Better Tech Solutions: Ed Tech for Every Classroom

How Educational Technology Improves Student Learning

It can be difficult for teachers to find sufficient educational technology that both meets the goals and needs of their lessons and engages students with learning. This website exists as a resource for educators looking to integrate innovative technology into their classrooms to assist and improve student learning.

As a secondary level English Language Arts (ELA) teacher, it is crucial to create a learning environment for my students that incorporates both the equitable use and ethical use of technology, and emphasizes social responsibility whenever using the internet. Technology plans - outlined and maintained by individual school districts - are an excellent tool to guide the adoption of educational, technological tools in any classroom.

Taking this technology plan into account, I aim to facilitate a student-centered learning environment where the basis of learning is inquiry. For students to truly succeed beyond the confines of academic achievement, learners must be guided in the development of "higher-order cognitive skills, such as reflective thinking, analysis, creativity, inquiry, and focusing on the process of learning" over "rote memorization of facts and figures" (Kolb, 2016, Higher-level thinking: avoiding drill and practice section, para. 1). Growth is shown to improve when students are taught how to ask questions about their own learning process and ultimately take charge of their learning.

Cornerstones of Educational Tech in the Classroom

There are three cornerstones of successfully applying educational technology in the classroom:

Equitable Use - The inclusion of assistive technology in the classroom is often mistaken as only benefiting students with learning disabilities, but this is simply not the case. Introducing assistive technologies into a classroom increases access for all students, thereby making learning accessible by all students, rather than targeting a specific group for support.

Furthermore, any educational technologies integrated into the classroom should "use technology as a tool for literacy development in English and other languages" while utilizing "a variety of languages consistent with language understood by students," effectively allowing learners equal opportunities to learn and develop their relative skills by capitalizing on the technological resources available in the classroom (Dieckmann et al., 2001, Assessment tool for equitable technology integration, para. 1).

Ethical Use - As more schools integrate technology into the classroom, the ethical use of such educational technologies are commonly detailed in an acceptable use policy outlined by the school district. These acceptable use policies generally regard issues like copyright, plagiarism and academic dishonesty, and responsible application of technological tools to learning in the classroom. "Reinforcing how to cite authors" and "requiring well-cited sources" from students should help to discourage fabricated research and teach learners to respect intellectual property rights (Mattison, 2018, Academic honesty and research ethics section, para. 2).

For individual educators, navigating copyright means understanding "fair use" as it applies to copyright law. In the US, fair use allows "the reproduction of copyright works for certain, limited, educational purposes" that "does not constitute copyright infringement" (Copyright Information Center: Fair Use and Other Educational Issues, n.d.). To determine whether the inclusion of a copyrighted work is allowed in your curriculum under fair use, there are four major factors to consider.

1. Purpose - "the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature, or is for nonprofit education purposes" (Copyright Information Center: Fair Use and Other Educational Issues, n.d.)

2. Nature - the direct nature of the work, the relevance of the copyrighted work to the curricular content and the appropriateness of the material

3. Amount - the substance of the copyrighted work as an excerpt as opposed to the substance of the whole work

4. Effect - the potential effect the use of the copyrighted work has upon the market value of the work

Educators should note that these four main factors are merely suggested steps to mitigate risks of breach of fair use, and "in cases of doubt, it is always most desirable to get permission" either from the publisher of the work or directly from the holder of the copyright (Copyright Information Center: Fair Use and Other Educational Issues, n.d.). However, for any works classified under the public domain, teachers are free to use these materials at their discretion since the material is now owned by the public and no special permission is required to use the material for educational purposes.

Social Responsibility - Educators have long held a role in teaching civic responsibility to younger generations, and this role is no different with the expansive integration of learning technology into the classroom. As information and knowledge becomes more widespread, it grows increasingly easy for students to falsify research sources and plagiarize copyrighted and published works. Thus, teachers are encouraged to reinforce respect for intellectual property rights and promote citation of reputable sources.

Furthermore, as the lines of communication between students and teachers are increasingly blurred between face-to-face and a digital medium, maintaining professionalism in all communications becomes of paramount importance. Whenever "using school or business email systems, these types of communications can easily be made public" and should thus never include personal information. Students should also be made aware of the dangers of mixing personal and professional lines of communications across electronic messaging services like email or texts, especially since exposing personal information online can have severe and dangerous consequences.

Lastly, while some innovative educators are incorporating social media networks into their classrooms, like curating a Facebook page for their class, ethical issues can arise if a person engages in repetitive online behaviors and messages derisive of others on these same community webpages. Cyberbullying is sometimes explained as worse than being bullied face-to-face, since there is little a victim can do to escape a cyberbully. In the interest of fostering working interpersonal relationships between students, educators should remain vigilant about social networks and cyberbullying and take measures to inform students "that they have waived their right to privacy by posting things on social networks" and that despite the absence of a "face-to-face interaction," they no longer are protected by anonymity (Mattison, 2018, Social networks & cyberbullying section, paras. 1-2).