Journal Post 3

Chapter 3

Developing Lessons with Technology

What is meant by “lesson development using technology”?

                Lesson development is central to the work of every teacher. Lesson development refers to all the activities that teachers do as they create, teach, and evaluate lessons with students. It involves a teacher’s decisions about three elements of teaching lessons: academic content (what to teach), teaching goals, methods and procedures (how to teach), and finally learning assessments (how to know what students have learned). School system guidelines and state national curriculum framework the bases on “what to teach”. However, because no national standard spells out everything to teach about any given topic, classroom teachers must make choices about what will be explored to students each day. Technology plays an essential role on helping teachers with their lesson plans. We have access to powerful new ways to research and retrieve information like blogs, internet search engines and wikis.

Photo Credit to the tartanpodcast

                Teachers combine goals, methods and procedures into formats for daily learning. Goals are the reason why a lesson is being taught. Methods are the instructional strategies. Large or small groups, discussion, lectures, role play, case studies are just a few of the examples teachers use to convey academic content to students. Procedures are the scheduling and grouping of students by teachers during a lesson, including time management. The goals, methods, and procedure all mutually support each other in the process of lesson development, which is where technology comes as a great use. Technology does best in enhancing the understanding of goals. It gets you to that higher order of thinking; it gets you to understand that goal.

Photo Credit to woodleywonderworks 

PBS Teachers

                PBS Teachers features thousands of lesson plans, professional development opportunities, videos, and blogs. You will notice that many of these sources are based on the award winning programming that is broadcast on PBS stations. You will also see that many are tied back to state standards and there are recommendations on how to study a topic beyond what is shown at the site. It contains a sufficient amount of appropriate use of school technology, to enhance what the teacher is already teaching. The PBS Teacher makes finding online lessons and activities so much easier!

Summary

                 Chapter three discusses how teachers plan, deliver, and assess lessons that engage students and teach academic content while integrating technology into the lesson plans. Two types of lesson planning are explained. Sample lessons are developed step by step in the chapter so you can see ways to use technology throughout the development process. It also mentions how teachers should evaluate their students. Prime examples are using teaching performances assessments to measure the knowledge of students before, during, and after teaching lessons. Technology offers multiple ways to conduct test and performances such as quizzes, portfolios, and student writing. It provides tools on how to develop and evaluate learning experiences for students.