A Healthy Mix of Reading,Writing and Technology Technology has influenced students’ learning in the following aspects; I. About

A Healthy Mix of Reading, Writing and Technology
    Good morning. Today’s lecture is about the healthy mix of reading, writing and technology in social studies curriculum.
    Although there were many outcomes related to technology use, we see technology only as a tool—that is, the technology allowed for interesting, exciting learning to occur. Today we are mainly going to look at how the technology influenced the students’ reading, writing and using of language.
    Firstly, about students’ reading.
    We learn that if a child cannot read well .that lack of skill is intensified when he or she tries to obtain and process information from the Internet. Webpage developers do not seem to take developing young readers into account. Font sizes, colors and types,the spacing between words,density of text,background graphics and colors,and animated graphics all challenge the less proficient reader. Interestingly, however, (2) children were so motivated by the opportunity to use the technology that they often persevered in decoding text and constructing meaning, beyond what they seemed willing to do when reading from their textbook. When students encountered difficulty reading the information on a webpage, locating information for their journals, or just with navigation, they raised their hands and one of the adults in the room would assist them. It was during these one-on-one help sessions that we realized the causes of the difficulties.
    On the other hand, these same webpage characteristics that were challenging for poor readers were interesting to children who possessed exceptional reading abilities. What they read and viewed excited them, and there were many exclamations of "Cool!""Awesome!"and"Look at this!"from the better readers.
    We also discovered that the Internet allowed students to broaden and deepen their background knowledge and understanding of the content. Students learned much more about the US regions than had previous classes that had gathered information primarily from the textbook. Because they had some choices in which sites they viewed during the WebQuests, these students’ interest was higher than it would have been without that choice.
    Secondly, about writing.
    Overall, we found that the writing component of the project posed the most difficulty for the students. Students struggled with composing complete sentences on the notes pages of their PowerPoint slides. We discovered that the spell-check option of the software was not helpful in all cases, because students’ spellings were sometimes not close enough to produce the correct spelling as an option. PowerPoint, like many word-processing packages,has a feature that enables the software to check spelling as words are typed; misspelled words are then highlighted in some fashion. It was interesting that rather than clicking to access the spell-check, when PowerPoint underlined a word in red, students just made several attempts at spelling the word until the red line disappeared. (4) We believe this is an authentic method of dealing with misspelled words—one that many proficient spellers use frequently.
    Summarizing caused great problems for students. Despite several lessons on how to summarize, most students resorted to copying information, either from their textbooks or from the Internet—which was a challenge, since the website text was sometimes dense and the arrangement of desks and computers in the lab gave students limited space for papers and index cards. We worked individually with students to help them with this summarizing tasks.
    Next,about language development.
    Children were exposed to a wide variety of writing styles on the Internet sites they visited,and these styles were different from what they had experienced in textbooks.
    Through the activity,the children learned vocabulary related to the regions they were studying.
    Children also had many opportunities to use language to communicate. As they completed the WebQuests, they shared information, discussed responses, asked for assistance from one another and from the adults, and chatted about what they were seeing on their computer screens. Students summarized and described what they had seen and read. It was fascinating to discover what different students found important, interesting, or noteworthy about the people, events, and locations they had investigated.
    Finally, about technology itself.
    I believe the children acquired technology skills easily because they were involved in meaningful learning activities. For example, had we attempted to teach the children how to navigate the Web for the sake of navigation, they would not have learned as quickly as they did. In fact, we spent little time on teaching technology skills. We demonstrated just enough for them to get started, and the students then either taught one another,learned on their own by trial and error, or asked one of us when they hit a snag. This proved very effective. (7) We found that the children took a real problem-solving stance with the technology throughout the project. Their motto seemed to be"When in doubt,click on something and see what happens. "
    In summary, (8) the only technology obstacles were those created by the slow speed of the Internet connection in the school, the breakdown of Internet access to the building,and the lack of appropriate tables on which to use the computers,write,and arrange materials.
    For those who are interested in integrating technology into their curriculum, I offer some advice hoping that others may learn from the insights.
    No. 1 ,when undertaking Internet-based activities,a high-speed Internet con-nection is essential.
    No. 2, do not spend much time teaching children how to navigate the Web. Instead,let those who have experience with the Internet sit by those who need help.
    No. 3, spend lots of time teaching the literacy skills necessary for completing Internet-based activities.
    No.4,evaluate children’s process and product.
    No. 5 , provide time for discussion after the lessons have been completed.
    To sum up,in the above lecture we talked about how to make it a healthy mix of reading,writing and technology in social studies curriculum. And we also give some advice in the hope that they will help in your everyday study. Thanks for your listening.