Challenges with Integrating Technology

Some challenges that may interfere with integrating technology into the classroom include access to computers, not enough computers for students, and the curriculum.
Some schools do not have the adequate funding to enable the proper amount of computers needed for the school. Most schools have at least one computer lab. However, the problem becomes sharing the lab with the entire school. If it is a big school with a lot of students, it becomes a dilemma of having adequate time for the students to use the lab. This limits you as a teacher because you will only be allotted maybe one class a week where you can incorporate technology into your lessons. During the limited time, you could maybe assign homework for them to do on their computers at home to overcome this issue. You can have them create a blog where they can submit their homework assignments or have them use google docs to allow them to read and respond to excerpts that you post.
Another problem is not having enough students for each individual student. This could become a problem because it would create the issue that one student may be getting more access than another. You, as a teacher, could overcome this issue by creating groups that are assigned to the same computer each time. Each student will have to share the time. For instance, if one student learns how to make a blog screen name and password, the next student will be able to do the same thing. This is will limit the amount the teacher can do in a certain amount of time because each student will have to do each direction you give.
The last problem is that some schools curriculum does not allow them to incorporate technology into their classrooms. Some schools actually discourage it because they are worried that students will not have enough time to learn how to use the computers. Standardized testing is a big part of curriculum now because more teachers are just teaching what is going to be on the tests. Some schools are more worried about their students passing these tests rather than educating them about technology. This can be overcome by giving the students homework where they can go home and use their computers at home to post things on their blogs or googledocs. You can also just incorporate technology by showing them videos, audio, or even using effective power points.

Blogs relating to technology in the classroom

http://davidwarlick.com/2cents/

Broadband Future & Connecting the Real

This blog was about how k-12 education is going to be the largest market for computers in the next decade because teachers need to start incorporating technology into the classroom or else students will soon not be able to function in society. He gave an example of how with the iphone, you can take a picture of any book, CD, DVD, or video game and within seconds, have a rating, description and several links to amazon, and other links.

http://kathyschrock.net/blog/
In this blog, Kathy Schrock talked about " how teachers that have grown up with technology in their lives, "Technology Pioneers" have effectively incorporated technology in their classrooms. However, the "Digital Immigrants," people who have come later to technology have new ways of incorporating technology in the classroom and it is important for these people with their new ideas to share them with the "Digital natives," the new teachers who have no yet experienced technology in the classroom.

From these blogs, I have realized that technology is a bigger part of society than I had thought. In my high school, technology was not incorporated really at all. We had one class our Freshmen year in which we learned how type. They provided us with the least amount they could have possibly done. From this, it was a shock to me to have to make power points and use technology in my projects, presentations, and papers. I had never heard of online journals or other credited websites such as these. I understand now from our first class and after reading these blogs, that technology is a much bigger part of our world than I had thought. I believe that it is vital that more technology be incorporated into classrooms.


When I was looking for a topic to do my my lesson on for this class, I came across so many lesson plans that had websites for the students to link to and use. I was so excited to see all of the fun games and activities that these websites involved. I think that using these websites would have helped me a lot if I were to have used them in elementary school. Literally, almost every lesson plan I clicked on had a link to other websites that involved fun activities for the students to partake in. I think these are a good way for children to learn more efficiently because it allows them to play games while also learning at the same time. I cannot wait to incorporate these websites into my classroom because I think it will really be able to hold the childrens attention and allow them to learn more information at one time.