Lesson Planning
• Multiple ICT Tools ICT learning design has to take these basic factors into consideration: visual, audio, oral, writing and thinking stimulation. With the help of ICT, a teacher can present the knowledge through a few different media, thus students can draw upon their individually stronger intelligence(s) to relate to their prior knowledge and experience so as to reach the goal of understanding the new knowledge.
Mastery of a concept or theory requires repeated exposure to that material: one almost never achieves instant understanding. But it is a mistake to present the same content in the same way. Understanding is far more likely to be achieved if the student encounters the material in a variety of guises and contexts. And the best way to bring this about is to draw on all of the intelligences that are relevant to that topic in as many legitimate ways as possible (Gardner, 2006, p. 60).
What will bring individualized education to the fore are powerful computer programs. Once it has been demonstrated that algebra can be taught three or even thirty ways, it will be malpractice to declare “Johnny could not learn algebra my way— bring me another child.”(Gardner, 2006, p. 57).
Thus, various ICT tools should be utilised in a lesson plan, which will include visual and audio tools, such as digital camera, interactive whiteboards, virtual online sites etc. Teachers should try to use image, music, video clipping, games and other methods to convey the meaning of the targeted information. For the teachers, ICT tools will make up for our disadvantage fields. If we are not musically intelligent, we can rely on ICT tools to deliver a nice piece of music work and if we are not linguistically intelligent, ICT tools can also ‘patch it up’ for us.
• Contents
With the assist of ICT tools, teachers should focus on content of each unit planning. The planning should be: cognitive, stimulating and interactive.
Cognitive – use ICT tools to draw upon students’ prior knowledge and experience. Use ICT tool as a media for students to reflect upon their existing knowledge and experiences relating with the targeting knowledge.
Stimulating – teachers should make the content stimulating and engaging. The material created by the ICT tools should be able to catch students’ attention as well as be informative. The truth is that we learn better when we are engaged. With the support of ICT, we can achieve a high level of engagement.
The kids will master systems ten times more complex than algebra, understand systems ten times more complex than the simple economics we require of them, and read far above their grade level—when the goals are worth it to them.(Prensky, Educause Review, September/October 2005)
Interactive – students should be able to interact with the material, the teacher as well as the peers. By completing different task supported by ICT, students also learn how to express their ideas, listen to other students’ opinion, debating and negotiating.
Lesson Implementing
When implementing a lesson, always take into consideration that certain students will respond to certain material more quickly and positively. Thus ICT tools should never be used to ‘serve’ a certain group of students. It should be used to close such gaps among students while at the same time catering for special needs as well.
Lesson Assessing
According to Howard Gardner, author of Multiple Intelligence, under certain assessing system, students who are more linguistically and logical-mathematically intelligent will achieve better scores. Most schools throughout history have been uniform schools: students are taught the same things in the same way and are assessed in equally similar manner. This approach is seen as fair—after all, everyone is being treated equal. Yet, as I have pointed out, this approach is fundamentally unfair. It privileges those who have strong linguistic and logical-mathematical intelligences, whereas it makes school difficult for the many among us who exhibit somewhat different intellectual profiles. An individual-cantered education is not one that is self-centered or narcissistic. Rather, it is an education that takes the differences among individuals very seriously. Educators attempt to learn as much as they can about the learning strengths and proclivities of each student. As far as possible, educators make use of this information to craft the optimal education for each child (Gardner, 2006, p. 56).
Therefore, we should use ICT to create various assessing system. Assessment should be more than an orally presentation or pen-to-paper tests. Instead, we should use various assessing methods. Students will be allowed to show teachers how much they have learned and how deep their knowledge is by using all kinds of ICT tools. It will also help teachers to gain a clearer idea about the students’ knowledge structure, assess them better and also to improve their own teaching in future.
Special Needs
ICT will also cater for students’ early professional education. Teacher will be able to design and carry out special lessons for individuals who wish to advance their knowledge and skills, those who are still ‘hungry’ after going through the daily school lessons. I recommend some degree of specialization during middle childhood—roughly from the ages of eight to fourteen. While children are mastering the crucial literacies, they should have the opportunity to attain significant levels of skill in a small number of domains: perhaps, on average, in one art form, one area of physical training, and one or two scholastic subject (Gardner, 2006, p. 131)
ICT also makes the learning and teaching free from the restraints of time and space. Thus the learning and teaching will not be affected for those living in remote areas. The Centre for Educational Multimedia (http://newmediaresearch.educ.monash.edu.au/exemplar/HomePage/home.php) clearly shows how successful learning and teaching can be once we can move education out of classroom and bring it into the digital world.
Concerns
While putting any online interactive work into our planning, we should be aware about whether or not all of our students will be able to access the internet. Although ICT can positively assisting learning and teaching, we should also be aware that certain ICT, when not implementing properly, might draw students’ attention to the technology itself rather than the content.
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