1 Digital Natives in a Modern World

Computers are now completely essential to learn in today's world. Computers are for research, communication, writing papers, or submitting assignments online. There is not a way to avoid technology in a classroom or learning environment. Therein lies the problem. If you do not have access to technology or for some reason your technology malfunctions, you cannot succeed in your courses. What do you do if you cannot afford a computer and do not have a car to go to a library or cyber cafe? What do you do if your WiFi cuts out? Your paper doesn't save? Your printer breaks? In any of these situations, your grade could slip because you cannot use your technology. It is so important to use technology in a classroom but until it is one hundred percent reliable it should not be the only source or option for communication, assignments, and research. In the chapter there were four challenges outlined: finances to provide educational technology, time to learn to use the technology and teach about it, school culture allowing the technology, and the shift from teacher to facilitator of learning. I agree that these four challenges are prevalent in our schools and need to be considered while planning to use technology in my classroom.

I am excited to implement technology in my classroom. For some children, school is the only place where they will have the opportunity to use technology. I hope to have a classroom set of computers that my students will use for research for projects or for added knowledge. I hope to have a Smart Board or some similar technology to use for lectures and instruction because they allow more interaction than a classic computer and projector provide. By the time I enter a classroom as an educator, I hope that iPads or other tablets will be used instead of text books because they are lighter than textbooks to carry and also have all information in one place. Many tablets can also access the Internet which will give my students technology accessible at home. This class will give me ideas on how to use the Internet for classroom tools to teach my future students. I am excited for the future to see what technology will be available to use in a classroom setting.

A digital native is someone who was born into a world where technology always existed and was accessible. I am considered a digital native because I do not remember a time without technology, granted the technology was not as modern as today's. I agree that this title is fitting for my generation and those coming after because our world has always been a digital one. Those coming before my generation immigrated into the digital world and had to learn as they went have technology is used. All of the teachers I have had have been digital immigrants. Many times a teacher would ask a student to help figure out how to use an application like PowerPoint or how to find things on the Internet. I know that as a future educator I will be asking for help from my students as well as technology evolves in the near future.

0 A Bit About Becca

Technology has always been a huge part of my  life. I have had a computer and a printer in my home my entire life. I attended a small Catholic School in my hometown where I took computer technology classes from kindergarten to eighth grade. During this time my mother, who is a music and social studies teacher at the Catholic School I attended, received a donation of a Smart Board for her classroom. This went way past the standards of normal classroom technology. This technology made learning fun with the interaction with the lessons by drawing right on web pages or playing games on the screen. During my middle school years I received a prepaid cell phone, and then a real cellphone,  an MP3 player, and then an iPod, This gifts of technology were amazing because they were completely mine to learn and play with and progressively became more advanced.

I finally received my first real cellphone in seventh grade, and an iPhone in ninth, where I could start texting and calling my friends and with an iPhone I could have the functions of an iPod as well as a cellphone. During my high school years I was very active in TV Production where I used cameras, computers, editing software, microphones, etc. The best piece of technology I received was a Macbook Air in eleventh grade. I could work on homework like a computer, contact friends like a cellphone, and have fun playing games and listening to music like an iPod all in one tool which belongs completely to me. I have been blessed in my life to have always had access to the latest technology to help me learn and improve myself.

In this class I hope to learn to apply my love for technology in a classroom setting. I want to give my future students the same opportunities to learn with technology and inspire an interest in them. I hope to hone my own skills and pick up pieces of information that I may have missed learning in previous classes. The sad truth is many people do not have easy access to technology in their homes. When these students come to school in my classroom or in other classrooms I hope to have them receive the gift of technology and the resources to succeed.

I learned today that my learning style personality is Reflective-Intuitive-Visual-Sequential. Being reflective means I prefer to work alone and think quietly about facts or ideas before I apply them. Being intuitive means I work fast, I am innovative, I am abstract in my thinking, and I enjoy new possibilities and relationships. Being a visual learner means I thrive with pictures, diagram, charts, timelines, films, demonstrations, etc. Finally I am a sequential learner where I learn things in linear steps progressing off of the step learned before. Knowing this about myself will give me the tools I need to thrive in all classroom settings