Instructional Use of Smart Boards

Technology Reflection Assignment

Description/Experience

In the last seminar, whiteboards and smart boards were presented. I learned a lot about the smart board and remembered back to when my high school began to get them. I was intrigued just by how high-tech it was compared to a blackboard which was enough to keep my attention in class.

Application

An activity where my host teacher can incorporate this technology is by having a virtual skeleton on the smart board. The students will take turns coming to the board and dragging the names of bones to the right bone on the skeleton. This would be a relevant activity because we are currently working on human bones. The learners are middle school students in 7^th grade. This activity should be focused on learners around the age of 12.

            The learning outcomes would be correlating the names of bones with where they are on a human skeleton. Instead of just looking at a bone and knowing what it is, they will understand where it goes and be able to see its function.

            I would know that the students have acquired the learning outcomes with a homework worksheet that has a skeleton and asks the students to name the main bones such as the humorous (upper arm), cranium (skull), scapula (shoulder blade), carpals (hand), etc…

• The lesson would begin with a brief introduction of the human skeleton to refresh the students.
• Once the skeleton is brought up on the smart board, students would spend 10-15 minutes labeling the bones that they recognize.
• After the labeling is complete, I or my host teacher would call on students to explain the purpose of each one for the remaining 5 minutes.

Reflection
Considering your learning activity described above, write two paragraphs or three for each section below addressing the questions. It may be helpful to keep in mind the followings when reflecting:

1. How well the use of this technology may support your teaching strategies in this activity.
2. How effectively the use of this technology may enhance students' understanding of and learning from your particular content in this activity.

--Pedagogical-Content:

• My strategies for this activity are to give a visual, concrete example of where the bones in the human body go and what their function is, by giving demonstrations and illustrations of the bones in a skeleton. I feel that science is a subject in which students need to be more hands-on to learn. It goes with Chinese proverb, “I hear, I forget; I see, I remember; I do, I understand.” If the students are finding where each bone goes, they will be able to use critical thinking and hypothesize what each one’s function is.
• One conception students may bring is that the skeleton is the framework for the body and is what keeps humans from collapsing. I would be concerned about students’ motivation because everybody has a science teacher that they don’t like because they don’t get to do hands-on activities, which makes them not like science.

--Technological-Pedagogical:

In the previous section, you talked about your instructional strategies. Keeping these strategies you stated in mind, now tell us how the technology is used in your activity.  Specifically:

• The smart board would serve as a concrete example of what was being taught. It would support what was being taught by giving a visual example so the students did not have to guess about an abstract topic.
• What different classroom management strategies you might need to consider when using this technology in the activity? Give examples and be specific to your described activity.
• Classroom management strategies wouldn’t change from my host teacher’s normal ones. The students have a lot of respect for my host teacher and now myself and do not require much enforcement.

--Technological Pedagogical Content:

• The smart board enhances the way the content is represented because it is used as an illustration that can be interacted with. The students would enjoy using it because they love hands-on activities and already enjoy writing on the blackboard. This is why I believe that it would enhance the lesson. The students get to take turns labeling the different bones on the virtual skeleton on the smart board.
• The students would not be able to take turns labeling a skeleton in front of the class because it is pretty much impossible to draw one on the blackboard. It would take way too much time that could be spent teaching. In addition to being motived by the smart board, they can see what the bone’s specific function is and where it is located in the human body.