New Ed-Tech Standards

From Catherine McKenzie:


What's Happening in Ed Tech
New reports highlight trends and new technology standards.
By Jessica Springgay
Most people working in the education field do not doubt technology's impact on teaching and learning. While congressional leaders fight to maintain funding for such education initiatives as the Enhancing Education Through Technology (EETT) block-grant program, two recently-released reports highlight the importance of technology in education and focus on new technology standards and emerging technology trends.To keep pace with the changing demands of today's global and digital economy, the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) recently completed a draft of its National Educational Technology Standards (NETS) for students, and is asking educators for feedback on the draft....continued below ad
The original National Educational Technology Standards for Students were released in June 1998, and at least 45 U.S. states adopted the standards. In the original standards, the skills necessary to define technology proficiency were outlined across six categories: 1. basic operations and concepts; 2. social, ethical and human issues of technology use; 3. productivity tools; 4. communication tools; 5. research tools; and 6. problem-solving and decision-making tools. The revised draft standards also are organized into six categories: 1. creativity and innovation; 2. communication and collaboration; 3. research and information retrieval; 4. critical thinking, problem solving, and decision making; 5. digital citizenship; and 6. technology operations and concepts. The new student standards focus on the skills and knowledge required for students to learn and live productively in a digital society, with special emphasis on creativity and innovation with technology.Creativity and innovation are highlighted in another report that examines virtual worlds, emerging forms of publication and "massively multiplayer educational gaming" as emerging trends in educational technology.The New Media Consortium (NMC) and the EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative (ELI) released the "2007 Horizon Report," which seeks to identify and describe emerging technologies likely to have a large impact on teaching, learning, or creative expression within higher education. Each year, the report describes six areas of emerging technology that will have significant impact in higher education over the next one to five years. The six selected areas for higher education in 2007 are: 1. user-created content, 2. social networking, 3. mobile phones, 4. virtual worlds, 5. new scholarship and emerging forms of publication, and 6. multiplayer educational gaming. Download the Horizon report here. Or use https://mail.palomar.edu/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://www.nmc.org/horizon/
Those interested in the ISTE NETS refresh can participate by responding to the NETS Refresh survey. Read the draft of the new National Educational Technology Standards for Students here.