My name is Carol G. I am a reluctant blogger, I must admit, because I am kinda overwhelmed with all the information out there and I'm wondering if the world really needs another blog. Plus I've made websites, wikis, instagrams, snapchats, and many other techie instruments and here I am all over again. When does it ever stop???????
OK ok I have to tell a little something about myself. As you might have guessed from the above, I'm old! Way too old to really care about all the ed tech...I mean I find it interesting, and my students are supposed to love it, but honestly, some days I find I know waayyyy more about edtech than my students!! What?? I thought they were the digital generation!! They don't even know how to use prezi, canva, powtoons, etc. etc. What's up with that? I teach mostly English Language Learners, actually I'm back to teaching these students after 3-4 years of teaching reading to general ed kids. The ELLs seem bewildered by tech, only thing most of them know how to use is their favorite form of social media on their phone, which is easy and requires thumbs, that's about it.
I also co-teach a class called Science Explorations which is for low levels of ELLs. We have an enormous class of 27 and lately it's been all reading and writing, which is mighty boring in a science class! We need to do experiments and other fun stuff, well I'm the language support teacher so I'm not in charge. Hopefully this last semester we will get to do some cool things. We are working on a biology unit, not sure what we are doing yet but hopefully my coteacher will let me know soon, since we start on Monday...
Reading class for sophomores, 9th period!, is another class I teach. I love, love, love these students, they make me laugh and we always try to have a good time. I love it when they pull out a book and beg me to read. Yes!! On Monday if it's nice out we are gonna go outside and write our favorite lines from poetry with sidewalk chalk. April is Poetry Month and they have read a lot of it lately!
OK enough already...
That is interesting that ELL students are bewildered by technology more so than gen ed kids. Why do you think this is the case if they have the same access to technology as gen ed kids?
ReplyDeleteMy district is the same way with our science/social studies instruction. We do not have blocks of time to teach these subjects anymore, therefore, no time to do the fun experiments and projects that we used to do. We are told to just fit in our science and social studies instruction to our reading block by reading about the topics. That is totally boring! I don't remember the stories and articles that I read about science topics, such as simple machines. I remember actually building the simple machines and learning how they work through hands on activities like that.
Hi Carol. It sounds like you have a bunch of ed-tech balls in the air in terms of blogs/wikis/websites. What kind of sites (blog/wiki/websites) are you creating? In terms of the world needing more blogs that's a touch question to answer! If you have something positive to create and teach other educators than yes! Not everyone is at the same level as you so you never know when one of YOUR blog posts will spark an idea or inspire someone else who *hasn't* created so many blogs/wikis/websites. And if all else fails, you can delete this one after class.
ReplyDeleteI'm also curious about Danielle's question- why do you think your ELLs respond different to technology than your gen ed kids?
Hi Nicole, thanks for your comments. I almost think that my reluctance to blog is somewhat generational, because I grew up thinking that there were "experts" in the field and that you studied them to learn. So for me to blog as a nonexpert is tough, something I have difficulty with... And there are so many blogs I enjoy, I feel like those bloggers share their insights much better than I could. Maybe some day I will overcome these feelings! As for the ELLs and tech, it's really one half of my class of 16 that were sooo reluctant, and they explained that they like using google slides and just wanted to use that, they felt time constraints, etc. There were a variety of reasons, but Karen gave me a great suggestion, maybe trying out one app/program per semester might ease some anxiety with some of the more reluctant students. Duh! I just get all excited about something cool and think my students should be excited too, when of course they are under pressure and time constraints that I don't feel. Lesson learned!
DeleteCarol, It is nice to get to know you, and to have a new "face" in the class. Sometimes I feel the same way about the different things we could use based on technology and how we have so many options out there. I think it would be great if there was an option for each teacher to use one interface for a quarter/semester so that the students could get a good grasp on the program.
ReplyDeleteThat is very interesting about the ELL students being bewildered about technology. Do you think that the reason they have more issues with it because of the language barrier? I think that could be the difference if everything is presented in English as apposed to their native language.
Hi Karen, so nice to meet you! I asked my students the other day, why the resistance to using new tech tools? I would say that it's really about half of my students in a class of 16 were reluctant. I teach the highest-level ELLs, so language is not really an issue. A couple students told me they always use google slides, so didn't want to learn anything else. A couple students said they felt they were running out of time (I know how that feels), so I will add more time to the next assignment when we use new apps. Then just a few students told me they were lazy, and didn't want to learn anything new. OK, points for honesty, I guess! They can always use google translate too if they are having trouble understanding a word, although g.translate sometimes doesn't work too well...I like your idea about using one interface per semester, next year I will have to try that, so students can really get to know a program before we move on to another one. Thanks for that suggestion!
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