Technology Autobiography - Take 2

My experience with technology is very extensive. There wasn’t a time in my life when I don’t remember using computers. My father is a Technology Consultant at an Accounting firm, and always had the latest technology in our home when I was growing up. We were the first one on the block to have cable TV, a CD player, High speed internet, and DVDs. Not only is this his job, but he enjoys technology in his spare time, such as editing digital home movies.
This is probably the main reason I have the career I do today. I decided I wanted to teach Business and Technology about halfway through college. I got my undergraduate degree in business, and shortly after began teaching at Mercy Academy. After I started teaching I went back to school to get my MAT. This is the last class that I have to take to complete my degree.
This is my 4th year teaching a Computer and Technology Applications class at Mercy. It is a required course for all freshmen. Since the class’s inception, it has been a course on Keyboarding and Microsoft Office programs (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access and Publisher.) This however is quickly becoming unnecessary as many of the grade schools are teaching these programs. This year, I have shortened the length of each unit and added a unit on Digital Storytelling.
When I did the unit on Digital Storytelling, the students loved the idea of recording their narration to the movie. It was difficult to get them to understand that this wasn’t a slide show, but a movie. Before Christmas Break they all completed a 2-3 minute story with narration and background music.
In the past couple of months I have learned about many new online resources to use with my students. Here are a few:
o I hope to use flikr.com with my students to find photos that are legal to use in their presentations. I want to continue to reinforce the importance of obeying copyright laws.
o I experimented with creating a podcast with my students. They enjoyed recording their own voice, but since I feel the program Audacity is difficult for me to understand, I am not ready to set them loose on editing themselves. I hope in our new school, this fall, we will have a couple of Mac’s with Garage Band, which I find much more user friendly.
o I learned about how to determine if a website is a good resource for my students to use, and to teach my students how to determine it for themselves. I will be teaching a lesson on this very topic in the next few weeks.
o I learned that most students don’t know how to search the Internet beyond the first few links that come up on Google.
I still want to keep up to date with the latest technology resources available. Once I graduate, there will be opportunities for workshops, seminars and Professional Development to learn about the latest and greatest technology.
As a Computer teacher, I feel it is very important to have computers in the classrooms. It allows us to be more efficient in the way we teach, and exposes the students to some technologies that they will see in the workplace. I think it promotes organization and neatness in their work. Technology makes it impossible for students to use the excuse, “my printer was broken” because they can always email an assignment or print it out at school. Students use technology to demonstrate knowledge in a variety of ways. They can also make teaching aids to help their classmates learn in fun and exciting ways.
Students today are “Digital Natives” and have had technology around for their entire lifetime. They are very comfortable doing several things at once while using technology, and as a teacher, I should be taking advantage of that to get more and more accomplished in my class. If they function better doing multiple things at once, why shouldn’t I design my class that way, instead of focusing on one topic or assignment at a time.
I hope students learn in my class that technology is in the workplace, and it is necessary to be familiar with how to use computers and technology of all sorts. Employers expect a new hire to be proficient. If we did not include technology in our curriculum, we would be doing a disservice to our graduates.