http://www.edutopia.org/blog/student-engagement-stories-heather-wolpert-gawron?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=blog-kids-speak-out-question
I found this article to be particularly interesting. The teacher asked the students to speak about what engages them. First of all I think this is a brilliant strategy. Asking students what they find interesting and engaging is something I believe that many teachers do not think to do. While many of the answers are ones that I think many educators would give for engaging students, I still think it is interesting to hear it from the perspective of the student. Students spoke of working in groups and using technology. Technology and interaction with people is embedded into the lives of our students on a daily basis. Why should they have interaction in a social manner and with technology in every setting except the classroom? Technology is the way to engage students, so as a teacher I want to embed it into my classroom.
Using technology presents a challenge for teachers. One, a lot of teachers aren’t as familiar with all the technology in many schools and as a result there is at least an initial resistance to it. Second, how to we keep students from being distracted from learning using technology as opposed to engaging in learning. Often times when technology is put in front of students they are easily distracted and entertained by other components other than the task they are to complete. I think the burden to use technology in an academic manner rests on the teacher. The teacher should provide clear guidelines and instruction. The use of the technology should be something that the student can become highly interested in using and the task something which they can be highly interested in doing. When students are passionate in their learning and engaged, things unrelated to the learning material will not easily distract them. I can commit to at implementing three of these engagement strategies. I want students to use technology in my classroom. We have access to Chromebooks and I have used their mobile devices to play Kahoot. Also, I will implement projects and assignments where they may work with peers. I have already done this with poster projects and letting students develop essays together. Finally, I want to get students out of their seats more often. I have taken them outside to paint tshirts, but I would also like to get them outside and using technology moving forward.
I found this article to be particularly interesting. The teacher asked the students to speak about what engages them. First of all I think this is a brilliant strategy. Asking students what they find interesting and engaging is something I believe that many teachers do not think to do. While many of the answers are ones that I think many educators would give for engaging students, I still think it is interesting to hear it from the perspective of the student. Students spoke of working in groups and using technology. Technology and interaction with people is embedded into the lives of our students on a daily basis. Why should they have interaction in a social manner and with technology in every setting except the classroom? Technology is the way to engage students, so as a teacher I want to embed it into my classroom.
Using technology presents a challenge for teachers. One, a lot of teachers aren’t as familiar with all the technology in many schools and as a result there is at least an initial resistance to it. Second, how to we keep students from being distracted from learning using technology as opposed to engaging in learning. Often times when technology is put in front of students they are easily distracted and entertained by other components other than the task they are to complete. I think the burden to use technology in an academic manner rests on the teacher. The teacher should provide clear guidelines and instruction. The use of the technology should be something that the student can become highly interested in using and the task something which they can be highly interested in doing. When students are passionate in their learning and engaged, things unrelated to the learning material will not easily distract them. I can commit to at implementing three of these engagement strategies. I want students to use technology in my classroom. We have access to Chromebooks and I have used their mobile devices to play Kahoot. Also, I will implement projects and assignments where they may work with peers. I have already done this with poster projects and letting students develop essays together. Finally, I want to get students out of their seats more often. I have taken them outside to paint tshirts, but I would also like to get them outside and using technology moving forward.