We all know of the teachers who, if asked, could not explain why they have
integrated a specific technology into their lesson or classroom. Usually, they
just go on the assumption that it will directly compliment the material;
however, this may sometimes not be the case. For situations like these, a
Technology Integration Matrix would solve all problems by directly relating the
selected technologies to standards and teaching strategies, thus creating a
flow of learning from right to left.
I chose to integrate such a matrix into my lesson on Pendulum Motion, with a
specific focus on the experimentation (lab) aspect, to map out the use of
technology in my lesson.
This matrix can be found here. As you can see, I have
addressed three Science (Physics) standards and one Math standard in the first
column. In addition to the core standards, I have also integrated some of the
NETS-S student standards as well. In this lesson, the NETS-S standards will
draw more focus to the use of technology to find, evaluate, process,
communicate, and understand data found via electronic sources.
The 'Strategies' column is where the matrix all comes
together. In this section, varies teaching strategies are listed and
implemented, and also organized into Teacher, student, or assessment based.
This section I found to be extremely helpful on breaking down where and when I
will assess my students, and also how much freedom they will be given during
the lesson. In this matrix, as you can see, students are given the majority of
the lesson to learn and discover on their own. The exceptions are during
classroom discussion (such as instruction, lecture, and directions), note taking
during lecture, and any formative assessment strategies that I will place into
the lesson.
Mathematica and Maple are two mathematic computation
applications that can solve even the hardest of problems (given enough time and
processing power). Students can enter their experimental data and draw
equations from the relations (much like excel), and then formulate very
detailed and specific graphs based on the generated equations. Although these
are, by definition, technologies, they are also very strategic ways to analyze,
present, evaluate, and organize data and equations.
The third column is a list of technologies that will
supplement the correlated strategies and standards. For the most part, an
active internet connection is necessary for the use of the strategies,
especially with the rising popularity of cloud computing. Likewise, Microsoft
Excel also shows up in nearly every row, simply because it is such a versatile
program for anything involving data. For the students who do not know how to
use Mathematic or Maple, Excel is a suitable alternative.
Although the content in the columns is very important, the
main focus of the matrix is row-centered. In order, the rows are Access,
Analyze, Evaluate, Produce, and Communicate. Each row is a microcosm, which
when combined together, form a complete lesson that is infused with assessment
and technology.
In my lesson, the Access row concentrates on the gathering
of data via various information streams, such as in class discussion and note
taking, lab group work, experimentation, and any internet sources. Class
discussion and note taking are the only strategies that the teacher will be
directly involved in, all of the others are extremely student-centered. During
lab work, students will be able to develop their own sets of data by the
manipulation of various apparatuses. When they are finished with their
experiments, they are able to compare their data and findings with that of data
listed online from similar experiments. Students are then able to assess what
they did right or wrong during the lab, and adjust their apparatus and approach
accordingly.
The Analyze section is where the students are able to look
at the data and calculations they have acquired and develop a hypothesis. This
is a section of the lesson that students may have to repeat several times,
should their hypotheses not be correct or (reasonably) provable. This section
is very similar to the previous in terms of strategies and technologies;
however has the addition of YouTube and multimedia.
Evaluate is a very important part of the experimentation and
lesson process. It is here that students will gather and assess data that is
relevant towards their hypothesis. During this time, students will have access
to various computational and experimental technologies, such as calculators,
computer simulations, Mathematica and Maple, and also peer analysis and
discussion. In my findings, it is not uncommon for students to coordinate
between different lab groups and compare their findings and data.
Produce is where students use their findings to defend or
prove (or in some cases, disprove) their hypothesis. Here they can propose
alternatives to today’s accepted hypotheses, explore different ways to solve
problem sets, and experimentally prove any theorem or phenomenon. There are
many interactive simulations that can be found online that can be of assistance
during this process. For example, if students are trying to figure out how
frequency affects the visual appearance of a wave, they can find an applet,
such as this one, that will allow them to isolate frequency as a variable, and
experiment with its affects.
Communicate, as far as the teacher is concerned, is perhaps
the most important of the rows. In this section of the lesson,
students present their findings to the rest of the class. The technologies and
pathways in which they can utilize to aid them is endless, they can use
anything from a poster to an elaborate PowerPoint that is cluttered with
Mathematica coding.
Overall, this technique for mapping and analysis of a
classroom is extremely efficient; it takes nearly half the time that a lesson
plan takes to make, and can be used as an outline to formulate a lesson plan, or even a whole unit!
