REFLECTION OF TEACHING ON THE USE OF ICT IN CLASSROOM
1. COMENIUS PROJECT
DEBATES IN TEACHING DEPARTMENTS AND CONCLUSIONS ON
“WHY WE ARE ON THE MOVE”
CONSIDERATIONS ON THE SUITABILITY OF THE HIGH SCHOOL BEING OPEN TO NEW
WAYS OF TEACHING BASED ON THE USE OF NEW TECHNOLOGIES
The necessity of using ICT in everyday education can be defended in two ways:
firstly, because of its utility as a way to facilitate communication with the student (e‐
mail, etc.) and motivate the student (the presence of more audio‐visual sources,
digital blackboards, etc.), which allow access to content and cultural aspects that
weren’t previously available or were too expensive (through websites, blogs and
virtual classrooms) and that even make possible distance teaching and evaluation
(online courses);
secondly, its use introduces, illustrates and teaches the student to live in a world in
which technology is necessary in almost every context (professional, social, personal,
etc.), as it was before with reading and writing, etc.
However, we believe that there must be clear that the backbone of the education
should be knowledge and comprehensive training for students. For this purpose,
new technologies are not an end but a means in itself.
In a secondary school or high school the principle idea of using ICT—and it is not
always this way—should be the utilization of ICT as a servant to our educational
purposes, avoiding that the unquestioning fascination with technology takes hold of
us and becomes an end in itself.
On the same line it is also our job to orient students to the conscientious control of
these tools and promote the reflection its advantages, its disadvantages and its
rational use.
In conclusion, the use of new technologies in our teaching practice is a need and vital
to get:
o Teachers and students updated
o Syllabuses wholly integrated into our current society and labor market
needs
o Our students motivated since we are using the same language and
communicative channels they usually use in their own daily lives
HOW DO WE USE IT TO OBTAIN AND REINFORCE THE IDEA THAT OUR SECONDARY
SCHOOL IS OPEN TO THE INCORPORATION OF THE USE IN ITS TEACHING PRACTICE?
The best approach is to integrate ICT into every single aspect and fields dealing with
education and training, including administrative issues
Teachers of this high school mainly use ICT
as a complementary source to other methods of teaching in and outside the
classroom,
as a way of distributing materials (and sometimes as a substitute of textbooks),
and
as a way to follow the students’ work (for the submitting of work and to control
the activities),
in support of the work of the tutor and as an additional tool for evaluation.
2. In no way do we use IT as an alternative to other forms of work, communication or more
conventional evaluation techniques, but always as a way of complementing these.
TYPES OF STRATEGIES
Daily use in the classroom:
o Google Earth,
o youtube videos,
o own themed blogs and other ones from education professionals.
o WIKIS
Incorporation into cooperative work.
Using email to send syllabus, schemes and supplementary classes at the high
school level (at this level we have renounced the textbook) item
Participation in training of new web tools (dipity, prezi, ...)
Scientific pages from which we can see as useful images and animations
Access to virtual laboratories from which students can simulate some processes
that we are possible, due to the necessary material available in our laboratory.
Using the website of the institute in which hung work done by students.
Virtual classroom, where we hung notes and web resources where students can
review the different animations we've seen in the classroom. They also appear
to have work to do, directing support pages to perform the work safely.
Digital Whiteboards
Short scientific videos from youtube.
Social networks
Web pages
Collaborative suits (google drive)
Skype and sharing lessons
Projects made using multimedia
WHICH ARE THE MAIN PROBLEMS ASSOCIATED WITH THE USE OF IT IN THE CLASSROOM
AND THE ADMINISTRATION OF OUR HIGH SCHOOL?
ICT is helpful but also present some problems, even risks.
First of all, there are the problems with the functioning of the tools themselves.
IT is socially in constant evolution and its updating—what gives it educational
value—requires resources and technical capacity that the school doesn’t have.
• Frequently problems of obsolete technological materials threaten the
planned activities in the classroom or make the activities ineffective
because the materials are outdated. With respect to this there is little
that the teacher can do about this.
The wifi network does not always work properly and the connection speed is low
in many occasions. There is a high number of persons using internet access,
which slows usage.
There aren’t enough devices (laptops, PC, software...)
3. Another thought on the topic of ICT is one of the effects that the implantation of
the use of IT strategies can produce in our work as teachers and in the results of
students.
• It has already been mentioned that we should never forget that the use
of technology should always be supportive of our educational goals,
avoiding that the unquestioning fascination with technology might take
hold of us and become an end in itself.
We should realize that, by itself, ICT usually produces collateral and negative
effects in some students, which starts with a gap that can open between them
because of its major and minor resources in domestic access to IT and these
technologies (laptops, internet connection, etc.).
Students are so used to handling social networks, but most do not know access
to information sources, and critically discern what are appropriate and which are
not.
Other associated effects that usually occur do to the use of technology by the
students are deficiencies in the domain of their oral and written language,
problems with concentration in the classroom and reading, less persistence in
the work, motivated by the habits of the rythyms (accelerated) typical of audio‐
visual, etc.
Teacher training is not enough or accurate. We need more support from
Administration to participate in training courses.
Another problem is the dense schedule of all teachers that prevents the
coordinated use of tics. It takes time and a lot of work to prepare products for
teaching and every time we have more teaching hours and therefore less time to
prepare new teaching strategies in class action.
HOW CAN THE COMMUNICATION BETWEEN DISTINCT MEMBERS OF THE EDUCATIONAL
COMMUNITY BE IMPROVED THROUGH THE USE OF IT?
By using email and other systems of communication.
E‐mail and other systems of communication in real time (the virtual
classroom) streamline the communication between members of the
school community, but their easy access can be a double‐edged sword
because it can overwhelm everyone.
Norms of use should be established (regarding channels, times,
messages); in one word: rationalization of their use.
We should have enough time to an effective coordination.
