Funding: A Lazy Excuse for Ignoring Technology Education in Elementary Classrooms

My very first day as a teacher, I expected to walk into a classroom of 5^th graders who knew more about computers than I did. I actually used to have anxiety about my students knowing how to use our class computers for evil without me noticing. I started thinking about ways to use technology in my classroom before I was introduced to a curriculum guide. What I found was a classroom full of digital natives that had no idea how to use computers for anything besides gaming, Facebooking, and watching Netflix (I would have said “streaming videos,” but if I used that term, the students would have no idea what I was talking about). Imagine my surprise when I gave out our first project assignment. I thought it would be simple: research an explorer (i.e. Christopher Columbus, Ponce de Leon, etc.) and create a poster to present to the class. There were specific questions that had to be answered on the poster, such as “What did your explorer discover?” or “Why was his discovery important?” I assumed this would be a very simple project the students would be able to finish in about three days.

Our first day in the computer lab working on this project was a disaster. Here is a list of things I was shocked to learn the students could not do:

• Locate any type of word processor on the computer
• Copy and paste text or an image
• Change fonts in a word processor
• Use spell check, or even realize that the squiggly red line under a word means something is wrong with it.
• Save a document or a picture
• Locate a document after its been saved
• Conduct an efficient Internet search.
• Shut down a computer

I did not understand why the students seemed as computer illiterate as I was when I was 10 years old. Hadn’t these students grown up with computers and iPads their entire lives? My parents didn’t even own a computer until I was 11, so at least I had an excuse. This led me to wonder, what are these kids doing with their technology? Everyone always talks about how these kids are the most digitally connected generation of all time. Older teachers talk about computers as if they were weapons: the single force that will destroy the traditional American education system. From what I witnessed throughout my time in the classroom, they have nothing to worry about. Weapons can’t destroy anything if no one knows how to use them.

In a recent interview, "'We Don't Have Resources to Keep Up with Technology,' 2016 US Teacher of the Year, Jahana Hayes claims “We don’t really have the resources to keep up with technology in the way that other industries have….We train students on programs that end up being obsolete by the time they go into the workforce” She is correct about one thing: most of the programs our students use today will be obsolete in a few years. However, the skills we can teach students while using these programs can stand the test of time. Think about how long you have been using a PC and all of the ways it has evolved. When system changes occur, we adapt. It takes only a few days to “get used to” using a new version of a previous program because we have a solid foundation of knowledge on the way a program works. We become familiar with a program’s jargon, the way it’s functions are organized, and what it’s best tools are. I know that the way I learned to save a file the very first time I ever saved to a floppy disc paved the way for my daily usage of the cloud.

The monetary and logistical limitations of constantly outfitting out classrooms with the most up-to-date technology are obvious. We don’t have the money or the resources. But what we do have are teachers: an entire industry of people dedicated to preparing students for life beyond the classroom. To solve the problem of technology becoming obsolete by the time a big purchase is approved by the school board, teachers should be focusing on teaching their students basic skills we tend to take for granted. The pieces will begin to connect faster for our students than they did for us and they will soar. I guarantee you will never hear a student say something like “Man I really wish I never learned how to type in school. Practicing basic computer skills like typing and learning how to search the Internet sure was a waste of my time. Now let me get back to practicing my cursive writing…”