On the Daily
with
Classroom Tech
As I work my way through school I have thus far, forty five hours of clinical observations in a classroom setting. Thirty hours in eighth grade Language Arts and fifteen hours in eighth grade Social Studies. And I can honestly say that the majority of the time I have observed teachers and students they are using technology. From overhead projectors linked to the teacher's desk top computer, cameras that follow the movement of the teacher as she walks around her classroom, to the Chromebook that each students uses everyday.
Throughout the time I have spent observing I have seen the students use an actually book only once. The students were reading And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie. And very rarely were the given assignments on paper. The school that I was fortunate enough to observe in uses Schoology: Learning Management System. Schoology makes it easy to construct new class materials and strengthen existing content. Teachers can develop engaging lessons, recycle older lessons, and use Google Drive, Microsoft Office, YouTube, and a wide variety of other inter-web tools.
I would most definitely use Schoology in my own classroom. For example, the students can take a virtual field trip to Ellis Island. I can create a scavenger hunt assignment for them and grade it, all on Schoology. This technology gives teachers the advantage by making classroom management more efficient. Instead of having to use multiple tech tools they can just one.
Pros
- Similar layout to Facebook.
- It is a cloud based system.
- Supports a variety of different shared platforms.
Cons
- No moderation for student discussions.
- Free version is difficult to navigate.
- The best version of Schoology is not free.
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