Emerging Technologies Project

Technology is becoming a bigger part of education more than ever. The Apple website has many different ways in which to incorporate technology into the classroom. A program that I found intriguing on the website was the 1 to 1 program. The 1 to 1 program allows students to have full accessibility to a laptop or notebook computer. The 24 hour, 7 day a week access allows students to have more academic freedom.

The 1 to 1 program is seen by local districts as a way for technology to improve students’ academic achievement and also get them acquainted with technological resources. Not only can it help improve student academic achievement, but it can also enhance teacher instruction. This would be a really cool program to implement in the classroom because every student would have a notebook computer and could follow along with you as you guide them to different and relevant things on the internet. I would totally take advantage of this program because I think it would be a good motivation for students to come to class and engage in classroom activities. The only downfall I see of this program is the possibility of broken equipment.

Another emerging technology is the rise of blog sites. One of the main blog sites that are used is blogger. Blogs are a way for students and teachers to share work and communicate. Teachers can also make personal blogs for the students that are used only for the class. On blogger, students can create their own profile with pictures and a description of themselves.

More blogger information can be found on blogger.com and the Google website. More information might also be attained from students or teachers who have experience using it. Blogger can impact teaching and preparation by being able to send out posts with assignments and announcements. It is also a good place for students to post work so you are not carrying loads of papers all the time. I see students really liking blogger because it allows them to post assignments the night before and not risk losing the hard copy during the next day before they get to class.

The Google labs website is also an emerging technology that can be used for many different classroom settings. The Google labs feature is a place where a teacher can create a class webpage find current up to date music create a reader to keep track of websites, and create a notebook to hold on to clips and other materials you have found on the web. I see Google labs as being a good place for teachers to find new innovative ideas on the web and create a place to keep track of all of it. This website also has a search for videos, which is good for teachers to show different examples of certain things in the classroom. For example, in Health class you could find a video on the blood circulation through the heart to give students a more visual interactive example of the concepts.

I can see this website impacting my teaching because there are many resources such as Google video, Google webpage maker, and Google reader that can help make my class more interesting. I would really pay a lot of attention to the webpage maker in order to create a place where students can go when they are not in the classroom. This can be useful for students as well because they can use the Google notebook to hold on to things they find on the internet that they feel is relevant to the class and can help enhance their learning. Students can also use this website to join discussion groups they are interested in. Teachers who provide a class discussion board can get students interacting with each other and learning from each other.