Techology in the classroom
I teach Transitions 1 and 2, which is an employability, career/life skills class for special need students. (11th and 12th graders in a career tech school) I also serve on our schools' literacy and technology committee. We are currently researching to find out what our best option would be as far as incorporating technology in each classroom. My goal is a 1:1 ratio with some type of technology in my classes. What has been your experiences with 1:1 or different types of technology used in your classrooms? Have you used the Ipad, cell phones or other pda devices? Pros/Cons?
Thank you for your input!
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Ruth Holland on
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Hello Niki, I teach a Transition Prgram in Key West. We are experimenting with an Ipod touch for a student to use as a communication device. He uses the app, proloqu2go. We also are using an Ipad for picture schedules, job task prompts and so forth, with other students. I have had great success, but the district does not support Apple. The management of the devices are done from my home through my personal Itunes account. The inability to be online with the devices at school are crippling the effectiveness of them. I would love to here what your technology team is doing, I am out of the loop in my district as I am not on the technology team.
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Permalink Reply by Steve Ruddy on
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I would like it if you could tell us more about what you want the technology to do for your students. I would consider laptops over the other options, they will give your students more opportunities to create their own work as opposed to just using apps. If you are preparing kids for the working world, a good knowledge of Microsoft Office might be a valuable skill set for them to have. My wife who works in private industry is always surprised that so many people applying for employment can't even format a document.
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Permalink Reply by Niki Luciano on
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My goals with the technology in the class is to provide better opportunities for my students to complete assignments, as well as prepare them for life after school....as you said, some students can not even format a document or use a computer appropriately. We are researching different things to see what might be best suited for our students. We have ruled out cell phones since at the high school level we would most likely need the students to do larger amounts of work and would be in need of a keyboard/keypad. There are many things we would use the technology for including book work, reading, projects etc... I have a vision of the kids using something every day, walking in, sitting down and logging on to get started.
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Permalink Reply by Julia Trygstad on
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Hey Nikki,
I'm Julia. I am actually not a teacher yet, but I am a student at ISU. I am in a Special Education class called SED379. This class is basically based on all kinds of assistive technology. (AT) All of my spec. ed. teachers here have reiterated to me how important this class is. Apparently ISU is the only college in Illinois that offers this course as an undergrad student so they keep telling us that we basically have a one-up on other students becoming teachers because this issue is so big. So my point is that everything we've learned so far has basically straight up said...we have to be twenty-first century teachers in order to be successful and to positively effect our students and their learning capabilities. We've covered multiple technological devices and what they help students to achieve. We've also covered all the help they provide students with and the loads more of learning they receive and the heightened achievements they accomplish when applying technology into the classroom. I absolutely agree with having the ratio 1:1 with students and technology. I hope everything works out in your classroom!
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Permalink Reply by Crangle on
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Absolutely, PDA devices should be used for assistance. W/ a new version of iPad and the ability to sync w/ either a Mac or PC, this provides an excellent solution for an "Office" suite.
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If you don't already have actual computers in your classroom already, that is what I think you should be considering. In terms of assistive technology, the macbook has a powerful suite of tools that we use here in our school for some of our special needs students. I do not know what type of assistance your students need, but if they are visually impaired you would probably want a device you can attach a high contrast/large key keyboard to. If the impairments are visual, I am not sure they could even see what is happening on a pda type device, even something as 'big' as the ipad. I am sure that Windows based machines are also providing comparable tools. You will get a lot more bang for your buck. I have and use my iphone all the time, but I get most of my work done on a laptop.
If I were you I would create a matrix of the exact tasks you want the device to perform and then list out all of your possible device choices and start checking off the tasks each one can actually perform. The device with the most checks would be the winner.
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