Cool Tools Should Be Transparent
and Student Selected
ISSUE ORIENTED
By Anita McAnear
Anita McAnear is
L&L’s acquisitions
editor and national
program chair for
ISTE’s conference and
exposition. A former
middle school math
and language arts
teacher, McAnear
has been with ISTE
since 1983.
Cool online tools, apps, and mobile devices are everywhere. ISTE 2011 will have a plethora of sessions on these
popular topics, with such titles as 60 Tools in 60
Minutes. There is an app available for just about
everything you can think of (see “There’s an
App for This!” on page 36). And we now have a
fourth generation of cellular wireless standards,
ultra-broadband Internet access, and streamed
multimedia. But what contribution can all of
these tools make to education?
Daniel Light’s article on page 10, “Do Web
2.0 Right,” reveals a number of useful tools for
changing classroom culture. Light carefully describes the conditions under which these tools
change the level of communication and collaboration and contribute to student learning.
Students need to have 24/7 access to information, experts, potential collaborators,
online tools, and other resources. Choices for
connecting to the Web include desktop computers, laptops, tablets, netbooks, and handheld devices. At this point, some combination
of tools in classrooms is ideal, as you do need
desktop computers or laptops for writing
projects, and large monitors are helpful when
using certain applications, such as desktop
publishing programs, high-end graphics tools,
or 3D animation software. These aren’t as portable as mobile devices, however—and mobile
devices have many new apps that are useful
for learning.
Helen Crompton, Lynne Goodhand, and Su-
san Wells describe the implementation of iPod
touches at a Culbreth Middle School in their
article, “The Whole World in Their Hands,” on
page 16. The touches supplement classroom
computers, and students are using them in all
classes for learning and for their own productiv-
ity. When the right tool is readily available day
and night, it becomes almost invisible or trans-
parent. You hardly notice it. That seems to be
happening at Culbreth.
