Activity 6 Pros and Cons of 1 to 1 learning with ICT

Today’s generation is full of a bunch of little digital natives. Therefore, today’s classrooms and learning tools need to evolve and change to better appeal to and engage these students. Today’s classrooms are moving away the traditional lecture style classroom setting and educators are now focusing in on engaging and empowering their students by utilizing mobile device technology in the classroom as a valuable learning tool.

Mobile devices like iPads in the classroom help give today’s  tech-savvy generation has the ability to experience things like gaming, blogging, reading eBooks, and even taking virtual field trips right from the comfort of their classrooms. Mobile device technology in the classroom has made learning more interesting and exciting than ever before!

Pros:

-Uniform integration of technology in every class eliminates digital inequality.  The school won’t have to worry about who doesn't and who does have the right devices.

-Since everyone has the same mobile device and is on the same platform teachers know whatever apps they use on their device will work on their student’s devices.

-With all the new technologies like iPhones, iPads, and laptops you can easily introduce stimulating online games and listening exercises. You can play games together, listen to podcasts, watch movie clips, or have a heck of a good time exploring YouTube together! Whatever you choose to introduce, be sure that you always have interactive language activities, discussions, and vocabulary exercises to make the most of your time plugged in.

Cons:

-iPad in the classroom With all the cash-strapped schools nationwide, it will be difficult for them to find the funding to support this method.

-The 1-to-1 model will require both teacher and student training of the device the school decides to use.

-With 1-to-1 there are long-term maintenance costs, but with BYOD the students would be responsible for their own maintenance on their mobile devices.

It has the potential to get boring. If this is the case, the student-teacher match-up may not be a good fit, or perhaps your student is just not cut out for all this student-centered attention. You can battle this by having a lot of tools at your disposal and by over-prepping for lessons. If you find yourself stuck in a boring lesson, try to make the best of it and switch gears!

Activity 5 Interactive Whiteboards

Interactive whiteboards are great tools to enhance teaching and learning in the classroom. It provides greater means for engagement,interaction and direct manipulation of the learning resources among the learners and teachers. With careful planning and implementation students become more excited about their lessons and collaboration is increases in the classroom.

Some benefits of  IWB are as follows:

•      They help in broadening the use of e-learning because they rapidly demonstrate the potential of alternative modes of delivery.
•            They make it easy for teachers to enhance presentation content by easily integrating a wide range of material into a lesson, such as a picture from the internet, a graph from a spreadsheet or text from a Microsoft Word file, in addition to student and teacher annotations on these objects.
•          They allow teachers to create easily and rapidly customized learning objects from a range of existing content and to adapt it to the needs of the class in real time.
•          They allow learners to absorb information more easily.
•          They allow learners to participate in group discussions by freeing them from note-taking.
•          They allow learners to work collaboratively around a shared task or work area.
•          When fully integrated into a VLE (virtual learning environment) and learning object repository there is potential for widespread sharing of resources.
•          When used for interactive testing of understanding for the entire class, they can rapidly provide learner feedback.

Activity 4 One Computer Classroom

The one computer classroom is basically defined as a classroom that has 1 or up to 4 computers in a classroom. This is beneficial by means of eliminating the need to schedule lab time with the rest of the school. The teacher will have the convenience of having the computers in the classroom  and do not have to regularly travel to the lab to integrate ICT. Groups can now be easily monitored by the teacher while others are meaningfully occupied and the teacher has quick access to online resources saving time.

Assignment 2

This was an awesome assignment. I really enjoyed planning the budget. I tried to make it as realistic as possible and related it to my school. I choose to allocate some of the funds towards teacher training and initial setup etc... The reason I did that was because I believe if you are going to spend that amount of money USD 50,000 on purely hardware, it would be unwise to not consider installation cost and other additional expenditure that comes with the process. Secondly why have all this new computer labs or one computer classrooms when teachers are not proficiency and unable to use them effectively to improve teaching and learning  and helping the students to develop 21st century skills? However, I did enjoy the experience of creating my presentation and adding my voice to it. I would have like to do the YouTube video but was pressed for time. I will definitely try and use that in the future.

Activity3a- Pros and cons of computer labs reflection

High density labs could be difficult for a teacher to manage depending on the size of the class.
It is my experience that the computer labs that I have worked in are small in relation to the size of the class. When lots of students are cramped into a small space the working environment may not be condusive towards learning. Most of the time students will have to share computers and get distracted easily. This has to be taken into consideration when planning classes and can become quite tedious. However, I like the idea of a U shaped layout for computer labs. This configuration allows the teacher to monitor the students screen while they are working and the teacher can  have access to each student easily to provide guidance and support.
Another issue with high density computer labs is that students need to leave the classroom and travel to the lab which means that technology is not being integrated into the curriculum. Its not in the classroom where core subjects are being taught. In St. Vincent the Ministry of Education has recently introduced the one laptop per child. This I believe is more beneficial to me as a teacher as opposed to the high density labs, because this gives learners the freedom to access their computer in the classroom providing there is wireless access to the internet as and when the teacher need them to. With regard to security and storage the students are solely responsible for their equiptment as they would take it home with them when it is not required by the teacher.  

Activity 2B pros and cons of ICT in the classroom

After my research, I believe that ICT enabled classrooms are a great way to enhance teaching and learning. It encourages students and teachers to learn 21st centuary skills.These skills not only prepares students for work life, but also fosters skills for creativity and social life. I found it interesting to read about the 'Grade 1 farms and food' document. The students got an oportunity to study farms and food. The project involved on site and classroom research, visits by experts, hands on work with food, expeditions, literacy activities such as writing and labelling, as well as cooking ,sketches, observations and taste tests. I realized that this project would have been able to take place without ICT, and the students would have learnt many valuable life skills. However, the ICT was used to record, document and share their work. A full colour calendar, professionally printed was able to be sold, which helps provide money which can be reinvested into similar projects. In this instance, using ICT aided the learning process and provided a product of their work. I believe this is a great balance. Having a useful ICT enabled classroom requires careful planning, guidance, and allocated times of use in order for it to be positively effective.

Module 8- Managing Learning and Teaching with ICT- Activity 1 Reflection.

Before this module it would have been perceived that learning with ICT tools could pose as a distraction and there could be scenarios arising such as not all learners would be provided for with a device. After all the readings and research. I have learnt a lot of strategies and the benefits of embracing diversity. I can now encourage students to bring their own devices to class. The result may be students walking through the door with a diverse assortment of technology tools — iPhones, androids, tablets, iPod touches and the occasional laptop. Therefore the moment they enter the room, my low tech classroom is instantly transformed into a buzzing technology hub. By allowing them to use their own devices they become more comfortable with the technology and tool they choose to use. This is also the device they use to navigate the world. Both of those factors translate into more meaningful, relevant and engaged learning.

- Devices also need to be treated as learning tools.

- Teachers need to establish new norms.

- Students need to be connected to educational apps and websites

- When using I.T Labs rules need to be established. Students can be paired or work in larger groups. Clearly posted timetable should be visible for all.

- If there’s one computer in the classroom there need to be a roster with set time so students can have equal time for computer use. Ensure computer and all software is up to date. Ensure that software is age and subject appropriate.