Tiffany Robbins

Articles Summaries and Critiques

Due Date: February 7, 2014

Citation:
Padrn, Y., Waxman, H., Yuan-Hsuan, L., Meng-Fen, L., & Michko, G. (2012). Classroom
Observations of Teaching and Learning with Technology in Urban Elementary School
Mathematics Classrooms Serving English Language Learners. International Journal Of
Instructional Media, 39(1), 45-54.

Identification:
Type of article: Research

Summary:
This article focused on the use of technology in urban elementary classrooms. The beginning of
the article gave the reader an overview of the importance of technology in the classroom for
ELLs as well as minority students. The objective of the study was to systematically observe the
extent to which technology is used with English Language learners in urban elementary
mathematics classrooms. The article tells the readers the purpose of the study, methods used,
instruments, procedures and results. In this study 27 classrooms were observed. The observers
used an observation tool called a Classroom Observation Measure (COM). This instrument has
33 indicators that the observers looked for. The indicators addressed these areas: (a) classroom
organization, (b) classroom activities, (c) teacher role, (d) teaching strategies, (e) evaluation
strategies, and (f) quality of the lesson. The overall findings in this study was that in almost
every classroom, technology was not utilized at all in the classrooms for the ELL students as
well as the other students. The observers found that on average, the classrooms had about 3
computers each and that at the time of observation only one out of three computers would be
turned on or no computers would be on at all. The observers also found that the only technology
that was used were calculators. The observers found that the only instructional practice used was
direct instruction. The results of the study suggested that technology had not been used to its full
potential in the mathematics classrooms. The author said that the lack of technology could have
happened because the teachers preferred traditional instructional strategies or that the amount of
professional development in educational technology that the teachers received was not sufficient.
In conclusion, the results of the study suggested that even though teachers may or have had
access to technology and some training on how to use the technology, a better understanding is
needed on how to effectively integrate technology tools and resources into the classroom.

Critique:
I thought that the article was good. I am a teacher of and ELL student, so I was curious to read
article about this topic. I think that it was useful to me because I wanted to learn more about the
topic. There were no problems with this article, so nothing needed to be corrected. It was easy to
understand and easy to read. However, there was one issue that I had with the article and that
was that it described everything that the teachers were doing wrong but it did not list or describe
some ways in which the teachers could improve on integrating technology effectively into the
classroom for the ELL students. I think that something like that should have been included. As
second grade teacher, I think that technology is especially important to elementary school aged
children as well as ELL students.



Citation:
Bekta, M. (2013). An Examination of the Elementary School Teachers' Preferred Teaching
Methods and Instructional Technologies in Terms of Various Variables in Life Study Lesson.
International Online Journal Of Educational Sciences, 5(3), 551-561.

Identification:
Type of Article: Research

Summary:
The article focused on a research study that investigated the use of instructional technology tools
in elementary classrooms in Sakarya, Turkey. The researchers used the survey method of design
to conduct research. The research population consisted of approximately 1000 elementary school
teachers. The survey that was used is called the Life Study Lesson Survey and it consisted of 124
questions. The survey included questions about the availability of technology, preferred teaching
methods and the use of technology in the classrooms and schools. After the data was collected
and analyzed it was found that about 30% of the elementary school teachers always used the
method of lecture to teach and about 60% of the teachers only lectured some of the time. As I
read further in the article, I found that gender was not a factor in whether or not teachers used
things like computers, internet, smart boards, projectors, and video and television to teach
lessons in the classroom. I also found that the seniority of the teachers was not a factor in
whether or not the teacher used the computers, projectors, internet and video/television, but it
was found that teachers with less seniority used their smart boards more often. The article
summarizes lots of factors that were and were not significant to whether or not the teacher used
technology. The main issue about the use of technology was the class size. Teachers who taught
smaller groups of children in the elementary schools utilized the use of technology as opposed to
teachers who had a higher number of students. Toward the end of the article, the author
discussed the fact that 52% of the teachers said that they had not received a lot of in-service
training concerning the use of technology. The end of the article also discussed some suggestions
for improving the use of technology in the classrooms. In conclusion, the researcher suggested
more technology professional development for the teacher in that particular city.

Critique:
I thought that the article was a good one. I think that it would be a useful article to a graduate
student who was doing research on the use of technology for a class. If the reader of the article
does not have any prior or background knowledge of research designs and things of that nature,
then some of the terminology in the paper would be a bit foreign to the reader. I think that if the
author of the paper would have summarized the results of the research in a more simple context,
then the article would have been better.




Citation:
Lee, L. (2012). "A Learning Journey for All": American Elementary Teachers' Use of Classroom
Wikis. Journal Of Interactive Online Learning, 11(3), 90-102.

Identification:
Type of Article: Research

Summary:
This article discusses a study on how teachers in primary and upper elementary grades used
Wikis as a means for integrating technology into their classrooms. The article starts out by
talking about child-centered elementary education. It talks about how child-centered approaches
in the American classrooms derived from the significant influences of several Western theories
and philosophies such as those from Piaget, Dewey and Vygotsky. Then the article describes
how wikis are used as a child-centered technology. The teachers that were interviewed for this
article said that using a classroom wiki, the teacher can develop a concept of playful
explorations. 17 teachers participated in this study, 4 were males and 13 were female teachers.
What happened in this study is that some teachers used a classroom wiki in their classroom for 6
months to a year, some used it for a year to two years, and only a few used it for over 2 years.
The class size for the participating teachers ranged from 19 to 25 students. What was found in
this study was that teachers in the primary grades incorporated simple parts from the wiki
process, instead of using the complete wiki process with their students. The upper grades use the
complete wiki process. The article then talks about ways that the teachers used the wikis in their
classrooms and one way that a first grade teacher incorporated the wiki into her classroom for
her social studies lessons. The would update the wiki on a daily but mostly weekly basis. The
teacher would also put a special symbol on her weekly news report and this would let the parents
know that the wiki had been updated and that they could go check it. She also asked her students
what they thought should be included in the wiki for that week. The article also describes how
the upper grades teachers used the wiki as well. Toward the end of the article it discussed what
some of the benefits of teaching and learning with a Wiki. The article states that the home and
school connect became stronger because of the use of the Wiki. It made parents feel as though
that were a part of their childs learning process without having to always come into the
classroom daily. The article discussed that the big benefit to using a classroom wiki was that the
children were more motivated because they enjoyed contributing to the wiki at school as well as
at home. Lastly, the results of the study showed that the childrens needs were an important
aspect on why using a technology tool such as a Wiki is important in the learning process. To
conclude, one of the participating teachers said that We must accept or students as digital
natives and we should not bore them by simply using paper and pencil learning.

Critique:
I thought that this article was very informative and I enjoyed reading it very much. I think that
this article would be very useful for elementary school teachers as well as middle and high
school teachers because they could definitely use some a classroom wiki with their students. I
like that the article talked about the experiences of the teachers and it included the suggestions
from the teachers on how to use the wikis in the classroom. Although this was a research paper it
was easy to understand and did not have a lot of complicated terminology in it like some
research papers have that I have read. I am now considering making a classroom wiki for my
second graders.


Citation:
Miranda, H. P., & Russell, M. (2012). Understanding Factors Associated with Teacher-Directed
Student Use of Technology in Elementary Classrooms: A Structural Equation Modeling
Approach. British Journal Of Educational Technology, 43(4), 652-666.

Identification:
Type of Article: Research

Summary:
This research article was about the use of technology in kindergarten through sixth grade
classrooms. Over 1000 teachers participated in the study. Most of the teacher were female and
most of the teachers taught all subjects. Over 84% of the teachers had computers available and
used the internet in their classrooms. The teachers who did not have computers in their
classrooms had computers available to them in their school computer lab or media center. The
data source that was used to collect data was a survey method. The survey had about 330
questions on it. The questions were theorized by 14 factors that affect technology use. These
factors were district vision for technology, school and district culture, leadership, technology
resources, technology support, professional development, technology policies and standards,
technology beliefs, pedagogical beliefs, equity, community, demographics, physical
infrastructure and preparedness. The results of the study suggests that if teachers view the use of
technology as beneficial, they will use technology more with their students. The teacher
experience with technology is also a factor in the use of technology in the classroom. One of the
implications of this finding is that, as teachers use technology more often, they begin to value
technology more as an instructional tool and as their perceived importance of technology for
instruction increases; they are more likely to guide their students to use technology. The results
of the article also suggests that the association found between teacher experience with
technology and teacher confidence with technology is also relevant. In conclusion, this study
offers a more comprehensive understanding of what drives instructional technology use in the
classroom.

Critique:
This article was okay. It was hard for me to understand some of the tables and terminology in the
results part of the article. I think that this would be a good article for maybe a graduate student
who had experience with research and research designs. I think that it would be hard for just a
normal person to just read through the article without having questions on what some of the
terms were. The beginning of the article was great because it gave an overview of the
demographics of the participants and gave really good details on the participants. I think that If I
were an administration, I would want to look at research like this so that I could see what factors
motivate and drive teachers to use technology in the classroom. This article also helps to
understands what factors hurt the use of technology in the classroom.


Citation:
Yuan Y, Lee C. Elementary School Teachers' Perceptions toward ICT: The Case of Using Magic
Board for Teaching Mathematics.Turkish Online Journal Of Educational Technology - TOJET
[serial online]. October 1, 2012;11(4):108-118. Available from: ERIC, Ipswich, MA.

Identification:
Type of Article: Research

Summary:
This article focuses on a study aimed at teachers perceptions toward the use of Magic Board,
which is an interactive web-based environment that provides a set of virtual manipulatives for
math in elementary school classrooms. 250 elementary teachers participated in this study. The
teachers were given a questionnaire to answer questions about Magic Board and how it was used
in the classrooms. The article starts out by with an introduction on physical and virtual
manipulatives. It then gives and overview of what Magic board is and how to use it in the
classroom. It shows illustrations on how to get to the site of Magic Board and how to maneuver
through the site. The instructions are clear and simple. The researcher then talks about the
demographics of the participants of the study and displays a table that categorizes the teachers by
gender, age and teaching experience. Most of the teacher were female teachers between the ages
of 30-40, with five to fifteen years of teaching experience. The results of the study show that
teachers like the ease of using the magic board in their classrooms. The teachers were trained on
how to use it so I think that made it easier to use instead of just giving them it and saying go at it.
The scores for the Magic board software were high. From looking at the results of the study, I
can conclude that it was used successfully in almost all of the classrooms.

Critique:
This article was a good article and I like that it was a research article. I would love to have the
opportunity to use the magic board software in my classroom. I think that this article would be
great for teachers in the primary and upper grades to read. The only issue I had with this article
was that it had a lot of research terminology that may be difficult to understand if a reader was
not familiar with research designs. I think that the illustrations on how to use the Magic Board
were a great help and would be useful to the reader or someone who would be interested in
learning how to use Magic Board. I personally think that the use of virtual manipulatives are a
great ide especially for students in elementary school. I have noticed that in my classroom most
of my students need that hands on type of manipulative as well as the physical manipulatives.











Citation:
Kurtz, J. (2009). Twittering about Learning: Using Twitter in an Elementary School Classroom.
Horace, 25(1),

Identification:
Type of Article: Professional Practice

Summary:
This article focused on a teacher using twitter in her classroom in order to incorporate
technology into her second grade classroom. The article starts out with the teacher telling the
readers about how she communicated with parents at the beginning of her teaching career. The
way that she communicated with the parents of her students at the beginning of her teacher
career was sending a 24-by-16 inch chart tablet home with one student teach day. The class
would write down the daily events and news and it would be sent home. As time progressed she
stopped using this method and began using twitter to update the parents of her students on news,
events and student achievements on twitter. She modeled how to tweet a tweet and pretty soon
the students where tweeting their own tweets for the class account. Before they could post
something though they had to proofread and correct the tweet if they needed to. The teacher
thought that using twitter as a communication tool would be great so that families who did not
have computers at home could go to a public library or public place to read what was going on in
the classroom. The teacher stated that her school did not use or have a great deal of technology.
She also stated that she knows that Twitter is a very public forum, but she tries a great deal to
protect her students privacy by not using last names and using the privacy settings.

Critique:
I thought that this article was good. I really wanted to know how teachers in a elementary
classroom setting were using something like twitter in their classroom for educational purposes. I
like how the teacher used it as a writing tool and that the students have to proofread before they
posted something final. I think that this article was a very useful article to classroom teachers so
that they could read about an experience of using a social networking site as an educational tool
and as a communication tool for her students. One of the problems that I had with this article was
it did not tell me how the teacher used the twitter account to incorporate other content areas on
the twitter site. I am wondering of the teacher also used the site to post things such as homework
and current school events. Another problem was that the author did not tell the reader if the use
of Twitter was effective in the aspect of communicating with the parents. She said it worked
great for the students being able to write and proofread, but nothing was said about
communication. I was curious to read this article because this is the first year that my school
system has a Facebook and Twitter account, so I wanted to know how others were using it and if
it was effective.







Citation:
Potter, S. L., & Rockinson-Szapkiw, A. J. (2012). Technology Integration for Instructional
Improvement: The Impact of Professional Development. Performance Improvement, 51(2), 22-
27.

Identification:
Type of Article: Theory In Practice

Summary:
The article starts out by talking about how the school year begins and teachers are excited and
optimistic about the things they have learned during a few professional development
opportunities during the summer. It then talks about all of the different types of technology that
is available at a school for a teacher, but as the year progresses and winter break comes and goes,
the teachers realize that they have not used much technology in the classroom at all during the
school year and hope to do a much better job at it in the future. The author of the article then
talks about how the constructivist and the adult learning theories are can help in the aspect of
professional development for the integration of technology into the classrooms. The article
discusses how learning can be enhanced and students seem to be more engaged in learning when
technology is involved. The article then discusses how Vygotskys theory of social
constructivism is based on the premise that learning is a social collaborative activity. It also
discusses the theory of andragogy and how it acknowledges that adult learners have prior
knowledge and experiences to build upon and that adults are motivated to learn what is relevant.
The article implies that before professional development opportunities occur, the prior
knowledge, flexible approach to design and the use of context-based practices need to be taken
into account. The article also says that just because technology is available, that does not mean
that its going to be used effectively in the classroom. Teachers need to know how to operate
software and hardware before they can identify ways to use it and then implement it. To
conclude the article, the author suggests that from a constructivists understanding of effective
learning, teachers are more likely to integrate technology if time if devoted to identifying how it
can be used in the classroom.

Critique:
I liked this article and I think that it was very useful and helpful. I think that this article would be
useful for teachers and administrators to read. I think that this article could give suggestions to
school administrations on how to plan effective professional developmental opportunities for
their teacher and staff. There were not any problems with the article. It was easy to read and very
interesting. My classroom and school is full of lots of technology but because this is my first year
at the school and in this grade level, I feel a bit overwhelmed with how to effectively use the
technology that is available to me and I have not had lots of professional development
opportunities to learn how implement the technology, this article was really helpful to me.







Citation:
Northcote, M. (2011). Teaching with Technology: Step Back and Hand over the Cameras! Using
Digital Cameras to Facilitate Mathematics Learning with Young Children in K-2 Classrooms.
Australian Primary Mathematics Classroom, 16(3), 29-32.

Identification:
Type of Article: Professional Practice

Summary:
This article discussed the use of digital cameras in kindergarten through second grade
classrooms. The article starts out with the teacher talking about how she let her students use the
digital cameras in her classroom. For 3 weeks, she let a different child take the classroom camera
home with them. The children were asked to take photographs of mathematics taking place in
their lives and the lives of their families. The article then discusses why the teacher sent the
camera home with her students. She explained that to her, handing over cameras over to young
students in mathematics class was like handing over technology to those who know best. She
described it as the digital immigrant putting technology into the hands of the digital natives.
The author of the article said that using technology such as technology can help facilitate the
process of learning mathematical concepts. She then gives examples of how to use the digital
cameras for math. She used the students pictures to for How To Do records, for things such as
baking a cake or measuring a table. She used them for graphing, space and geometry, math
journals, shape identification, counting and game resources. The author concludes that handing
over the digital cameras to students in your classroom can increase participation in classroom
activities to a level where children are valued as active contributors to the classroom learning
environments.

Critique:

This article was fantastic and I think that it was very helpful and useful. It would be most helpful
to teacher in the k-2 classrooms. I am a second grade teacher and I this article has made me want
to try the use of the digital camera in my own classroom, I think that the students would really
enjoy it. I like that the author of the article said that putting the technology into the hands of the
students helps them to feel valued in the classroom environments. I think that activities like these
really help students to feel that they are a part of their learning at school and I also think that it
would also increase the parent participation with their childs learning.











Citation:
D'Angelo, F., & Iliev, N. (2012). Teaching Mathematics to Young Children through the Use of
Concrete and Virtual Manipulatives. Online Submission,
Identification:
Type of Article: Theory In Practice

Summary:
This article talks about the use of manipulatives and how they are an essential key to teaching
mathematics to young children. The author then talks about how using manipulatives, both
concrete and virtual help enhance learning on mathematics for young children. The article gives
an overview of manipulatives and the use of them in the classroom. The article then talks about
the theory supporting the use of manipulatives. It also talks about how the National Council of
Teachers of Mathematics recommended the use of manipulatives at all grade levels. The article
then discusses how teachers who use manipulatives in the classroom create a constructivist based
classroom. The article talks about how the constructivist theory, which involves top-down or
student centered-processing of information is a theory in which children construct their own
knowledge through interaction with the world around them. The author(s) of the article then
discussed the virtual manipulative and how this type of manipulative can function similarly to
concrete manipulatives because the computer mouse works as an extension of a students hand.
Yet the virtual manipulatives can be used in whole or small group. The article then discusses
how the author(s) of this article conducted a survey on how virtual manipulatives where used in
kindergarten, first and second grade classrooms. The results of the survey showed that although
many of the teachers did not start off their lessons with virtual manipulatives, but at some point
in the math lesson, the teachers used the virtual manipulatives

Critique:

I think that this article was a good article and I enjoyed reading it. I think that the article would
be useful for teachers of young children and it may be especially helpful to beginning teachers
who are just starting out in the primary grades. Since I am a second grade teacher who teaches all
subjects, I realize the importance of teaching with virtual manipulatives and I implement them in
many of my math lessons today. There werent any problems with this article at all it was a bit
long but it was well worth the read.