Reflection #2

Over Spring Break I had the pleasure of visiting my best friends college, Moody Bible Institute, in Chicago, Illinois. The overall experience was wonderful, but more specifically I was able to attend a couple classes with her. During these classes I compared and observed the different technologies used in the collegiate setting in comparison with an elementary, junior or high school setting. First of all, I think college is a different atmosphere entirely because the students are paying money to attend classes, they are not necessarily needing to be "entertained" or "engaged" at all times because a college education truly relies on independence and responsibility from the student. But what I did find interesting is that both professor from the classes I observed used an appealing PowerPoint to display their lectures. One professor added floating words or images and included a number of cartoon-like pictures to coincided with his lecture. Though this technology may not be "advanced" it was very helpful, to me at least, in learning the material and I am still actually able to remember the different pictures that related to Bible stories and characters. The other professor used his iPhone that was connected to his Mac Book Air to connect to his PowerPoint. He was able to use his iPhone as a remote to control his PowerPoint, which I thought was extremely cool and could be useful to me in the future. Although this observation was of two college classrooms technology was still a part of the teaching process and it assisted students in better note-taking and clearer comprehension of the material.