Technology in the Classroom

Hello there.

My name is Shane Corbell. I'm an English Education major at Boise State, and I'm looking forward to teaching English Literature and Creative Writing in the near future. Technology is an invaluable tool for teachers, with English instructors being no exception. Word processing applications are vital for effective writing. They allow authors to proofread and edit their work much more freely and easily than they would using the old-fashioned pen and paper method. In addition, English teachers are able to utilize technology to bring new writing techniques into the classroom, check for plagiarism, and gain access hundreds of millions of written works with the click of a mouse.

Microsoft Excel is a tool that I have learned to use with much more flexibility than I did in the past. I always thought of Excel as a number crunching tool, but through the Educational Technology class at BSU I have come to realize how invaluable the application is. Even for an English teacher, Excel is vital for keeping an accurate gradebook. I encourage all Education students to independently research Excel to learn about the many ways it can be helpful to their future careers.

This blog "thing" is very new to me; I have never blogged as a blogger in the blogosphere before. I will say one thing: blogs sure have created a fun situation for Linguistics professors. Even after a short glance, I can readily see how blogs can be utilized in the classroom. They allow each member to post their thoughts and comments on the contents of the blog, post relevant media to the blog's subject, and basically get everyone involved in the discussion.