Man on the What??

I am an astronomy teacher at a H.S. in New Hampshire and this is one of my favorite subjects to teach.  Forty years ago today Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin were the first men to walk on the moon.  Those men are in their 70's now but made such a huge impact on where we are today in our space exploration and where we are headed in the future.  

I had dinner with my parents the other night and we were discussing the fact that we are going back to the moon.  My dad wasn't quite sure why we would go back there if we have already been.  But after talking with him and explaining the innovations that have happened in technology in the last 40 years he was a little bit more receptive to the idea of going back.

Do you remember this night?  I was not born yet but I bet it was amazing!  I have seen the news clips and the recaps but please feel free to comment and tell me what you remember.  It is always nice to have first hand accounts to relay back to my students when we discuss the moon.

Equal Access...Is it really equal?

After doing a bit of research about equal access when it comes to technology in the classroom I found that it really comes down to two things: funding and professional development.  In order for teachers to provide an equal experience to all students in their classroom they need to know how to do that first.  Many times you hear teachers (who are less experienced in the technology world) say that they used technology by having their students word process the reports they have been working on in class.  Why don't you just drag out the typewriters and have the students use those because that's the extent of technology you incorporated into the classroom!  Don't get me wrong, students need the experience word processing documents, but using a class period or more to do this isn't really applicable any more.  

So how do we get teachers out of this mind frame and have them use technology more effectively?  We teach them!  What a novel idea!!  If we want our students to use technology appropriately we teach them how to use it (hopefully) but if we want our teachers to use technology what do we do?  We plop a computer in their classroom and say "here you go...use this!"  But there rarely is instruction on how to use the computers effectively and equally in the classroom.  The school districts need to hire people who know how to use the computers in the classroom effectively and they need to be able to convey this to teachers. This should not be the "tech guy" in the building, they have enough problems to worry about!  This should be someone who is paid to help teacher integrate technologies into the classroom that all students will have access to and an equal experience.  This should be part of every teacher's professional development, they should have to learn how to use the resources that are available to them.  If there is video conferencing materials at the school, utilize them!  If there are mobile carts with a class set of computers on it, use them not only for word processing, but for other things too... web quests, research methods,  digital storytelling, blogging, and voice threads.  These are resources that are very user friendly, are free and may not require the students to have internet access (if their parents will not allow them internet access).

The second problem with trying to give all students equal access is money.  Many districts can not afford to have computers in all classrooms and ones available to all students.   In order for all students to have equal access to technology a district needs to be able to provide that opportunity to the students, through funding, classes, and seat time.  If the students do not practice using the computers they will not be as skilled as using the computers as other students would be.

I look at an article called "Ensuring that Students Have Equal Access to Technology".  Check it out at this link:

http://tie.smartlibrary.org/newinterface/segment.cfm?segment=2349&question_id=26910&from_segment=2244

To evaluate or not to evaluate?

Why should a teacher evaluate a website they are going to use in the classroom?  This is an interesting question.  There is nothing like showing a website to a class full of students to find that it wasn't exactly what you thought it was.  Teachers should always research what they are using to prevent an embarrassing mishap!  

It happens often times that you discover a website that looks amazing, full of great information, and detailed pictures.  But after doing a little bit of uncovering you find that the sight is run by a biased party.  Then you have to think:  Is this information factual?  How skewed is the opinion being expressed? Or is this an open source, where any one can post any information, factual or not?

Moral of the story...do your homework and check your sources!  Make sure that what you are showing the students is accurate, factual and unbiased.  It is not worth finding out too late that the site you have chosen is not as great as you initially thought it was!