Hi everyone.

I'm so excited about our new blog!  I work as a substitute teacher on a high school campus and I get to experience first-hand everyday how teens learn via technology.  Whether it's in a traditional classroom or an online learning environment, technology is a vital component of classrooms as well as libraries.  However, teaching technology is very different based on what types of students are present.  School-age children and teens are digital natives, having technologically-rich lives from the moment they were born.  Whereas most adults are learning on an as-need basis; learning new technology as necessity dictates.  I am among this group.  For instance, I have never blogged before.  Is it hard?  No, but I just never felt the need until now, when I'm required to do it for my degree.

Teaching technology is an area where it is essential to have the right tools.  I can't fully teach a student to use a new program or hardware just from a book.  There has to be a hands-on component.  Labs, service learning, volunteering, and other forms of hands-on techniques are extremely important and essential for a complete learning experience.  I got to teach coding to a group of high school students recently, and they got to use the courses available at code.org in order to really try coding firsthand.  Learning coding from a book would not have been nearly as good of an experience for these teens.

Technology is an segment of the market that is growing exponentially and will continue to grow for many more years.  It's important that we have a workforce that excels technologically, but before we can get there we need people to teach them properly.