We often write about how technology can help
teachers, but sometimes it’s useful to take a step back and consider how
teachers influence technology. As with other subjects, the knowledge and
enthusiasm that teachers show for technology in the classroom will have
long-term effects on students, and the nation as a whole. A tech-savvy nation
starts with tech-savvy teachers.
Teacher Tech Enthusiasm Can Change the Course of
Tech Development
Imagine for moment if all teachers were
technophobic. What would that mean for technology development in the long term?
Sure, we’d have some self-taught geniuses, like Bill Gates, who would figure
out computer programming all on their own. But they would be outliers, and the
majority of students would grow up with the same fear of technology as their
teachers. Studies have already shown how this happens with math: a recent
survey of seven hundred elementary school teachers found that over a third of
them had math anxiety, leading their students to also develop anxiety about the
subject.
This means that teachers can have a profound effect
on whether their students embrace technology, in the classroom and beyond. The
way that teachers present technology skills will also affect what kinds of
technological thinkers their students become. Teaching coding as a stand-alone
skill is a great way to train future computer programmers. Integrating
technology into other subject areas such as history, English and the arts will
teach students to use creative, technology-based problem solving skills in many
areas. Both are great skills to have.
Bottom line: if you are enthusiastic about
creatively using technology and willing to give it a try, your students will be
too.
No matter what subject and grade level you teach,
there are many ways to inspire creative use of technology in the classroom,
even if you’ve never done it before. I recently spoke with Liz Harnage, a
technology enthusiast who works at Brooklyn Friends School. As the Academic
Technology Department Chair and Middle School Technology Integrator, she
teaches technology classes and also helps teachers integrate technology into
their classrooms. She shared her advice for how to bring technology into your
classroom and make it fun for both you and your students.
Getting Started: Tools for Technophobic Teachers
Do you have nightmares of standing in front of your
classroom with a blank screen on the projector, unable to load the presentation
you worked on for hours? It’s happened to everyone at some point. It’s
completely understandable to fear technology in the classroom—most of us did
not grow up in high-tech classrooms, and most teacher training programs offer
very few opportunities and resources for using technology in lessons.
“The real advice I would give to any teacher using
technology in the classroom is to try and have fun with it themselves,”
suggests Liz. She explains that if you expect of yourself what you expect of
your kids—patience and enthusiasm—and give yourself the opportunity to tackle
difficult problems, fail, and try again, then you’ll be on your way. Liz also
recommends breaking the technology part of your lesson into small chunks, such
as 15 minutes. That way if something fails, your whole lesson isn’t ruined.
Exploring technology together can help create a new
dynamic in the classroom, according to Liz. “I’ve had teachers say that this is
the first time I felt a lot like my kids. What often ends up happening is that
kids who are the lowest achievers in the class end up being the highest
achievers with technology. They end up helping the teachers, which gives them
agency and makes them feel special. I’ve seen that over and over again.”
Here are some tricks and tools Liz recommends that
teachers use to get started to make sure lessons more tech-savvy:
• For
the true beginners, start with something simple, like showing a video from TED
or YouTube in class. You can even download it to your computer in advance, so
you don’t have to worry about connectivity issues. Brainpop has great animated
short videos on many different topics, with follow-up activities and games. You
can start with a short video on the Fibonacci Sequence, for example. Be sure to
check out our advice for incorporating TED talks into your classroom.
• Involve
your students with setting up the technology. By assigning one person to set it
up every morning, you not only give yourself a helper—you also give students
ownership over this new project and an opportunity to feel special.
• Brush up
on your own skills. Code.org has an entire curriculum for anyone who wants to
learn and use programming skills.
Taking Technology Outside the Computer Lab
Ready for something a little more advanced? Here
are some creative ways to integrate tech into other subject areas:
For math teachers, use one of the many tools out
there for testing math skills. You can give your students ten minutes to show
off what they’ve learned on a website like Tenmarks. Or check out one of our
favorite educational apps for math fluency.
For history or urban studies, the website Thinglink
allows you to upload a picture and tag different videos and websites to make it
interactive. For example, if you’re doing a history of the Brooklyn Bridge, you
can upload a photo of the bridge and turn it into an interactive timeline. Once
you’ve got that down and are ready for something more advanced, you may want to
try Aurasma, an augmented reality app.
Geography and history teachers can use Google maps
to create customized maps. This is a great tool not only for planning your next
vacation, but also for mapping ancient Egypt, for example.
Art teachers should check out Google Maps Arts
Project. Google has already mapped out many of the world’s great art museums,
so you can use street view to go inside of MOMA and walk right up to “The
Starry Night.”
With English, “the sky’s the limit,” says
Liz—technology is built for communication. Litgenius (a spin-off from the
popular website Rapgenius) allows you and your students to annotate literature.
“One teacher went from being tech-phobic to being on the forefront thanks to
Litgenius—all the kids were annotating a Maya Angelou poem!” reports Liz. You
could also have kids draw and create graphic novels based on literature using
an online comic book creator like Pixten.
One English teacher at Liz’s school wanted to make
Twelve Angry Men more interactive, so she assigned each student to be a juror
and had them create their own blogs to write about their thoughts on the case
as they read the book. Emodo is a free and safe social network for schools that
works well for creative collaborative class projects like this. The students
even created “angry juror” avatars for their project using Voki, and programmed
them to say things and fight on the screen!
In Short
The most important thing to keep in mind? Stay
focused on your goal, and make sure that technology is helping your students
learn. “Trust your gut,” says Liz. “If there’s a particular tool that’s out
there that can enliven the material that’s great, but don’t use something just
because it’s flashy and showy.”
This point is key—it’s important to use technology
to help you achieve your goals, but also know when to leave it behind. After
all, we don’t want a nation full of students who are constantly distracted by
the latest, flashiest things. We want them to creatively use—and build—tools
that help us communicate better, learn faster, and accomplish more. That all
starts with you!
