In my current teaching environment my 27 fourth grade students are in my classroom set up in desks that are in groups in order to aide in collaboration. There is a Smart Board at the front of the room where all lessons are taught in one way or another. Usually my lessons have specific slides that correspond with the information we are learning about. I always post scanned pictures of the pages they are looking at in their workbooks and can point to exact numbers or problems when giving directions. Although my school, students, and I are embracing the Smart Board Technology as a central focus we are still using workbooks, textbooks, teacher made packets, supplemental worksheets for practice, and traditional assessments.
In 2025 I hope that teaching spaces will look even more technologically driven and centered. Students should be guiding their own discoveries and use inquiry based differentiated instruction with the support of a teacher as a facilitator. I think the learning spaces will look less like rows of desks and more like tables designed to be collaborative work spaces instead of individual desks with folders holding all of their loose papers and school supplies. Students would each have a laptop or iPad to work on and use to do simulations, research, writing, and reading during school time. Thinking is encouraged, has endless amounts of freedom, and is not confined to the walls of the classroom.
The main aspect of my current environment that I would keep is the sense of community within the classroom. I plan to never lose the quality teaching that exists when telling the students of the importance that respect, kindness, empathy, and other character building traits can have on their lives. With the technology driven collaborative classrooms, students being able to work together and respect each other in group work will be more important than ever.
One aspect of my classroom I would change is the use of paper/worksheets. I use so many different worksheets in order to give the students additional practice. I know that I can use my Smart Board or computers in order to get this practice in, but my struggle is in the assessment of that practice. It is necessary for me to be constantly assessing the practice that we do in Math for example and all of my “checkpoint” assessments cannot be graded as easily at this point in my classroom through technology. Right now I am able to collect the work, grade it, and then use it in order to guide further instruction. If I had the Smart Board remotes I could see how easily I could do checkpoints throughout the units to check understanding. It is my hope to get rid of all of the paper that I am constantly filing through and having to store and then recycle throughout the school year.
The changes I see happening could affect teachers, administrators, and learners in the sense that there will be a period of time when the changes need to be adapted to. Everyone will need to get used to the changes and figure out what works for them and what will not. Each individual will have to be constantly assessing their performance and learning throughout the whole process. I think this change will be positive for everyone involved, but the process of getting used to it will be what some will struggle with. In my experience teachers do not even like to find out their math or spelling curriculum is changing, so how will they react to a much larger change?
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