Tech+Integration

** Tech Integration **
// The following is a reflection I wrote about Technology Integration. The video I watched was retrieved from www.edutopia.org, a website that inspired me even more in pursuing to be a future educator. I will refer back to this information and website many times, I'm sure, in my education and when in the classroom. //

After watching several of the videos, I finally settled on //Project Learning: Expeditions in Portland, Maine//. To begin, this project alone was very eye opening in respect to online teacher education sources. I feel excited that teachers are sharing ideas and learning from each other online now. The reason I chose this video, though, was for its subject school’s unique approach to not only technology integration, but towards student-teacher relationships, building a better academic future for the student, and, more than anything, synthesizing the student’s understanding through project-based learning. The state of Maine apparently gave each of its public school students a laptop in 2002. As this is not necessarily in the budget for all states or even school districts, I think the idea of it and the statement that it made towards broadening technology’s availability was understood. One teacher even remarked that schools need //both// 1-1 learning (the use of the laptops) and project-based learning. In another education course I am taking this semester, we researched online websites for young adult literature. Being an English Education major, I enjoyed not only the content of these websites, but the fact that we were //using// them as part of our curriculum. I find that too many classes still today are void of any technology integration. In a time when technology is all around us, we, as educators, should be embracing it rather than neglecting it. It is vital not just because it is fun and new, but because students need to be taught how to properly use it and to not be technology shy. One idea I had after researching these websites was to turn an average book report (in which, traditionally, students would together read a book and individually write a paper on it) into a technology and project-based learning experience. I would have them, instead of writing a boring paper, write a review, blog, or create a video to post online at one of these websites, and perhaps even create our own class website filled with personal book reviews, author biographies, etc. The opportunities with technology are virtually endless, you just need the tools to be comfortable and get started!
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//Information retrieved from: www.edutopia.org//