I learned a few things about technology being incorporated into the classroom from the article Introducing TPCK by Matthew J. Koehleri and Punya Mishra. In this article I discovered that the use of technology in the class not only impacts the curriculum being taught, as well as the teaching and learning contexts and techniques. TPCK also discusses the negative side effects that can be caused due to integration of technology into the classroom. For instance it is stated that digital technologies are unstable and changing at a fast rate; this makes it more difficult for a teacher to use the newer digital technologies because they have to dedicate time and patience into learning how to navigate and control this new technology so they can use it to better educate their students. Another problem teacher’s face with integrating digital technology into their classroom is that they need further training to be able to harness the ability to use the technology to improve their teaching strategies, as well as others who are against this type of integrations such as the community or coworkers.
I also found the statement “Plato, for example, deliberated over the many constraints and affordances of this new technology, reasoning that this new technology may prove to be a crutch that causes the populace to lose the capability to trust their own memory” very interesting and true. An example of this that can be seen anywhere, an example is if your contacts are deleted from your phone you have no way to call someone because you don’t remember their number. People are so reliable on their cell phones they slowly begin to stray away from remembering certain things all because it is in their hand held device. Phone numbers, birthdays, reminders, important dates, etc can all be programmed into a cell phone, and this leads to a person not having to memorize things most of the times. I found it interesting that a philosopher from hundreds of years ago made a statement that can be applied to the present in such a direct way.
I found the piece about Plato to be interesting as well. It just proves that whether past, present, or future, no matter what, technology is changing or is going to be changing at a very quick rate. Its interesting to me that something so simple as writing was considered to be technology. I can only assume that hundreds of years from now people will think of computers, and other types of present technology as simple as we feel writing is.
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