Trends and Issues in IDT

Part A:

This week we learned about the many different trends and issues in IDT.  Many of them in my opinion are very big issues that are discussed on a regular basis, especially on social media.  Social media being the best way to keep in touch with the issues and trends in IDT.  I know for me personal that is how I keep up with day to day issues, because its almost real time information as it happens. 

The three trends and issues that I picked for this assignment are P-12 Education, post-secondary education, and business and industry.  Let’s start by talking about how each three are different and then talk about how they are same.

Business and Industry

·         Has different roles for which a person can play in instructional design, example a person can do it alone or do it in a team format

·         As a person you can be in the role of client, where you hire someone to create something for your team to learn from

·         The subject matter for most instructional design would focus on the day to day operations of the business

·         The tools used for instructional design do not often get prove to be test or correct, its more here is a theory you can use in your business and then the business tests it

·         The whole goal of instructional design is to ensure that the business makes more money but runs more efficiently

P-12 Education

·         This issues focus on three types of development the system, the product, but ultimately how will it affect the classroom

·         This issue also deals about how to integrate technology into the classroom to facilitate the learning of the student

·         All methods are backed up with research and when the teacher gets hold of the different methods he or she evaluates how it affects their students

·         Teachers think of technology as a tool to help facilitate learning and when they do it changes the classroom behavior

·         Unlike in some areas there is still a huge gap between the technology in the classroom, example while businesses may keep up to date in some districts they cannot afford this so technology in the classroom is less to be desired

Post-Secondary Education

·         This issues deals with the working environment and analyzing the different job roles

·         It also focuses on how to become a better researcher, I know that when I was doing my graduate level work and even currently with my doctoral studies.  They focused on this because they were describing how it would help me when I published academic research in scholarly journals

·         This issue could also deals with how one is also learning and teaching, I equal this to apply what you learned

·         While other issues and jobs are straight forward and most people know what they do on a day to day basis in common terms

·         While others just borrow research from others on ways they do integrate technology into the classroom, in the post-secondary level they curve out time to do research on their own

In many ways these three issues are very similar to my job teaching social studies in high school.  For the most part just like in the business world where it focuses on efficiency, I find that in my classroom that I want my lesson to run as efficiently and smoothly as possible to ensure that my time but ultimately my students time is used wisely. In the P-12 education community I know that technology can change the behavior in the classroom, because it engages students.  I will play kahoot games with my students as a way to review them and I can see that most students are engaged and there are less behavior problems in the classroom.  In post-secondary I think the biggest difference is the fact that I do not do my own research for my classroom, I rely on other people’s research.

Part B:

As the world keeps growing as educators we need to prepare our students to enter a ever changing world.  In relation to the growing number of people and the lack of resources, I think one way we can prepare our youth is teaching them about conservation.  I know in US History, we talk about this subject when we talk about Teddy Roosevelt setting up national parks.  However, if we could teach them about it on a global scale and what it truly means to conserve resources, this could have a lasting effect on the planet. Unfortunately, I do not think our current educational system helps them problem solve.  Depending on what grade level they are in depends on what is taught and if they are in a STAAR test subject for the most part most educators teach toward a test.  I know that when I try to get my students to do this they cannot and it’s hard to teach them the higher level problem solving when they don’t have basic problem solving.  Lastly, I know that in some classroom around the world they have small classrooms but they have more teachers in the school, and still have money to fund other programs.  I think that a smaller classroom size would benefit students in the United States because they would get that one on one instruction.