As I grew up, access to computers was quite limited. I don't recall ever even using a computer from K-5th grades. From grades 6-8, we managed to hop onto a computer now and then to practice typing or play an educational game, but the computers were not easily accessible. We had to venture to the computer lab during designated times and hope that nobody else occupied the few computers there were. I personally had not used anything other than word documents to type up papers. Once in grade 9, computers were becoming a little more common in the school. We had two computer labs, one for the keyboarding and computer basics classes, and one for students to use for research or typing papers. Throughout high school I had more of an opportunity to use and learn about the internet on my own, although computers were not a required part of the curricular activities. In my Junior and Senior years, I participated in designing and producing the school yearbooks. In this class, we were not required to use computers, however we were encouraged to use photo editing programs to enhance or crop pictures, or to create layouts. All this was also possible by using scissors and glue and pieces of template paper that the publishing company sent to the school. Sadly, this yearbook class was the most computer and technology access I had through those 13 years of school.
At this point in my life, I am interested in teaching the 3rd grade. I think that nowadays it is much easier to incorporate the use of technology in the classrooms, since the technology is more available. I also believe that it is important to introduce the use of technology at an early age, so that children can slowly familiarize themselves with the ever-growing need for knowledge of the tech world. I think at a third grade level, technology can be introduced by helping the children to understand proper ways of researching topics online, they can make videos with a webcam (regarding a certain topic) and possibly have a blog to post it on. They can write documents and email them to each other or to a person (such as the President, author of a book, etc.) we are discussing in a topic. There are endless possibilities at this point in time as to what kinds of technology could be used presently in a 3rd grade class (or nearly any class, for that matter). There are a wide range of purposes for using these types of technologies in the classrooms, but the reasons I feel most important are:
- Makes learning more fun for the children;
- Introduces them to the necessary knowledge of the working world;
- Gives them opportunities to explore ideas easily, and at the push of a button.
I think that since nowadays technology is improving and changing at such a fast pace, there will be plenty to look forward to in the future. I do not think we will have the same restrictions as we have had in the past (teachers' lack of knowledge of technology, small windows of opportunity, few resources) since it is already becoming more engrained in peoples' lifestyles. In the past, people did not have many (if any) opportunities to utilize technology in the way we do now. It was not that long ago that internet or computers were not available, so most of the teachers at this moment did not grow up with technology readily available and on-hand. Now, most people that are going to become teachers in the next few years have at least several years under their belt of experience with some types of technology (search engines, email, networking, blogs, video sharing, picture editing, etc.). The children of this coming generation will have even more experience since they will have been surrounded by technology since entering the world. I think a slight challenge when integrating technology into the classroom may be the funding for the equipment and maintaining/updating this equipment. However, I think the main roadblock we will be running into is that the children I will be teaching even just three years from now may be far more advanced than I am technologically. The rate at which technology changes is so incredible, that the tools I am learning now are very likely to be outdated by the time I am teaching. It will take a commitment from future teachers to continue their education in learning the newest and most applicable tools for classroom use, which will probably be very difficult for some teachers.
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Avatars can be very useful in education for communication purposes. Some children may feel more comfortable expressing their feelings or commenting about something, and may feel more at ease when they are represented by someone other than themselves. Also, I think it would be a useful tool because students may be more ready to complete tasks given by the avatar rather than the teacher who is in the "power" role. It also may simply be more fun for the students to explore their creativity when being able to create and use the avatars.
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