There are some things related to technology that every teacher should at least be familiar with. I’ll be posting several of these throughout the remaining weeks of school.
I wanted to start today with one of the more important ones, which is obviously really an acronym: ISTE (pronounced “isty“), which stands for the International Society for Technology in Education. ISTE is an organization that helps to curate and provide resources for integrating technology into education. But most importantly, ISTE is the body to which most people in education look to set the standards in using technology.
ISTE has published and revised standards for students, teachers, leaders, and coaches, as well as those for cross-cutting concepts related to computational thinking. These standards really constitute competencies that are designed to guide the thoughtful integration of technology into the learning environment in order to maximize the value of the technology being used in and around classrooms. It is always helpful when teachers can justify the decisions they make with regard to technology (or justify its absence) using the categories and competencies delineated in these documents. The ISTE Standards for Students have officially been adopted by the State of Michigan under another acronym, which will be featured in an upcoming segment of “EdTech Word of the Day”.
ISTE provides a variety of resources centered around these standards to members and non-members alike, as well as conferences that have been touted as “The World’s Most Comprehensive Ed Tech Event”. However, it is important to note that while ISTE speaks much into the world of Educational Technology, its scope is not exhaustive. Nevertheless, ISTE contributes much to the conversation and is a significant entity in the world of learning.
Check out ISTE and become familiar with it if you’re not already!
