Saturday, October 19, 2013
By Denise Dick
CANFIELD
Teachers can incorporate technology into instruction to engage students and help them retain information.
About 200 teachers attended the Mahoning County Technology in Education Conference on Friday at the Mahoning County Career and Technical Center. Wes Fryer, a Fulbright Scholar, Apple Distinguished Educator and Google Certified Teacher, was the keynote speaker for the professional development event.
Technology is changing quickly, and many students rely on more than one device simultaneously — a smartphone and laptop or a laptop and tablet, for example.
“Is technology a magic bullet?” Fryer asked. “Absolutely not.”
Investing in technology in and of itself doesn’t guarantee better test scores, he said.
It can, however, be used to help inspire students.
Fryer listed a number of media that teachers may use to help students learn.
Interactive writing allows sharing of electronic texts. In narrated art projects, students draw or take a picture then record the voice with a website to share the voice recording; and a five-photo story is a collection of five photographs that depict a story without any text.
The suggestions allow students to be more involved in the learning.
Fryer told the attendees that there is a war going on against public education in general and teachers in particular. Opponents contend that there are better ways to educate children.
He challenged the teachers for their next parent-teacher conference to have more media to share with parents than they had at the last parent-teacher conference.