Readings for Nov 6

The readings for this week were on a topic of your choosing, and I chose to read about technology in the classroom. This is a hot topic right now, as new technology is invading our everyday lives, and now our classrooms.

The first article I looked at was 'Technology is Changing How Students Learn, Teachers Say.' I really liked this article because, while it was not a scientific study that proved anything, it interviewed many teachers about their students, technology and how technology is changing their students and their methods of teaching. Teachers are the people who are in contact with students for the longest periods of time, so it makes sense to interview them. Teachers reported that they felt the attention span of their students were decreasing, and they needed to be constantly entertained. Teachers think of themselves as entertainers, just to get their students to focus long enough for them to get a point across. Technology is training kids to need constant stimulation while they shift their attention quickly. This is not really conductive to the traditional style of teaching, so technology is being brought into the classroom to try to engage and teach students of the younger generation. But then are teachers just encouraging the negative consequences of technology? Are they reinforcing the short attention spans, or engaging and teaching their students in a better way? That is hard to tell. Personally, I believe that technology shortens attention spans. I can see it in myself a lot. It is difficult for me to focus for long periods of time without looking at my phone or computer. It's quite sad actually. But, on the other hand, technology is such a big part of our society, I think we need to make sure students can use it effectively, so it must be utilized in the classroom. I really think that technology should be used less outside of the classroom, if we are concerned about the negative effects of technology.

The second reading I looked at was titled "11 Real Ways Technology Is Affecting Education Right Now.' This article and accompanying study looked at college students and the increasing rate of use of technology in the classroom. If you look around at a college classroom, almost everyone has a computer. We use them to take notes, write papers, do research and even take classes. Students are also using them to get online textbooks for their classes and communicate with their professors and classmates, much like this class. This survey study also found that 67% of students cannot go 1 hour without looking at technology, while 40% can't last more than 10 minutes. Yikes! I am really guilty of this too, unless I am studying hard for a test. This is scary! Talk about short attention spans. But this use of technology saves students hours of work a day, and helps them perform research more effectively. There are some perks to using technology, I can attest to that, but what are the downfalls? I don't think we know the extent yet. There haven't been any long term studies of the effects technology on social skills or learning ability. I guess we will see.