069: How to Use Technology in the Classroom in a Meaningful Way

The Beautiful Struggle

Okay, you have the iPads or shiny new Chromebooks in your classroom. What do you want to do with them? How are you letting your students use them in their learning? Apps? Websites? Which ones are the cools ones today?

Okay, you have the iPads or shiny new Chromebooks in your classroom. What do you want to do with them? How are you letting your students use them in their learning? Apps? Websites? Which ones are the cools ones today?

Okay, you have the iPads or shiny new Chromebooks in your classroom. What do you want to do with them? How are you letting your students use them in their learning? Apps? Websites? Which ones are the cools ones today?

Okay, you have the iPads or shiny new Chromebooks in your classroom. What do you want to do with them? How are you letting your students use them in their learning? Apps? Websites? Which ones are the cools ones today?

Sharon and I share our thoughts on what it means to use technology in the classroom in a meaningful way. Hint: It is about the learning! Join us as we figure all this out and more!

Transcript

[Welcome to the Teaching Bites Podcast. Here are your hosts, Fred and Sharon Jaravata.]

Fred Jaravata: Ba-ba-da-bomp-bomp.

Sharon Jaravata: Bomp-bomp.

Fred Jaravata: Hi everyone. I’m Fred Jaravata.

Sharon Jaravata: And I’m Sharon Jaravata.

Fred Jaravata: Welcome to the Teaching Bites Show where we connect you …

Sharon Jaravata: With people and ideas to take your teaching to the next level.

Fred Jaravata: Yes.

Sharon Jaravata: Hi everyone!

Fred Jaravata: We are recording live from San Francisco on this Labor Day weekend and we really hope you guys are enjoying or have enjoyed when you listen to this your Labor Day weekend, right? I know everyone has started school.

Sharon Jaravata: Yeah.

Fred Jaravata: And we’re back to the grind. We’re back to the grind and just know, take care of yourself and take some breaks here and there. OK?

Sharon Jaravata: Take a day off.

Fred Jaravata: If you can.

Sharon Jaravata: Not because you’re sick.

Fred Jaravata: But also after work, go for a run. Do the yoga class. Get a massage, a chair massage. I think I mentioned this before. Get a chair massage at the mall.

Sharon Jaravata: Those are cool. Leave your clothes on. It’s 15 minutes. Done.

Fred Jaravata: Yes. Leave your clothes on, please. Well, for me, yeah. OK. So on this episode, we’re going to talk about – real quick about how to use technology in the classroom. Now we know that a lot of schools have started or probably in year one, year two, maybe in year three and four, that they have laptops, iPads, Chromebooks in their classroom available now.

Sharon Jaravata: So I actually want to stop right there. So when you say technology, do you mean those kinds of electric devices …

Fred Jaravata: Now, let me stop right there.

Sharon Jaravata: Yeah.

Fred Jaravata: I’m going to clarify that. So let me continue with that. People think that the Chromebooks, iPads – there’s this misconception. Well, I guess the media – everyone talks about technology and rightfully so. When we talk about technology, it’s basically the newest things, right? We think of a technology company, Facebook, Google. The shiny objects, right? We don’t think of Ford is a technology company. We don’t think McDonald’s a technology company. Though they use technology, right?

Now technology could also include – let me clarify this – cardboard, a knife, spoons, forks. Those are all technology. Those are old technology.

Sharon Jaravata: Pencils.

Fred Jaravata: They still work. Exactly. They still work, right? And they still enhance us, right? They enhance humans. They make us do things better. We eat better with a fork and knife, spoons and utensils, right? We cook better with slow cookers and all that. All right? So technology and education almost always means the shiny tablet, the Chromebook and so on.

Sharon Jaravata: OK.

Fred Jaravata: OK?

Sharon Jaravata: OK, good.

Fred Jaravata: But how to use it – so I’ve been teaching technology and computers since 2004, right? And I’m an innovation teacher and I’m glad – I’m really glad I don’t have the word “technology” in my title at work and I’m the K8 Educational Innovation Coordinator.

Sharon Jaravata: What does that mean?

Fred Jaravata: I work with both faculties. There’s a boys’ school. There’s a girls’ school, elementary schools. Girls’ high school group, boys’ high school. I primarily work for K8 and I work with the faculty for boys’ school and faculty with the girls’ school. It’s about let’s say – I don’t know, 60, maybe 70, 75 teachers I work with. Not all the time. It’s all staggered out. I work more with teachers more – more teachers I work with than others. I also work with the students, right?

So I teach the students iPad boot camps. I teach them how to use the iPad, how to use – how to get in their email, Google Apps for Education. They also train the teachers in using all that as well. I also nudged the teachers, a friendly nudge to have them start innovating, meaning do something new and different or something new and – yeah, a little different.

Sharon Jaravata: Doing something old in a new way.

Fred Jaravata: In a new way, instead of doing a word processing – typing up a word processing document, have the students create a podcast.

Sharon Jaravata: So that leads into your SAMR model.

Fred Jaravata: Right. So going back to the how to use technology in the classroom, I’m going to say in parenthesis [0:04:46] [Indiscernible] in a meaningful way.

Sharon Jaravata: Yes.

Fred Jaravata: OK. So the thing is in SAMR, I think some of the people may have heard this already. We mentioned it a few episodes ago. The S-A-M-R model and I forget the gentleman who created that – this model. But it’s widely referenced when creating a – or using technology in the classroom. OK? And the other models too. We have the Bloom’s Taxonomy. That’s also referred to and also the 4Cs, the 21st century skills. All right?

But going back to the SAMR model, the S stands for substitution. A is augmentation. M is for modification and R is for redefinition. All right? So what does that mean? There is a great info graphic of the SAMR model and they use coffee cups, right? Coffee, right? Say you go to Starbucks or Peet’s or whatever, Blue Bottle. If you have that, great, or Philz Coffee.

So S, it’s substituting things, right? So it’s the technology. It acts as a direct tool or a substitute, but no change, no real change. It’s like the cup of coffee. There’s no real change. But when you start augmenting it, OK? The A part, when you augment your coffee, you start adding more function to it or a different – an improvement to it. So instead of just coffee, now you add like steamed milk. It becomes a latte with foam and so what – it’s essentially still coffee but you’re adding – instead of cold milk, you’re adding steaming, frothy milk, right? So you’re changing it. You can see there’s a different texture to it. There’s a different taste to it than regular coffee.

Sharon Jaravata: Right.

Fred Jaravata: I will talk about the assignments, how that can – how does it look like?

Sharon Jaravata: So would you say this is like a continuum maybe?

Fred Jaravata: Yes, you can start off with the S and then move on, right? We all start simple and I will talk about that later. But the modification, the M part, it’s where you are starting to allow for more redesign. So instead of a cup of coffee or a latte, now you’re going to start adding like a caramel macchiato. You see how it has transformed?

Sharon Jaravata: Because I think – so I used to actually work at a coffee station back in college.

Fred Jaravata: Yes.

Sharon Jaravata: And I had to make all these drinks and I don’t even drink coffee myself. But I remember – I think a macchiato is where you combine espresso and coffee. I forgot.

Fred Jaravata: See? You’re enhancing it now, right?

Sharon Jaravata: Yeah. From what I remember, it’s not just straight coffee. We just put it in a machine.

Fred Jaravata: Right. You’re doing something more to it, right? It has become different.

Sharon Jaravata: Yeah.

Fred Jaravata: And then the R, now you are the technology – in terms of technology of the classroom. You’re creating something pretty new, right? Something completely different. So in this example, coffee, like Starbucks pumpkin spice.

Sharon Jaravata: Oh, fall.

Fred Jaravata: Right.

Sharon Jaravata: The fall drinks.

Fred Jaravata: Fall is coming. So it’s different now. It has a different taste, a different texture. It’s also for the time, the fall you were saying. So you’re definitely making that different. You’re transforming it little by little. Another way to think about it is – another info graphic by I think Sylvia Duckworth. She made the same info graphic. Sylvia Duckworth, she’s a very popular graphic facilitator. She draws amazing pictures of people’s talks, like TED Talks and so on. She made this little essay on our …

Sharon Jaravata: You might have seen her on your Facebook feed or stuff.

Fred Jaravata: Yeah, she’s all over the place.

Sharon Jaravata: So let me interrupt you. Actually I looked up macchiato just because I wanted to make sure that our audience knows. It is sometimes called an espresso macchiato. It’s an espresso coffee drink with a small amount of milk, usually foamed. So I was kind of right. Espresso, coffee, a little bit of milk.

Fred Jaravata: Now you want me to drink some coffee.

Sharon Jaravata: OK.

Fred Jaravata: Anyway, moving on. OK. So think about – you’re at the beach, right? The SAMR model, how to use technology. How do you integrate technology? We’re using the SAMR model. Say if you’re at the beach. You’re looking out. That’s like – you’re looking into the water. That’s using no tech. Now if you take the boat or the canoe, and you’re rolling across the water, that is using a little tech, right? But now the SAMR model encourages to go deeper. The next step besides – after the boat, you snorkel. You’re going deeper now.

Sharon Jaravata: But you’re still close to the water. You’re just under more.

Fred Jaravata: And then the next one is modification, going much deeper. So it’s like scuba diving, right? But it’s deep now. Then the last one is redefinition, the R part. It’s taking a submarine going way deep. You’re exploring more. So basically exploring, right?

Sharon Jaravata: I like that picture.

Fred Jaravata: Yeah, it is a very cool info graph in a way. It defines it really well. So real quick, I don’t have the thing right here in front of me to refer to. So it’s like taking – so S, substitute. It’s just basically – you’re taking the person’s notes or a paragraph that they wrote by hand and you’re just putting it on Microsoft Word or Google Docs.

Sharon Jaravata: Or typing it, yeah.

Fred Jaravata: You’re just typing it out. That’s it. Nothing special. It’s digitized now. Cool, right? But that’s all right. Now, the augmenting part, now you take that same document, the digitized document now, and you’re transforming it into a PDF. You’re emailing it to people. So now you’re sharing it what way.

Sharon Jaravata: So the reach is bigger. It’s not just your classroom.

Fred Jaravata: Yes. And then now, you are – the next part is M. After that, you can take a Google doc, typing it out. But now you’re sharing it with others that way. You’re sharing it.

Sharon Jaravata: Is that kind of what you just said with augment though?

Fred Jaravata: Yeah. But the other one is email.

Sharon Jaravata: Oh.

Fred Jaravata: Right? So it’s living in your computer. The original document is living in – you email the document out. The M part is where you have a Google doc and you’re sharing it and it’s live. As you make changes, it changes automatically for other people.

Sharon Jaravata: OK. And then they can interact …

Fred Jaravata: Not yet. That’s going to be the R.

Sharon Jaravata: Oh.

Fred Jaravata: That’s the redefinition part.

Sharon Jaravata: OK.

Fred Jaravata: So you’re sharing with other people but you’re not sending this in a PDF. You’re sending a link and as you type – this is the M part – people can see the live things happening. They’re not interacting, not yet. So they can watch it.

Sharon Jaravata: So that’s one way.

Fred Jaravata: One way still. Maybe there are some differences and you could probably – some experts in SAMR may argue against that and please let me know. The R part now is when you get a bunch of students working on the same document.

Sharon Jaravata: In real time.

Fred Jaravata: And then – I guess that includes the teacher going in and giving comments on how to improve it.

Sharon Jaravata: OK.

Fred Jaravata: Does that make sense? I know I went fast and probably I’m tweaking the SAMR model a little bit. But that’s what I remember. But I hope that makes sense.

Sharon Jaravata: Yeah. So if I’m a new teacher, right? Do I start with S and then gradually go to R or just try to jump to the R?

Fred Jaravata: You gradually – I think as a new teacher, gradually move to the R, right? So you start with S. Yeah, type it out. That’s fine. And then you move into like a – you send it as a PDF. But I think a lot of people have done that a lot already.

Sharon Jaravata: I guess it would depend on what you’re doing too, what kind of project or assignment, right?

Fred Jaravata: Right. But the SAMR model is great. But I always refer to the 4Cs, 21st century skills. The 4Cs are important because they encourage you – those offer guidelines to add. The Cs are collaborate, communicate, be creative and collaborate. Did I say that right?

Sharon Jaravata: Creativity. OK.

Fred Jaravata: No, no, critical thinking.

Sharon Jaravata: Yeah. It was – I forget too.

Fred Jaravata: OK. Critical thinking, collaborate, communicate and creativity.

Sharon Jaravata: Yes.

Fred Jaravata: Those four Cs, they offer me a guide myself in how to reach my students to do that. I want my students to do those things, one of those things, right?

Sharon Jaravata: And sometimes that’s correlated with the common core state standards too.

Fred Jaravata: Exactly. And it goes to the Bloom’s taxonomy of – you know, on the bottom of the triangle. Remember, understand, apply, analyze, evaluate and create. These models, they’re all very similar. There are other info graphics to put into each other and how they do relate. They all relate to each other. But yeah, maybe in a different episode, we will talk about Bloom’s taxonomy and how that can be flipped over. I think we mentioned that before. But we will analyze that a little more on a different episode.

Sharon Jaravata: Yeah.

Fred Jaravata: So there’s a great – another great info graph that has been shared since like 2013 and it’s by a man named – a teacher named Bill Ferriter. You can find him at WilliamFerriter.com.

Bill Ferriter https://www.flickr.com/photos/plugusin/9223386478/in/datetaken/

Sharon Jaravata: We will put these in the show notes, right? The info graphics.

Fred Jaravata: This is a very good one and it’s also – this is in George Couros who I follow a lot on Twitter and I bought his book. I love his book called The Innovator’s Mindset and he refers to this graphic and after this graphic, he worked with Bill to make a new graphic for leaders. But going back to this first info graphic that Bill made. So it says on the top, “What do you want your kids to do with technology?” OK? And on one side – it’s like a T-square. On one side, you have wrong answers. On the right hand, you have right answers.

By George Couros https://www.flickr.com/photos/plugusin/with/9223386478/

So let’s go to the wrong answers first. OK? So what do you want your kids to do with technology? I want my kids – these are running answers. I want my kids to do – to make Prezis. I want my kids to start blogs. I want them to create Wordles. I want them to publish Animoto videos, making video slideshows. I want my students to design flip charts. I want my kids to produce videos. I want to post to Edmodo. I want to use whiteboards. I want them to use – I want them to develop apps, right? Those are the wrong answers of what you want your kids to do with technology.

Sharon Jaravata: From what it looks like to me, there’s – for every wrong answer, there’s the right answer that’s correlated across to it. So for example, the wrong answer is make Prezis and the right answer is raise awareness.

Fred Jaravata: Exactly. So what is Prezi? Prezi is just a fancy PowerPoint. It’s a fancy keynote, right? You can go zoom it in, zoom out. I get like seasick when I see that stuff. If it’s don’t really bad, you know. But yeah, Prezis or presentation apps or keynotes. I want my kids to do PowerPoint. It’s just basically just raise awareness.

Sharon Jaravata: So the wrong answers are if – if you guys haven’t figured out, those are the tools that you use in which to extract these big ideas.

Fred Jaravata: So the big ideas, the right answer – let’s go to the right answers, the right way to use technology and the info graph by Bill Ferriter. You want them to raise awareness. You want them to start conversations. You want them to find the answers to their own questions. You want them to join in partnerships. You want your students to change minds, convince others. So a lot of communication is important.

Sharon Jaravata: Persuasive writing.

Fred Jaravata: Right. You want your students to make a difference. You want them to take action and you want them to be agents of change or drive change in the world. So these are our huge, big ideas, right? These aren’t tools we’re talking about. Technology are the tools to do all these big ideas.

Sharon Jaravata: Right. I think the thing is – because a lot of the teachers, they see or hear that oh, look at that school. They’re doing – they’re using all these shiny tools. Then maybe I should be doing that, but not really understanding that – what the purpose of it is, right?

Fred Jaravata: Sometimes a lot of my faculty and my colleagues – I love them to death, but sometimes they’re so fixated on the app. Oh, I saw a cool app. I saw this cool app. It can do this, this, this, this. Cool! That’s great. I always support them. But I also tried to make sure – what is the learning goal? What do you want them to do? I’m glad you found a great app. There are always great apps out there. But they still need to support learning. All right?

There’s another info graphic that continues this, the George Couros. He talked about this and another info graphic was created for this. The question is, “What do you want leaders to do with technology?” OK? Now, the shares on the left hand side again like a T-square. So good answers.

Sharon Jaravata: I think you mean T-chart.

Fred Jaravata: A – what did I say?

Sharon Jaravata: T-square.

Fred Jaravata: OK, T-chart, sorry. What do you want to do – what do you want leaders to do with technology? Some good answers are like I want – you want them to tweet. You want them to use Google apps or Office 365 or whatever. WordPerfect, if you’re still on that. Write a blog post.

Sharon Jaravata: It’s still around?

Fred Jaravata: Yes it is actually. I guess the legal people, the legal professionals, they use WordPerfect.

Sharon Jaravata: OK.

Fred Jaravata: You use Learning Management System, the LMS. You want to publish a video, text reminders, blah, blah, blah, develop a website. The better answers are you wanted to build relationships. Technology is for building relationships. That’s the key right there. You want the leaders and your students to build relationships and that’s where technology is very powerful, right? Yeah, you can – I’ve seen teachers use – what is that? Flat Stanley? Remember that? Flat Stanley.

Sharon Jaravata: The character. Yeah, from the book.

Fred Jaravata: And then they use an envelope or a cardboard or whatever, one of those big interoffice envelopes.

Sharon Jaravata: Manila envelopes.

Fred Jaravata: And then they send it around the world, send it around the country and they – the whole – they share. Where would it go, right? Where did it go? That’s cool.

But now, you can only reach one person at a time. It’s very short or you have pen pals, which is great, right? It still works and I still encourage that. But – so you’re building relationships and there’s something said to be – having handed to – with the real envelope.

Sharon Jaravata: Yeah.

Fred Jaravata: Right. Handed a note, right?

Sharon Jaravata: Uh-huh.

Fred Jaravata: But you can accomplish pretty much now today that – the building relationships with an email, as long as you write the email in a proper way that’s empathetic and that’s actually personal, right? You can send that email. You could tweak it and personalize emails. You can send to a hundred people at one time, right? You just change the name.

Sharon Jaravata: Just click it.

Fred Jaravata: You can click it. But I advise you, you had to personalize each one. But you can send it and it goes boom! It goes out all over the world, wherever you want to, right?

Sharon Jaravata: Yeah.

Fred Jaravata: That’s another way of using technology and how powerful it can be. But here it is. Whatever you do, when using technology in the classroom, make sure it’s meaningful. All right? Make sure it’s simple. Don’t get overwhelmed with it because you can have all these – thousands of apps are available.

Sharon Jaravata: Well, start small, right?

Fred Jaravata: Right. And my favorite app, people, I’ve said this before, over the past couple of years – years of using – in this podcast, the Camera is my favorite. OK? Because you can slow mo, time lapse. You can reverse it, replay back. You can slow mo backwards. You can share it. You can make movies. You can do tutorials. The Camera is the best one. OK.

I have this thing, the three Es. I have these things with 3Es, 4Cs, blah, blah, blah. I always say things like that.

Sharon Jaravata: Well, we know teachers. We have all acronyms and short cuts.

Fred Jaravata: I like this acronym, the – it’s not an acronym but the 3Es helps you remember. Make sure that the technology you’re using – or anything really. This goes beyond the lesson. Make sure that your lesson or your – the technology is effective first thing and then make sure it is efficient. Don’t go all over the place. Make sure it’s efficient unless you have some kind of design in a way that’s kind of complicated. But overall, keep it efficient and lastly, keep it elegant.

What does effective mean? Make sure it works. What does efficient mean? Make sure it’s not too many steps, right? What does elegant mean? It kind of has to be designed well, right? It has to be designed well. So you can flow easily from one task to another. You’re elegantly moving from one app to another app, to another app, to the person where you want to do – or the learning outcome you want to do. So it has to flow well. That’s the elegant part.

Sharon Jaravata: So I guess I can also – so maybe it means it just makes the experience for the user or the audience smooth, right?

Fred Jaravata: Yeah, a smooth experience. It has come down to it. Yes. For the creator, for the receiver, the person you’re trying to reach. Have an elegant solution to that.

Sharon Jaravata: So would you say that’s also a continuum, like in order? You could try to do the first two first, like efficient …

Fred Jaravata: Yeah.

Sharon Jaravata: And effective first.

Fred Jaravata: Yes.

Sharon Jaravata: That’s the most important.

Fred Jaravata: Keep it. Yeah, make sure it’s effective. It would be clunky though. If it’s effective, it can be clunky.

Sharon Jaravata: Yeah.

Fred Jaravata: All right? Again, that’s how you – make sure you use technology in the classroom in a very – in a meaningful manner. All right, folks.

Sharon Jaravata: Yeah.

Fred Jaravata: I talked a lot today.

Sharon Jaravata: Full tips, yeah.

Fred Jaravata: All right. Let me check. OK, yeah, I did record this. I’m glad.

Sharon Jaravata: Can you imagine if we do it again?

Fred Jaravata: That’s my biggest fear. You know, podcast people. I think I’m recording and we’re talking and talking and talking. So many knowledge bombs but they forgot to punch record.

Sharon Jaravata: So far I’m not going to worry. It has not happened to us.

Fred Jaravata: Not yet. All right, folks. Make sure you subscribe to our show. Thank you for joining our show. Make sure you share our show with other teachers. We’re getting a lot of people every day listening to our show and we’re very, very grateful. We’re here to serve you. If you have any questions, please email me at [e-mail].

Sharon Jaravata: And you can email me at [e-mail] and of course find us on our website TeachingBites.com.

Fred Jaravata: In all the social media, we’re out there.

Sharon Jaravata: Yeah.

Fred Jaravata: All right?

Sharon Jaravata: OK, everyone. Have a good day! Be super!

Fred Jaravata: Bye.

Sharon Jaravata: Bye.