Teachers apply a variety of technologies to meet students’ learning needs:
"As new technologies prove useful and become available in schools, teachers develop their own and their
students’ proficiencies in using the technologies purposefully, which may include content presentation, delivery and research applications, as well as word processing, information management and record keeping"
- Teaching Quality Standard Applicable to the Provision of Basic Education in Alberta (KSAs)
Upon reading this week's topic on researching in my ED 4764: The Internet and Education class, I was compelled to understand the significance of technology and internet integration as a teaching standard especially with today's 21st century learners. The statement above shows how important it is for teachers to not only develop their students' proficiencies in using technology but also their own.
In regard to research, I usually use Google's search bar and enter specific words associated to the topic I want to learn more about. This strategy has proved to be helpful in the past but not the most effective because it often yields too much information to sift through. I usually end up browsing the first two or three websites in the first page of the search and wonder if the information is the most valid and insightful around. If necessary, I would do a more advance search by entering narrower keywords, using a different search engine or going to a specific online journal such as JSTOR for more academic sources. These research strategies are limited, however, as I've had many experiences of completely unsuccessful searches.
One way to improve my research skills and my students' is through the Step Zero Activity. This activity outlines two steps prior to researching that really gets us to think carefully about what we are looking for. The first step is to think about your topic and write down people, terms, organizations, places, objects, etc. that may be included in any web page. The second step is to create 3M chart of search items. In the first column under MUST, a researcher would write any terms that would surely appear on a web page that is relevant. The second column under MIGHT entails words that are synonyms for relevant terms, any of which might appear on a webpage of interest. In the third column under MUSTN'T, one would put words that exclude pages that use some of the same desired words, but which aren't of interest. With this 3M list, starting a search becomes much easier and effective. In the search bar, put a + in front of the MUST terms, a - in front of the MUSN'T terms, and nothing in front of the others for a thorough and accurate search. The terms in the MIGHT column can be turned into MUSTs to narrow the pool. This activity is very useful in getting students and I to think critically about a topic and make relevant connections. By specifically identifying what we are looking for first, we can learn to become knowledge seekers that actively seek out relevant components of content to build our own structures of knowledge. In a study on research strategies and hypertext navigation, Lawless & Kulikowich highlight how important knowledge seeking is in our digital society and how different it is from being feature seekers or apathetic hypertext users.
Another tool for effective research is the unique search engine, InstaGrok. This search engine enables users to research a topic through an interactive map that can be divided into further related concepts or topics. Facts, images, websites, videos, and quizzes on a searched topic are available for exploration. Users can analyze and pick which information to use through a 'Journal' option that automatically saves the information and sources in a single document. This tool is incredibly useful in not only helping students make relevant connections, but also in fostering information analysis/evaluation skills. By accessing multiple sources on a topic and exploring related concepts, students are able to synthesize the information in their own way through the 'Journal' option and meet higher level outcomes in Bloom's Taxonomy. Such research opportunity will increase student motivation and appreciation for more complex search strategies as they are able to be their own knowledge seekers who strive to build their own structures of knowledge (Lawless and Kulikowich, 1998). In this sense, the power of researching lies in teaching students how to think rather than what to think. I truly believe this is how teachers are more than just content curators for students. Teachers as content curators would mean only teaching research skills and providing resources. We go beyond this by encouraging students to evaluate the information they retrieve so that they can synthesize it in a way that is personally relevant and meaningful.
Research can be a powerful tool for challenging our thinking processes and exploring new perspectives. The experience itself cannot be possible without the internet. Studies have shown, however, that having information at our fingertips produces cognitive consequences on our memory. While this may sound negative and detrimental, the consequences outlined in Sparrow's research may simply indicate that we are adapting to a rapidly changing society where information is everywhere, hence, the term information overload that comes up more and more in our lives. The real challenge I believe is in learning how to retrieve, analyze, and synthesize relevant information effectively for our own purpose. In the aspect of managing the information we amass, it is important to recognize that we are cognitively limited as humans and it is here that we can use technology and the internet to our advantage.
References:
Lawless, K. A., and Kulikowich, J. M., (1998). Domain Knowledge, Interest, and Hypertext Navigation: A study of individual differences, Journal of Educational Multimedia and Hypermedia, 7(1), 51-69.
Sparrow, B., Liu, J., and Wegner, D.M. (2011) Google effects on memory: Cognitive consequences of having information at our fingertips. Science, 333: 776-778.
Significant Comments:
http://joansjournal.weebly.com/1/post/2013/07/blog-1-researching.html#comments (Joan)
http://agroenenboom.weebly.com/2/post/2013/07/research-in-education.html#comments (Allison)
In regard to research, I usually use Google's search bar and enter specific words associated to the topic I want to learn more about. This strategy has proved to be helpful in the past but not the most effective because it often yields too much information to sift through. I usually end up browsing the first two or three websites in the first page of the search and wonder if the information is the most valid and insightful around. If necessary, I would do a more advance search by entering narrower keywords, using a different search engine or going to a specific online journal such as JSTOR for more academic sources. These research strategies are limited, however, as I've had many experiences of completely unsuccessful searches.
One way to improve my research skills and my students' is through the Step Zero Activity. This activity outlines two steps prior to researching that really gets us to think carefully about what we are looking for. The first step is to think about your topic and write down people, terms, organizations, places, objects, etc. that may be included in any web page. The second step is to create 3M chart of search items. In the first column under MUST, a researcher would write any terms that would surely appear on a web page that is relevant. The second column under MIGHT entails words that are synonyms for relevant terms, any of which might appear on a webpage of interest. In the third column under MUSTN'T, one would put words that exclude pages that use some of the same desired words, but which aren't of interest. With this 3M list, starting a search becomes much easier and effective. In the search bar, put a + in front of the MUST terms, a - in front of the MUSN'T terms, and nothing in front of the others for a thorough and accurate search. The terms in the MIGHT column can be turned into MUSTs to narrow the pool. This activity is very useful in getting students and I to think critically about a topic and make relevant connections. By specifically identifying what we are looking for first, we can learn to become knowledge seekers that actively seek out relevant components of content to build our own structures of knowledge. In a study on research strategies and hypertext navigation, Lawless & Kulikowich highlight how important knowledge seeking is in our digital society and how different it is from being feature seekers or apathetic hypertext users.
Another tool for effective research is the unique search engine, InstaGrok. This search engine enables users to research a topic through an interactive map that can be divided into further related concepts or topics. Facts, images, websites, videos, and quizzes on a searched topic are available for exploration. Users can analyze and pick which information to use through a 'Journal' option that automatically saves the information and sources in a single document. This tool is incredibly useful in not only helping students make relevant connections, but also in fostering information analysis/evaluation skills. By accessing multiple sources on a topic and exploring related concepts, students are able to synthesize the information in their own way through the 'Journal' option and meet higher level outcomes in Bloom's Taxonomy. Such research opportunity will increase student motivation and appreciation for more complex search strategies as they are able to be their own knowledge seekers who strive to build their own structures of knowledge (Lawless and Kulikowich, 1998). In this sense, the power of researching lies in teaching students how to think rather than what to think. I truly believe this is how teachers are more than just content curators for students. Teachers as content curators would mean only teaching research skills and providing resources. We go beyond this by encouraging students to evaluate the information they retrieve so that they can synthesize it in a way that is personally relevant and meaningful.
Research can be a powerful tool for challenging our thinking processes and exploring new perspectives. The experience itself cannot be possible without the internet. Studies have shown, however, that having information at our fingertips produces cognitive consequences on our memory. While this may sound negative and detrimental, the consequences outlined in Sparrow's research may simply indicate that we are adapting to a rapidly changing society where information is everywhere, hence, the term information overload that comes up more and more in our lives. The real challenge I believe is in learning how to retrieve, analyze, and synthesize relevant information effectively for our own purpose. In the aspect of managing the information we amass, it is important to recognize that we are cognitively limited as humans and it is here that we can use technology and the internet to our advantage.
References:
Lawless, K. A., and Kulikowich, J. M., (1998). Domain Knowledge, Interest, and Hypertext Navigation: A study of individual differences, Journal of Educational Multimedia and Hypermedia, 7(1), 51-69.
Sparrow, B., Liu, J., and Wegner, D.M. (2011) Google effects on memory: Cognitive consequences of having information at our fingertips. Science, 333: 776-778.
Significant Comments:
http://joansjournal.weebly.com/1/post/2013/07/blog-1-researching.html#comments (Joan)
http://agroenenboom.weebly.com/2/post/2013/07/research-in-education.html#comments (Allison)
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