And that's all she wrote....
Whew! We read a lot of books. I am not too sure I have many new, insightful
offerings for the blog this week as I feel like many of the thoughts I am
having after reading The App Generation are similar to what I have
expressed before but here are just a few tidbits:
**The
App Generation tells us that we want kids to be app-enabled, a term that I
hadn’t heard before, and I agree. What I
have taken away from all of these books and weeks of studying is that what we
want in the end, when designing digital education, is for our students to be USERS
of technology and not passive receivers.
We control the technology; it doesn’t control us. This takes effort however, a lot of effort,
along with mindfulness and intention.
Technology cannot DO the work of thinking and learning for us but rather
it has the potential to give us access to resources, tools, apps and outlets
that students of 20 years ago could only even begin to imagine.
My other
big take-away is that old-fashioned human connection is an integral part in all
of this. Technology is most successful
in conjunction with collaboration, human connection and relationships. People need time with each other and with
themselves (introspection!) away from technology to maximize digital
potential. If we look at innovative
companies as an example (I am thinking Apple, Google and the like), they value
and promote a lot of human interaction and time together to collaborate and
form the best ideas.
Technology
doesn’t replace thinking and learning, it enhances it. Choosing the right tool is very important to
the success of the learning outcomes of any specific educational design. I have said this before, but is all comes
back to affordance analysis, the backbone of good DDLS’ing😊.
I've enjoyed reading your blog over the course of the semester!
ReplyDeleteI like how you pointed out in this post that "technology is most successful in conjunction with collaboration, human connection and relationships." This is so important- using technology doesn't mean just sitting in front of a device for hours. It needs to be meaningful and we still need interaction and collaboration with others.
I think you nailed that blog! I could not agree with you more. It does seem to go back to the affordance analysis and making sure our technology choices actually enhance the learning not take anything away from it. I also agree that human interaction is vital. I find that when I give students the opportunity to work collaboratively they are more creative in the process because they have the ability to work off of each other.
ReplyDeleteThis comment is by Alana Stanley. Google is goofing up and my email is not being provided.
ReplyDeleteYou blog this week was spot on! I loved your connections to affordance analysis and 21st century skills. The use of technology to its fullest potential is only as good as the USER. When using technology in the classroom it becomes a teacher's responsibility to teach students how to use technology safely, appropriately, and successfully. In elementary school, this will require a lot of instruction, practice and feed back for students. Students need to learn how to use apps, search engines, Blackboard, Google Classroom appropriately. Through authentic problems, collaboration and communication these skills can develop, be remembered and used in their future!
I love the concept of students needing time away from the technology in order to get the most out of it. I fully agree. I think that is the time in which kids do most of their meaning-making. It's a shame that in the current context of my classroom students don't have the time to interact much. We are constantly working together as a team, but their isn't a lot of individual interactions. I think that's something that I need to work on. If we want kids to become more proficient social navigators and collaborators they need a chance to interact on a personal level.
ReplyDelete