One of my focuses now moves to talking about what makes learning better – not the technology tool, but rather the situation/experience for the learning to happen. Sure technology can take it to a new level, but the focus has to remain on the learning.
I just finished an introductory workshop on Marzano’s What Works in Classrom Instruction. The focus was on technology tools to support the 9 strategies, but the key is the 9 strategies:
- Identifying similarities and differences
Summarizing and note taking
Reinforcing effort and providing recognition
Homework and practice
Nonlinguistic representations
Cooperative learning
Setting goals and providing feedback
Generating and testing hypotheses
Activating prior knowledge
I’m not sure yet how, but I’m thinking the focus of some posting here is going to focus on these, as they are about the learning, and not the technology.