Thursday, March 13, 2014

Journal Post #8

How Can Teachers Use Email or Text messaging to foster information exchanges with and among students?

One of the biggest goals of effective teaching has to do with the teacher being able to effectively communicate with his/her students. Throughout my educational years in the public school system, this was accomplished through face-to-face action. Of course, I'm talking twenty years ago. Presently communication between teacher and student is done via many technological devices, such as cell phones, computers, ipads, etc. A very big part of effective teacher-student relationship will always have its basis in communication and collaboration. What better way to maintain that foundational flow of connection between teacher and student then in the use of social media.

With the demands in education, the amount of time allotted in the day to accomplish your lesson along with the size of a classroom, educators are needing more assistance to help aid their students in the learning processes. Sending home countless papers in a day can be overwhelming both for the teacher and the student, so teachers have to be able to use other resources in order to effectively and proficiently communicate with their students. Furthermore, students have to be able to provide feedback to their teachers in a timely manner. Today, the usage of emailing or text messaging provides that type of connection between the teacher and his/her students. However, this can be a difficult journey for those who struggle with new technologies. Many times teachers need more technology training in order for them to effectively communicate in technologies with their students.




 





























Photo Credit to Flickr: mgehly


During classroom time, the communication between teacher and student will be synchronous. This type of communication usually involves real time or face-to-face connection. The usage of cell phone and texting could also be a part of this type of communication. There is also asynchronous communication. This type of communication usually consists of emails, text messaging, or blogs, all which require a period of delay before information is passed over from teacher to student. Both forms of communication are used by teachers to provide information to students.  (Maloy, Verock-O'Loughlin, Edwards, & Woolf, 2014) 

Tech Tool: 
The commercially available website called TaskStream is a type of program the allows users to create many features and functions.

Summary & Connection:
In the past two decades, many strides have been taking by those in the field of education to lessen the communication gap between teachers and their students. Classrooms are no longer controlled by teachers who simply give long lectures and students who sit idly and misbehave. Teachers are beginning to utilize modern technology in order to be able to effectively communicate with their students. With the ever evolving cell phone and computer, we can only suspect that the teachers' expectations to consistently and effectively communicate with their students through emailing and text messaging, will only get better.

Resources:

Edwards, S., Maloy, R., Verock-O'Loughlin, R.E., & Woolf, B.  (2014) Transforming Learning with New Technologies, Boston, Massachuettes: Pearson


























1 comment:

  1. The demand for communication and connection these days really does demand different tools. The more you can use, depending on appropriate relevancy, the better chance you will have for completing the message 'loop' - and there is definitely the need for training on some of these...not only in the 'how to' but also in the 'do it ethically and with privacy rights appreciated.'

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