Educational Technology: Let's Help Students Become More Motivated to Learn!: January 2013

Bloom’s taxonomy is an organization of learning objectives within education. This organization has become a vital tool in structuring and understanding the learning processes of individuals. Overtime, Bloom’s Taxonomy has been revised and adjusted to effectively analyze student’s thought processes. The first two levels that we have learned about in this course so far are remembering and understanding. Remembering is the most basic level out of all of Bloom’s Taxonomy. This is the level where students simply recall or recite the information being taught. Key words that would be used for this aspect of Bloom’s Taxonomy are recognizing, listing, identifying, naming, locating, and finding. Remembering is the most basic level because it only requires an individual to memorize something and regurgitate it. They do not need to understand or be able to apply the concept or knowledge. The second level of Bloom’s Revised Taxonomy is understanding. This is a more complex level of thinking because an individual must now build relationships and link the knowledge they previously learned. Understanding requires the individual to understand concepts and have the ability to explain them. Some of the key words that would be used for this level are interpreting, inferring, paraphrasing, classifying, explaining, and comparing (Churches, 2009).

Technology is an effective tool, for both teachers and students, that can be integrated into the classroom. This effective tool can have many benefits in the classroom, the main one being a tool of engagement and motivation. Students today are emerged in technology and it is a big part of their everyday life. Therefore, I find it important to utilize tools that students are most accustomed to because they are able to relate to it more. Utilizing and integrating technology into the classroom, especially the elementary level, allows teachers to use visuals and simulations that are able to explain more complex or in depth concepts (Kessler, 2010). Visuals allow students to picture what the concept is about and better understand it. Additionally, technology allows students to expand their cooperative learning ability. Especially in the younger grades, teachers want students to work together and interact with one another to problem solve and come up with their own knowledge/learning. Technology integration is also beneficial to teachers in many ways because it acts as a motivational factor for students. Teachers are able to grasp the students’ attention more easily when the students are using the technology in some way (Manraj, 2010). Being in the classroom, I notice that technology also allows me to create interactive lessons that keep students on task and interested. This is an important aspect because teachers are now seeing how much more is being demanded from the students. On the flip side, the state is also asking a lot more from the teachers. We are all being held more accountable for what the students know and understand; therefore we want to create the most engaging and productive learning environment for our students. That being said, technology integration is something that can help us achieve this high standard.

These past three weeks/units have truly shown me the importance of technology and how it can enhance a learning environment if incorporated properly and appropriately, when it comes to remembering and understanding.

Here is a video that illustrates :