Oregon Technology Standards

1. How might you explain the big picture of what these standards are trying to accomplish?
The standards are set so that each graduating student will be not only able but comfortable with many aspects of technology.  Some of these aspects include comuputer processing literacy such as typing, creating documents, and power point presentations.  Another aspect or standard is that the student must be able to do research using online sources.  They must be able to share projects or work on documents with other students via the internet, and they must be able to save and access information, documents and websites for later reference.  Students must be prepared to use technology for school and work as many jobs require you to be technologically literate.  Even a job in a fast food restaurant requires use of a computerized cash register.  It seems that very few jobs will not require some level of technological literacy.  As a teacher, we must also be comfortable and knowledgable about technology so that we can teach these skills to our students, so they can pass the standards required of them now to graduate. 

2. Describe some strategies you could implement at your grade level in order to accomplish this huge task.
      I work with middle schoolers currently and I can think of many ways in which these standards can be taught and worked on.  One of those ways is by doing a group presentation.  First, the student can access the internet to do research on their chosen topic for their presentation.  Secondly, the student can use google documents to word process the information to go into the presentation.  Third, by using google documents, each person in the group can contribute information or give feedback to other's information.  Fourth, the students can coordinate a time to get on Skype and discuss revisions and opinions about their presentation.   All of this can be rom anywhere they have access to a computer.  Fifth, the students can create a web page or a blog and post their presentation in video, audio or document form.  All of these steps can be preformed on one assingment yet the multiple steps will meet several of the technology standards.  I think that the more technologically advanced we become as a society, the more specific and detailed these standards will become.  This is done to keep up with employer demands in society.  Not only for our future doctors, teachers, attorneys, social workers, engineers and computer tech people but also for our future bookeepers, car salesmen, postal workers, beauticians and retail store clerks.