Think Outside the Box

As I was browsing through YouTube, I came across this video which really called my attention.  While the video does not directly relate to technology in the classroom, it does make a great commentary on our society’s heavy reliance on technology.  Instead of simply walking up the escalator, the two people in the video just give up; they insist on believing they are stuck.  As a future educator, it is extremely important to engage students in critical thinking, to have them “think outside the box.”  Although technology can foster creativity and problem solving skills as we saw through the NETS standards in interactivity 5, teachers should mediate the use of technology and provide relevance to its function in the classroom.  In interactivity 4, we completed a similar task by determining whether our lesson plan was completely dependent on technology or whether the technology aided the lesson plan.  Overall, technology can be a great support.  However, as future teachers, we can’t allow it to completely take over the classroom.  Students should still be able to do simply tasks without solely having to rely on technology.  While escalators can get you from the first floor to the second floor with ease, sometimes going up the stairs can get you there faster!