Article Review 7

Article Review 7

http://blog.reyjunco.com/will-itextbooks-increase-student-engagement-not-really

The article by Dr. Junco really is quite interesting.  I greatly appreciate the discussion on engagement versus cool.  I think that other teachers (and perhaps administrators) feel that my inclusion of various technology techniques in my classroom is engaging, and some of it may be, but is it the technology itself that makes the student desire to learn?  I think not.  I do, however, believe that how the teacher approaches the lesson, or activity, can help shape the students' engagement of said activity.  I couldn't help but think about the coolness of an entire class of students using a German textbook on an iPad in my class.  Way cool!  But in reality, the students would still be reading a textbook.  Just the fact that you change the way they read it, it's still not very engaging.  How about using an iPad to communicate with students in Germany?  Now that can be engaging (if approached correctly).  Is it the iPad that makes the engagement, or is it the activity? 

I think educators need to spend more time devoted to planning more creative and engaging projects for students to complete rather than try to figure out how to teach the same lessons they've taught for years but incorporating some cool techno trick.  Converting all of your overheads to PowerPoint presentations is probably a good thing, but no more engaging.  Review quiz material by playing Jeopardy is probably incredibly engaging for student who are used to review quiz material by reading their notes, but let's start thinking more big picture.  What will excite the students enough to want to do something with their learned knowledge or skills?  In the world language model, how do our students perform in the target language?  It's great that they can memorize 3 zillion vocab words, but can they order a coke in Shanghai?