I am a science teacher and this is something I have been harping about for quite sometime. Educators do not know how to use computers in the classroom and are given only superficial training at best.
It seems computers have taken the education world by storm and school districts, departments of education and local school boards are requiring teachers to use them in the classroom without giving teachers proper training. In fact, I am required by the Texas Department of Education to integrate certain computer skills into a set number of lessons each year. Most of the teachers I teach with know very little about computers much less how to integrate them into a proper lesson. Many of them do not even own a computer at home.
In order to integrate computers into a lesson the teacher needs to carefully design the lesson to actually involve the student in the learning process and take the emphasis off of the computer. In other wordsit should not matter that the student is learning using the computer, it should be transparent. The teacher needs to look at the lesson and ask him/herself whether the student is learning what they are suposed to be learning just as effectively as if they were not using a computer.
A large problem is that teachers who have very little training design a superficial lesson using computers in order to get their technology education requirement in. At the end of the year they can say "See, I used computers in this lesson!" However, the students suffered because of it.
I believe that computers should be used only as a supplement to normal instruction in a regular classroom and not as the main form of instruction. The computer can be used as some form of enrichment or reinforcement exercise. Most lessons I have seen invlove very little critical or higher level thinking on the part of the student, unless you invlove higher level thinking skills then the lesson is wasted.
Another problem I see is school districts (including mine) are increasingly going to an 'integrated' approach to computer education. The students no longer have a seperate class they attend to learn computer skills, the regular classroom teacher is required to teach that as well. So, if a teacher wants to have the students do some form of project using Power Point then the teacher must also teach Power Point to the students while doing the project. I think this is a highly inefficient approach. Most of the teachers I know do not have the skills to teach Power Point etc.. One reason to blame is the aging teacher force. People today are not going into education and the majority that do will leave the field in 2-5 years never to return. So, we are left with an increasingly aging teacher force that does not want to learn how to use a computer.
I could ramble on forever about this subject. I am not against using computers in education. I simply wish that they were being used differently than they are today.
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I am a science teacher and this is something I have been harping about for quite sometime. Educators do not know how to use computers in the classroom and are given only superficial training at best.
It seems computers have taken the education world by storm and school districts, departments of education and local school boards are requiring teachers to use them in the classroom without giving teachers proper training. In fact, I am required by the Texas Department of Education to integrate certain computer skills into a set number of lessons each year. Most of the teachers I teach with know very little about computers much less how to integrate them into a proper lesson. Many of them do not even own a computer at home.
In order to integrate computers into a lesson the teacher needs to carefully design the lesson to actually involve the student in the learning process and take the emphasis off of the computer. In other wordsit should not matter that the student is learning using the computer, it should be transparent. The teacher needs to look at the lesson and ask him/herself whether the student is learning what they are suposed to be learning just as effectively as if they were not using a computer.
A large problem is that teachers who have very little training design a superficial lesson using computers in order to get their technology education requirement in. At the end of the year they can say "See, I used computers in this lesson!" However, the students suffered because of it.
I believe that computers should be used only as a supplement to normal instruction in a regular classroom and not as the main form of instruction. The computer can be used as some form of enrichment or reinforcement exercise. Most lessons I have seen invlove very little critical or higher level thinking on the part of the student, unless you invlove higher level thinking skills then the lesson is wasted.
Another problem I see is school districts (including mine) are increasingly going to an 'integrated' approach to computer education. The students no longer have a seperate class they attend to learn computer skills, the regular classroom teacher is required to teach that as well. So, if a teacher wants to have the students do some form of project using Power Point then the teacher must also teach Power Point to the students while doing the project. I think this is a highly inefficient approach. Most of the teachers I know do not have the skills to teach Power Point etc.. One reason to blame is the aging teacher force. People today are not going into education and the majority that do will leave the field in 2-5 years never to return. So, we are left with an increasingly aging teacher force that does not want to learn how to use a computer.
I could ramble on forever about this subject. I am not against using computers in education. I simply wish that they were being used differently than they are today.