CAT 200 Assignment 1

Mallory Stewart

Geoff Price

CAT 200-003

30 January 2011

Technology in the Classroom

            For one semester of my senior year in high school I got the opportunity to shadow a local kindergarten grade teacher at Taylorville Primary School. Through this experience I was able to confirm my career choice as an elementary school teacher. I made many connections at the school with students and faculty, which lead to my current job working at their after-school program. As I have seen in kindergarten classrooms, technology such as, computers, projectors, and smart boards are not used as often as in middle or high schools. The technology I have seen in elementary school is more hands-on and does not require a lot of prior knowledge like being able to navigate a computer. In my experience students solved simple math by adding and subtracting actual cookies. This was a cute and straightforward way to teach the children math problems by using a simple and effective type of technology.

            My definition of educational technology is teaching with tangible elements. Younger children have a better understanding when they are taught using hands-on activities. They would not be able to understand adding and subtracting by reading a worksheet because most students are not excellent readers at this age. Technology serves a teaching tool to help teachers communicate lessons and tasks to his or her students in an interactive way. Its role is learning is a tool to help children learn and understand something in a fun activity. One major factor that discourages technology in the classroom is money. There is not enough funding in the state for every teacher to have multiple computers in their classroom. I believe that two encouraging factors of technology are improvisation and creativeness. Teachers do not need computer to teach their students.  By using what they have in their classroom, teachers can make up creative methods of teaching their students new things. For example, counting how many crayons Ginny has in her box and adding them to how many Jared has in his box. This is an inexpensive yet effective way to teach.  I believe that using technology is vital in teaching and learning because it makes children want to learn.