Week 9- Technology Inventory Interview

I had the opportunity to interview Sherry Parham of Wilsonville, Oregon who owns and operates a preschool located in a community church building. She has been a part of this Frog Pond Preschool for just over 5 years. She has a younger preschool aged class every Tuesday and Thursday for 3 1/2 hours and she has an older preschool aged class every Monday, Wednesday and Thursday for 4 hours. She is busy all day everyday either planning lessons and activities or teaching in the class. It is a private preschool where the parent needs to apply for their child every year they wish to attend.

There are not as many technological devices as Sherry wishes to have in her classroom. She does have one computer, donated by a parent, which rarely ever works. When it does work, her students play educational computer games that are interactive. They wear headphones while on the computer if the program produces noise. This computer is very old and freezes frequently while the students are playing their games. She also allows the students to use the Paint program and draw pictures there. There is a digital camera in her classroom but it is teacher-use only. She uses this camera to take pictures every single day and at the end of the school year she compiles a small binder/notebook showing what the students did all throughout the year. She also gives a CD out along with these notebooks that includes all the pictures of that particular child. So each parent receives a CD with all the pictures of their child on it that are not included in the class notebook/binder. In her preschool there are also a lot of electronic toys. There is a large toy with all the alphabet letters, colored shapes and numbers that announces what you are pressing. There is a function where the toy announces the sound of the letter they are pressing so that the students can make the words for themselves. In Frog Pond preschool there are many interactive electronic toys donated by the parents (such as a fire truck that makes a variety of related sounds, and a tea part set which also makes related sounds). Another neat piece of technology that Mrs. Parham has is a large commercial copier. This was donated by a local company. She uses this to copy some of the students work and she also allows the students to press the buttons at times.

When I asked her what technologies she wished she had had, she told me she would have liked to have had a few newer computers along with some more interactive software games. The children seemed to love the computer games and she wishes she had the money to provide games that are more intellectually stimulating but still fun. She also told be she would love to have a video camera. She has seen how many children love to see themselves on TV or be recorded and watch it later. She has a few lesson plan ideas in relation to this; she just needs a tape recorder! She said that would be the only way she would incorporate a TV into her classroom instruction because she feels that there are better ways to teach her curriculum than watching a movie.

Sherry told me that she uses technology to plan her lessons almost every time. She does have curriculum books and a bunch of lesson plans, but when she needs other ideas or supplemental activities she browses through the internet. She is always typing up a newsletter for each month for each of the families. She creates CD mixes by purchasing fun children's songs that they can dance to. She plays these CD's while the children are doing many of their activities. She is always printing pictures, words, letters, etc. for her lesson plans. She has a list of great internet sites that she refers to every week for some great activity ideas for her students.

I asked Mrs. Parham if it would make her nervous to incorporate newer technology- I was curious about how she felt about letting the students use digital cameras, or newer computers- would they be able to understand them?, would they be able to be careful or gentle? She told me that she has discovered how natural technology seems to come to young students. Most of her students have technology at home and have their own computers. She feels that she only needs to remind them a few times that they need to be careful, but otherwise, the students seem naturally in-tune with how to work technology.