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= = =__Special Interest Group: Enhancing Learning with Technology__=

Why is it important to encourage educators to embrace technology, to use it in our classrooms to the best of our abilities, and to make sure we are using it in ways that are effectively enhancing our students' educations? Please take a moment (actually about 7 minutes) to watch the video below. Some of the research may surprise you. Hopefully it encourages you to embrace new technologies that can effectively enhance your curriculum.

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= = =SIG Proposal=

The Special Interest Group for Enhancing Learning with Technology (SIGELT) supports educators who wish to improve learning experiences through effective integration of technology and seeks to develop a resource center for educators using various technologies. SIGELT currently focuses on using CMS and personal response systems but encourages new members to contribute towards other technologies as well. SIGELT’s goal is to collect and disseminate information on these technologies for interested educators. It is the hope of SIGELT to support educators in their pursuit of professional development in uses of educational technologies and to avoid feeling like the gentleman in the above video.

SIGELT has been created in order to enhance learning across the curriculum for K - 12 students and teachers around the globe in both classroom and virtual environments. We are working to help educators learn about: effective use of technologies, improving student achievement with technologies, appropriate uses of technologies to present content and assess students in different contents and grades, and using different technologies with students in the classroom, online, and in varied settings.

Kristen Winter will focus on utilizing CMS in the Elementary School setting. She is researching best practice in the use of CMS to enhance student learning. Within this focus, she will collect online tools for teacher training in the use of CMS, as teacher competency with the technology precedes effective teaching and learning in the classroom. She will share research that investigates the potential of CMS to improve student achievement via improved communication, assessment, and/or collaboration. Her research will also incorporate the potential for CMS to provide a viable back-up plan for international schools that face potential short or long term closure or evacuation.

Fred Hollingshead will also focus on implementing CMS but for a mathematics learning environment. Fred will be examining the use of CMS to supplement a summer school curriculum. As a part of this focus, he will seek, collect, and share resources in support of enhancing learning mathematics by effectively using CMS and training educators on best practices of using CMS successfully. Fred’s inquiry will also investigate multiple content management systems and seek to determine which may be best suited for use for mathematics content.

Brent Atkinson will focus on using a Classroom Performance System to formatively assess his students' learning. He is researching effective uses of this technology using articles published in educational journals and feedback from discussion forums on the topic of CPS use in classrooms. He will be looking for ways to improve his own teaching by the instant analysis of student responses to content based questions. He will also be looking into the availability of funding so that a CPS kit can be purchased exclusively for use in his classroom. Brent also plans to share his findings and classroom successes with his fellow staff members to encourage them to use this technology in their classes, where applicable.

To achieve these efforts, SIGELT will compile its resources, offer annotations for each, and house them on the Resources page. This list will include links to journal articles and scholarly research, discussion forums for technical assistance and best practices, and software developers among others. Interested educators will find the links sorted by the areas of emphasis of our members and the above categories. It is our hope that interested educators find these resources valuable to their professional growth as they seek new and exciting technologies which will enhance the learning environments in which they teach. Our purpose is to help these same educators avoid a similar situation to our 15th century monk friend, who is learning his own "new" technology, in the video below.

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