Using Environmental Education as a Foundation for Training Teacher Candidates in the Integration of Learner Centered Technology into Classroom Lessons Jana Willis, Ph.D. University of Houston-Clear Lake United States of America
[email protected] Brenda Weiser, Ed.D. University of Houston – Clear Lake United States of America
[email protected] Janice Meyer, Ph.D. University of Houston – Clear Lake United States of America
[email protected]
Abstract: Teacher education programs need to move teacher candidates beyond simple technology skill acquisition to a more advanced level where they are able to apply teaching methods that facilitate technology integration in their classrooms. Teacher candidates are often introduced to technology training early in their teacher education programs where they are provided with instruction that focuses primarily on software applications. This practice often leads to technology use that is isolated from content, methodology and pedagogy. Teacher candidates need technology training that supports student-centered integration in curriculum areas that can be replicated in their future classrooms. Teacher candidates need to work with a model curriculum that supports a variety of technologies. Using Project Learning Tree and environmental education (EE), provides teacher candidates with an opportunity to work with standards based curriculum. This approach offers teacher candidates an opportunity to work with curriculum that crosses grade levels and content areas, promotes and supports the development of well planned technology-rich lessons and classroom activities while infusing EE into their daily lessons. Introduction The central proof of a teacher’s ability to effectively integrate technology within the curriculum is the development and delivery of classroom lesson plans that integrate technology. (Kajs, Underwood, Coppenhaver, Driskell, Crawford, 2001). Teachers entering today’s classrooms often feel unprepared to create technology-rich lessons that support student-learning processes despite technology training. Technology training obtained during their teacher education programs often were limited to the "how to" components of technology applications rather than the use of student-centered technology to support lesson objectives. Training in the use of student-centered technology that support lesson mastery or provides evidence of mastery is essential if teachers are going to bring technology into the classroom as an effective learning tool for students. Typically, technology education for teacher candidates has been to teach them computer skills leaving the application in the classroom to their own initiative. (Mayo, Kajs, Tanguma, 2005). Training programs often fail to model appropriate use of technology and do not incorporate the use of technology across the curriculum. The focus is placed on low-end applications (e.g., drill and practice, word processing) while ignoring more sophisticated tools that can integrate realistic problem-solving activities into the classroom (Abdal-Haqq, 1995; OTA, 1995). While classroom technology training enables teachers to build skills and confidence they often fall short in teaching strategies to integrate technology to
supports a learner-centered curriculum Today’s teacher preparation programs must take the initiative to design and develop effective technology training programs that provide teacher candidates with the skills and knowledge necessary to develop learner-centered technology use in the curriculum. Effective technology training must focus on more than basic technology skills and strive to provide teachers with models that offer opportunities to practice integration with a curriculum that can be adapted to their classrooms (Willis & Cifuentes, 2004). Teacher candidates are often enrolled in technology training courses early in their certification programs and therefore have no prior experience in integrating technology into students’ learning processes resulting in a lack of models on which to build their own visions of an integrated classroom (Beichner, 1993; Cifuentes, 1997; Kerr, 1996; Schrum, 1999; Strudler & Wetzel, 1999). To meet this need teacher preparation programs must take the initiative to design and develop effective technology training courses that provide teacher candidates with the skills and knowledge necessary to develop technology rich curriculum that enhances student learning processes. The University of Houston – Clear Lake (UHCL)/ PT3 Collaborative using Project Learning Tree (PLT), an environmental education (EE) curriculum, built a reproducible technology-training model that helped foster the development of classroom lessons (guided by standards) that effectively incorporated technology to enhance student learning processes. EE is interdisciplinary and easily incorporated throughout the curriculum in any grade. EE encompasses math, language arts, social studies, and communication skills making the curriculum. Approximately two-thirds of elementary and secondary teachers include environmental issues in their curriculum (Elder, 2003). Unfortunately, the training teachers receive to teach the subject correctly is limited (Ramey-Gassert, 1997; Robertson, 2001). Administrators, school boards, and state governments often do not require EE and do not provide the needed training for implementing EE. In a recent study, one-forth of teachers surveyed reported having an environmental science or ecology course during their preservice training; one-third reported inservice training in these areas (Elder, 2003). Students are not achieving environmental literacy due to this lack of support. How can children become scientifically literate when their teachers lack the training to be scientifically literate themselves? The model offered teacher candidates and their field-based mentors an opportunity to work collaboratively in student-centered technology rich learning environments using a standards based curriculum. The model used a variety of instructional delivery methods to provide the students and field-based mentors hands-on experience with the emerging technologies that were available for the classroom. The products produced during training provided students and field-based mentors with working models that could be transferred to the classroom. During training teacher candidates were presented with best practice cross-curriculum lesson plans, developed by PLT, that were aligned to state standards but lacking in integrated technology components. The teacher candidate was guided through the lesson plan process with the aid of a WebQuest that enabled the candidate to explore and analyze web-based resources that supported the content and lesson objective. The candidates were to identify and integrate a web-based technology component they believed would enhance the learning process. The WebQuest activity also provided the candidates with links to state content and technology standards. In addition the teacher candidates were directed to resources related to assistive/adaptive technologies that would enable them to meet the needs of diverse learners in their classroom. The Study The purpose of this study was to determine the impact of a foundational curriculum on teacher candidates’ ability to integrate learner-centered technologies that supported mastery of the lesson objective or provided student created products for use in the assessment of mastery. The study was conducted during a semester long technology-training course designed to prepare teacher candidates to use technologies to support their teaching and enhance student learning. The results of this study will provide invaluable information for teacher education programs in the area of technology integration. The Course
The encouraging results of the UHCL/PT3 training model prompted the integration of the model into the technology integration course required by all teacher candidates enrolled at UHCL. INST 3133:Computer Use in the Classroom, a core undergraduate-level course offered by the School of Education at the University of Houston – Clear Lake (UHCL), was developed to introduce teacher candidates to the tools and skills necessary to understand and operate computers, navigate the Internet and World Wide Web, and create a variety of multimedia products. The course included educational applications of instructional and information technologies that promoted the integration of technology into the curriculum. Emphasis was on the comprehensive integration and implementation of the Technology Applications Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (Texas Education Agency, 2001) as required for all beginning teachers in Texas, and those tools that have important implications for the creation of products with the specified technologies. Teacher candidates gained experience in the educational use of such technologies as productivity tools, presentation graphics, multimedia, and telecomputing technologies. The PK-12 teacher candidates enrolled in all six sections of the undergraduate level INST 3133:Computer Use in Classrooms course at University of Houston – Clear Lake made up the research pool. Three of the six sections were selected to use Project Learning Tree, an environmental education curriculum, to support their integration projects. The PK-12 teacher candidates in the other three sections were instructed to select their own curriculum based on their certification grade levels and content areas. The Method The teacher candidates in all six sections were required to develop mini-lesson plans for each technology application covered in the course. The applications included Word Processing/Desktop Publishing, Internet/WebQuests, Graphics, Spreadsheets, Databases, Storyboarding/Concept Mapping and Presentation software. The mini-lesson format was based the University of Houston-Clear Lake/PT3 Lesson Plan Template (see Appendix A). The University of Houston-Clear Lake (UHCL) in partnership with eight rural and urban school districts in the Houston, Texas area, called the UHCL Collaborative developed the lesson plan template and associated rubric as part of a Preparing Tomorrow’s Teachers to Use Technology (PT3) capacity building grant. The mini-lesson format included the lesson objective, assessment, standards alignment for content and technology, adaptations for special populations and materials. Each mini-lesson was scored using the criteria for each of those components as noted on the UHCL/PT3 Lesson Plan Rubric (see Appendix B). The mini-lesson plan components were individually scored and summed for a composite score. The mini-lessons were scored initially by the course section instructor and then by two external evaluators. The external evaluators were graduate students with classroom experience. Mean scores for each lesson plan were calculated based on the three assessments. Course level and group level summary scores were calculated for the purpose of this report (see Table 1). The Results The results of the six-section course study indicated that teacher candidates are better able to use technology as a tool for supporting lesson mastery or to provide an assessment artifact when provided with a foundational curriculum during early technology skill training. Lesson plans created by candidates using the foundational curriculum indicated a stronger focus on the lesson objective with technology as a tool than those candidates who selected their own curriculum. Candidates using their choice of curriculum frequently focused the lesson on the acquisition of technology skills as a component of the lesson objective. Table 1 Mini – Lesson Plan Scores Across Groups Group EE Curriculum (3 sections) Self-Selected Curriculum (3 sections)
Discussion
N 87 84
Mean (across sections) 9.010219 7.974942
sd (within sections) .51 .54
Recommendations from this study will contribute to the future development of an effective model of teacher training in technology integration This study will add to the existing literature on effective training in technology integration by focusing on the use of curriculum based technology integration training. “Cookie cutter” courses that focus on basic skills and application training will not enable the transfer of skills from the training environment to the classroom. Frequent modeling of technology-enhanced instruction directly related to the classroom curriculum would better facilitate transfer of technology skills and use (Studler & Wetzel, 1999). Training for technology integration must incorporate in its structure the instructional methods and classroom curriculum that facilitate technology integration. Training in the integration of technology that is a combination of both integration and skills training is more beneficial than basic technology skills training alone, but technology training that is aligned with the curriculum and relevant to what teachers do in the classroom is most effective (Trotter, 1999). References Abdal-Haqq, I. (1995). Professional development schools: A directory of projects in the United States (2nd ed.). Washington, DC: American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education. ED 391 778. Beichner,R.J. (1993). Technology competencies for new teachers: Issues and suggestions. Journal of Computing in Teacher Education, 11(2), 17-20. Cifuentes, L. (1997). From sages to guides: A professional development study. Journal of Technology and Teacher Education. 5(1), 67-77. Elder, J.L. (2003). A field guide to environmental literacy: Making strategic investments in environmental education. Environmental Education Coalition. Kajs, L. T., Underwood, D., Coppenhaver, A., Driskell, T. L., & Crawford, C.M. (2001). The integration of technology into classroom lessons in the teacher preparation program at the University of Houston-Clear lake: In J.D. Price, D.A. Willis, N. Davis & J. Willis (Ed.), Proceedings of the SITE 2001 Annual - Society for Information Technology and Teacher Education, 2001, Charlottesville, VA: Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education (AACE), 1984-1989. Mayo, N. B., Kajs, L. T., & Tanguma, J. (2005). Longitudinal study of technology training to prepare future teachers. Educational Research Quarterly, 29(1), 3-15. Office of Technology Assessment (1995). Teachers & technology: Making the connection. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office. Ramey-Gassert, L. (1997). Learning science beyond the classroom. The Elementary School Journal, 97, 433-450. Robertson, W. C. (2001). Community connections for science education: Building successful partnerships. Volume I. Arlington, VA: National Science Teachers Association Press. Schrum,L.(1999). Technology professional development for teachers. Educational Technology Research and Development, 47(4), 83-90. Strudler, N. & Wetzel, K. (1999). Lessons from exemplary colleges of education: factors affecting technology integration in preservice programs. Educational Technology Research and Development, 47(4), 63-81. Trotter, A. (1999). “Preparing teachers for the digital age.” Education Week, 19, 37-43. Willis, J. M., & Cifuentes, L. (2004). Moving beyond the training environment to a
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