Digital literacy and technology is growing every second, of every minute, of every hour, of every day. I hope to become a teacher, and that field requires you to be up to par with technology and digital literacy. I have researched and found that some teachers use more technology then I previously thought. New programs such as the TextAloud read text “ranging from Internet pages and emails to text documents and eBooks.”(nextup.com)
The earliest I remember using a computer was when I was extremely young, before I was four, since my father is an electrical engineer, we’ve always had pretty advanced technologies in the house. I remember playing Disney CD-ROM games, that helped me count and learn the alphabet and even learn to spell basic words. Then as years went on, I remember having a computer lab every week in elementary school, sometimes twice a week. One of our assignments was that we had to finish one story in Accelerated Reader, where we read a short story then answer question based on the stories. We then could play learning games that helped us spell words. Then in middle school, we also had to take a computer course, in this class we learned how to type correctly using a specific program, where to put our fingers, no more search and poke. We learned the keyboard by heart and had to learn to type with our eyes closed. This helped me a lot in high school. Freshman year in high school, we had to take yet another computer course. Here we used the same typing program as I did in middle school, so naturally I excelled and finished it before most other students. We also learned how to thoroughly use Microsoft Word, PowerPoint and Excel. Since I use both Word and PowerPoint more often I remember how to use those, as opposed to Excel. I also competed in the Future Business Leaders of America competitions in ninth and tenth grade, both in Word Processing. In this subject you had to memorize how to format memos and professional letters, I got 4th in the county in ninth grade and 2nd in the county in tenth grade. From tenth to twelfth grade I took a web design class, I learned how to create web pages, Flash animation movies and also about audience awareness. We had to learn what kind of audience we were appealing to, whether it be children, adults, elderly people, business people, or even foreign people. Depending on what audience one is appealing to, is how one designs their website, if they are appealing to children, one might make the website fun and easy to navigate, and maybe even have the text a little larger than normal, have basic words and even have a bright color scheme. This has helped me in other aspects of school, especially my college composition courses, where one learns how to become aware of one’s audience when writing.
As of right now I consider myself to be pretty technologically advanced, I have a lot of knowledge with many basic programs such as Microsoft Word, and PowerPoint. I also know a lot about Adobe Fireworks and Dreamworks, these programs are used to make websites. I intend to learn a lot more about Microsoft Excel, since I haven’t used it since ninth grade, and Adobe Photoshop. I think I also need to learn more about how to maneuver through Apple products, because I think more teachers use Apple computers to create better and more fun learning experiences for children. I’m not sure about what other programs teachers use in the classroom but I’ve read about a fourth grade teacher named Jeff Paulson who uses everyday technologies to teach his class.
Jeff Paulson uses wiki space, where he has some of his students update it by “researching an aspect of the current Social Studies unit.”(Paulson) Mr. Paulson will also have other students “recording personal narratives as podcasts”(Paulson) and eventually post them to the school website. Paulson has created a different approach to persuasive arguments, he converses with his students before they create an argument and once they do they post it to their own blog. One other group of students creates a science experiment and records it with a Flip video camera and posts it as a podcast. There is a lot of controversy about having technology in the classroom, some fear that it’ll decrease test scores and take away from learning. I think this is incorrect, I think technology can really help a lot of kids, especially ones who have disabilities and learning disorders. I believe what the McKinsey report stated in 2007, “the only way to improve outcomes is to improve instruction.” I think that technology can most certainly improve this instruction. Since I know how to do all of these things, I think these are excellent ideas to use in my future classroom. I also have a few ideas of my own, I think if we read an intriguing story I can have them make a movie of the story, camcorder and all, and maybe even make a movie poster in Adobe Photoshop or Fireworks. I think this will enhance their creative thinking, especially if I make them create an alternate ending to the story.
I downloaded a free trial of TextAloud and found that it’s quite easy to navigate through. I think this is a great innovative technology that will really help children who have trouble reading. I think this is one of those technologies that can improve instruction. It uses “a range of different pleasant, human-like voices.”(nextup.com) According to the informational website, it reports that students who previously struggled reading often felt a sense of real empowerment. This program was created to help students learn at approximately the same rate. Most curriculums are created expecting students to learn at the same pace, sadly this is more than likely not the case. Many have reported that it’s very easy to use, including me. According to the website, “there are no slow learning curve, and no long, dense manual to struggle through.”
I expect to learn all the necessary programs that I need to be able to become a good teacher. I hope that I can help all my students excel in technology because it will constantly grow and to succeed now-a-days one needs to be technologically advanced. I feel kids comprehend things better when they’re younger; research shows it’s easier for kids to learn a new language than older kids and adults. I’m sure this is the same for learning how to use the latest technology, when you grow up with something, you tend to keep it your whole life. As I said before, technology is one aspect to improve the instruction of education and learning.
WORKS CITED
(Paulson) - http://teachingtechnology.suite101.com/article.cfm/teachers_use_technology_in_classroom_control
(nextup.com) - http://www.nextup.com/TextAloud/assistive-technology-software.html
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