Secondary Principals Support Mobile Learning
by alphadesigner
I always get excited when national international organizations (members in 45 countries) come out with statements that encourage the use of technology for learning purposes. Partly because my beliefs in the future of education and the tools students need to succeed, but also because it’s one more organization we can lean on as leaders.
The National Association of Secondary School Principals just released a statement advocating the use of Mobile and Social Technologies in Schools. Yes…that’s right….principals are saying we need to use these tools for learning. W00T!
A couple of quotes from the article that I like:
Yet as mobile and social technologies become ubiquitous, attempts to block them are increasingly ineffective. For example, in schools that prohibit cell phones, 54% of students still report sending texts during the school day (Lenhart, 2010).
In recent years, there has been explosive growth in students creating, manipulating, and sharing content online (National School Boards Association, 2007).
(Love how this quotes 4 year old research)
Nowhere is the vision for the use of mobile and social technologies more clearly articulated than in the National Educational Technology Plan (U.S. Department of Education, 2010). The plan describes new models of teaching and learning in which students and teachers are virtually connected to one another, to colleagues, to fellow students, and to a variety of resources that maximize opportunities for anytime-anywhere learning.
I suggest you sent the article on to your principal no matter where they stand on this issue. Mine will be receiving it tomorrow in their inbox.
Yet as mobile and social technologies become ubiquitous, attempts to block them are increasingly ineffective. For example, in schools that prohibit cell phones, 54% of students still report sending texts during the school day (Lenhart, 2010).
Yes, I believe schools should institute ways to use technology in the educational classroom, but not mobile and social technologies. Can we get back to basics and leave the school environment and classroom for learning not socializing. Lunch period, extra-curriculum activities and school dances are for socializing. I view the statement above as losing the battle of creating an educational classroom to the diverted tech social activites by students. Can adults and educators take a stand, set a boundary, draw a line? Just because 54% of students are not obeying school rules and sending texts during the school day, does that mean we should not enforce the rule prohibiting cell phones and allow them? The majority makes the school rules or does the authority makes the school rules? My vote is for the school authority.
MVR, Newark, Delaware
Dear Jeff Utecht,
This is an interesting argument you make for the use of technology in the classroom. I fully believe the statistic that 54% of kids report using their cellphones at school even though it is prohibited. I can say that I was one of those kids when I was a high school senior in 2009! However, I have to agree with the comment left above, it is not necessarily a good thing that kids are using their cellphones so much and I do not see how the cellphone could be used for learning in the classroom. Maybe we should view the statistic as more of, why are kids texting and using their cellphones so much while at school? This means they are not fully engaged in the classroom experience. They are bored. In this case, something needs to change in the classroom to make it more interesting so the cellphones will not be touched. An answer to that problem could be your push for technologically advanced classrooms.
Good read,
Elizabeth Brooks
You can follow me on twitter at http://twitter.com/#!/Lizzzybell