"Simply being able to use technology is no longer enough. Today's
students need to be able to use technology to analyze, learn, and
explore. Digital age skills are vital for preparing students to work,
live, and contribute to the social and civic fabric of their
communities." (ISTE, 2011)
Sounds good, right? Tell that to the poor classroom teacher who is already overwhelmed with the pressures of NCLB, implementing the Common Core standards, new teacher evaluation systems, and the usual heavy workload of planning lessons and assessing student work, and you are likely to be greeted with a groan and complaints of "just one more thing added to our already overflowing plates." Not that teachers don't want students to use technology for learning, but having to embed the National Educational Technology Standards for Students (NETS-S) could be the stressor that puts them over the edge. Since more skills need to be taught in the same amount of time, the key is to integrate the technology into the classroom so that the NETS-S and curriculum learning objectives can be met at the same time. One technology tool that lends itself well to the integration of the NETS-S is blogging. Let's take a look at how blogging can address each of the six standards outlined in NET-S.
1. Creativity and Innovation --When students blog, they are applying existing knowledge to generate new ideas, and they are expressing themselves through original work.
2. Communication and Collaboration -- Blogging is a form of communication, and students interact with peers, teachers, and others when they publish their thoughts online. It is also possible for students to develop global awareness by engaging with students from other cultures.
3. Research and Information Fluency -- Before students blog, they need to have background knowledge of the topic they will be writing about, and this knowledge can be obtained from a variety of resources, including websites and videos. The information they gather would then need to be evaluated and analyzed, and the students would synthesize that information to compose their ideas.
4. Critical Thinking, Problem Solving, and Decision Making -- A well-crafted blogging assignment could have students examining research from various sources and analyzing that data to identify solutions to authentic problems. Alternative solutions and other perspectives could be shared with each other through comments.
5. Digital Citizenship -- This is an underlying component to any use of technology, but it is one that must be taught and modeled to students. The personal nature of blog writing necessitates that students practice safety and proper netiquette, so that students view blogging as a safe medium for sharing thoughts and ideas. Additionally, any resources used when writing a blog post should be cited accordingly.
6. Technology Operations and Concepts -- This standard is addressed through the actual experience of using digital tools such as blogs. Students will learn the "nuts and bolts" of the blogging software/interface and will begin to understand the complex nature of the Internet through the inclusion of hyperlinks, images, sound files and video files.
In my situation, integrating the NETS-S standards is not as challenging for me as it might be for other teachers, because my classroom is a computer lab and my curriculum is technology. The challenge for me will be to find topics interesting enough to be able to blog about them in depth; describing how to format text or insert a photograph into a Powerpoint presentation is hardly blogging material. One topic that generates good discussion is cyberbullying and Internet safety, so I will be sure to use blogging during that unit of study. I can try to coordinate other topics with the classroom curriculum whenever possible. Current events can be another source of discussion topics, especially with the older students. Regardless of the subject matter, I want to include blogging in my lessons this year, because I think that the skills they will learn while blogging will carry over into other aspects of their education, helping them to become 21st century learners. I am eager to teach my students how to blog this year, and I hope they will be just as excited about it as I am.
Reference:
International Society for Technology in Education, "ISTE | NETS for Students." http://www.iste.org/standards/nets-for-students.aspx, 2011.
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