- Net Standards Spreadsheet
I was luck enough to Interview my cooperating teacher who is a 7th grade Language Arts Literacy teacher in the West Orange school district. She is a woman that has been teaching for about forty years and enjoy every second of it. She tries very hard to keep up with the new advances in teaching but as she had to admit, it doesn't always work.
The teacher that I interviewed know about the standards but is not necessarily familiar with the standards themselves. She seemed to know what they were when I asked her but did not know much more. The have been brought up in conversation she told me but they where never something that was a requirement of the school itself.
She informed me that there was talk about the standards but they are not obligated to include them on lesson plans etc as of yet. She said that she understand the need for technology and she is working her best to keep up with it but adding more standards just adds another aspect for teachers to include on their lesson plans and search the standards when they already accomplish them in their classroom one way or another. This particular school has recently put a brand new SmartBoard in each classroom therefore urging the teachers to integrate that technology into their classroom. The teacher I interviewed loves her SmartBoard and uses it now in all of her lessons. She did tell me that it was up to her how to learn to use it though. She had to teach herself and see if classes were offered in order to learn more than the basics of a SmartBoard.
I was not really surprised by her responses because I have been in the school district and have heard very little about these standards. She keeps very up to date with the technology that she uses and keep me very in the loop when talking about anything lesson plan and standard related. I see her implementing most of theses standards without having to be told to do so.
As a future teacher I believe it is important to know about technology and how to use it, but these standards are what new teachers are going to be implementing on a regular basis without actually looking at the standards. I think that these standards are good, but will become irrelevant because they will become common practice.
Tuesday, April 23, 2013
NETS for Teachers - Interactivity 5
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I wonder if it is maybe a veteran teacher thing that they have HEARD of the standards, but are not familiar with them. I think the reason so many school districts do not need to implement the standards because they already recognize the value and importance of technology in the classroom without having to include standards on their lesson plans. I think its interesting how the two teachers we interviewed are on very different sides of the teaching spectrum, and yet they both have so many things in common. It's up to the classroom teachers to implement technology and to learn about it. Like with so many other requirements in school districts, the district makes it mandatory but does not provide the teachers with any support. I like how your teacher is eager to use the Smart Boards, and that even though she has been teaching for a long time, she still finds ways to stay current in order to engage her students. One can only imagine the changes she's seen in the teaching world.
ReplyDeleteWhether or not teachers are familiar with NETS, I think teachers and school districts already understand the importance of integrating technology within the curriculum and classroom. Your coop teacher seems to love the use of technology within the classroom; whereas many other veteran teachers may not due to the fact that they have to become familiar with these endless and overwhelming technological possibilities as well as recreate their lesson plans. I did not like the fact that your coop teacher had to learn how to use the Smartboard on her own; I think that is one of few problems within a school. School administrators should have offered some kind of guidance to help your coop know how to use Smartboards. On the other hand, she is self educating herself which is beneficial when it comes to education because she can always research about other technological tools and learn how to integrate them within her lesson plans.
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