Aspiring for More

My Future Goals

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       Like many others, as a child I wanted to be a teacher when I grew up. Now as an adult, and a third grade teacher, I have developed new goals for myself. One major goal I now aspire for myself is to expand my work as an educator and become an elementary STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) teacher. As a STEM teacher, I would teach students how to learn through exploration, problem solving, and critical thinking. I would help students foster their creativity and improve their team-work skills. This job would allow me to pursue new passions surrounding educational technology and spread my wings as a young educator. In order to reach this goal, I have identified three topics for future study: educational technology resources, inclusive and accessible technology, and incorporating technology in lower-elementary classrooms. Together, these three topics of study will help me achieve my goal of becoming an elementary STEM teacher and help prepare me for the job itself.

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Educational Technology Resources

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            As a STEM teacher, it will be important to have a wealth of knowledge on educational technology resources. These resources could include robots, building tools, websites, coding, and many, many more! As a student of the Master of Educational Technology (MAET) program through Michigan State University (MSU), I have been learning about how to consider resources with a critical lens to ensure that the tool is educationally useful. For my future studying, I want to identify resources that I could build a STEM unit from. Through my undergrad at MSU, we learned about the importance of cross-cutting concepts and having overlap with your lessons. I hope to find resources that will not only benefit my students in our STEM class, but their core ELA, math, and writing as well. Amy Cohen expands on the importance of hands-on, authentic learning experiences in STEM lessons (2022). She has curated a list of resources to help build K-12 STEM lessons and units to fit most science topics covered throughout those grade levels (Cohen, 2022). 

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Inclusive and Accessible Technology

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         Something that I have noticed as an educator at a Title I school, is the lack of resources available compared to schools from high-income areas. Studying to find more financially accessible technologies will allow me to overcome this barrier for my school. There are also many English Learners at my school. Not all resources available to my students are available in their home languages. Students with visual, audial, or developmental disabilities might not have the same level of accessibility to technology as their peers. The International Telecommunications Union (ITU) suggests the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in classrooms to help provide accommodations to students (Widmer-Iliescu, 2022). Along with AI, the ITU has an extensive list of information and resources to help all classrooms have accessible information and communication technology (ICT) (Widmer-Iliescu, 2022). Through the assistance of the ITU and by researching more technologies to help bridge gaps created by inaccessibility at my school, I can begin to help solve this problem.

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Technology in Lower-Elementary Classrooms

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        The final area of study that I want to pursue to help me achieve my goal of becoming an elementary STEM teacher is to research best practices for implementing technology in lower-elementary classrooms. In my school, the lower-elementary classrooms are Young Kindergarten-2nd grade. As I have only taught in a 3rdgrade classroom, I have less experience implementing technology with students that are younger than 8 years old. An article published by the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) encourages the use of technology in early education to support “creativity and learning” using touch screens and other interactive media (Technology and Young Children: Preschoolers and Kindergarteners). The NAEYC also partnered with the Fred Rogers Center for Early Learning and Children's Media at Saint Vincent College to produce a statement supporting young students’ use of technology in appropriate ways. I believe that it is important to find technology that is going to be educational and challenging for these students, without being outside of their capabilities. These technologies can be both “plugged in” and “unplugged” technologies that can be used to encourage curiosity and creativity in my STEM classroom.

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             These areas of study will not only help me get hired as a STEM teacher, but will assist me with becoming an effective, informed, and prepared STEM teacher. By learning about more educational resources that are both inclusive and accessible, and by learning  best practices for bringing technology into lower-elementary classrooms, I will be able to reach my future goals.

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Resources

Cohen, A. (2022, August 4). Curated STEM Resources for Teaching Science Units: Science buddies blog.               Science Buddies. https://www.sciencebuddies.org/blog/teaching-science-units 

Technology and young children: Preschoolers and Kindergartners. NAEYC.(n.d.).                                                                 https://www.naeyc.org/resources/topics/technology-and-media/preschoolers-and-kindergartners 

Widmer-Iliescu, R. (2022, December 5). Technologies and strategies for inclusion and accessibility. ITU                   Hub. https://www.itu.int/hub/2022/12/technologies-and-strategies-for-inclusion-and-accessibility/

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