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understandings for students, but technology can also be used in impersonal and inappropriate
ways that lead to dispassion, confusion, and distraction. In this interactive powerpoint
presentation I created to teach fourth and fifth graders hyperbole and limericks, I used the
visually flashy and animated fun advantages of technology and combined it with student
interaction with the technology and each other. During this lesson, students were attracted and
entertained by the visual and movement elements of the presentation. They were also completely
engaged in the participatory portion of the lesson, using the technology themselves to express
their understandings of hyperbole and limericks. They were pulled into the lesson in ways they
might not have been had I not used technology, during both the instructional and participatory
Reuben Puentedura developed the SAMR model to suggest increasingly complex ways that
technology impacts the classroom (Portnoy, 2018). The acronym SAMR stands for Substitution,
Augmentation, Modification, and Redefinition. While substituting technology for tasks that
could just as easily and as effectively be taught with paper and pencil or the whiteboard does not
experience through the use of technology involves a redesign of the task by creating real-time
interactive experiences that might be impossible without technology. Redefining education with
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technology makes new tasks possible that were previously unattainable without the integration of
technology.
Using an interactive SMARTboard for my lesson on hyperbole and limericks, I was able
to create the collective experience of analyzing and annotating examples of poetry together in a
way that would have been very cumbersome to do without the technology. Technology allowed
me to project poetry for a shared reading experience, and also allowed my students to identify
and experiment with literary devices and poetic structure collectively. To accomplish this
learning experience without technological tools would have been extremely time-consuming in
both preparing for the lesson and teaching the lesson. My use of technology modified
instructional content to make it accessible to all students at the same time and share their
knowledge and understandings with each other through example. It also redefined how students
in my class had previously experienced reading poetry and identifying the structures and
elements of poetry.
Technology can transform the learning experience for students so that they are
accustomed to being dynamic and responsive to the technological world around them.
Integrating technology simply for the sake of including it in the classroom is a waste of resources
and time. Something that is boring and ineffective on paper is probably still boring and
ineffective on a laptop or tablet. Relying on technology to drill and promote rote memorization
isn’t promoting critical thinking, problem solving, or creative application. (Reissman, 2017). In
order for technology to be anything more than “overpriced distractions”, it needs to be more than
There is also a potential down side to the techno-hype buzzing in the educational world.
What kinds of messages are we sending to students with our preferences for punchy, quick, and
exciting tools to teach concepts that in and of themselves should be engaging enough to captivate
them? Are we perpetuating the need for instant gratification? Learning doesn’t always have an
entertainment element; sometimes it’s just plain challenging, and the sense of accomplishment is
the reward. How does the use of technology impact intrinsic motivation to learn?
A great deal of responsibility rests on educators to ensure that learning and healthy life
skills are not being sacrificed for the sake of technology in classrooms. Pedagogical
considerations need to include equity of access, the academic dishonesty that can accompany the
open content that technology offers, how to best use assistive technology to accommodate
students with learning disabilities, approaching assessment of learning via technology and
assessing with technology, and how best to use analytical data provided through technology
(Lynch, 2017).
It’s an exciting time in the intersection of technology and education. The potential of
using technology to enhance and transform educational experiences runs the gamut from
communication and differentiation, to collaboration and inclusion. While access to devices and
connectivity to the internet has steadily increased for schools and students, we must remain
vigilant and abreast of the potential dangers of relying on the technology in our pedagogical tool
box. Using technology in our classrooms in responsible and efficient ways means integrating it
References
Lynch, M. (2016). The dark side of educational technology. The Edvocate, Oct. 15, 2016.
technology/.
Lynch, M. (2017). 10 more educational technology concepts every teacher should know about.
The Tech Edvocate, March 8, 2017. Retrieved on April 11, 2019 from https://
www.thetechedvocate.org/10-more-educational-technology-concepts-every-teacher-
should-know-about/.
Portnoy, L. (2018). How SAMR and tech can help teachers truly transform assessment. EdSurge,
2018-02-01-how-samr-and-tech-can-help-teachers-truly-transform-assessment.
Reissman, H. (2017). 7 smart ways to use technology in classrooms. ideas.TED.com, Sept. 13,
technology-in-classrooms/.