EDLD 5364 Week 1 Reflection

Teaching with Technology EDLD 5364 is the third course in my pursuit of my Master's Degree.  I am very excited and looking forward to getting started with the group project that we have assigned for this class.  I am a second grade teacher and this year is my 14th year to teach.  All of my experience has been in second grade and with the same district.  Over the years I have seen education change from teaching with thematic units to switching to a phonics based program.  The goal was never to bring in more technology as part of the curriculum.  My principa'ls main goal has always been about student success in reading and math.  We did upgrade from an overhead projector to an ELMO projection system.

This has been the first week of EDLD 5364.  In this class so far, I have joined with a team of other classmates and we have collaborated on a group blog where we have posted all of our team information.  I have also read many articles and parts of two books.  I also stay in touch with my classmates through the discussion board where we give feedback to each other about a significant quote.

The first book is Web 2.0: new tools, new schools by Gwen Solomon and Lynne Schrum (2007).  "Today's students know that they are tech-savvy and report that their schools are not." (p 31).  This is a growing concern and I read it over and over in other articles that I have had to read  for my classes.  I do see that schools are not able to keep up with changes in technology as fast as technology is changing.  One of the problems is funding.  Schools only get so much money and have to spend it in wise ways.  I also see that schools are trying to incorporate technology but some teachers are resistant to it.  We have teachers who are used to the way that they have always taught and live by the motto "If it isn't broke, don't fix it".  There is always room for improvement and we must keep up with the changing times.  I am really looking forward to this class because I think that it will show me some ways to help bring technology into the classroom so that the students are learning about technology while also learning the basics.

Reference:

Solomon, G. & Schrum, L. (2007).  Web 2.0: new tools, new schools. International  Society for Technology in Education.