EDLD 5364 Week 2

This week was a very good week for me. I was able to meet up with my group members and at first I think there was a lot of confusion on what was expected of us. When we met the second time we were able to get everything planned out for the most part and we finally had direction to what our goal was for the project. After the web conference I was finally able to understand what was expected of us for the project and go from there. As far as the readings were concerned, I am very excited about the Using Technology with Classroom Instruction that Works. I was able to find a few websites from the first chapter that will be beneficial for our group project and sites I can use in my own classroom getting students prepared for TAKS. I even browsed through ahead to the second chapter which is rare since I am not one who enjoys reading. I am the type that does not want an explanation just let me jump in to it and figure things out for myself. I blame wanting interactive technology, but I know I can't use that excuse. The rest of the readings were ok, a lot of it I thought was common sense. As far as lower socioeconomic groups responding to using technology and parental involvement is a no brainer. The only concern I have is that if every classroom on campus decides to integrate as much technology as possible that it would be impossible to do so since we only have so many labs and mobile carts available. I like the activities with www.explorelearning.com, but I know that if I advertise this to all of the math teachers then I will not be able to let my students have constant access to try something new. To me this is a major problem that will not get better as purchasing enough computers will be even more difficult to do due to budget cuts. Our district for instance is losing over $200,000 of grants just for technology. That is a big chunk of change. I do think trying to integrate technology will be a big improvement but trying to make it happen is once again the challenge. I hear a lot of great ideas but trying to make it happen seems to be a topic that nobody wants to address.