Warming Soup on theFire

Our society, our country, the world is being redefined as technology changes the way of life.  The system we use to educate needs to match it.  Today we learned about the SAMR model.  As technology redefines the way people think it only makes sense to redefine the way we teach.  For example, if a teacher wanted to learn how to warm up her soup in a school break room and asked the principal how she would do that.  She would find it strange for the principal to teach her how to build a fire, expecting her to warm up her soup on a fire.  The teacher would use the microwave and would never warm her soup during lunch break on a fire.  The same thing applies to how teachers teach their students.  Teaching students to handwrite draft after draft of an essay rather then using google docs is like warming food over a fire rather then using a microwave.  When we have entered the realm of redefinition, performing a task without the proper technology seems inconceivable.  If the student is asked to perform a task that seems outdated and doesn't apply to current technologies they may do it to receive an expected grade, but will never use that technique again.  Embracing technology and teaching students through modern mediums of technology helps them engage with the world around them.

Keeping up with current technology and realizing how it's modifying and redefining our way of life is essential when teaching.  I realize in order to prepare students to be contributing citizens within our society they need to understand how to use these tools and how to live within the culture we, through technology, are creating.