Common Core Standards & Shifts AND Technology In Language Arts

1. My understanding of ELA instruction is...

• that it serves the purpose of preparing our students for successful academic and/or professional careers in a world where communication (written and spoken) is global and technologically advanced. 
• that its' focus is on both content and on the application of knowledge through higher order skills. The importance is not only on skills or tests but on students' ability to make connections between their skills, their ideas, their ability to apply these to real world problems.
• that it is informed by what other countries are doing to help prepare students to participate in a global economy.
• that it is based on the Common Core standards and shifts which are clear, understandable, and consistent.
• that it is broken into areas of reading, writing, speaking, listening, and language, though it is not encouraged to teach the areas exclusive of one another but rather, through assignments and projects that purposefully include all of the areas.
• that it provides clear guidelines of what is expected of students and educators for each area and each grade, while still allowing for the flexibility in choosing instructional methods and differentiation by educators and schools.

2. A great technology tool for ELA is...

• Prezi - an alternative presentation tool to Microsoft PowerPoint.

• Prezi is a tool that can assist in each of the five components of ELA instruction, reading, writing, listening, speaking, and language.
• Prezi allows its' creators the freedom to create a presentation that is dynamic, rather than linear like a typical slideshow type presentation. It pushes the creator to get their idea across to their audience using more concise written language, while also allowing for the addition of details before and during the presentation. It encourages the creator to be knowledgeable about their topic in order to appropriately share all of the important information while also being more interactive with their audience. For students, it is motivational to create and present language based presentations because of the opportunity to be creative, individual, and to create in the order their mind thinks rather than slide 1 should have...slide 2 should have. It allows for easy edits and additions, contains attention grasping animation choices, and has a range of templates to be used by beginners to those who want a little more of a challenge.

3. ELA teacher interview...

• I interviewed an ELA teacher (also my friend) at work about what she feels are personal challenges to integrating technology into her literacy teaching.
• Some background...We work at a non-profit private school designed for students with high functioning autism. Our math and literacy instruction is broken into hour blocks where students are broken into leveled groups and are instructed by head teachers or assistant teachers (or a team of the two). We have a brand new building but there is fairly limited space. We basically have 1 classroom per grade, except for two 3rd and 4th grade classrooms. We utilize every space we can for instruction.

 Here are some of her thoughts/feelings...

• "The biggest problem for me right now is the space I work in. I have a group of 3 in the staff lounge and there is no access to a computer, Smart Board, anything in the room. I wind up using my iPhone a lot of the time to show a quick video as an introduction to something new or as an example if they aren't getting it, even though we're not supposed to. [Names the three students] are really low for their grade level so it's really hard to keep their attention with only discussions. I try to put up those big sticky notes on the way and use prompting but when I focus on one student I lose another. [I asked about using my computer lab for certain lessons/access to computers]. I try to sign up for slots in the lab when you don't have classes or the days you're out but it's been harder lately because of all the state testing. Plus, it's just me with them and they don't really know how to do research or understand the task so I'm running around from kid to kid trying to help them and before you know it the period is over. [I asked if she had a say, what would she want technology wise to help in her literacy instruction]. I know we have two iPads at school, but I never have time to fill out the forms and that's to keep them for one day. It would be nice to have access to an iPad or laptop to use  on a regular basis, but then we'd need access to the wi-fi and that's a whole other issue."

LearningSpring School

Interviewee