Good use of technology in math and/or science learning environments consists of active, eager learners that are very engaged with the task at hand. The technology being used has to support the learning goals in order to be considered ‘good use,’ in my opinion. This takes a bit of planning on the teachers part, but it is really important for the technology to be directly tied to the goal. I think there should also be a variety of different types of technologies for students to use to appeal to the different learning styles.
I generally work with students in the K-6 level, however I think that a technology rich learning environment may look fairly similar over the K-12 grades. The class may look very busy and chatty, with many different things going on at once, but this is a sign of students being interested in what they are doing. In the school I previously worked in, they had a STEM learning commons with unlimited resources. When students were working in there they would be entirely immersed in what they were doing and they wouldn’t want to stop. Students could be working with building materials, ipads, computers, models, or coding with robots, and you could watch them be so active in their learning that they would become in charge of their own learning. When teachers can take a step back and allow students to be interactive and experiment, it shows that it is a good use of technology.
This vision is definitely possible, however, unfortunately some schools do not have the resources to attain this goal. The school I currently work in does not have access to a lot of the materials you would want to create a technology-rich math or science learning environment. I definitely try to be as creative as possible to provide these opportunities to students but it doesn’t always look the way I wish it did.