As some of you have already alluded to, a good use of technology would be any technology that engages students at the higher levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy and SAMR model. Instead of technology that merely digitizes traditional learning, students should be encouraged to develop critical and design thinking skills while solidifying core knowledge. For instance in the science classroom, 3D modeling, 3D printers, and laser cutters, enable students to iterate and solve real-world problems in physics and structural design.
In addition, a good use of technology would also include any technology that enables collaboration and communication. Most jobs in the real-world require people to be effective in group settings. It is quite rare for one person to take on a large scale problem. Many current applications including Slack and Google Apps are already being used effectively in the math and science classroom to facilitate communication and group work. The more connected students are to the teacher and other students, the more likely misconceptions will be eliminated due to the exposure to different minds; student universes can no longer be private in environments that are strongly interconnected.
It is obvious that these ideas require a lot of work from teachers to implement effectively. However, school administrators also need to have a similar mindset and understanding of what makes digital technology “good”. Budgets need to shift quickly to eliminate technologies that have little impact on student learning and shift to technologies that do. For instance, ten years ago SMARTBoards were found in many modern math and science classrooms; teachers and administrators have now realized that the large budget required can be invested in better ways.
Krathwohl, D. R. (2002). A revision of Bloom’s taxonomy: An overview. Theory into practice, 41(4), 212-218.
Puentedura, R. (2010). SAMR and TPCK: Intro to advanced practice. Retrieved February, 12, 2013.
This is a great post, Gordon! I especially appreciate your ideas that highlight Bloom’s Taxonomy and a focus on communication and collaboration. I believe that if students’ can demonstrate some form of mastery around communication and collaboration skills, they will be successful in multiple contexts. But what does mastery look like? What specific skills related to communication and collaboration are most important?
Hi Allison,
Those are some tough questions! To your second question, a recent study identified a correlation between agreeableness/openness and two important skills, empathic listening and assertive communication, that are key to group dynamics (Sims, 2017, p. 179). Interestingly enough, extraversion was not nearly as important as agreeableness/openness to a person’s ability to utilize empathic listening/assertive communication. As for mastery, coincidentally we are utilizing two applications to observe and record progress in these areas. The first is Parlay Ideas, an application that facilitates assessment of synchronous group environments like Harkness tables and asynchronous group environments like discussion forums. For assertive communication, we are piloting an application called StarSpeak which uses natural language processing to evaluate student speech (i.e. speed, tone, number of filler words) and facial recognition software to evaluate non-verbal communication.
Sims, C. M. (2017). Do the big-five personality traits predict empathic listening and assertive communication?. International Journal of Listening, 31(3), 163-188.
That sounds like a great article, Gordon. I will definitely be checking it out!