Digital+Native

= Living In The Technology World! =

===I consider myself a Digital Native, even though I wasn’t born straight into the technology world. My family didn’t upgrade their technology until I was in the third grade, so I have slowly adapted to all sorts of technology. Over the years I have been introduced to new technology and I have watched older technology grow and advance. Watching all the new “toys” that have come out, I like many other people, go out and buy, play, and explore them because I want to know more and more about what our world is becoming!===

Where will knowing a lot of technology be a downfall?

 * ===I believe that there is no such thing as knowing too much about technology, but I do believe that using it all the time has a bigger downfall. When using it all the time I believe students and adults lose their ability to think for themselves. If we have a computer in front of us we will have the tendency to just “look up the answer” instead of reading it in a book. I know that I do this now, and I can’t even imagine what will happen ten years down the road. The reason I feel this way is because text books have become very boring and bland, which no one will want to open a book that has absolutely no pictures when they can look up the answer on the internet that has pictures or do a quick find and not read up on anything else. Now I don’t believe that books should be dumbed down, but this would be the slow process of being on a computer all the time.===

What happens if you are in a school with limited technology?

 * ===This question makes it seem like it will be the end of the world if there is no technology or limited in a classroom. Personally I would not lose my mind if there wasn’t much for technology in my future classroom; this reflects back to my previous answer. If my students don’t have access to computers, they can simply write their research paper on paper; assuming they will even know what that still is! There are also dictionaries, encyclopedias, and libraries with thousands of books to do research with. If I have to I will resort back to old chalkboards for kids to write on. But if technology was needed in the classroom and there was no budget for it, I would start holding some fundraisers and incorporate the money raising into my lessons somehow to get the money.===

What technology do you want for your room?

 * ===This was a question that was brought up and then we were given a pretend budget of $5,000 dollars to spend on classroom technology. Personally I would really want each of my students to have their own computer, but the computers would only stay in my room and be used for my room only; that way they aren’t a distraction to other teachers. If I couldn’t have individual computers I would like to have at least ten high-tech computers for the room that the children could use. I would also want an Epson projector to project onto the white board; which I have found more useful than Smartboards. I would also want a laptop for myself to keep all the school work organized.===