Synthesizing Across Courses
Answering my compelling question, I have listed concepts below that I have discovered through my courses about how technology can support student literacy skills in the classroom:
Motivation:
Utilizing technology in the classroom for literacy increases student engagement and motivation to learn.
Research suggests that by tying the seven rules of engagement to your lessons and incorporating technology tools, a student's level of interest to learn can be elevated; which increases focus on a particular literacy task being practiced with technology. The three engagement concepts below are those that I observed in my own classroom while teaching literacy with technology.
Ability to choose:
Integrating technology that gives students the freedom to make choices will support their literacy skills. For example, StoryBird allows students to choose the pictures that they use to create a story. The web 2.0 tool Voki allows students to choose which character they want to record their voice into. Providing a handful of word work apps on the iPad and allowing students to choose which they'd prefer to use during a literacy block will increase their engagement level. Creating multiple QR codes to research informational text allowed my students to choose a topic they were interested in studying.
Socially Interact:
Introducing technology tools that allow students to collaborate in groups during your literacy block can increase motivation to practice literacy skills. For example, allowing students to record literature circle discussions into the I-Pad, record their reading partner, or have apps that are for more than one person correlate with this notion. During my action research, most of the students choose to participate in the partner CVC activity on Educreations.
Meaningful:
The ways that a teacher integrates technology tools in the classroom need to be relevant and meaningful to their students lives. Creating and recording a song about reading strategies that includes the students in the classroom is more meaningful than just showing a song on reading strategies. Explaining different ways that students can use the same web 2.0 tools used for class projects outside of the classroom can help increase student motivation. Updating the class website at school was meaningful because the students were excited to race home and view the new material.
Video's Related to Motivation:
What Motives Us?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=Y64ms-htffE
Having Our Say
http://www.ignitelearning.com/pdf/having-our-say-middle-grade-student-perspectives-on-school-technologies-and-academic-engagement.pdf
Utilizing technology in the classroom for literacy increases student engagement and motivation to learn.
Research suggests that by tying the seven rules of engagement to your lessons and incorporating technology tools, a student's level of interest to learn can be elevated; which increases focus on a particular literacy task being practiced with technology. The three engagement concepts below are those that I observed in my own classroom while teaching literacy with technology.
Ability to choose:
Integrating technology that gives students the freedom to make choices will support their literacy skills. For example, StoryBird allows students to choose the pictures that they use to create a story. The web 2.0 tool Voki allows students to choose which character they want to record their voice into. Providing a handful of word work apps on the iPad and allowing students to choose which they'd prefer to use during a literacy block will increase their engagement level. Creating multiple QR codes to research informational text allowed my students to choose a topic they were interested in studying.
Socially Interact:
Introducing technology tools that allow students to collaborate in groups during your literacy block can increase motivation to practice literacy skills. For example, allowing students to record literature circle discussions into the I-Pad, record their reading partner, or have apps that are for more than one person correlate with this notion. During my action research, most of the students choose to participate in the partner CVC activity on Educreations.
Meaningful:
The ways that a teacher integrates technology tools in the classroom need to be relevant and meaningful to their students lives. Creating and recording a song about reading strategies that includes the students in the classroom is more meaningful than just showing a song on reading strategies. Explaining different ways that students can use the same web 2.0 tools used for class projects outside of the classroom can help increase student motivation. Updating the class website at school was meaningful because the students were excited to race home and view the new material.
Video's Related to Motivation:
What Motives Us?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=Y64ms-htffE
Having Our Say
http://www.ignitelearning.com/pdf/having-our-say-middle-grade-student-perspectives-on-school-technologies-and-academic-engagement.pdf
Game-Based Learning/Creation
- Game-Based learning and creation of products can increase a student's accuracy and fluency.
- During my initial PBI project and action research, I observed my student's independently practicing literacy skills by creating a product using technology. The creation of a product allows the teacher to have an artifact to observe whether the student has mastered the literacy skill being practiced. Creating a Blabberize product showed a positive correlation in my students' fluency and accuracy rates. When my students created Educreation recordings displaying their ability to read CVC words, I observed multiple attempts to re-read and self correct. The idea of audience awareness using technology made my students much more focused during independent practice of literacy skills.
- During my tutoring sessions, I would have my student create his own book by taking pictures and recording his voice. This activity made him much more careful with his accuracy when reading texts at his instructional level. He also became aware of his fluency from listening to himself read, and wanted to read in different voices.
- When the class creates Text2mind maps, Voki's, Voicethreads, or Wordle's during Daily 5 lessons they have an online product to refer back to in order to master the literacy skill being taught. They also realize that these creations will be displayed for other's to view and review their product much more than if it was just being turned in as an assignment to the teacher.
- Game-based learning will help bridge together old and new literacies by bridging the gap between how students live and learn. In turn, students will move into the workplace with their interests in technology transferring with them. One of our PAC nights focused on how using the Wii and other gaming systems could be used for literacy.
- Game-based learning teaches situated learning, real world problems, collaboration, strategy and critical thinking skills, flexibility, and analyzing skills. Communication and collaboration is an essential skill that is not currently a heavy focus in the curriculum. With game-based learning students are asked to revise and reflect on their own learning process; which is a skill not currently supported in another content area.
- During my action research, I found that the CVC game "Change, Change, Change," was much more appealing to students than simply creating CVC words. The students self-corrected each other during the recordings.
- During my tutoring, I found that my student was the most focused when I turned our word work activity into a game by using digital dice and timers. The use of these tools pushed him to self correct more often in order to "get a turn".
- My class recently participated in "Hour of Code" which had volunteers from around the county teaching them how to create video games. However, the students did not realize the amount of critical thinking that went into this activity because it was game-based.
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TPACK:
Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge
TPACK explained by Claire Kilbane
What Is Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge?
/uploads/1/6/1/1/16111912/what_is_tpack.pdf_week_5.pdf
Scaffolding the TPACK Framework in Reading and Language Arts: New Literacies and New Minds
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Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge
- Student's literacy skills can not be supported by technology without the classroom teacher developing their TPACK.
- Teacher's need to be aware of their TPACK in order to support students literacy skills through technology. Without teachers reflecting on their own pedagogy, technology will not likely be used in a meaningful way in the classroom.
- It is essential that teacher's are exposed to the notion of TPACK. The TPACK framework describes types of knowledge teachers need so teachers understand different levels of technology integration. By changing my pedagogical approach, I can build new, engaging, and research based lessons based on the TPACK framework to prepare student's for the 21st century.
- During my literacy case study, I observed many teacher's using technology to "keep the students busy" rather than support and reinforce literacy concepts.
TPACK explained by Claire Kilbane
What Is Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge?
/uploads/1/6/1/1/16111912/what_is_tpack.pdf_week_5.pdf
Scaffolding the TPACK Framework in Reading and Language Arts: New Literacies and New Minds
/uploads/1/6/1/1/16111912/what_is_tpack.pdf_week_5.pdf
Technology Needs To be used After literacy skills are ACQUIRED
The most important lesson that I have learned is the notion that technology is not a "babysitter" and must be used in a meaningful and developmentally appropriate way in order to support students' literacy skills. From my action research, I discovered many students with literacy deficits that I had not previously been aware of. Therefore, they had incorrectly been practicing creating CVC words using the iPad when left to complete work independently. From student work samples, I was able to discover the exact needs of each student to form a strategy group.
The Teachers as Leaders course gave me an opportunity to become more familiar with the school's interventions used for literacy. Many teachers were using literacy interventions on the iPad that were not research based; therefore many of the student's made little growth. A literacy intervention should be carefully selected when using technology to make sure the student is unable to practice independently. Many of the interventions using iPads allowed the student to "look like they were showing growth" by randomly clicking buttons until they clicked the correct one to move forward.
Northrop & Killeen’s (2013) provide a four step framework for using iPads in the classroom to build literacy skills. This framework will ensure that an educator explicitly teaches the literacy concept whole group without the use of technology. Next, the teacher will model how to use the technology and provide guided practice. Then, the teacher will allow independent practice with the app and re-evaluate student samples to ensure they have a foundation of the literacy skills needed to correctly complete the iPad activities. Finally, students will independently practice using the iPad to reinforce a literacy skill.
The Teachers as Leaders course gave me an opportunity to become more familiar with the school's interventions used for literacy. Many teachers were using literacy interventions on the iPad that were not research based; therefore many of the student's made little growth. A literacy intervention should be carefully selected when using technology to make sure the student is unable to practice independently. Many of the interventions using iPads allowed the student to "look like they were showing growth" by randomly clicking buttons until they clicked the correct one to move forward.
Northrop & Killeen’s (2013) provide a four step framework for using iPads in the classroom to build literacy skills. This framework will ensure that an educator explicitly teaches the literacy concept whole group without the use of technology. Next, the teacher will model how to use the technology and provide guided practice. Then, the teacher will allow independent practice with the app and re-evaluate student samples to ensure they have a foundation of the literacy skills needed to correctly complete the iPad activities. Finally, students will independently practice using the iPad to reinforce a literacy skill.
Conclusion:
- The 21st century is here; now. Students utilize technology outside of the school environment more than in the classroom and are leaving school with the “unplugged” feeling; craving school to look like the world that they live in. Whether teachers are willing to jump on board will be the determining factor towards our educations success. We are each only one teacher, true, and the future of our students is unknown, but with the right tools and leadership we can all make life changing impacts in our classrooms in hopes of giving our students a digital foot print to leave behind as they become competent global citizens. Although they might be considered baby steps, I am moving in the right direction towards understanding myself as a educator and the significant impact I’ll be making on students in order for them to be successful in the 21st century.
- Morrow & Gambrell (2011) note that technology can benefit students who struggle in literacy and support diverse learners by being exposed to a variety of applications. My findings have led me to agree with the above notion. Technology can support students literacy growth in the classroom in multiple ways.
- Without participating in the New Literacies & Global Learning program, I am certain that I would be unprepared to integrate technology effectively in my classroom. Taking the tools and confidence that I've received from this program, I am excited to support student literacy skills through technology in my classroom!
Resources:
- Literacy Apps for Struggling Readers- http://www.education.nh.gov/instruction/special_ed/documents/apps_early_literacy.pdf
- 100 ways to use ipads in your classroom- http://www.edudemic.com/2012/09/100-ways-to-use-ipads-in-your-classroom/
- Amy Hutchison, Beth Beschorner & Denise Schmidt-Crawford (2012). Exploring the use of the iPad for literacy learning. The Reading Teacher, 66(1), 15–23. doi: 10.1002/TRTR.01090
- Barone, D., & Wright, T.E. (2008, December). Literacy instruction with digital and media technologies. The Reading Teacher, 62(4), doi: 10.1598/RT.62.4.2
- Fien, H., Baker, S. K., Smolkowski, K., Smith, J. L., Kame’enui, E. J., & Beck, C. T. (2008). Using nonsense word fluency to predict reading proficiency in kindergarten through second grade for English learners and native english speakers. School Psychology Review, 37, 391-408.
- Morrow, L. M., & Gambrell, L.B. (2011). Best practices in literacy instruction (4th ed.). New York, NY: The Guildford Press.
- Northrop, L. & Killeen, E. (2013). A Framework for using iPads to build early literacy skills. The Reading Teacher, 66(7), 531–537. doi: 10.1002/TRTR.115
- Walpole, S., & McKenna, M. C. (2013). The literacy coach’s handbook: A guide to research-based practice (2nd ed.). New York, NY: The Guilford Press.