I’m sure it’s been written about before, and I’m sure I’m not the first to feel like this needs to be stated.  Nevertheless, I have to say it.

When talking with educators about using technology in schools, I’m constantly confused by the notion that SmartBoards–or other interactive white boards–are the epitome of integrating technology in schools.

The question that needs to be asked is not, “What ’stuff’ are you using in your classroom to integrate technology?” but “What thinking skills are you using in your instruction, and what technology are you using to support it?”

In essence, SmartBoards are an evolved form of a blackboard, whiteboard, or even overhead projector.  I think most would agree that presenting information is not the same as getting kids to manipulate and process information in new and meaningful ways. So using a SmartBoard with its galleries of visual tools is an example of using technology to enhance the presentation of material, but doesn’t do much for getting kids to think differently about the content they’re meant to be learning.

With that said, SmartBoards certainly have their benefits for teachers.  And for teachers who already provide activities that actively engage students in high level thinking skills, the SmartBoard can serve to enhance their work.  What troubles me is the assumption that the presence of a SmartBoard and ceiling mounted projector transforms a classroom into a model thinking environment.

I had a long commute today and had the opportunity to catch up on some past podcasts by The Tech Teachers (I can’t remember which episode, but it was in the late 30s or early 40s). One of the topics discussed was downplaying an emphasis on handwriting and focusing more on typing and computer skills.  Ray and Hollye agreed that handwriting, specifically printing, should be taught at the elementary grades, but that students also need to be focusing on typing.  During their conversation I got the sense that this is seen by some as an ‘either or’ scenario, and the question of whenone should be taught or downplayed came up.  For me the answer to this question comes from watching technology grow, what I know about neurodevelopmental weaknesses in some students, and a belief in student choice and differentiation.

First, it comes from the wave of the future argument that says students should be typing because computers are the wave of the future and they won’t be using much handwriting.  As far as I’m concerned, the wave of the future is no longer about the future.  The only thing holding students back from going full force with computers as their main means of writing is the availability of them in the classroom, and adults with a TTWWADI outlook on using technology in education.  In fact, I once heard a teacher state that she was fearful that society would suffer due to a lack of handwritten thank-you notes.

The simple fact is that computers are here, they’ve been here a long time, and they’re not going away.  And unless you’re using a Tablet PC, handwriting is not the most commonly form of computer interface.

My second thought is that some students have serious neurodevelopmental weaknesses in what Dr. Mel Levine refers to as graphomotor function (simply stated, the physical and mental ability to write with a pencil or pen).  As simple as that sounds, it’s no simple task.  Handwriting requires students to formulate language in their minds, access their memories for the rules of sentence structure and language, access their memories for the formation of letters, hold these rules and the language in their minds, and get their hands and fingers to move in such a way that all of these things get onto the paper in a legible and comprehensible manner.  While this becomes automatic for many people, any weakness in a person’s ability to use rules, receive feedback through the writing implement, juggle their memory, or to form language not only makes writing non-automatic, but painful and embarrassing. 

So the question becomes: Why on earth do we force students to do something that is physically and emotionally harrowing when typing (or creating a podcast…) may be a more viable option?

If we take differentiated instruction into account, perhaps there is no right answer for saying when handwriting or typing ought to be taught.  If we believe in finding strategies to help all students succeed in school by modifying content, process, or product then student choice and preference may be the answer to when typing or handwriting should be used. 

That is, go ahead and teach handwriting in the primary grades, but please expose students to computers so they become keyboard users as well.  And when a student begins to demonstrate a strength or preference in one or the other, cultivate it.  If he’s a pencil and paper kid, Tablet PCs may be just his cup of tea when it comes to technology.  If she’s a keyboard user, then by all means let her type the paper.  If a student has difficulty with both, keep offering them exposure and practice, but let him or her create a podcast of their report.

As for the thank you notes?  I don’t know about you, but as much as I like getting a letter in my postal mailbox, I also like to get an e-card delivered to my inbox now and again.

For a while the difference between blogs and wikis has been apparent to me, but the purpose behind each on in education has taken some time for me to work out.  I think the key is really seeing great examples of each medium and going from there.

Wikis, for me, are pretty exciting because they are truly a blank slate or playground for developing content and building on that content.  When I think about Wikipedia and other wikis, it reminds me of the game “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon.”  If you’re not familiar with the game, the challenge is to think of an actor and try to link him/her to Kevin Bacon through their roles in movies and their relationships with other actors.  The idea is that any actor can be eventually linked to Kevin Bacon even though the two may not have ever been in a movie together.  In the end it paints a picture of interconnectedness.

As it applies to Wikipedia and wikis, the degrees are all there for you (albiet more than six degrees).  In school we tend to think of things in isolation.  For example, math and science are dealt with in isolation with some overlap, but in looking up an entry about gravity I can click on mass then kilograms, then SI Base Unit, then second, and then see a table of conversions from minutes to seconds.  The degrees of separation from math to science are there, but rather than separation it comes across as interconnectedness between two content areas we typically view as individual.

The potential of any wiki is that–all though it needn’t–it could eventually meet the goal of Wikipedia…. to catalog–and interconnect?–the whole of human knowledge.  If there’s any power in a wiki, it’s the power of growth and making otherwise opaque relationships apparent.

A blog is often defined as a website.  Just a website.  And in looking at the seemingly endless examples of websites referred to as blogs, this may not be an inaccurate description.  Examples of sites calling themselves blogs range from diary entries, homework posting, logs of the foods people eat, and displays of photographs or other artwork.  Although these sites are undoubtedly ’web logs,’ they lack the act of blogging and are not truly blogs.

Blogging is what makes a blog a blog.  Blogging is interactive, thoughtful, and taps into higher thinking skills like synthesis, analysis, and questioning as opposed to less challenging skills like simple logging or listing.  Blogging is a volley of ideas in which opinions are stated in response to other opinions, and then reformed or reasserted in response to responses.  Blogging allows anyone to become an ameteur journalist seeking the truth behind whatever it is they’re pondering, and yet it goes beyond traditional, static journalism because ’letters to the editor’ are immediately published in the form of comments to a given post. 

Although evidence of blogging is shown only through posting or commenting, the act of reading a blog or other piece of information and silently reflecting on it is the first step to blogging.  I heard it stated that “Blogging starts with reading,” and that is absolutely the truth.

In reading Will Richardson’s book, Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts, and Other Powerful Web Tools for Classrooms, blogging as it’s own form of thinking and writing was clearly illustrated.  Richardson offers a continuum of blogging that mirrors the progression of Bloom’s Taxonomy.  Low level blogging–which really isn’t blogging at all–aligns with the simple knowledge level of Blooms Taxonomy, while higher forms of thinking such as analysis, evaluation, and synthesis are represented in points 7 and 8 of Richardson’s continuum.

What Richardson does even more effectively is in explaining other critical features of the blogging.  One can’t ignore that blogging is an Internet-based activity, and that a post without links out to others’ thoughts and ideas isn’t as high a form of blogging as posting thoughtful writing without links.  Blogging transcends writing essays or commentaries, because it provides for immediate reference checks and the ability to see first-hand what the blogger is referring to.

As blogging evolves, the language around it needs to become more specific.  When visiting a random blog at technorati or blogpulse think about whether the blog is actually a product of blogging, or just another website with a list of information.