The Train is Leaving the Station

Don’t get left behind! Students and education are changing. The train is leaving, and we can catch it if we adjust to these new digital educational possibilities. The education in technology course with Jeff Utecht has me thinking a lot about what these changes mean for me as an educator and how to use this new information productively in the classroom.

My relationship to technology may be like many other slow-adapting millennials. I want to use tech for ‘productive’ activities, but still don’t want to rely on it for a lot of my daily life. I haven’t embraced it fully and still think back to the ‘good ol days’ when social media wasn’t an issue and tablets weren’t everywhere. In a nutshell, I have been resistant to change. I pride myself on being open-minded and willing to try new things, but for some reason, I haven’t fully opened myself up to learning how to use these essential tools and practices. The class on Monday reminded me that it doesn’t really matter what I want for myself because my role as a teacher concerns the needs of the students. If utilizing technology will result in more authentic and powerful learning experiences for my students, then I need to find creative ways to bring it into the classroom in profound ways.

Why should my students only hear from me when there are amazing teachers all over the world? How can I help students succeed in a rapidly changing economy? What’s Fortnite and how can I use it to enhance lessons and activities? These are some of the questions that were rattling around my brain during class on Jeff’s keynote on Monday. He presented a clear picture of the disconnect between the digital native students that are in schools now and the digital immigrants that are currently teaching them. Students live different lives than previous generations and THAT IS OKAY. Technology has been with them their entire lives and instead of treating that fact like a negative, we should embrace how digitally advanced these students are and incorporate that familiarity into the classroom. There are definitely challenges that arise with the overwhelming use of smartphones and other technologies, but the possibilities should excite all educators that want to create engaging lessons for their students. Education seems to be slowly pushing for more technology in the classroom and Terry Heick recently wrote an article with TeachThought about the interesting ways in which education could change in the next decade. https://www.teachthought.com/the-future-of-learning/13-likely-realities-the-future-learning/. We need to alter our actions and help students thrive in a quickly changing world.

Students are different, education has changed, and educators need to follow suit in order to help students succeed.