Krinessa Amor Hernandez Mangubat / Dong Yuan Elementary School

《ABSTRACT》

“In education and in life, change is the only constant. We can all agree on that. Fortunately, we never outgrow our capacity to learn and therefore to change. For this semester’s paper, I have decided to write about technology integration in teaching and learning that must really collide to reach for the goals in the learning process during online classes.”

Technology integration is incorporated to bring about the needed rapport and experiential type of learning in class. The use of technology resources such as computers and mobile devices like smartphones, tablets and iPads have been widely used throughout this time. The use of software applications, the Internet, etc. in daily classroom practices was highlighted as well. Integration of technology in education simply refers to the use of technology to enhance the student learning experience. Utilizing different types of technology in the classroom, including a virtual classroom, creates learners who are actively engaged with learning objectives.

The practices in an in-classroom session were put into an online classroom with technology integration. It brings about the change that this pandemic needed, to bring the learners on their feet and have this agility when in virtual learning. At first, it was so nice to see that students are overwhelmed by online classes and that they are still thriving to follow instructions even if everything is based online. However, it is not always the same for some without parents’ proper supervision. Due to this, I have decided to keep the students busy with activities that will boost their knowledge even if it is outside class time. Yes, you heard me right. I gave students some activities or homework wherein they will utilize the learnings that they have gained from the class. I believed that this change should bring about a big change to the students’ life instead of making them lazy and just love the comfort of being at home. No student is alone, yet has a sense of independence in his or her own educational journey. I believe that students can show their ability to switch between in-classroom and online instruction during this time and that this will increase their intellectual ability.

Google Classroom has been the newly used online classroom setup that actually makes online classes conducive to learning. I have made sure that this technology integration will be achieved by:

1. Making accessible and readily available tasks at hand
2. Routinary ways of finishing an activity
3. Giving homework that will bring about experiential learning

Figure 1. Sample Wordwall activities that students enjoyed to answer during the class.

The first step of this technology integration is to make accessible and readily available tasks at hand. To make this possible, I have planned Wordwall activities where students can test themselves on the vocabulary and sentence patterns that they have learned. This strategy does not only enhance the students’ ability to remember the lesson but also offers a great impact on their willingness to learn. Since Wordwall activities are very creative, user-friendly, and interactive, the students enjoyed it utmost. Based on my assessment, more students are engaged in learning when they are using gadgets because it brings them endorphins or these happy hormones and gives them the vibes that they are playing video games though they are just answering questions in a very video game looking templates.


The next step that we have to consider, when technology is integrated, is the way or routine of how to meet the educational or lesson goals. It is the very challenging part where some teachers fail because most of us tend to teach like the normal type of class with our PowerPoints, videos, eBooks, etc. We hardly consider that we should be engaging and interacting with them because students do not only learn by watching and listening, they are learning more when they are engaged and answering questions. Due to this, I have made sure that there is a routine class roll call where all the students need to answer, and not only the good ones who always raise their hands. Because of this, every student at the end of the class feels satisfied because they have participated in the class activity. This way shows very effective outcomes as students feel like their time online passes efficiently. To assure an easy routinary way of calling the students the teacher should call them from the first number to last or other ways but must be always in order so that students will anticipate their time to answer. Yes, it may sound very weird but this is an effective way to utilize time in teaching online properly.

Figure 2. Excerpt from the homework instruction that has been uploaded in Google Classroom.	Figure 3. The students need to complete the sentences to make their family introduction.

The last step that I have always believed to be the most effective is to give homework that will bring about experiential learning to the students. This part of the technology integration has something to do with the homework. Some teachers think that it is not possible to give homework that will cater to students learning by doing a task, but I defy that belief. So, I have made a homework that will ask my third-grade students to finish a task in their book and make a video using the answers that they have made. With these tasks, we could assess their learning ability towards the topic that they have learned from the unit. For instance, what I have made is based on the topic on page 89 of our Wonder World Book 2. The students introduced themselves, a boy family member, a girl family member, what can they do, and their job. In addition to the book task, I have asked them to write their ambition and aspiration in life. This task has been in order for them to use their family vocabularies from Unit 3, things that they can do vocabularies from Unit 2, and jobs from Unit 4. Technology integration is necessary here because I have asked them to take a video using their computer or parent’s cellphone and upload it to our Google Classroom. I gave them a step-by-step process on how to turn in their work. I have also given them sample answers to give an activity sample. Since it is about their family, I have told them to draw or borrow a family picture to show in their video and introduce their family using their family members’ real jobs. The activity turned out very well. The students’ works are exemplary. Many students impressed us. Some students that we wished had spoken more in our class have been speaking a lot on that video activity. We have gotten so many takeaways after watching the students’ videos. They come up to the point where they have shown that experiential learning is still one of the best tools to give students the learning that engages them to do hands-on experiences and reflection that showed their knowledge from the classroom to real-world situations. I guess the fact they are going to face their gadgets when speaking instead of facing their classmates in the classroom gave the students confidence in sharing their answers. Most of the students who have stage fright or fear of public speaking sent videos. Although the truth of the matter is that there are no perfect online activities there are always some students who were not able to send any because they said their parents are busy or that they have no resources to do it.

Figure 4. A student's submitted video introducing his family member.

This season just proved that when technology integration is at its best, a child or a teacher does not stop to think that he or she is using a technology tool because it just becomes their second nature. And students are often more actively engaged in projects and activities when technology tools are a seamless part of the learning process.