ISTE Standards and Elementary Curriculum

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Permalink Reply by Miss Mahoney on November 7, 2008 at 12:02pm

I'd like to hear how to do this too. Our school doesn't teach these to elementary students and I would like to formulate a curriculum or push in course to teach basic computing skills to students. I teach students with learning disabilities who often cannot spell, but it seems impossible to find the time to teach them keyboarding skills (and therefore spellcheck) when there is no time that they can "miss" in the classroom or want to "miss" during recess, PE or Special Area.

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Permalink Reply by Bill Brennan on November 7, 2008 at 8:15pm

Hi Miss Mahoney,
I hope that this thread gets some action from our audience. I think this is a huge part of what we do as educators. We constantly have to re-align our curriculum to meet new standards. We are looking at designing a program that is directly tied to the district curriculum standards and will also integrate the ISTE standards.
Bill

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Permalink Reply by Kris Vassos on November 8, 2008 at 4:08am

I'm a K-4 elementary technology teacher for two schools who goes into the classroom to teach the skills that you've listed above. Our district's program has been in a constant state of flux as we try to find the best solution for teaching skills while also integrating with the curriculum.

The hardest skill to teach is keyboarding since it requires so much practice. As a result, I'm only able to do a quick introduction, but this year I've asked the parents to help me out by explaining what students need to do to be successful and asking them to sit with their children as they practice. Although I know I haven't reached all the students, I've heard from both parents and students that they are practicing. We'll see.

The other skills, such as word processing, spreadsheets, podcasting, etc., I've embedded within the regular classroom curriculum and are taught as students complete their projects. Teachers are pleased when they don't lose time for "computers" and content area is being supported through a different means. It works best when the technology teacher can work with the classroom teacher at least a couple of times a week. This helps to keep continuity with the curriculum being studied and creates more meaningful, engaging lessons.

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Permalink Reply by Bill Brennan on November 21, 2008 at 5:37pm

Kris,
Thank you for your response. This is exactly what we are looking for.
Bill

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Permalink Reply by Maddy on November 8, 2008 at 6:04am

While we do have a lab at my school, we also push the technology into the classrooms through special projects and laptops. Keyboarding takes place in the classroom with reinforcement in the lab, if time allows. The addition of IWB (coming to 10 classrooms in December) will give us an excellent way to teach with technology. Check out my blog for ideas and projects.

http://heightstechnology.edublogs.org

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Permalink Reply by Bill Brennan on November 10, 2008 at 6:24am

Maddy,
Thank you for sharing. I really like your blog and will share with my staff.
Bill

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Permalink Reply by Dawn on November 22, 2008 at 11:46am

I am at a K-5 elementary. We are just finishing up the Enhancing Education Through Technology grant funding. We do total push-in for technology. We just finished writing a technology scope and sequence/curriculum for our teachers. I will upload the file. (I put up both 2007 Excel and pdf.) I am interested in any comments anyone might have.
Based on info from the computer teacher at the middle school, we have decided to start teaching keyboarding at second grade. The students will do this during on of the center times they have during our guided reading program. We are looking into a Garfield program as well as a Keyboarding program published by ISTE. The teachers are responsible teaching the technology within the regular curriculum. The technology aid provides support as needed, more so with troubleshooting than anything else at this point. We only have her for two and one-half days.

Attachments:

• Technology Curriculum.xlsx, 16 KB
• Technology Curriculum.pdf, 294 KB

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Permalink Reply by Kim Thomas on January 4, 2010 at 10:08am

We are getting ready to write a tech curr for 5-8 in our (K-8) district and am very appreciative of the information you all have provided. Once we get done (this summer) I will be sure to post our final work for all.

Thanks,

Kim T.
Phoenix AZ

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Permalink Reply by Jonathan Wylie on January 4, 2010 at 9:14pm

Thanks for sharing. I like your organization and skill choices. What are the I, D and M letters for?

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Permalink Reply by Michelle Hapich on March 4, 2010 at 5:39pm

I'm sure I should let Dawn respond to this, but we used to use these letters in our old curriculum charts. They stood for Introduce, Develop, and Master for each skill.

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