Feeling Uncomfortable is a Necessary Evil


I work with many veterans teachers who cringe at the sight of new technology and media, especially when they feel “forced” to adopt these tools in their classrooms. To be honest, I completely understand their fear and appreciation – it takes time to learn these tools (e.g. podcast, audacity, mastery manager), they are difficult to master, and most importantly, change can be scary. But technology is not our adversary – technology (used correctly) can support our instruction and help students learn the material in non-traditional ways.

I would argue, as teachers, we should not wait for administration of ed policy to tell us what to do or how to use technology; rather, we should be in the forefront of change and seek out different multimedia tools.

The assignments for this week – creating a google site, podcast, screencast, avatar, etc. – got me/us out of our comfort zones. This is vital to being, or becoming, an effective teacher because our students face similar challenges. Being uncomfortable allows us to step in the shoes of our students who are learning complex material for the first time; it allows us to feel what it’s like to try something new, fail several times, but still persevere (It took me several attempts to complete the activities for this week). It is human nature to avoid situations that evoke feelings of uneasiness but it is essential to the learning process. 

If you are looking for other technological tools/resources to help your instruction in the classroom, I would suggest the following links: 

Create ‘Word Clouds’ as a hook to any lesson: http://www.wordclouds.com/
Connect with parents/keep them informed: https://www.remind.com/
Engage students in discussion using their phones (as clickers): https://www.polleverywhere.com/
Create a collaborative learning experience: https://classroom.google.com/h

Comments

  1. Diane MullerMay 26, 2017 at 8:32 AM

    Thanks for those extra sites! I've used Remind and Google classroom before and both are fantastic sites to use in a 1:1 school. My school has been 1:1 for almost 10 years and we have definitely have grown in our technology usage and ideas. The kids are certainly more willing to "play around" with technology than most adults are and they have taught us more than we would have ever found out ourselves.

    I did enjoy having to create everything we had to this week - if only to get me more out of my comfort zone. I feel like I'm pretty decent with technology and I'm okay playing around with it, but there's always something more to learn.

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  2. UnknownMay 30, 2017 at 5:56 AM

    Thanks for the additional resources, Steve! I agree, it was good to have this space to explore tools. Even though the tools are pretty intuitive, I still need some dedicated time to get to know all of their capabilities. Now that I'm getting faster (with EdPuzzle and Audacity, in particular) I can focus more on the content of the lesson than the process of using the tool.

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  3. TrollgeekMay 30, 2017 at 6:16 AM

    I love your attitude, Steve. Technology can allow to do some things better, and in some cases, can allow us to do things that won't work any other way. One issue that I have learned over the years is that the real difficulty is getting people to see how these tools can be used in their own specific areas. Often that have a hard time transposing to their own situation. I hear comments such as, "Sure, that fine for you, but what am I supposed to do with it?"

    Thanks for the extra links. I have used all of these and found them useful. In OL 101 I have to be careful not to overwhelm people with too many things during our 4 weeks.

    ReplyDelete

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