Tech Trends - Industry Articles

Technology as a core curriculum - Is K-5 too early?

Ask any parent and they will tell you that their 5-10 year old is quite savvy on the DVD player. This same child can take superior photos using the family digital camera, and has no problems calling home on the cell phone.

The children in many families are the resource for getting any new technology to work. The instinct to feel comfortable and empowered with technology is a key survival skill for the next generation. In order to be able to succeed in school, in commerce, and ultimately in daily life, people must be able to not only use skills they are taught to complete known tasks, but forge ahead with new ideas and trends.

In order to meet these challenges, educators are introducing Technology as a core curriculum early in the education process. There are few who would argue that knowing how to work a computer, understanding the basic components of a computer, and knowing how to use the basic applications to complete tasks, are essential skills for any student. The issue is whether mandating technology education as early as Kindergarten is essential, and if not, at what level should technology education be required as part of a core curriculum.

Supporting the argument of early inclusion is the belief that the earlier students have a fundamental understanding of how to use a computer and the basic applications, the sooner they can apply these to learning in all curriculum areas.

Technology is a tool, a life skill. The sooner students are taught these concepts and skills, the better chance they will have for success in all subject areas. The National Education Technology Standard project is working to develop a set of national standards for technology education at the elementary level.

http://cnets.iste.org/ As stated on their Web site, "The primary goal of the ISTE NETS Project is to enable stakeholders in PreK-12 education to develop national standards for educational uses of technology that facilitate school improvement in the United States. The NETS Project will work to define standards for students, integrating curriculum technology, technology support, and standards for student assessment and evaluation of technology use."

Many states, such as Texas, http://www.tea.state.tx.us/rules/tac/ch126toc.html, California http://www.eteaca.org/etea/techstandards/standards.htm, and Louisiana http://www.doe.state.la.us/DOE/lcet/curric/k12stand.asp, have created curriculum technology standards for their elementary schools. According to the National Education Technology Standards, 45 of 51 States have adopted or referenced some form of technology standards as of March 2003. http://cnets.iste.org/docs/States_using_NETS.pdf

There are many benefits to learning the skills based on a set of standards.

The Growing with Technology text books, www.course.com/growing in the Shelly Cashman Series published by Course Technology, Thomson were designed to address the need of teaching the fundamentals of computing, keyboarding, and basic applications (word processing, drawing graphics, presentation software, spreadsheet, and database) in an easy-to-use, grade-level appropriate format.

Careful planning went into the organization and design of the series. Each chapter is divided into short lessons that teach a specific concept or skill. These lessons build upon each other within the chapter and conclude with an assessment component that reinforces the skills presented.

Chapters map across all levels in the series to facilitate curriculum development. Each level adds new concepts or skills, but every level addresses the needs of the novice learner. There are no prior assumptions of knowledge in any book. Higher levels teach more complex skills however, they are designed to include the elementary skills and concepts. Later chapters in any of the books do not require that students apply knowledge not taught in previous chapters of that level.

Chapter 1 introduces basic computer terms and concepts. It is essential that students begin their technology education by learning correct terms and functions of each part of the computer. The benefits that a text provides are that all the terms are defined and placed in context. There are several hands-on lessons to teach how to use input and output devices and basic file management.

Once the foundation is set, students move on to Chapter 2 to learn proper keyboarding. Keyboarding is essential to be able to complete the lessons in Chapters 3-7. The application chapters begin with one or two concepts lessons to lay the foundation for learning the skills. Chapter 3 teaches level-appropriate word processing skills, covering basic commands and features of a word processor.

Chapter 4 teaches networks and the Internet. Chapter 5 teaches drawing tools. These tools appear in many of the basic applications, knowing how to use the drawing tools can empower students to create enhanced reports or art work in any cross-curriculum activity. Chapter 6 introduces Presentation graphics.

Recent reports have indicated that students are using presentation graphics software, such as PowerPoint, to create presentations across subject areas. Chapter 7 teaches spreadsheets. Chapter 8, the database chapters do not require the computer but involve group projects. It was our belief that the skills required to create and manage databases was too advances for the K-5 student. We felt it was more important to focus on the concepts of databases.

With the exception of the Foundations and Keyboarding chapters, the chapters don't have to be taught sequentially-if students are learning about a subject in history, perhaps the Internet chapter should be taught first so they can use those skills to find information about the topics in their history class.

The classroom teacher has a comprehensive curriculum with which to teach technology to the elementary students. Formal education, standards and the curriculum to support the objectives will ensure that all students learn appropriate terminology and use of basic computers and software.

The Growing with Technology series begins with the Blue level because we believe that grades K-1 is an appropriate age to introduce technology in a structured framework. With clear and attainable objectives, students as young as five and six years old can learn basic technology concepts, terms, and skills.

Young students will be using computers at home and in school. It is always best to learn the right way to do things so poor habits don't develop. Beginning technology education at an early age ensures that proper foundations are established for later learning of more complex skills.