Question:
In the technology integration scenarios that you’ve worked on in class, I haven’t seen many examples that incorporate technologies that you probably use every day – cell phones, video games, You Tube, social network sites, maybe Twitter, blogs… (what else am I missing?). Why do you think that you don’t tend to think of those technologies when you’re asked to incorporate technology? Do you think they might in fact be useful, or do you see a disconnect between your personal technology use, and technologies you’d consider using in your teaching? If so, why?


It's not that I do not believe that we should leave the technologies we use every day out of our integration, but that they are harder to monitor and filter. Some content may not be suitable for use in a classroom, and teachers need to be aware of that. These types of technologies may be useful in the classroom, but there is also a line that needs to be drawn, some things such as Facebook and Twitter are more personal and in my opinion have less of a place in the classroom. I'm not familiar at all with using a cell phone as classroom technology (other than our text messaging system here at Towson), but would be willing to use it given the proper information on how to incorporate it. Also, for sites such as facebook and twitter, they may be useful for certiain age groups (I'm thinkking more like high school and college) to be used for discussion and even something like a "buddy system" for missed notes and assignments.
~Stacey Rogers