Friday, October 9, 2009

Do Your Teachers Need a Personal Trainer? By Aileen M. Owens

In this article it talks about how teachers need help with the new technology that is coming out. And that they have one person at their school that is able to work all the programs. The problem is that there are 356 teachers and the one technology person. So what the school decided to do was find a way to have more people come in and teach the teachers about the new technology. There was a program of master students that were still going through their training. The school decided to see if they could have a few of the students come in and help the teachers. They first had the teachers all have in intense training with the students. Then they pared up the students with the teacher so that they could be in a classroom to assist when the teacher was using the new technology. On of the pieces of technology that the teachers had trouble using was the smart whiteboard.

Some of the students stayed longer to work with the children. Some of the kids had problems working on Word. They would right a paragraph and then they would want to change the font size and style, but they would forget to highlight the paragraph. It was very frustrating for the young children. This was something that they noticed that all the kids did. So having the helpers made it easier for the teachers to teach the kids how to work on programs.  The teachers were so happy to have someone come in and help them with their technology problems.

I think this is great, being able to have helpers in the class assist with technology is great. I don’t think that any one or any school would give up the opportunity to have free help. And if you have someone to brainstorm with about great new lesson plans even better. Technology is hard and challenging and working with others makes it easier. They didn’t really say what kinds of technology problems they had besides the smart whiteboards, but whatever new technology they had it is always a challenge when you first work with it. 

2 comments:

  1. I too find it very beneficial that there is help out there! Technology can be very challenging and technology is not always predictable. You can plan a whole lesson around technology and when the time comes around, the technology doesn't work and your whole lesson is ruined. We are thankful as college students to have been given the opportunity to take a course specifically designed to work with technology in the classroom. Sometimes you just need a quick reminder and these helpers will do just the trick in these times of need!

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  2. I like this idea, expecially the role reversal students teaching teachers. Working in a school district, I have always noticed that several of the teachers dont know the technology, therefore dont use it. I think it's important that teachers take classes, much like 422, and learn how to incorporate technology into their classrooms - that way their not stuck in the "dark-ages". Great job!

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