Implications and Teaching Opportunities for Camera Use in Teaching and Learning

"I DON'T USE MY PHONE EVERY DAY." - People in DENIAL

 Dr. Strange gave us these astonishing facts:
"A recent study by Zogby Analytics reports several interesting findings regarding young people aged 18 - 24:

1. 87% say their smartphone never leaves their side.
2. 80% say the very first thing they do in the morning is reach for their smartphone.
3. 78% say they spend 2 or more hours per day using their smartphone.
4. 68% say they would prefer to use their smartphone instead of their laptop or personal computer for personal use.
5. 91% say that having a camera on their smartphone is important (61% very important)
6. 87% say they use their smartphone camera at least weekly. 59% use their smartphone camera at least every other day. 44% use their smartphone camera for still or motion picture taking every day."

With so many recent updates to the world of technology it is almost impossible to NOT own a smartphone. I got my first phone when I turned 13 and I was LUCKY to have a camera on it, AND IT HAD A FLASH! It was intense, feeling like I had won a million bucks. The truth of today though is that kids that are under the age of ten have smartphones, use them daily, and guess what.... theirs has a high speed camera in it already.....And it has a flash. Uncle Ben said it best: "..with great power comes great responsibility." (Spider-man... for all you non-nerds...) Children today hold a great power and with that must learn their responsibilities. Some of the issues with having smartphones in the classroom is that students do not have a very long attention span. Everyone wants to be updated on whats happening, even if its happening in the same room that you're in. Fighting the urge to not text your friend in class is like trying to fight off the urge to not blink.... its really hard to do but eventually you cave. I know that being a student in college, this is definitely hard so I cant imagine how it would be for students in an elementary school.

Knowing that my students will have always known cell phones with cameras can be entertaining. We could bring in old phones and ask them to figure them out and take a photo, only to show them what its like not having one. This presents an issue though, with every new technology, there are teachers that still have no idea about them. Many teachers want to keep technology out of the classroom and that, in my opinion, is a terrible idea. These students know so much about technology and smartphones that they are teaching the teachers how to use it. Teachers that embrace the technology revolution can do so much more in the classroom.

Examples:

• Using their cellphones on a "fieldtrip" around the school taking photos of certain plants, scavenger hunt style, to bring them back and upload them to a poplet for a science lesson.
• having them do a venn diagram about the differences and similarities of phones from the past and phones they have now
• creating an idea for a future phone by basing it off of the phones they have. What would they keep/change/add
• record the teacher's lecture/project instructions so they have them to take home and don't forget
• Using their tablets to search AVL and other virtual libraries for links and upload them to their blog
• Text-a-friend assignments: when your partner is absent from school you can text/skype them so they are not behind
• playing music that they don't know and having them use the listening features on the phone to identify it
• taking photos to add to iMovies
• creating poplets/iMovies
• having them look up individual answers to questions they don't know and see who can find the most answers
• taking photos of a page from a reference book that cannot leave the library, so they can have it with them later
• playing TELEPHONE while using an actual telephone, for famous quotes

There are so many different things that we can come up with. These are just a few ideas on how we could use each individual child's tablet/phone in the classroom. These could all be used in conjunction with other projects as well.  I really believe that technology is going to be in the classrooms a lot more from now on because of all the cool things we can learn to do with it! Hopefully one day we can create more signs like these: