Journal Review 7

Tech Camp Unleashes Creativity and Collaboration
By Joe Bardin

Each summer Kindergarten through 12th Grade teachers gather together to put on a technology based summer camp for students. The goal being to improve Arizona schools through high quality professional development, and teacher leadership. It has become apparent that teachers want to utilize technology more, but they need a way to jumpstart their efforts. Enter, the Arizona K-12Center.

The great thing about technology is that it actually gets students interested in the material and inspires them to cooperate. When making iMovie projects, there was no hassle to get children involved since they all wanted to be a part of the movie. The great thing about each of the tools is that they are all so easy to use. The technology can also be used to bridge language gaps, for example with deaf students, or any other second language learners.

Finally the camp was able to enhance collaboration between not just the teachers, but the fellow students. The older ELL students were able to help the younger students, everyone is able to learn from each other. The greatest revelation discovered through the camp was that no one person knows everything about any given task or application. This is not however seen as a barrier, but rather as an opportunity for knowledge.

Question 1: What attracted me most to this article?
Answer 1: I usually skim the articles before I decide which one I’d like to write my blog about, and what popped out to me about this one was the iMovie project. It was so fun playing around with it in class that it inspired me to do my blog on this article.

Question 2: How does this article help to encourage using more technology in the classrooms?
Answer 2: It proved how effective teamwork can be. Not just the efforts of the teachers, but the student involvement. Technology seems to be an arena today’s youth are able to actively participate in, they feel comfortable with it, and therefore more likely to get involved. Since getting children excited about learning is what it’s all about, we should be encouraging them to learn through outlets they are comfortable with. Assigning more projects that promotes the utilization of their computer savvy skills.