The Classroom of 2018 - Forward to the Future
“Teaching
in the Internet age means we must teach tomorrow’s skills today.” – Jennifer
Fleming. I think this quote pretty much sums it up; if it doesn’t, it sure says
a lot. As educators we have to stay that much farther ahead of the game. In
order to teach, implement or incorporate technology in the classroom we first
have to equip ourselves. Students are born into technology; this is their generational
mark and if we don’t keep up us an educator, we’ll be left behind. Classrooms
now are delving more and more into the technological advances out there for
classroom learning, but how much more prominent and permanent will it be in the
future? What will the classroom of the future look and be like?
For
starters future classrooms will be completely technology driven. Chalk and
chalkboard style teaching will completely be gone. BYOD as in (bring your own
device) will have taken over every classroom, every educational outlet; it will
be unavoidable. According to Rob Wrubel, Chief Marketing & Product
Development Officer, Apollo Group, “The classroom of the future is going to be
a really interesting combination of elements. First of all, it will live in the
proverbial cloud. Content – so you can be able to access this classroom, where
you’ll have teachers, your faculty, other students, mentors, connections to
whomever you want -- the content will
live in a place that you can access it from any device.” Wrubel goes on to say,
“so imagine the world where your mobile smartphone, the desktop setup you have
in your home, or the digital television set, back to the room you actually go
and conduct your work with your classmates is all tied together.” These notions
or ideas are already being used today; but in the future these ideas will be
considered the norm, a “regular” classroom setting and how students will
conduct their daily tasks.
Before action is taken in designing and
implementing these technology driven classrooms, goals have to be set in order
to set standards and engage the student’s learning and increase the teaching
experience in a modern classroom:
The
program's goals should be to:
- Increase the technology literacy of students in the district.
- Help teachers provide a 21st century learning environment for students.
- Provide teachers resources and training to integrate technology into their teaching.
To
accomplish these goals, the following steps should be taken:
- Purchase of a model technology classroom for teachers.
- Provide technology training for teachers, in summer sessions and other workshops.
- Develop a training program for teachers in technology proficiency.
- Develop Best Practices for use of technology in the classroom.
And to
maintain satisfaction and that both the student and teacher are well assessed
there should be standards for:
- Surveying teachers.
- Having external evaluators observe classrooms.
- Creating focus group interviews with a small selection of teachers.
These goal
setters will show progress, allow necessary changes to be made and will set
standards for other classrooms that will be brought on board at a later time.
According to the Horizons Report
K-12 Edition, “In the U.S. alone, 61% of Americans age 12 and up own a mobile device,
and 44% specifically own a smartphone.” Mobile devices have become one of the
primary ways that youth interact with and learn from each other. At the same
time phones have become more capable, and more pervasive among school-aged
children, mobile apps have redefined the way we think about software itself. It
is easy and cheap to outfit a smartphone with exactly the feature set you want,
and many people are beginning to see the mobile platform as the most compelling
home for one’s personal learning collection of tools and resources.
We
all know that mobile devices are a common way to collaborate on a daily basis;
through text messages, apps, etc. However, mobile devices can only bring so
much to the table. For a more pleasant
experience I see tablet computing and or iPads, adding much to the learning
process. Tablets and iPads have high-resolution screens allowing users the ease
of sharing content, images and video. They are engaging and viewed as less
disruptive than other hand-held devices (no phone ringing and no incoming text
messages.) Because tablets are able to tap into all the advantages that mobile
apps bring to smaller devices but in a larger format, schools are seeing them
as feature-rich tools for all sorts of assignments. The Horizons Report K-12
Edition, indicates that, “Recent research indicates that tablets, because they
are designed to easily share their screens, foster key 21st Century
Skills in students, including creativity, innovation, communication, and
collaboration. Because of their portability, large display, and touch screen,
tablets are ideal devices for one-to one deployments.
There
are so many game changers to the way curriculum is delivered into the
classrooms now. The traditional classroom lectures are slowly fading away. Do I
think they will ever completely go away? Of course not; but as time progress,
technology in the classroom is extensively taking over. Game-based learning for
one, has gained more traction in recent years as research continues to
demonstrate its effectiveness for learning. Currently, the integration of games
into K-12 is largely driven by individual educators who are motivated to
experiment with gaming at school. PLEs or Personal learning environments refer
to the personal collections of tools and resources a person assembles to
support their own learning – both formal and informal. The conceptual basis
for PLEs has shifted significantly in the last year, as smartphones, tablets,
and apps have begun to emerge as a compelling alternative to browser-based PLEs
and e-portfolios. The goal is for students to have more control over how they
learn in school, just as they do at home, and for teachers to set expectations
that their students will be actively engaged in designing and supporting their
own learning strategies.
Other
futuristic aspects of technology in the classrooms are the idea of augmented
reality or AR. This refers to the layering of information over a view or
representation of the normal world, offering users the ability to access
place-based information in way that are persuasively intuitive. This idea to me
is awesome! Think of being in a historical place, or even a museum, you take
your device, point in the general direction and gain a world of information.
This would be excellent on a field trip or study of a historical figure or artifacts
for class. Another intriguing thought for a futuristic technologically inclined
class is natural user interfaces. This would allow computers to respond to
gestures, motions of the body, facial expressions, voice, sound and other
environmental cues, and the replacement of the keyboard and mouse as the
standard for computer/human interaction. These ideas can clearly be seen and
demonstrated in the Xbox Kinect and Nintendo Wii.
As
generations come and go the classrooms of the past, present and future will all
compare differently. The times are changing, technology is no longer on the
horizon; it has come, it is here to stay and is surpassing some of our wildest
dreams. The classrooms of the future will be more invigorating, more inspiring
and will be more engaging for student learning. Technology is bringing us to a
level to incorporate more learning in K-12 before students hit the college
level. My hope is that the design of the futuristic classroom will have a true
sense of distant learning; having those brainstorming sessions with a class in
California, competing in competitions with students in Germany, or mock
interviews with professors and students in Britain all via satellite, some form
of face time, big screen TVs’ mounted in the classroom as monitors, Ethernet
hookups all around, wireless capabilities and an endless list of other
technological devices to engage student learning. The technology is here, the
know how is being taught, it’s time for educators to stay up to par making sure
a true learning experience is provided to all students willing to learn.
REFERENCES
Rao, A. (2012, March 1). 10 Educational Technology Quotes. Retrieved on April 29, 2013 from http://teachbytes.com/2012/03/01/10-educational-technology-quotes/
Wrubel, R. (2011). What will the classroom of the future look like? Retrieved on April 29, 2013, from http://curiosity.discovery.com/question/classroom-of-the-future-look-like
Johnson,
L., Adams, S., and Cummins, M. (2012). NMC Horizon Report: 2012 K-12
Edition.Austin, Texas: The New Media
Consortium. Retrieved on April 29, 2013, from http://www.nmc.org/pdf/2012-horizon-report-K12.pdf
MedianEducation. (2007, September 12). Classroom Of The Future HD: What's New in Educational Tech. Retrieved on April 30, 2013, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QcXEznPXj8k&feature=PlayList&p=4DAA0739CBF70FBC&index=11&playnext=2&playnext_from=PL
Richard,
V. (2007, April 1). The model of a modern technology classroom. Tech and
Learning. Retrieved on November 17, 2009, from http://www.techlearning.com/article/7146
