Blog 4: Tech Made Easy: Keeping It Simple in the Classroom

The article point’s out that maybe having one computer in the classroom can make things easier. The article makes an acronym called KISS.  KISS stands for "Keep It Simple, Stupid," a slogan borrowed from the U.S. Army. One way to make it simple is the teachers can put the students in hypothetical dilemmas, which would be both fun and instructive. An example it gives is for social studies teacher. Teachers could buy software that would set up the student to role-play. The Role plays cane be the U.S. president, the American secretary of state, and other roles to see their every day life.

One of the things today, is that most high-tech schools don't teach true computer science. They do introduce the latest software programs, but by the time today's students reach the workforce, most of this technology will be long gone, significantly changed, or not even important no more. Schools should just teach computer skills. Junior High and High school students will benefit the most out of using the computers. In Elementary schools, computers can take time away due to often spent teaching students to do things on a screen they can more easily accomplish with paper, pencil, and crayons. Judah Schwartz, professor emeritus of MIT and Harvard and the founder and former co director of the latter's Educational Technology Center, thinks that the calculator's ruins student because the students don’t pick up the process to do the formula. They limit the student knowing how numbers and place value actually work.

 Japan practices something different than us in its elementary schools. In science classes exercises typically begin with a simple question, followed by active exploration with basic materials such as water, dirt, and so forth. Rather than rushing from topic to topic because of time, Japanese students focus on individual problems. They examine them from every angle as much as they need. Technology is rarely used in any lesson.

Reflection in my classroom

Well this article had some great points and on others not so much. One reason I don’t like they compare us to Japan is because Japan has only one race and one language while United States has several languages and several races. America is called the melting pot because there are people from everywhere around the world, they have different cultures and different custom.  So we cant be compared to Japan or any ether country.

 Another thing is America has focused on standardize testing. An incredible amount of pressure is placed on teachers to ensure an increase in achievement on standardized tests. This pressure is often wielded by administrators who draw attention to the test by reviewing scores with the entire staff and applying praise or reprimands based solely on test scores. Curriculum is sometimes modified in schools to cover specific test-taking skills and topics. Significant time is devoted to test preparation, including review worksheets and practice tests.  Due to this we cant spend weeks on one single thing like Japan.

This article would be great to help all teachers if we didn’t have standardize testing.  All the technology short cuts we take is because of that tests.