"The bottom line is that technology should not drive instruction. Instead, the desired curricular outcomes and students' needs should be the driving factor. "
~Denise Johnson (2014)
It's not the tool that motivates the student, rather the students' motivation to use the tool to show us what they know. Traditional writing with pencil and paper can be effective for some students, but what happens when other factors impede a students' ability to truly write what is in their head in order for them to share it with others? During the literacy block I started using more multimodal tools to help students see the possibilities of their reading and writing outcomes through the use of certain digital tools. "When teachers integrate writing and reading, they help students use writing to think about what they will read and to understand what they have read. Writing may be used as a motivational tool to catapult students into reading." (Vacca, Vacca, &Mraz, 2016).
In order to have my students understand that using technology in our classroom to learn was more than just getting on an iPad or laptop, but understanding that that device could provide them with opportunities to write and learn. It wasn't an easy task to teach my students that devices were meant for more than math and reading games. I begin by inviting our media and technology specialist into our classroom. We conducted a lesson that required students to take a question and then use resources from our schools website to discover the answer to their "Wonder" questions. At the end of the lesson we shared that we wanted our classroom to be a more digital friendly environment, where devices are used to learn and demonstrate learning.
In order to have my students understand that using technology in our classroom to learn was more than just getting on an iPad or laptop, but understanding that that device could provide them with opportunities to write and learn. It wasn't an easy task to teach my students that devices were meant for more than math and reading games. I begin by inviting our media and technology specialist into our classroom. We conducted a lesson that required students to take a question and then use resources from our schools website to discover the answer to their "Wonder" questions. At the end of the lesson we shared that we wanted our classroom to be a more digital friendly environment, where devices are used to learn and demonstrate learning.
"Children today are digital natives." (Johnson, 2014). Today's students need to have and experience a range of skills to communicate and effectively use technology in order to successfully adapt to the rapidly growing digital world. Teachers need to create digital environments to help fosters student learning outcomes. When students learn to write and communicate online it changes how students see themselves as learners. Their roles as the learner is to determine how they can create and distribute their knowledge to teachers and peers.
As the teacher of these digital natives it was my job to offer them experience that will equip them with the tools necessary to successful use technology as a way to show their learning. I used objectives from across the second grade curriculum to see where I could integrate and use multimodal tools. In the area of writing students planned, drafted, edited and published using tools such as Storybird, Piktochart, Google Docs, Google Slides, Voicethread, and Flipgrid. In science and social studies the use of digital books and articles was important when they were researching for their life cycle and geography unit. In math online books and videos helped increase students written response to journal prompts because they were able to make connections from the digital texts and videos to help with their understanding of concepts.
Rather than using technology to entertain my students, I used it as a way to encourage and motivate their learning. Through the use of multimodal tools my students were able to experience learning through a lens in which they could build their knowledge, increase their motivation, and improve their ability to demonstrate their learning.
Johnson, D. (2014). Reading, Writing, and Literacy 2.0: Teaching with online text, tools, and resources k-8. New York:Teacher College Press.
Vacca, L.,Vacca,R.,Mraz,M.,(2016). Content Area Reading: Literacy and Learning Across the Curriculum (12th ed.). Pearson.
As the teacher of these digital natives it was my job to offer them experience that will equip them with the tools necessary to successful use technology as a way to show their learning. I used objectives from across the second grade curriculum to see where I could integrate and use multimodal tools. In the area of writing students planned, drafted, edited and published using tools such as Storybird, Piktochart, Google Docs, Google Slides, Voicethread, and Flipgrid. In science and social studies the use of digital books and articles was important when they were researching for their life cycle and geography unit. In math online books and videos helped increase students written response to journal prompts because they were able to make connections from the digital texts and videos to help with their understanding of concepts.
Rather than using technology to entertain my students, I used it as a way to encourage and motivate their learning. Through the use of multimodal tools my students were able to experience learning through a lens in which they could build their knowledge, increase their motivation, and improve their ability to demonstrate their learning.
Johnson, D. (2014). Reading, Writing, and Literacy 2.0: Teaching with online text, tools, and resources k-8. New York:Teacher College Press.
Vacca, L.,Vacca,R.,Mraz,M.,(2016). Content Area Reading: Literacy and Learning Across the Curriculum (12th ed.). Pearson.