Mobile Technologies in Teacher Ed - Chatting with Dr. Diane Burke

I love talking to other people who are passionate about their interests and research---educators who are trying new things, asking pertinent questions, and searching out the answers.  Dr. Diane Burke, Professor Emerita from Keuka College in NY, is exactly that type of person.  Today I am excited to share my interview with Dr. Burke, focusing on her recent research (with several colleagues) regarding mobile technologies in teacher preparation programs.

At the end of this post is the embedded podcast, but below are just a few highlights to heighten your interest and entice you to listen.

• Only four teacher preparation programs that responded to the nationwide survey reported full implementation of mobile technologies across the curriculum.  (I'm not really surprised by this finding---just sad.)
• One of the most important aspects of utilizing mobile technologies in teacher education is about actually utilizing them in lessons, not the devices themselves.  (Who knew that after we actually all bought the devices, that it wouldn't even be about the devices!?!)
• Mobile devices are not a panacea for all the problems in education today, but they are an excellent tool for differentiating instruction.  (If you haven't figured this out yet, there really aren't any panaceas in education.)
• Dr. Burke raises the question---"As teacher preparation programs, is it our job to prepare teachers for what exists now in classrooms?  Or for the future?"  (In other words, not all classrooms have mobile devices yet, but they soon will.)

If you are a teacher educator interested in utilizing mobile technologies in your program, don't miss this interview!  You can find more information about Dr. Burke's research with her colleagues here:

Foulger, T. S., Burke, D., Williams, M. K., Waker, M. L., Hansen, R., & Slykhuis, D. A.  (2013).  Innovators in teacher education:  Diffusing mobile technologies in teacher preparation curriculum.  Journal of Digital Learning in Teacher Education, 30(1), 21-29.

As a follow-up to the study above, an article that specifies which four institutions are fully implementing mobile technologies into their teacher preparation programs with details of how mobile devices are actually used will soon be published.  I got a sneak peek recently, and you don't want to miss it!

I KNEW They Were Out There

I knew they were out there.....other teacher educators who were integrating technology into their courses---some, dare I even say it, flipping their courses as well.  I am here at the Literacy Research Association Conference in Dallas, TX, and I have found several teacher educators who are flipping their courses to make them  more authentic, meaningful, and hands-on.  Some call it inverted instruction; some subscribe to techno-driven, student-focused terminology.  However it's labeled, I am finding other teacher educators who are utilizing digital tools for the direct instruction portion of their courses, so their pre-service teachers are more engaged in the learning process.  This is so exciting!

Here are just a couple of excellent examples in one session I attended yesterday:

- Lisa Zawilinski from the University of Hartford teaches literacy methods courses to pre-service teachers.  She has been flipping her courses for two semesters now.  In addition to screencasting lectures, she has recorded her interpretations of running records, so students can listen to her thought processes as she shows them on the screen to prepare them to enact and analyze their own running records.

- Laurie Henry from the University of Kentucky found herself in a unique situation when she started teaching a course focusing on teaching 21st century learners.  Her students were made up of a combination of pre-service teachers, grad students, and practicing teachers.  She decided this would be just the course to try inverted instruction, so she plunged in enthusiastically.  Since broadcasting the sound of her voice did not particularly appeal to her, she decided to search for resources and utilize the open content available.  The majority of the videos she used were TEDEd videos of presentations given by experts such as Sir Ken Robinson.  Her students then responded by sketching (print or digital) their interpretations of the videos and other resources they had explored, similar to my own use of blogging as a response (blog entry soon to come), but with the artistic flair.  These sketches acted as discussion starters for the in-class portions of the class.  

- Kim Richard from Saint Joseph College has been flipping her literacy methods courses over the course of the last year.  She started her research with a survey and periodically checked in with students to inquire about their reactions to the new model (similar to the podcast interviews of my own students).  She shared how her students valued the personal nature of their relationships with her and each other as they were interacting more and building social, collaborative relationships with all of the hands-on, meaningful in-class activities.  Kim even shared that she was NOT the most technologically savvy instructor at the outset of this research, but her openness with this aspect endeared her to students as they worked through difficulties together.  

These are just a few of the teacher educators who are utilizing the flipped classroom model to create more student-centric classrooms, giving pre-service teachers the experience of engaged learning, so hopefully, just maybe, they will choose to create a similar environment in their own future classrooms.