P4 Practice the integration of appropriate technology with instruction. Teacher candidates use technology that is effectively integrated to create technologically proficient learners.
This principle of learning and education to me really represents the ongoing learning that we all must play a part in for the sake of our student understanding.
Being open and willing to try new things is an important characteristic for teachers and especially new teachers who may feel overwhelmed keeping up with the day-to-day class routine. Adding various aspects of technology to their day can in fact help them become more familiar with the technology and improve their ability to help their students access the information. The Learning with Technology class provided some easy and helpful ways in which to weed out the deluge of information into more reasonable bite sizes.
The Learning with Technology class helped me recognize the resources I could use to effectively search for those resources that were up to standard. It also offered guiding questions that ended up providing some riverbanks to the potential excess of information discovered. One of our first tasks was to learn and begin using a platform for student discussion. Google +, which allowed all of the students to be broken into groups and work together by sharing their ideas and gathering feedback about those resources.
One of these new resources that I found was a program called ReadyTest A-Z that helps students gain knowledge about how an online high stakes testing operates. The ReadyTest A-Z is similar to what students will experience when they take the SBA (Smarter Balance Assessment) later this spring. The screenshot provided below is from the ReadyTest A-Z program and describes some of the features available with the program.
Finding this program and spending time researching it has added to my emerging level of understanding, not only of programs such as the ReadyTest A-Z but also a greater understanding around how the SBA is constructed in both the knowledge of questions being asked as well as the technical abilities that will be required for students in order to successfully complete the assessments.
Having the ability to work on this practice test will be very beneficial to students in helping them have awareness with the format and the style of questions being used in high stakes testing situations.
Overall what impressed me the most about this program was the how it mirrored the Raz-Kids program currently used by our school. The same company develops both programs: Learning A-Z. Having such a similar format is a tremendous boost in helping students quickly and easily understand the technical requirements of the newer program. By having a higher comfort level with the formatting, students will be able to get to work sooner and start focusing on the questions.
By giving students the opportunities to acquire fluency with technology, schools are providing students an opportunity to improve their SBA scores.
One way to further improve my effectiveness with the technological requirements of any newly implemented program, would be to sign up with a blank student account to have the chance to see what a student sees, work on the program and better learn all of it’s particular shortcuts and tricks. Understanding this technology better would lead to a better explanation to students to help them as they become technological learners.
Reference:
Lewis is learning 