Interactivity #3

Going into this project, I was with the mindset that finding technologies for teaching English would be difficult because we don’t rely on computers, or other technologies like that.  That misconception was quickly shattered when I discovered a website with many different lists, and techniques for incorporating technology into an English classroom (www.tewt.com).  I quickly learned that technology doesn’t equal electronics.  In an education setting, a technology is more like a tool.  Technologies such as Discussion boards and collaborative writing parallel the kind of work we did with this exercise.  They use group work to achieve a common end product. I was happy to see that we included Google Docs in our technologies, because we won’t know the potential of technologies until we actually try them ourselves.  One of my favorite technologies that I found was a comic book.  A comic book is such a great way for students to analyze a story map because it incorporates visuals, and also the literacy aspect that every student has to master.  The most interesting find was that technologies are not housed solely within an electronic device.  A technology such as Wordle (a website that formulates word clouds) is an exercise that can be done without a computer.  Then there were technologies such as Ning and Edmodo (educational social media).  With these technologies, a student could create a profile for a famous author or character and practice their literacy skills again!  The potential for the use of technologies is infinite and requires minimal effort to incorporate it in an effective way.  Now that I have accumulated a list of different technologies I can use in my classroom, this list has become a technology for me to use.