How have the Ed Tech courses to date changed my classroom this year?

The courses to date have changed my teaching by taking my classroom from primarily paper-based texts to electronic texts sourced from the Internet. A large portion of student reading material is now from texts found on the Internet. In addition, student writing is now done on a computer and then posted to the Internet as opposed to being printed on paper as in the past. This change to an Internet-based classroom has brought numerous benefits to my students.

 This year the Team 7 Humanities has the theme of “Connected World” as a common thread running through all of the units. Each student has had to choose one country to research in order to develop a deep understanding of its people, culture, economy and political systems. Students have found current events articles on the Internet and have had to read and analyze the articles and then write a blog making connections to prior learning.

 When students write their blogs they are writing for a for a real world audience instead of just for the teacher. As a result, students are aware of a higher standard for written work in terms of content, organization, fluency and conventions. In addition, writing blogs offers students much more feedback to their writing from other students and from the real world audience.

 As a teacher who is always striving to have my students improve their reading and writing, the Internet offers an enormous number of reading texts at many different levels. Letting students choose texts matched to their interests, learning profiles and readiness, provides differentiation to student learning.

 In summary, I think that the biggest benefit of the educational technology courses to date has been to explode the limits that traditionally confined student learning. Students are no longer restricted to paper texts found in the classroom or library. Likewise, my students now write for a real audience that includes anyone with access to the Internet. My classroom, like thousands of other classrooms today, offers an enormous number of texts directly connected to real world issues for students to study and a vast audience for them to communicate their thinking.