למידה, אינטרנט ... ומה שביניהם

Students use technology to …

In the beginning, there was technology — and there was the urge to teach how to do technology. Possibly this came out of our own lack of confidence with the new information and communication tools, but a set of standards that itemized and specified machine-oriented skills was what we got, and it’s what we needed. They were clear, and it was easy to imagine teaching children how to boot up a computer and access the Web.

The problem that’s been scratching at my nerves is “What does this look like in the classroom?”… Well, picturing some of this in the classroom is not difficult. But some of it is hard. It sounds too big!

I, too, have been referencing the new standards and also feel that they are difficult to digest. I have spent time with the draft version, trying to note in the things we are currently doing with kids so they’ll make more sense to teachers. I have my fingers crossed that ISTE will be releasing grade level indicators for the refreshed standards, as were available with the previous version.

With all due respect, why are you looking to an anonymous committee to tell you what to teach, especially at grade levels? Do you really require such granularity?

Any such proclamation is bound to be deliberately vague (to work everywhere) and arbitrary. If some set of standards says that digital video is a 6th grade activity does that mean that kindergarteners cannot make movies prior to learning to write, despite the evidence that it may be a beneficial tool for storytelling?

It’s time for us to take responsibility for what we teach without depending on buying random lists of stuff from others.

• Exposing the value of information is very closely aligned with Information Fluency.
• Employing information requires the creative use of information tools, inventing solutions to new problems, and thencritically examining the results.
• Expressing ideas is entirely about communication.
• Ethics is responsibility, and, in my mind, that’s what digital citizenship should be about - learning to use information responsibly.

None of this happens without the tools. They are not the outcome, but the avenue, and the avenue is constantly changing.

תוויות: סטנדרטים