Why should technology be integrated into social studies classrooms? How has the learning from our first session influenced your answer?
Before this class session, I really didn’t make the connection between social studies and technology. I mean, other than using technology to complete assignments and to network, I didn’t see the purpose of integrating it into our classrooms. But now I understand why technology should be integrate into social studies classrooms, so students can learn how to use it more accurately and efficiently. As the National Council of Social Studies (NCSS) mention, technology will teach students how to contribute to the media and become active citizens.
Through technology, students will learn how to navigate the internet and question the content of everything they come across. This will protect students from harmful websites that have misleading information and teach them how to be more critique of what they see, hear, and use. Since technology is already apart of our everyday lives, it is only right for teachers to include it in their curriculums in order to make social studies more interesting to students and relevant to their lives.
Moreover, technology will benefit students by preparing them for college and the workforce since many of their classes and jobs will require them to search for scholarly articles and accurate data. Technology also gives students the opportunity to network on the global scale and learn how to become more open-minded towards different ethnic and cultural groups. This will definitely give students a head-start to “interact with ideas, information, and other people for academic and civic purposes” (National Council for Social Studies, 2009).
As I learned in EME5432, technology is not only a means of communication and entertainment but a source to academics, politics, and social issues. This class has definitely persuaded me to integrate technology into my classroom therefore, my students can learn how to cross-reference sources and weed out inaccurate data.
