PRQ Paper #5

Technology
Bekah Bryant
Vanguard University

Technology has opened endless doors in the world of education today.

Not only has it created new ways to engage and motivate students,
technology provides endless ways to organize and manage a classroom. It
gives students the opportunity to engage in and build 21st century skills that
are needed for the future. Technology supports my curriculum development
and teaching through providing creative ways to engage my students,
multiple means of teaching a specific content area, and can introduce a new
way of setting goals for students and reinforcing behavior.
First and foremost, technology supports my classroom teaching by
providing ways to engage students. In class, we discussed the use of visual
aides like a Haiku Deck (Haiku Deck, 2016.) This tool allows teachers to put
together a visual with easy access to images that relate to what is being
discussed. Having a visual aid in addition to lecture can help visual learners
or any struggling learners focus their attention and get a better grasp on
what is being discussed. Visual aides, like the Haiku Deck tool, can clarify
what is being learned and create learning that is more permanent. When
asked to review a certain subject, students may remember a picture from the
slides and be able to recall the information being discussed.
Next, technology supports curriculum development and teaching
through giving multiple means of teaching a specific content area. As
previously discussed, it can add a visual component to an otherwise dry
lecture. Technology is also the perfect tool to use through the gradual release
of responsibility model. For example, a teacher may give direct instruction

during the beginning of a math lesson. During this process, students will not
have a hands-on role as the teacher is guiding the conversation and
providing explicit instruction to students. Once the concept is seemingly
grasped, students can move on to guided practice and then independent
practice as the lesson goes on, students assume more responsibility for the
task, moving from participants in modeled lessons, to apprentices in guided
instruction, to collaborators with their peers, and finally, to independent
performers. (Burden & Byrd, 2010) This is the perfect time to introduce
technology to amplify and add to the structure of this lesson. Students can
use a program that can either be a game or simply practice on their chrome
books or Ipads. This is a way to engage students with the curriculum in a
new way as well as in 21st century skills.
Lastly, technology introduces a new way to set goals for students and
reinforce behavior or good practice. For example, students in my fifth grade
class use their chrome books to participate in programs like Reading Plus and
Aleks mathematics program. These programs automatically differentiate
assessment for these students and provide them with review and practice on
the content areas they need more work on. These programs help teachers in
seeing where each student is at with their learning and setting goals based
off of their results. In his article, Origins of Behavior, Albert Bandura
discusses the reinforcing function of learning. He explains that learning..can
occur without awareness, albeit slowly and quite inefficiently. (Bandura,
1997) He goes on to explain that students learn much faster when they are

aware of the goals and expectations of them through valued incentives.

Teachers can use technology to reinforce student learning and awareness of
content. Through using differentiated programs to set specific goals,
teachers can reinforce the expected learning goals for each student.
Technology has given teachers multiple means of supporting their
curriculum development and teaching in the classroom. Not only can it assist
with lesson planning, organizing and grading, it can amplify any lesson to
assist in differentiating assessment or instruction to students as well as
giving multiple means of presenting content to students. Technology
supports curriculum development and teaching through providing creative
ways to engage students and introducing a new way of setting goals for
students and reinforcing behavior as well.

References
Haiku Deck. (n.d.). Retrieved March 08, 2016, from
https://www.haikudeck.com/presentations/dFy5KkApwh
Burden, P. R., & Byrd, D. M. (1994). Methods for effective teaching. Boston: Allyn and Bacon.
Bandura, A. (1977). Social learning theory. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.