software, applications, and learning tools. Lessons developed must reflect effective grouping and assessment strategies for diverse learners.

I envisioned the map depicted in this Popplet (or something similar, since this example was done by one person rather than a collaboration of an entire class) as something developed by a U.S. history or government class over the course of several units or an entire semester. The concepts on the map grow outward from more general social studies concepts (civil liberties, political liberties, federalism, etc.) to the specific 27 amendments to the U.S. Constitution and their provisions. As the class learned about and discussed those amendments, the teacher and students could add new elements to the map. There may be some debate about where exactly they belong, but given the importance of critical thinking and differing viewpoints to a social studies classroom, I'd view that as a success!

One of the best things I can say about Popplet is that the example above just scratches the surface of what the application can do. I played around with color-coding to help visual learners and illustrate where the concepts overlapped, but the tool has many other functions. It wasn't until I was done with this map that I realized that I could embed not only pictures in the Popplets, but videos and social media links as well. As part of an exploration-style activity, a teacher using this map could have students link relevant videos or web pages to the corresponding Popplet. Finally, I had a lot of fun designing this activity. While some concept mapping I've done for my own research works better with something like Gephi (because of the sheer volume of data), Popplet works as well on a limited scale, and has a much smaller learning curve. As with Wordle, I expect to be using this tool again!

Tech-Tac-Toe Tools #1: Wordle

For our Tech in Ed course, my classmates and I were asked to design three classroom activities using Web 2.0 tools. My first activity is structured around Wordle, a "word cloud" generating tool available for free at http://www.wordle.net/.

Grade Level: 9-10
Subject: Government/civics
Lesson Topic: Political rhetoric and party platforms
Objectives:
- Students will know how politicians use rhetoric and vocabulary to express their party's platform.
- Students will be able to compare and contrast the platforms of different American political parties through their use of rhetoric and vocabulary.
- Students will be able to use technology to visually demonstrate these comparisons and contrasts.
Standards:
Social Studies Common Core
- RH.9-10.2: Determine the central ideas or information of a primary or secondary source; provide an accurate summary of how key events or ideas develop over the course of the text.
- RH.9-10.7: Integrate quantitative or technical analysis (e.g., charts, research data) with qualitative analysis in print or digital text.
- RH.9-10.9: Compare and contrast treatments of the same topic in several primary and secondary sources
Core Technology Standards
- ISBE-TECH.3: The competent teacher will apply learning technologies that support instruction in his or her grade level and subject areas. He or she must plan and deliver units that integrate a variety of software, applications, and learning tools. Lessons developed must reflect effective grouping and assessment strategies for diverse learners.

Step 1: Students will locate the transcripts of the president's most recent State of the Union address and the opposition party's official response (available from a variety of web sources, including the official CSPAN site) and import the text into Wordle to generate two different word clouds. For the purposes of this example, I used President Obama's 2012 address and the response given by Governor Mitch Daniels (R-IN). As a side note, my first Wordle use revealed a hiccup: the words "Applause" and "Laughter" showed prominently in my word cloud because of their presence in the transcript! This was easily fixed by copying and pasting to MS Word, then using Find-and-Replace to remove the extra text.

President Obama's address (http://www.wordle.net/show/wrdl/5968303/State_of_the_Union_2012)

Governor Daniel's response (http://www.wordle.net/show/wrdl/5968309/State_of_the_Union_Response_2012)

Step 2: Viewing the two word clouds, the teacher and students will create a graphic organizer (digital or whiteboard/poster/etc) to examine where the two politicians/parties focus on either similar or differing concepts by their choice of wording. The word clouds and the graphic organizer will frame a discussion on how the politicians/parties use rhetoric to express their platforms and appeal to voters.

Extra: Students will locate the transcripts of each of the president's State of the Union address and import the text into Wordle to generate a series of word clouds, illustrating how his and his party's platform has changed its focus as time progresses. This was just another idea I thought worth inserting here, because it shows so well how Wordle and other word cloud generators can be useful in visually demonstrating abstract concepts. A similar exercise could be done with local instead of national politicians, comparing/contrasting a candidate's campaign speech to an address given in office.

2009 State of the Union address (http://www.wordle.net/show/wrdl/5968352/State_of_the_Union_2009)

2010 State of the Union address (http://www.wordle.net/show/wrdl/5968343/State_of_the_Union_2010)

2011 State of the Union address (http://www.wordle.net/show/wrdl/5968336/State_of_the_Union_2011)

From Time-Wasting Toy to Professional Learning Network: My Experience with Twitter

"I have returned... to Twitter. #historyjoke" - Gen. Douglas MacArthur, liberally paraphrased.

Confession time: the Twitter account I created for my Technology in Education course is not my first foray into the world of followers, hashtags, and URL shorteners. I created my first Twitter account during my final year as an undergraduate in 2010. I had previously been critical of the growing phenomenon, often remarking that I didn't need to inform the entire wired world if I was enjoying my sandwich. Things changed when I started looking for ways to enhance and support my first blog, and I stopped giving Twitter the cold shoulder. Introductions were made, flirting started, and within weeks a relationship had bloomed. We were even texting one another several times a day.

So why did I deactivate my first Twitter account? Why did this happy boy-meets-social-media-tool story turn sour? The answer is that I wasn't using it properly, or at least not in a way that really benefited me. I thought aggregating my interests in news, politics, culture, sports, music, and comedy in one place made sense; instead, what I got was something resembling sensory overload. The best I can describe it is as hearing everything, but not being able to listen to anything very well. It's also worth noting the role that first Twitter account played in my personal, social life. I'll be the first one to sing the praises of social media as a way to maintain and expand one's social circle (a multiple for everyone's Dunbar number, but that's a blog post for another day!). However, there's also something to be said for having a network that's purely, well, professional. The bottom line is that for me, Twitter became a distraction, not a resource. We decided to see other people... until my Tech in Ed class set us up for unexpected reunion.

Getting reacquainted with Twitter was bumpy at first, which you might expect after about a year of separation. I had days of technical difficulties trying to register a new account - after walking away, I should've known my calls weren't going to be returned right away. I also had forgotten some of the little details that had become second nature during our relationship. My first tweet on the new account, about the Library of Congress's American Memory collection, was conspicuously lacking a link to the site. As it turned out, though, we weren't completely estranged. After following a few accounts discussed in class or mentioned on our course's Wikispace, I started discovering new components of my Professional Learning Network with increasing speed. Following familiar organizations (Edutopia, Khan Academy) and education personalities (Alfie Kohn, Deborah Meier) led to me a host of new (and exciting) ones, including the subject of my PLN review assignment: Primary Source Nexus.

It's hard for me to overstate just how much useful information this site makes available to teachers - particularly social studies teachers. A branch of the "Teaching with Primary Sources" initiative by the Barat Foundation and the Library of Congress (no wonder I gravitated to it!), PSN is more than just a large collection of those sources. The home page is designed very clearly, and navigates to sections on Resources, Professional Development, and the TPS and LoC mothership sites. Under Resources, "Primary Source Picks" is an almanac-style offering in which every weekday highlights a source with a historical connection to that day (today's post features the quilting work of Harriet Powers, who was born on October 29, 1837). "Teaching and Learning" is even more comprehensive, with sample projects using primary sources available for lesson plan integration. The page is updated weekly, and includes almost everything a social studies teacher could ask for: learning objectives, relevant Common Core standards, necessary materials, and guidelines for instruction and display. I'd use these samples more as templates than ready-made lessons, but the benefits for planning and practice are pretty apparent. Everything here is very much a worth a look, but if you're just looking to get a glance at content, I'd recommend the "Featured Images" and "Themed Link Sets."

As rich and user-friendly as the PSN site proper is, its Twitter profile makes for an excellent portal. Adding it to my "Following" list gets me regular (i.e., several times per day) updates about new posts or retweeted info from other history education feeds. It was through the PSN Twitter page that I found this article from the LoC Teachers page, in which a former middle school teacher recalls her use of mock election projects to teach students about voting. The author, Meg Steele, includes nine Library of Congress primary sources on designing, casting, and counting election ballots, as well as sample questions that could inform lesson construction and discussions with students. Reflecting on the mock elections she held in her classroom, Ms. Steele writes,

...nothing engaged them more than the task of designing the actual ballot. Though it only had two candidates, it took an entire class period plus homework. The discussion they had was rich—about fairness, visual literacy, communication. Making decisions required deliberation, compromise and focus.

It would be hard to ask for much more as a social studies teacher interested in helping my students develop as critical thinkers and informed citizens. The upcoming presidential election made this article especially intriguing, but I think the general principles could apply to any real-world process for which primary sources would support inquiry and practice. Kudos to Primary Source Network for helping Ms. Steele share her ideas and experience!

Since I've started following about 10 new accounts while writing this blog entry, I think it's safe to say that Twitter and I are back together. I think this new commitment, however, is a more mature one. As with any relationship, it's a good idea to have defined, positive goals for growth when using Twitter as a professional tool. In the short term, I'd like to be able to learn from the people and organizations I follow, and harvest ideas from the intellectual soil there. Over time, I hope to contribute my own products and experiences, and give as much as I get. Far from just letting me know if my fellow teachers are enjoying their sandwiches, Twitter as a PLN offers considerable concrete (lesson templates, primary sources, etc.) and philosophical (other educators' thoughts on ethics, pedagogy, and beyond) benefits to my development as an educator.

Setting the "Stage" for Tech Integration

Our class discussion on the "Stages of Technology Integration" gave me a new framework for thinking about my own approach to using technology in my teaching practice. Based on the findings of an evaluation study by Apple Classrooms of Tomorrow (more on the ACOT study here, thanks to Professor Zumpano for the link), these stages are an effective way of imagining the breadth and depth of tech integration in the classroom, and for gauging the effectiveness thereof.

The first stage on the continuum ("Entry") is where the teacher is aware of technology and its uses, but does not take advantage of it. The Entry-level teacher's wider view of education does not allow for the possibility that tech can be a tool for improved teaching; he or she is a skeptic on the subject, and would see little value in receiving training on technology use. This was the easiest stage for me, and I progressed through it rather quickly. My generation, the so-called "Millennials," may be old enough to remember things like dial-up Internet connections (can't wait to tell my students about that one in 20 years) and primitive classroom tech, but we also grew up alongside the web and emerging social media. If there was a learning curve, it was a small one. Technology was already being well-integrated by my teachers by the time I finished high school, so as a teaching candidate, I think I've always seen it as having value, however amorphous that value might be.

Stage Two ("Adoption") is the period in which the teacher moves past their initial skepticism and begins modest technology integration; they make use of a handful of tools familiar to them, but mostly for enhanced production rather than teaching and learning. While this teacher sees promise in educational technology, they would likely still be less than entirely confident in their own mastery of it. Therefore, an Adoption-level teacher limits their students' tech use because of their own issues with manipulation and troubleshooting - technology is still something best left to a designated tech expert. I've long been open to adopting technology, but due to a lack of practical teaching experience, I can only say I truly entered this stage when I started backing up my tutoring sessions with some tech here and there. This has meant small things, like using digital testing or PowerPoint/Prezi with my students, but it's something I felt eminently comfortable with - and more importantly, something my students have consistently responded to.

In Stage Three ("Adaptation") the teacher has gained more experience using technology, and uses that experience for the benefit of their students' learning. In our discussion, we looked at how this also begins with small steps - basic programs like word processing, for example, are better-integrated into lessons for student use. In assessing my own level of tech integration, I'd put myself squarely in the middle of the Adaptation stage. I've gained a lot of confidence using technology (and having my students use it), but my "bag of tricks" is still somewhat limited to basic applications. Some of the best things I've already gained from this course is exposure to a wide variety of learning tech tools, a definite appreciation of their value, and a rudimentary understanding of how to employ them (something I hope to further hone and refine over this semester). Our lesson indicated that Adaptation can be the most difficult, frustrating stage, and I definitely agree. However, I think my (admitted) initial confusion and frustration with learning how to use these new tools is a motivating factor, and will push me to examine my practice more closely when it comes to tech. Adaptation may be a slow process for me, but once I've mastered this stage, I expect to continue to move toward full, effective integration.

As a final note, I'd like to include a link to this lesson, shared by USF's College of Education as part of their Technology Integration Matrix, in which a social studies teacher demonstrates a high level (i.e., "transformative," "goal-directed") of technology integration. While I may not be able to exactly replicate this, I think it's a good model of how technology can not only be incorporated into a social studies classroom, but done so in a truly innovative way.

Researching students' mindsets

Of the research presented in class, the piece that stood out most to me was Beloit College's annual mindset list. Not only do I find demographics fascinating, I try to appreciate their cultural relevancy, particularly in student-teacher relations. My curiosity thus piqued, I decided to cross-reference the mindset of my own college class (2009) with that of the most recent (2016). Here are some of the most interesting things I found:
- For today's college freshmen, Kurt Cobain (one of my favorite songwriters) has always been dead. I don't remember Mr. Cobain's passing myself, but the Seattle Explosion would certainly be a more relevant point in music history for me than it would be for them.
- The Class of 2016 has "always lived in cyberspace." I've definitely noticed a slight gap here when speaking to members of this class, such as my younger sister. I grew up with the Internet, but I still remember its infancy and the associated growing pains. Whether for communication, research, or socializing, I'm sure there are different expectations from those who never experienced dial-up connections.
- "Bill Clinton is a senior statesman of whose presidency they have little knowledge." While the second Bush administration probably had the biggest impact on my life and political thinking (so far) of any, I do remember the Clinton years, particularly with regards to the impeachment trial. Having that as my introduction to politics (as opposed to, say, the War on Terror) is probably another significant difference.
- "The paradox 'too big to fail' has been, for their generation, what 'we had to destroy the village in order to save it' was for their grandparents'." That much we have in common. However, when I consider the general apathy on politics and economics that seems to characterize this mini-generation, I only hope that they learn some lessons from it instead of tuning it out.
- "Their folks have never gazed with pride on a new set of bound encyclopedias on the bookshelf." This is a departure that I welcome, despite my enduring love of the bound book. The online, editable encyclopedia is a fantastic innovation in terms of information transfer and access. One of the biggest challenges to educators, however, will be teaching the students of the Wikipedia era how to discern which digital information is reliable (for academic research, but also for critical thinking).

These are just a few of the illuminating points I found on Beloit's lists. I certainly think we should be cautious (or at least healthily skeptical) about research findings, but it's hard to see much of an agenda in this particular study. I do think information such as that presented in the mindset lists is valuable, if only because of the cultural relevancy gap that necessarily exists between older teachers and younger students. While I have quite a bit in common with this year's college freshmen, the gap will only widen as I continue to teach successively younger classes of students. While trying too hard to act or sound like one's students can fall flat as a connection technique (students, in my experience, can smell a phony), some knowledge of their world, their experiences, and their values is essential in choosing how to present even perennial concepts in the classroom.