The Ways We Talk about Technology

I read a number of blogs daily for my own personal professional development more than for any other reason. So, it was interesting today that David Warlick wrote about the word "integration." That word and the term "integrating technology" have been bothering me for a long time. When we talked about integrated units many years ago, we talked about bringing together various, hopefully related, pieces. So, in Social Studies an integrated unit on westward expansion might have meant that we "integrated" music by singing songs from the period, or we "integrated" art by designing covered wagons, or we "integrated" math by figuring out the miles that were traveled. The problem with that was that we were just pulling together various pieces that may or may not have been connected in some way and we weren't really planning for the learning or understanding of an important concept. So the music, the art and the math really had no impact on achievement.

Instead of integrating technology, we should begin first with our learning goals, choose the tools and resources that will support that learning. So, if we want our students to be better writers, we might use blogs because they can provide our students with authentic and wider audiences than we can provide within the four walls of a classroom. If we want our students to improve their speaking skills then podcasting could give students an outlet for working on those skills. Standing up in front of a classroom giving a book report can't even begin to approach that kind of experience.

We have the tools and now, many of them are free and online - we just need to connect them more purposefully with student learning and achievement.