Skip to main content

Close
Get the best research tool on the web today,and free!
Connect with people with common interests!

saved by9 people, first bysusan carter morgan on 2008-03-29, last byjustin hardman on 2008-07-14

  • With procedural learners, they want to have everything spelled out in advance on a detailed handout they can follow. One of the greatest challenges in professional development for teachers, I think, is helping people who are naturally more “procedural” in their learning approach with technology to become more navigational.
  • Too often (and I am guilty of this too) we rush to get teachers to the creative integration phase of technology use, when they have barely started to use the tools themselves.
  • he difference in learning styles between many young people and many older people is summarized well in what I’ve heard others term a “navigational” versus a “procedural” approach to technology use. Young folks tend to take a more navigational approach, in which they experiment via trial and error to discover how something works. Many older folks, including lots of teachers, tend to be more fearful about technology use and take a more procedural approach. With procedural learners, they want to have everything spelled out in advance on a detailed handout they can follow. One of the greatest
  • To make technology integral to learning, teachers must be able to seamlessly use technology tools throughout the day as they access, use and share information. It must become part of the way teachers process and work in their world. Personal uses of technology are pivotal here, in fact I am sure they are a prerequisite to higher level uses of technology throughout the curriculum. I think too many leaders want teachers to skip developmental steps in their own technology use, and taking that approach is as developmentally inappropriate as giving a kindergartner an encyclopedia to read instead of a picture book.
  • The idea of being “developmentally appropriate” resonates with reading and language arts teachers. Perhaps we should use this vocabulary when discussing professional development for teachers involving the use of varying types of technologies?
  • When you teach a person how to drive a car you don’t give them the keys and tell them to go for it. Instead you gradually scaffold them moving them from total dependence, where you’re ready to grab the steering wheel to, to independence. In a sense moving from your procedural to a navigational learner — which takes time.
Print