I have always had a passion for Education Technology integration.  The first words that come to my mind when I hear the phrase “Edtech integration” are “fun” and “exciting.”  And any teache who is not accustomed to integrating education technology in his or her classroom would most likely say the same thing.  However, after thinking for a moment, these initial responses are incorrect and it is a disservice to those of us connected teachers to accept such a response.  The reason is because learning should be exciting – with or without integrating educational technology in the classroom.  Technology in education has changed over thousands of years.  Here is a link to a video describing the history of technology in education. http://www.edtechmagazine.com/higher/article/2012/08/32000-years-technology-education-video













































Although technology has changed and will continue to change, the role of the teacher is not going to change.  A teacher’s job is to teach; yet the word teach is an umbrella – it includes many facets.  Teaching is not merely delivering new content and/or skills to students.  It includes guiding, motivating, directing, facilitating, and so much more. Educational Technology is not going to replace the teacher; its role is to support the teacher.  Educational Technology integration is the “hype” in education nowadays.  Schools are spending thousands of dollars on various technologies and expecting miracles to take place.  So, they have the iPads, the SMARTBoards, the student response/voting systems, now what?  If I have a SMARTBoard, and all I am doing is using the digital pens to write on it, is the end result of my teaching going to be any different than if I were using a dry erase board with markers, or even a chalkboard with chalk?  Of course not.  But if I use my SMARTBoard as a tool to create interactive activities in which will foster increased student participation and engagement – which at the same time enables me to be a more creative teacher – then I know that I am integrating Education Technology effectively in my classroom.  It makes so upset when teachers have access to 21st century Educational Technology classroom tools and they misuse them or even worse, choose not to use them at all because they are afraid of using them.  I am by no means perfect at integrating Educational Technology seamlessly in my classroom; I have no problem admitting that I am at the beginning phase (according to the ISTE NETS-T) of doing so.  And it’s not easy to integrate the Educational Technology in my classroom either.  For one, on top of all of the lesson planning, creating activities using technology is time consuming.  Second, whenever technology is accessible, the chance of technical problems arising is also possible.  Third, I have to push myself to think outside the box and think of ways to be creative; I need to ask myself how I can create something different than what I have done in the past.  This is not always an easy task.  But when I am successful, it is all well worth the work and time that is invested.



By using Education Technology as a tool to support teachers, we teachers are able to make certain parts of our jobs easier.  This can include such routine activities as taking attendance, randomly choosing students, and tracking classroom behavior.  By doing so, we can spend more time on creating better content and lessons for our students and even spending more time in the classroom building appropriate relationships with our students.  For example, my students can go up to the SMARTBoard and take their behavior while I am helping other students in the classroom.  Some of the boring physical responsibilities of being a teacher are alleviated from me and I can concentrate on the social and emotional responsibilities of being a teacher.  In addition, we are not bound to the walls of the classroom and are able to take “virtual fieldtrips” to just about everywhere in the world.

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In addition, no two students are alike or learn the same way.  Some students learn better with visual aids, some with audial, and some with kinesthetic-tactile.  The more ways that a teacher can present the content to a student, the greater number pathways or connections will be made reaching the brain.  Educational Technology can easily be integrated to provide a multi-sensory learning experience for all students.  Of course, this is easier said than done.   

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So to sum up all of the above, my personal EdTech mission statement would be: to integrate Educational Technology to support my curriculum goals, improve my teaching methods, reach more students, and to take our learning experience to greater heights.  Integrating Educational Technology enables me to be a dynamic teacher and enables my students more possibilities to engage and interact with our lesson content.  Last but not least, my goal is to provide my students with a multi-sensory learning experience – integrating Educational Technology enables me to do that. 

There are many opponents to Educational Technology.  The claims that I am familiar with include: too much stimulation, dampens social skills, it could lead to inappropriate content.  I am not going to argue with these.  However, technology is a tool. It’s not “what” it is, but it’s “how” it is used.  In my personal situation, I was told by my supervisor that I need to “balance” the amount of technology.  Well, I initially understood this as working with the TPACK model – to integrate technology, pedagogy, and content knowledge.  Unfortunately, I was wrong.  My supervisor meant that I should balance the amount of technology so I wouldn’t be taking myself away from my class – I should build a relationship between me and my students.  This completely boggles my mind and I wish someone could explain this to me. My class is not academically behind any other class in the grade.  I taught my school’s curriculum meeting the objectives and I have done a good job preparing my class to enter the next grade level.  So no one can complain to me that I fell short and neglected my duties as a teacher due to using technology in my classroom.  Being that I am a beginner at this and I have made mistakes – and could do better with organizing my files, my lessons have not always been as smooth as I would have liked them to be.  But considering the fact that I got myself trained (as opposed to my school providing an adequate amount of PD), I think I have accomplished something in the past two years and I now have more of a direction as to where I want to be going.  When I use EdTech to create lessons and activities for my class, I consider their interests and motivation.  I want them to interact and engage with the content.  I want the content to become meaningful to them as it provides them with rich experiences.  These experiences create relationships between me and my class.  The students are motivated to learn, excited, and engaged when they learn.  Now, isn’t that every teacher’s dream?  Why would a school administrator not be happy with that?