Technology Deficient Lesson

National Education Technology Standards for Students are formulated to thrive in the rapidly advancing technological world. This body enacts standards that advocate students’ identification and also make guarantee that the learning process is a process driven by the students. These benchmarks are classified into six wide categories. The students are obligated to learn, adhere and uphold these standards at any given time. On the other hand, teachers can use these standards to schedule learning activities that rely on technology in order to make students attain success in the process of education, communication and the learning of life skills (Beck et al,. 2018).

The selected lesson URL is https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/effective-communication

Selected lesson title – Effective Communication

Primary Content Area and Grade Level – Communication Skills, 12th Grade

Selected Lesson Description

Business fundamentals course helps the learner to obtain appropriate basis in communication in order to enhance personal effectiveness, reduce the level of stress and save the time wasted while struggling with unnecessary elaborations as a result of ineffective communication. This course is vital because it equips one with the required skills for developing both verbal and written communication skills. After acquiring theoretical knowledge and the practical basis of executing an effective communication, the lessons learnt in this course will make it easy to discover the principles of writing proposals, academic papers, reports, influential emails and articles for publications among other written forms of communication. Eventually, the student will be able to discover an improve level of self-confidence that will make it easy to participate in convincing presentations, discussions and engage in fruitful meetings. Eventually, the student will be able to understand communication strategies that are related to personal and cultural differences.

The most useful thing is that, it is a communication lesson that will provide useful knowledge in handling multiple aspects of life such as education, inter-personal relations and even the professional life. Having proper communication skills is significant because the today’s world rely more on sharing informing that in turn favour only those having effective communication skills.

The objectives of this effective communication course are clearly stated. At the end of the course, the student will be able to respond and make effective phone calls, write emails professionally, acquire online communication basics in an expert context, make successful presentations, write high quality proposals and reports, engage in productive congregations and understanding the fluctuating trends in the world of communication. Before the learning could take place, student will be able to demonstrate what they know and are able to do by receiving assessment tests related to effective communication skills such as in applying and understanding different codes of effectual communication using a variety of media. The students will also be assessed through tasks that aim at determining their abilities to apply different frameworks in order to obtain more out of phone calls and emails. The circumstances under when the learning will take place will be determined by student’s inability to understand the codes of effective communication and respond appropriately to phone calls and emails. These results will be pre-determined by the test results.

The lesson is aligned to the appropriate state content standards because it aims at promoting the highest achievement of all students. The course does not target any specific group of learner, but any students who wish to achieve communication at a professional business level. It outlines different communication concepts, knowledge and skills that the students should obtain at the end of the lesson. The lesson upholds the state content standards.

This effective communication lesson is presented through a technological platform (website) and is aligned to the necessary NETS-S standards because it promotes social, ethical and human issues that stipulate that students should establish a positive attitude towards technology used for supporting learning, personal productivity and pursuit. According to (NETS-S), this lesson accessed through the internet is a technology productivity tool that will improve learning, promote creativity and increase productivity of students. This lesson is also in line with other standards because it is a technology research tool, problem-solving and decision-making.

The assessment of this course is closely connected to the topics of the course because at the end of the course, the students must be able to demonstrate their understanding based on what they have learnt. For this reason, the assessment aligns with the key objectives of the study. It promotes the evaluation and assessment standards of (NETS-S) because the lesson uses technology to collect data in form of student answers, communicate findings in terms of student weaknesses and finally improve student learning.

Technology is considered as a tool in assessment of student learning because it offers an effective way of learning such as through the internet. Through the internet, the students can access learning materials, assess their level of understanding and conduct advanced research and studies.

The key focus of this lesson is to improve effective communication. With efficient communication skills, my student’s learning experience will be advanced because writing skills will be improved. Writing excellent papers and adopting the concept of formulating a convincing presentation will promote my learning experience and even help improve my grades.

Part 2: Adapting a Technology Deficient Lesson Template

Primary Content Area and Grade Level: The lesson chosen is life skills in Course of Psychology lesson. This lesson is mainly for grade 12 students. It entails the positive behaviours and adaptive abilities that permit humans to handle various challenges and demand of life appropriately. This technology deficient lesson equips the learner with communication and interpersonal skills, adopting effective decision and problem solving, assertiveness and equanimity, flexibility and adapting with emotions, creative and critical thinking. The course is important because it equips the learner with practical expertises needed for maintaining a successful independent. When students attain the knowledge associated with this lesson, they will be at a better place to obtain more from their learning and job opportunities.

Lesson Timeframe

Since this lesson contains six basic topics, it will take six days learning three hours per day to study all the topics appropriately.

Content Area Standard/ Florida Standards applied by original developer of the lesson

SS.912.P.7.3 – One you should use conditioning to everyday life.

SS.912.P.7.9 – Use observational and Cognitive learning to everyday learning.

NETS-S for student standards used

Communication and Interpersonal skills – It applies the standard of creative communicator.

Adopting effective decision and problem solving – The standard of computational thinker.

Assertiveness and equanimity – It applies the standard of empowered learner

 Flexibility and adapting with emotions – It applies the standard of computational thinker.

Empathy and Self-awareness – It applies the standard of innovative designer.

Creative thinking and Critical thinking – The standard of knowledge constructor.

Assessment

Evaluating the students’ use of technology and the NETS-S will be based on the several metrics. The ability of students to use technology in achieving and showing competency in their learning objectives will be used to assess whether they are in line with the standard of an empowered learner. The ability to establish imaginative solutions towards problems will also assess whether students comply with the standard of innovative designer. The standard of creative communicator will analyze the level of students to use various format, tools and digital media platforms relevant to their specific problems. The capability of students to use digital instruments, make creative artifacts and apply knowledge to build a constructive learning experience will assess whether they are using the standard of knowledge constructor.

Materials

Internet – Digital

Journals – Non-digital

Procedure

In order to replicate this lesson and achieve the lesson plan objectives, the following steps will be considered;

1. Establish a learning objective

The teacher will prepare the key objective of the lesson while the student will conduct research on the top to familiarize and prepare psychologically.

2. Gathering the necessary Resources

The teacher will divide the resources based on availability. For instance, the teacher might find the resources that require extra expenses such as software plug-ins while the student might be instructed to find cheap resources such as piece, glues e.t.c

3. Standards expected for the lesson

Teacher – will note the standards that should be upheld by the instructor

Student – To research and note student standards

4. The expectation set

Teacher – Brief the student about the schemes of work and topics to be topics to be covered in the lesson

Student – To ask question on any issue related to the prospective lesson

5. Introduction

Teacher – To tell student the main objective of the lesson

Student – Form group discussions to stimulate their understanding of the lesson

6. Direct teaching

Teacher – Teach the student the detailed part of the lesson while giving examples, explanation and diagrams where possible

Student – Listen and relate the lesson with the real life situation (try to understand significance of the lesson).

7. Guided teaching

Teacher – Give students instructions

Student - Engage in small group discussions

8. Assessment step

Teacher – assess ability of students to grasp concepts either using tests or quiz.

Student – Respond to tests or quiz accordingly.

9. Lesson closure

Teacher – Ask students questions as a group or the entire class

Student – Respond to question based on instructions given by the teacher e.g thumbs up/down.

10. Special instruction

Teacher – Identify students with special learning abilities and adopt a special learning plan for them.

Student – Respond with special learning abilities to follow any special instructions or plans outlined.

References

Lim, W., Son, J. W., & Kim, D. J. (2018). Understanding preservice teacher skills to construct lesson plans. International Journal of Science and Mathematics Education, 16(3), 519-538.

Beck, J., Greenwood, D. A., Blanton, L., Bollinger, S. T., Butcher, M. K., Condon, J. E., ... & Kolb, L. E. (2018). 2017 National standards for diabetes self-management education and support. The Diabetes Educator, 44(1), 35-50.

Dugger Jr, W. E. (2018). standards for technological literacy: past, present, and future. Technology and Engineering Teacher, 77(7), 8-12.

Buss, R. R., Foulger, T. S., Wetzel, K., & Lindsey, L. (2018). Preparing Teachers to Integrate Technology into K–12 Instruction II: Examining the Effects of Technology-Infused Methods Courses and Student Teaching. Journal of Digital Learning in Teacher Education, 34(3), 134-150.