Technological Use: Authenticity

I have been a use of Facebook since 2005. I have been a part of Twitter since 2009. Blogging since 2008. Though it might seem as if I was behind on a few of those, I was generally ahead of most of the general population. Most of my students would also have joined up before the gen. pop. I love using these tools and going on the sites and blabbing about my day, what is on my mind, or just to get out a rant or share a link. I also use these sites to teach with, especially my Twitter.

Twitter has been around since 2006. It has grown in popularity ever since the celebrity buzz has made it popular. I joined the bandwagon a little late but I still find the site great - even better than Facebook in many ways. Being able to convey your message to an audience makes you think, use your creativity and ingenuity. Being able to RT (re-tweet) to someone or direct message them also makes it a practical technology.

I have my students create twitter accounts based on historical individuals. They then have to tweet to each other and about their historical lives. I have had students create fictional presidential twitter accounts that talk about what their presidencies were all about as well as how they would have handled modern day affairs. The kids love to project and many of them actually create their own twitters because of it. It is authentic learning at its best.

But now, the inevitable has happened. Twitter might have jumped the shark. 


My school is now on twitter, as well as people who I regard as digital dinosaurs. They are on twitter, they promote that they are but I don't think they are doing anything real with it. So, what is the point? Just to be a part of something but without really doing anything makes the whole situation ridiculous. I feel as if the whole idea of them being on twitter is disingenuous to the technology and those who actually use it. Just joining up for something and never using it is also wrong.

We need to make these products authentic and actually USE them. If we just had our students write them name of their papers but never fill out the rest, they would all fail. The similarity is there...

Hopefully, we all start using the products authentically otherwise I think we are doomed to stay in the 20th century.

Using Tech w/ students

Are educators "cool" for using technology in the classroom or are we just a step behind everyone else in the world, well  at least our students. 

It is a question I think about when I am about to introduce a new technology to my students. I think to myself:

Have this used this technology before?

Will then find it engaging and interactive?

How long will this technology be useful to them?

Will they really use this or am I just showing them something else to forget?

Shouldn't they be teaching me about some pieces of technology?

While I can't answer most of these questions - I often times just take the plunge anyways and introduce the new tech. with some excitement and some confusion. I realize that my students are not as tech. savvy as the media might portray them. They need guidance through these new technologies just like everyone else, in fact sometimes even more so. The tech (and internet sites, which I am interchanging with technology) that I am showing the students is new to the kids (at least for educational purposes).

Though many have seen a blog, not many had actually known how to make one, how to respond to one, and what the real purpose of one was. When I showed my students how to use it and how we were going to use it in our class, I got a mixed bad of responses. Some immediately gravitated towards using is but others saw no use to it. Still others thought it was just another way to do work but the work was still there (clearly, motivation needs to be instilled in this group!). 

It has been four years since I have introduced blogging to my students and every year I need to re-introduce why its important to a new crop of students. As an educator, we must be sincere with our technology and our students. It's one thing to use technology in the classroom authentically and its another just to use it. By guiding and using technology with our students, we can do the first one much more easily.