I find myself in a cycle. I want to on-board everyone to everything and then inexplicably when that does not happen I feel disappointed. Beyond comprehension, I find myself repeating this cycle numerous times before I intervene on behalf of my own sanity and ask – – –
is what I am trying to accomplish for everybody? Does #EdTech need everybody?
Does #EdTech Need Everybody?
Students need educational technology opportunities throughout their day, across their educational experience. However, should my goal be for every teacher to understand educational technology? Should I need every educator to understand the possibilities and promise of technology? Could all students be reached without reaching every teacher?
Teacher teams often have experts within the team. Some teachers are better than other at: writing assessments, coming up with reading strategies to support the content, work with students with specific challenges. Is edtech the same thing?
Instead of struggling with great educators about concepts which may or may not enhance their practice – should I just be connecting them to peers who are proficient at edtech?
Could awareness be enough for some teachers? Administrators typically receive our information as awareness, since they are not implementing edtech in a classroom. Maybe some teachers who are already strong in their teaching need only be aware?
Maybe edtech doesn’t need everybody. If there are some educators who need deep training in educational technology and others who only need awareness – we need to change our strategy and educate our leaders on how to identify teachers. Leaders need to identify teachers already providing exemplary teaching who would find the addition of #edtech cumbersome to integrating in their class. The leaders need to choose that since they are the instructional leaders of their schools. It is not a list of those we should not bother, but those without an ability to fold #edtech into a class to better it.
But, maybe we should include everybody in #edtech. Maybe the way we learned to teach, distributed over time, is what even the best analog teachers among us need – time to think about a beneficial way to integrate and enhance their practice. Maybe the way we are introducing, practicing, and even requiring edtech can evolve into something more practice-focussed, more leadership endorsed, more useful.
Does #edtech need everybody?
2017-12-18 at 8:17 am
I really do think that #edtech is important! We’re living in a tech world that’s only going to become more advanced, so everyone needs to be on board.
2017-12-18 at 9:49 am
Every teacher needs to understand technology. It’s like asking if everyone should know how to read and writr. Not having tech literacy is going to cripple teachers and their students if it’s not encouraged in the classroom. Def should be part of continuing education and if some teachers are more advanced they can do opt out tests.
2017-12-18 at 9:52 am
I hear your passion J. I just have to ask the question when I continually am teaching the same things with the same teachers; it makes me wonder how I could better.
2017-12-24 at 10:36 am
Interesting
2017-12-24 at 9:00 pm
As a recent high school graduate, I think all teachers need to have at least limited knowledge beyond awareness. It’ll help them to stay on top of their field and help their students get even more out of the class