Fitzgerald State School - Mackay

Focus Question

The focus for my investigation is ‘How to better use computer technology in order to promote literacy and numeracy skills’. It is hard to teach all the Year One concepts and skills whilst enabling children plenty of time to learn through play and using functional language. I find this is one of the biggest dilemmas in teaching Year One, while trying to incorporate many of the principles of early childhood learning. I wanted to manage my time better in the classroom to include more opportunities for children to learn through play. I also value children’s use of functional language to solve problems and discussing this with them through conversation. Computer technology is an area I wanted to develop more within my whole curriculum, especially with an emphasis on numeracy and literacy.

Problem solving is an effective way for children to develop numeracy and literacy skills. Language plays an important role in creating the learning environment. Children learn through play, modeled activities and guided learning experiences. Play is vital to children’s learning and therefore vital in schools. Life is not divided into separate subjects, all subjects are inter-related. Children need to be constantly exposed to real-life and like-life experiences. Computer technology is now a part of everyday society and children in early childhood can begin to develop skills which will enable them to become valued members of society in the future.

Results

Parent Survey Summary

23 surveys were returned from 25 sent home with the children.

1. 11 families have computers at home, 11 families do not have a computer, 1 family has a child’s computer.

2. From 12 families with computers at home, 10 of them can be accessed by the children, 1 sometimes and 1 never.

3. 11 children used the computers at home for the following activities:

play arcade games

play educational games

write / explore using word processing

draw pictures

print out (2 with help)

save work (1 with help)

Other applications included making cards, good behaviour certificates, spelling, plurals, addition etc. and games accessed by parents on the internet.

4. All 23 families state their children enjoy using computers.

5. 22 families believe computers should be used in Year One and 1 family believes the use of computers should be limited.

6. Activities parent believe their children should use a computer for in Year One include:

· Basic computer skills in numeracy and literacy (including reading, writing, spelling and listening),educational games that are fun so learning and computer use if encouraged, basic word processing, printing out, keyboard skills, mouse skills, fun activities, saving work, drawing pictures, social studies programs, typing, story writing and activities that convince children computers are a useful tool.

7. 15 families believe computers are very important in Year One, 2 families say fairly important, 2 families declined to comment, 2 believe computers and teachers play an equal role in educating their children, 1 family believes they should be introduced gradually and 1 family states they are not necessary but probably useful.

Comments included computers are not necessary but no doubt useful because computers are so prevalent in our society, children need to be educated in computer usage, and important educational tool, computers are a way of the future but they should not detract from the basics of numeracy and literacy skills, everything in our life is computerised, help prepared children for the future, computers are included in almost every sphere of employment, computers are becoming very common in homes not just the workplace and computers are an essential skill building tool.

8. Parents also further commented with: let children explore freely, computers need to be available to all children to provide opportunities for all especially those who wouldn’t normally have the opportunity to access them, integral part of children’s learning, taught from as early an age as possible, helpful if teachers advised parents of programs being used in schools, also if the school could have a computer library for parents to become familiar and helpful for their children, incentive to learn if introduced in a fun way, computers can enhance and complement the school curricula, programs that promote and model cooperative behaviour and computers can be used as a mechanical teacher’s aide where repetition can be fun for struggling students instead of boring repetitive work with teachers.

Computers in schools are fine but the success of the program is only as good as the knowledge, enthusiasm and commitment of school administration and staff. The number of computers in the classroom don’t necessarily reflect on way or another upon the total educational program of the school. Sometimes schools can be judged for the number of computers per classroom. Is this soundly educational?

Self Assessment Summary

1. All 24 children enjoy using the computer.

2. 17 like working by themselves, 20 enjoy working with a friend, 22 enjoy whole class activities with the teacher, 19 enjoy helping a friend and 22 enjoy working with their Year 7 buddies.

3. The children’s favourite activity was working by themselves (8), working with a friend (8) and working with their Year 7 buddy (7).

4. 21 enjoy painting / drawing pictures, 20 enjoy typing on the keyboard, 21 like practising their mane and the alphabet, 17 enjoy editing, 17 like watching someone else on the computer, 22 enjoy printing out their work, 23 enjoy playing the educational game ‘Earth Math’ and 16 enjoy practising with their cardboard keyboard.

5. The favourite activity was playing and exploring ‘Earth Maths’ (13).

6. 18 children would like to use the computer everyday and 5 would like to use it once a week.

7. The children said they would also like to play ‘Treehouse’ and other educational games on the computer and writing their stories straight on the computer.

Using the computer as a reward / consequence for Tony has worked quite well. He is a major behavioural problem in the classroom and in the playground. If his is reminded before lunches to act responsibly and not to break the class and school rules, then his reward / consequence is approximately ten minutes free time on the computer during silent reading straight after big lunch. I check with him, the teacher on playground duty and his peers for his behaviour at play time. At first the other children in the class questioned him having extra turns and could they have a go after him. When I explained that it was set up so the children could play without Tony annoying them at lunch they were quite understanding. The children were also good reinforces in the playground for Tony at lunch time.

Dylan had trouble using the mouse. He needed help to hold the mouse still when he needed to click the mouse. Dylan and Sally both had trouble colouring the letters of their name on their practise keyboard. Their knowledge of lower and upper case was not sufficient enough and they couldn’t distinguish between the capitals and lower case letters without help. These children needed to match the letters with their name written in capitals. Sally was more capable of typing her name than Dylan with the capital letters. Children enjoyed typing name and alphabet on the computer. Dylan and Sally required adult assistance but Sally was also a helpful peer tutor for Dylan. Dylan had a lot of problems matching the capital letters from the paper to the keyboard. The children used verbal skills to remember the alphabet. Sally was very good at matching the letters. Both children enjoyed the activity but needed a longer amount of time than the rest of the class to complete.

All children used only one hand when typing on the computer. Sally used her left hand and she is right handed. Dylan constantly changed hands depending on which was closest to the keyboard. Dylan’s skills improved over the investigation when clicking on the mouse.

Brendan was very fast, competent and independent throughout the investigation. He remembered and learnt directions easily. Brendan and Katie were independent when typing their name and the alphabet. They were able to effectively use the backspace to correct mistakes.

Brendan typed with his left hand only. He was very quick, confident and efficient. He had no problems when editing and innovating texts. Katie tried using two hands. She was also very confident and experienced no problems.

Tony was holding down the backspace and therefore erasing the text. He found it very difficult to be a verbal helper as he likes to touch the keyboard. He was very insistent about his turn, although very enthusiastic.

Dylan had a tendency to hold down the backspace or arrow when looking at the screen. His fine motor skills need further development and therefore using the keyboard and mouse were sometimes difficult. Dylan was constantly swapping hands on the keyboard, but only using one at a time. Pressing one key at a time was also sometimes difficult. Dylan was happy to sit and watch Sally after his turn. Sally was very quick typing her name but needed to match the words she needed from a piece of paper. Sally was reading the words to help her complete the text innovation. Dylan was helpful reminding her to use a full stop and pointing to it on the keyboard. Sally’s coordination with the mouse improved throughout the investigation.

Brendan used Paintbrush confidently to draw a picture. He was very capable of changing shapes and colours. He wanted to type in his name. He was good when typing to remember to spell sight words and I helped him with other words. Brendan was able to locate the keys on the keyboard quickly and accurately. He worked independently using backspace, the keys and the mouse. He was very self absorbed and independent with trying to solve problems. He could talk to himself to help him solve problems.

Dylan was beginning to become a behaviour problem in the class due to his inability to perform academically like his peers. The computer has improved his willingness to learn again. Sally and Dylan seemed to feel equal academically with their peers when they were on the computer, even though they required some assistance. They worked well with their buddies. Both these children had very good buddies helping them to learn, rather than their buddies doing the work for them.

Early Math involved six games involving shapes, patterns, number and quantity, ordering by attributes, following instructions measurement, counting, simple addition and subtraction.

The patterns involved geometric shapes, letters and numbers. Counting sheep 1 to 10 involved number symbols and words for numbers. These numbers appeared in forward and backward counting patterns. Completing the picture required students to use 2D shapes and skills of estimation to complete geometric pictures. Place value recognised the hundreds, tens and ones columns, also showing visual carrying over from one column to another. Addition and subtraction dealt with problem solving and the vertical format for these concepts. The tangram was used to construct a rectangular bridge. The shapes children had to use could be moved and rotated. These were three levels of tangrams from simple 2D shapes to polygons. Children needed to develop the mouse skills of moving, clicking and dragging. Additional activities we did included finding 2D shapes in the environment, using counters to practise addition and subtraction problems and creating and completing picture puzzles with geometric shapes missing.

The children enjoyed using the Early Math program. More attention was given to the word processing as this required more strategic planning and modeling. Early Math is an Educational game and the children were able to work on this independently at their own pace. The games involved problem solving skills and revision of concepts taught in class. I also included in my investigation activities the children could participate in away from the computer, which were then reinforced in a fun way on the computer. The children loved the game. The graphics and voice interaction were excellent. This program also enabled the children to improve their mouse skills as they did not need to use the computer keyboard.

Dylan and Sally were able to reinforce their addition, counting, pattern and shape skills with this program. They had difficulties with the place value and the more advanced tangrams. Brendan and Katie enjoyed the challenge of these more difficult tasks and were eager to achieve success with these games when working independently on the computer. This program complimented the concepts taught in Year One well, especially for revision in Term 4 before entering Year Two.

Discussion/ Conclusion

"In recent times a convergence of global computer networks and international communication systems has meant instant access to the most recent information," quotes Anderson (1996, p.1) Children need to begin using computers to develop their numeracy and literacy skills from a very early age.

Van Horn (1995, p.5) strongly argues that skill in learning technology is imperative to empowerment in modern society and that, "As we get deeper into the information age, knowledge becomes power, and the people who don’t know how to access and use the information will have no power."

Learning technology focuses on the use of computers and associated devices and how they are used to enhance subjects across the curriculum. The art of learning technology is more important in Early Childhood years rather than technology itself. Computers were once placed in classrooms with the assumption that the children would learn how to use them if allowed time to explore. But the teacher needs to expose children to computers and foster their development for them to be able to sue computers across the curriculum. Providing the computer resources in a classroom is not enough if teachers are not in-serviced on how they can be effectively used in the classroom to foster literacy and numeracy development.

Downes and Fatouros (1995) say that providing opportunities for children to interact is not in itself a guarantee that they will learn what you want them to learn. Educators need to take an active role in managing the learning environment to ensure the success of the experiences you have planned.

Many parents are concerned for their child’s future in the employment industry even when the children are still in their Early Childhood years. This is evident in the results of the Parent Survey I conducted on computers in Year One. Computer technology, according to Apple’s (1987) examination of statistics, has eliminated many more jobs than it has created thus contributing to the problem of inequities in society. Most employment areas now require their employees to have some form of computer literacy. We need to begin preparing children for the future in their Early Childhood years as computers are a way of the future in which they will be living and working. We need to provide children with as many opportunities as we can to help them prepare for the future.

Activities on the computer need to consist of more than ‘drill and practice’ thype programs. Anderson (1995) also believes we need to provide more than just ‘drill and practice’ games when educating children. Children also need to be exposed to problem situations through educational programs. It is also important that we include effective means to monitor children, whether or not the desired outcomes have been achieved.

Anderson (1996) states from research that there has been a positive correlation between school computing success and access to voluntary non-class computing activities. Children without access to home computers were found to participate less in school computing activities. Computers in the home are becoming more and more common. The Parent survey reveals one in two children in my class have a computer at home.

Lifter (1997) states with the prevalence of computers in both the classroom and the home, there is a definite need for young children to become familiar with the keyboard. Children need to become familiar with the keys so the flow of writing does not deteriorate. Technology in itself is just a tool to help deliver the curriculum, whether by aiding in the presentation of a lesson, helping with productivity, or helping with record keeping. The computer can be used for whole class or small group guided lessons.

Bryant (1996) discusses many ways one computer can be used in a classroom of 25 children. All teachers have unique teaching styles and therefore use technology differently. Tapping into the potential of a computer can be used in a variety of ways. Children may play educational games or the children may be responsible for producing technology projects. Timetabling is the key when integrating one computer in a classroom of 25 children. Children can help provide input into developing a suitable timetable. Some software programs can provide experiences and feedback to students during individual practice time that no maths worksheet can do. Early Math provides children positive feedback for successful and unsuccessful attempts at problem solving throughout the program. Bryant (1996) believes many computer novices have a fear of harming the computer. The majority of students have the opposite approach.

Throughout my investigation, all the children in the class thoroughly enjoyed using the computer to further develop their numeracy and literacy skills. They found it exiting and had no fears or apprehensions. All the groupings worked quite well too. The variety for the children was good. The activities I listed to complete were done with all the children in the class. This was very time consuming. Class management and time management were very important. All the children participated in the investigation. I believe this was only fair.

Children were very quick to learn new things on the computer. With practise I was rarely needed as they used each other for help. This also enabled the children to do more activities on the computer as I could continue teaching with the rest of the class.

The majority of children were excited and motivated when I did whole class activities. They could all see the screen and joint construction of letters, stories and instructions gave me a chance to introduce and model new skills. The children were generally very quick to use these skills when they came to using the computer. The children were very motivated to write, especially their creative stories as they knew they were being published on the computer.

The use of human resources was essential. I used my 90 minutes per week of teacher aide time and some parent helpers who were willing to help out. These parents were both literate and illiterate towards computers. It was good to offer some parents opportunities they had never had.

Year 7 buddies were very helpful to their Year 1 buddies. They helped with computer orientation and drawing pictures with the program ‘Paintbrush’. It was very beneficial for us to visit the Year 78’s classroom every week as they had a bank of six computers in their classroom. Most of the time the Year 7 buddies were very helpful. I did have to ensure in some cases that the Year 1’s were exploring and the Year 7’s were assisting and not doing the work for the Year 1’s.

The practise keyboard each child had should have been adapted to match exactly with the keyboard of the computer in our classroom. This practise keyboard was very useful for children to practise on. They found it quite exciting. It was good for children to become familiar with certain keys needed to edit and type.

The children could have been exposed to the ‘Typewrites’ that exist in the school. These are battery operated keyboards that teach children efficient keyboard skills. They have a small screen with display instructions. The children work through the various levels at their own pace. Our school policy states these are to be used three times a week from Year 4 to Year 7. These could be exposed to Year 1 in conjunction with their practise keyboards on cardboard.

During my six week investigation my class was involved in ten consecutive days of swimming and then ten consecutive days of rehearsal for our school spectacular. (A very professionally run school concert at the Mackay Entertainment Centre.) While allowing all children to participate in the activities, it was difficult to fit in all my planned activities. Although we did manage to complete most of them. The activities explored during my investigation could easily have continued for another four weeks, therefore allowing an entire ten week term to complete the activities.

Appendices

Computer orientation (Katie)

Keyboard (Brendan)

Paintbrush drawing (Dylan)

Paintbrush drawing (Katie)

Text Innovation (Dylan and Sally)

Creative Story ‘Bulldozer the Alien’ (Dylan)

Creative Story ‘Nipper’ (Sally)

Creative Story ‘Hogit the Alien’ (Brendan)

Creative Story ‘Sarah Falls Down’ (Katie)

Self Assessment: Year One Computers

Parent Survey: Computers in Year One

Photographs (individually labeled)

Bibliography

Anderson, Neil (1996). When Technology and Equity Become Partners. Wide Bay Queensland: SPSS Regional Project.

Anderson, Neil (1995). Beyond Drill and Practice - Higher Order Thinking Skills Through Technology. Proceedings of the Secondary Australian Conference on Technology for People with Disabilities. Adelaide.

Apple, M. (1987). The New Technology: Part of the Solution or Part of the Problem. Curriculum development Centre.

Bryant, Mary (1996). Integrating technology into the Curriculum: Intermediate Australia: Hawker Brownlow Education.

Downes, Toni and Fatouros, Cherryl (1995). Learning in an Electronic World. Newtown: Primary English Teaching Association.

Lifter, Marsha and Adams, Marian (1997). Integrating technology into the Curriculum: Primary. Australia: Hawker Brownlow Education

Van Horn, R. ‘Surfing the Internet’. Score, vol. 3, no 4, 1995.