For a variety of reasons, it has never been easy to fully integrate technology into the learning process in most schools. Even today, a school is fortunate to have classrooms with more than a few (new, not worn out) computers per classroom. How can a teacher really be expected to fully integrate technology when only a few students at a time can use the computer? Even if adequate computers are available, teachers may be skeptical about their usefulness.

“The kids are just playing games.”
“They just sit there and surf.”
“They just copy and paste information from a website and call it a report!”
“They can sit and chat all day long!”

The good news is that in many ways technology is becoming much easier to use. Most people know how to do basic tasks like e-mail, surf the Web, and use basic programs like Microsoft Word, Excel, and even PowerPoint. You can do incredible things with a few mouse clicks. Being cognizant of the three E’s of educational technology can help guide you in using technology to make a real difference in student learning.

Engage Students with Technology

In his article,“Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants” (NCB University Press, October 2001), Marc Prensky states:“Our students have changed radically. Today’s students are no longer the people our educational system was designed to teach.... (they) have spent their entire lives surrounded by and using computers, videogames, digital music players, video cams, cell phones, and all the other toys and tools of the digital age.”

1. Use instructional software.

There is a wide variety of instructional software programs that vary in their ability to demonstrate concepts and in their level of engagement. At one time, these programs were only available on disks or CDs; now many are available on the Web.

Some of this instructional software is unfairly dismissed as “drill and kill.” On the contrary, there is a great deal of software built by professional instructional designers who take great care in crafting an interactive and educational experience for students.

There are several categories of instructional software that are quite engaging. Here’s just a sampling of recommended, engaging software programs:

Fizz & Martina's Math Adventures (Tom Snyder): Fun characters pose math problems that reinforce graphing and other skills.
Decisions, Decisions (Tom Snyder): Students must work together to make some of the most important decisions in history.
Math Blaster Ages 9-12 (Knowledge Adventure): An adventure-story context engages students as they solve problems using integers, fractions, decimals, and percentages.
Kid Pix Studio Deluxe (Riverdeep): Engage student creativity with a talking alphabet, thousands of rubber stamps, magical screen transformations, and over 50 wacky brushes with unique sound effects.
The Oregon Trail 5th Edition (Riverdeep): Students build real-life decision-making, problem-solving, and writing skills as they immerse themselves in the history and geography of the westward movement.
Adventure Online (Broad Education): Adventure-themed practice activities in math and reading.
The Learning Equation (Cogniscience): Poses a real-world problem or game which motivates students to learn algebra skills in order to construct a solution.
Young Digital Poland—Chemistry (Young Digital Poland): Thousands of high-quality interactive pages including animations, films, 3D models, illustrations, tests, and activities present chemical phenomena and promote a comprehensive understanding of the world of chemistry.

One technique for making sure students are engaged when doing these activities is to use meta cognition—have them think about their thinking. As they do the activities, have them ask themselves questions and perhaps journal their responses.

What problems were the hardest? Why?
What problems were the easiest? Why?
How is this helping you learn?
How would you describe this activity to someone else?
How did you know that an answer was correct?
How did you solve the problems?

2. Use free Web-based interactive games or simulations.

A wide gamut of interactive educational games, tools, and activities are available on the Web. The quality will vary, and sometimes you may have to put up with advertising. The trick here is keeping track of the good sites that align with your curriculum. A few good ones are FunBrain (www.funbrain.com), EduGames by Education Place (www.eduplace.com/edugames.html), and Educational Web Adventures, (www.eduweb.com).

3. Connect lessons to current events to make the learning relevant to students.

The Web is perfect for finding current events related to almost any topic. At most of these current events sites, an archive search tool helps find past articles in case there isn’t anything related to your topic in today’s news: USA Today (www.usatoday.com), CNN (www.cnn.com), MSNBC (www.msnbc.com), and Newslink (www.newslink.org).

4. Introduce “cool tools” and rich media that can help make certain skills, concepts, and knowledge much more engaging than reading about them in a textbook.

• CalPhotos—17,287 images of animals (http://elib.cs.berkeley.edu/photos/fauna)
• Earthcam—live cams of the Eiffel Tower, penguins in a German zoo, space shuttle missions, or just about any thing or place you can think of (www.earthcam.com)
• View Above Earth—view the Earth from space (www.fourmilab.ch/earthview/vlatlon.html)
• How Far Is It?—Calculates the direct distance between almost any two places on earth (www.indo.com/distance)
• Calculator.com—calculate simple currency or metric measurement conversions or calculate loan payments when purchasing a home (www.calculator.com)
• Calories Per Hour—calculate how many calories you burn when doing everything from playing an accordion to windsurfing (www.caloriesperhour.com)
• Terraserver—an interactive map where you can find an aerial photo of the White House or maybe even your house (http://terraserver.microsoft.com/default.aspx)

Technology Can Make Learning More Effective

1. Use communication tools in educational activities.

Sure students love to communicate with their friends on the Internet. So why not combine that natural interest with some research-supported teaching practices to make learning more effective? David Jonassen, in his book Computers as Mindtools for Schools, talks about research-supported instructional practices using synchronous (like live chats and instant messaging) and asynchronous (like threaded discussions or e-mail) communication tools such as role-playing and learning circles. In the role-playing activity, students pretend to be historic personalities involved in a debate in which the students would need to understand both the character and the issues being discussed.

Threaded discussion boards (technology that allows one person to post a topic and others to reply or post a new topic) can be used for learning circles. In these activities students around the world collaborate in teaching each other about topics, solving problems, making products, or even solving a mystery. You don’t have to invent these learning circle activities. They are often referred to as “collaborative projects.” Here are some of the best places to get involved in effective learning circles:

• IECC is a free service created to help teachers link with partners in other cultures and countries for e-mail pen-pals and other project exchanges (www.iecc.org).
• Epals—Connecting over 4.6 million students and educators in 191 countries for classroom-to-classroom projects and cross-cultural learning (www.epals.com).
• Global Schoolhouse—A clearinghouse for more than 2,000 online collaborative projects, organized by topic and grade (www.globalschoolnet.org/GSH/index.html).
• KIDPROJ—another clearinghouse of ongoing projects such as the Landmark Game and the Who Am I Project (www.kidlink.org/KIDPROJ/index.html).
• NickNacks Telecollaborate—a comprehensive listing of ongoing projects organized in many categories (grade, subject, topic, type, etc.) (http://telecollaborate.net).

2. Use tool-based software and the Internet for more effective research projects.

Combining tool-based software, the vast resources of the Internet, and solid inquiry/research skills allows students to go beyond content mastery to developing higher level thinking skills and critical analysis skills. But you must remember that most students (as well as most adults) don’t know how to do this very well. We live in a culture where people want easy answers, and where many students just want to do the minimum amount of work. This is where the copy/paste mentality comes from. So remember to take baby steps and teach many mini-lessons on research skills. Following are some specific tools and resources to help your students research more effectively:

Show students models or practice with some “ready made” projects. • Thinkquest—student produced and award winning projects (www.thinkquest.org)
• Webquests—ready-made cooperative learning projects (http://webquest.org)
• TechKnow—dozens of thematic, project based units that teach technology skills (www.techknowassociates.com/projects/index.htm)

Use a standard outline to teach the research process.
1. Use a specific question as your topic; for example, instead of “All About Abe Lincoln,” try “If Abe Lincoln were alive today, what would he say about today’s issues?”
2. What do you want to be the goal of your research and presentation? (To better understand…., to be able to explain…, to demonstrate….)
3. How could the use of multimedia support your goal?
4. What do I already know about my topic?
5. What do I want to find out?
6. What did I find out?

Have clear rubrics for your students so that they know what success looks like.

Use high quality topical Internet sources.
• American Memory – Library of Congress (http://rs6.loc.gov/amhome.html)
• Live Science (http://explorezone.com/index.htm)
• History Channel (www.historychannel.com)
• How Stuff Works (www.howstuffworks.com)
• National Geographic (www.nationalgeographic.com)
• Why Files (http://whyfiles.news.wisc.edu/index.html)
• Infoplease (www.infoplease.com) • Animal Resources—Sea World (www.seaworld.org/animal-info/index.htm)
• Human Anatomy Online (www.innerbody.com/htm/body.html)
• Nine Planets (http://seds.lpl.arizona.edu/nineplanets/nineplanets/nineplanets.html)
• World Factbook (www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook)

Using Technology to Make Learning More Efficient

As technology becomes more integrated to support instruction, student learning requires systems that integrate the many software applications, tools, and resources. This has resulted in a growing trend in K-12 schools towards the adoption of Learning Management Systems (LMS).

An LMS provides schools with a single place to develop, store, align, and distribute instructional resources to students including commercial software and district resources. The ability to create libraries of digital resources can give schools one sign-in for multiple applications. An LMS provides access to student achievement data; a uniform method of standards/curriculum alignment; and a single system on which to train teachers, students, and parents.

These systems provide efficiency in teacher tasks, as well as in the learning process. Differentiating instruction can become a reality with enough computer access and when teachers can use such systems to have students working at different levels, on different skills, and at different rates all at the same time.

A few of the Learning Management Solutions currently being offered to K-12 schools include:
• Blackboard (www.blackboard.com)
• Desire2Learn (www.desire2learn.com)
• Microsoft Class Server (www.microsoft.com/classserver) • WebCT (www.webct.com)

We can probably all agree that students today are tech-savvy but prone to superficial uses of technology. As educators, we must use the engagement that software, tools, and media to foster the key skills, concepts, and knowledge that we want to get across. Let’s use what we know about effective practices in facilitating collaborative learning and in teaching research skills to help students go beyond regurgitation to synthesis and analysis. Lastly, let’s be open to more comprehensive systems that finally offer the opportunity to make learning more efficient.

Rod Haenke teaches graduate-level curriculum and instruction courses for St. Mary’s University and St. Thomas University in Minnesota. A former classroom teacher in public and Catholic schools, he is currently director of the Teaching, Curriculum, and Assessment Project for the Minnesota Association of Charter Schools.

Discussion Questions

1. What are some of your favorite instructional software programs? How do they engage students?
2. How can you use meta cognition strategies more often during your teaching day?
3. What roles could your students play in an online role-playing activity?
4. What mini-lessons would be most important to teach before doing research projects?
5. How can you help your students move from “all about” projects to more in-depth or interesting projects?
6. What would be the pros and cons of using a Learning Management System?

Resources

Instructional Designs, Inc.—more ideas for using technology for learning. www.instructionaldesigns.net
Computers as Mindtools for Schools (Prentice Hall, 2000) by David Jonassen California Learning Resource Network—a very comprehensive listing of instructional software programs with reviews. www.clrn.org/home/
Eric Robertson from Broad Education—more information on learning management systems. erobertson@broadeducation.com
Rod Haenke—the author will gladly email you more ideas on how to improve the quality of student research projects and more Web site lists that have quality content for research projects. rhaenke@instructionaldesigns.net