Response #1 Webinar: Managing Your Classroom Technology
As a new owner of a set of iPads, I am excited and hopeful for the future of integrating different and new learning opportunities in my math classroom. Through this technology, I hope to enhance my own teaching abilities and engage my students in a way that makes them excited to do math and be problem solvers. With my excitement, also comes some reservations about all of the important details to consider when providing students access to technology. This first webinar provided great insight, tips, and tricks to preventing issues that arise with the technology itself, in addition to managing student's behavior. There were components of this webinar that had not crossed my mind whatsoever, such as having a "golden ticket" or master device that holds all of your apps. Simple ideas like this, I can already tell, are going to save me a lot of time and make incorporating tech into my classroom run as smooth as possible.
Tina Holland made it clear in her webinar, that managing the technology is necessary in order for it to be successful in the classroom. Some major takeaways include: the need of having headphones for certain activities, numbering devices to hold students accountable, protecting the technology with cases and covers, updating the devices with the newest software, and having a means of tracking student data, activities, usernames, and passwords. When there are solid routines in place for the iPads and students can efficiently use them to learn, it makes the use of the technology much more enjoyable for everyone involved.
My next step in towards introducing this new element to my classroom will be to create a technology contract. I believe that this was one of the most valuable tips from the webinar, because it is a written reminder and agreement that is in place to create a safe environment in which the devices are used to learn and grow in mathematics. I will hold my students responsible by having them and their parents sign a copy of the behavior contract, outlining their "digital citizenship" duties as students with technology and the rules and guidelines for using it in the classroom!
Creating a technology contract will certainly be a great step in helping to manage the appropriate use of technology. I agree that routines and procedures, just as with classroom management, are the crux of a efficient and effective learning environment.
ReplyDeleteYou picked up all the most important takeaways from the video! The technology contract is very important, especially when the devices are a permanent fixture in the classroom. It can be easy to start to take them for granted when they are in common use. I'm sure you will be successful in using the technology with your students!
ReplyDeleteI think it would be great to incorporate the technology contract in with the syllabus expectations and to include a discipline plan along with it. If we plan on using the technology routinely then it should be a part of our daily expectations from day one. I believe we would get even more support if we required a parent/guardian signature as well. Keeping those contracts will be important in holding students accountable for violating the agreement.
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