Teaching in the Digital Age

I am working to better understand technology in the classroom. I know that it is important and can help students learn but I still struggle to use it effectively. I had previously viewed most of the material presented and still struggle to understand how to make use of the technologies that exist.

My issue is not accepting that they are important but instead figuring out how to make the best use of them. I have blogs for my classes but do not use them much because students do not participate when I do. Some times the blogs are blocked from school which presents another challenge.

Also whenever I allow students to use computers they "multitask" but seems to get more socializing done than classwork. I feel that they are not efficient multitaskers in my class and would like to be able to get them to work better when given technology to work with.