"How Can Educational Technology Enhance Interactivity and Engagement in Learning?"

Greetings fellow educators! How do you keep your students engaged throughout a lesson? As educators, we all know that it takes a lot to keep our students motivated and engaged. One of the things that is currently being pushed through our district is the need to implement technology in our curriculum. As a middle school teacher, I have seen first-hand how technology can create an interactive and engaging learning environment. Why are interactivity and engagement important? Vercellotti, (2018) describes an active learning environment consisting of both student interactivity and engagement. Active learning is where students are involved in the learning process where there is the retention of knowledge and increased academic success (Vercellotti, 2018, p. 207-208). Students develop an intrinsic motivation to learn and a positive attitude towards learning when there is student interactivity and engagement, (Ferrer et al., 2022, p. 333-334).

Educational technology can enhance the learning experience of students by providing interactive and multimedia-rich content. Bond et al. (2020) found that incorporating technology in education leads to an increase in behavioral, affective, and cognitive student engagement (p. 17). Incorporating technology in the classroom can offer a more meaningful and engaging learning experience for students, but its implementation requires careful consideration and planning to ensure positive learning outcomes (Domínguez & Jelena, 2021, p. 2968). Technology in the classroom can create distractions for students if planned incorrectly or haphazardly.

The three technological tools that I would like to highlight are Kahoot, PhET.com, and Google Apps for Education (GAFE). These educational technology tools offer interactive and engaging learning experiences that allow students to collaborate and learn while having fun in the classroom. In this blog post, I will highlight the features and benefits of each educational technology tool as well as show how each tool can enhance the teaching and learning experiences of our middle school students.

1. Kahoot (https://kahoot.com/student-centered-learning/)

Kahoot is an interactive game-based learning platform that makes learning fun and a collaborative effort. Kahoot allows educators to create assessments, surveys, and discussions prompts. Kahoot is a great educational technology tool for motivating students and encouraging active participation. Educators can choose from pre-made assessments on various topics. Kahoot allows for gamified learning experience that serves as a formative assessment for educators (Kalleny, 2020, p. 181). The gamification format of Kahoot boosts student engagement but also helps in reinforcing knowledge and improving retention (Cortés-Pérez, et al., 2023; Bawa, 2023; Licorish, et al., 2018). Kahoot not only improves student students' attention, but it also increased student participation and provided students with an enhanced enjoyable learning experience (Alawadhi and Abu-Ayyash, 2020, p. 3643-3644). Additionally, Licorish et al. (2018) noted that Kahoot enriched the quality of student learning in the classroom, with the highest influence reported on classroom dynamics, engagement, motivation, and improved learning experience. Kahoot has a user-friendly format which makes it easy for beginners to get used to creating their own quizzes or discussions. Kahoot can operate with all operating systems. Educators can easily register to Kahoot using their Google account. Kahoot offers a free subscription option as well as a premier option for educators and school districts. Students can participate using tablets or computers and even their smartphones, making it accessible for all to participate and classroom size a non-issue. With Kahoot, I created an interactive asset that an educator can use to engage students in collaborative teams while assessing what students know about the water cycle.

2. PhET.com (https://phet.colorado.edu/)

PhET stands for Physics Education Technology. I have used PhET to teach general science as well as biology, chemistry, and physics. PhET.com was developed by the University of Colorado Boulder which offers a vast collection of interactive simulations. PhET.com is a free website but continues to provide its simulation services free of charge through the help of donations from its supporters. Like Kahoot, it can offer students an engaging learning experience. PhET has interactive simulations covering various math and science concepts. The interactive simulations promote inquiry-based learning and enable students to explore and experiment with concepts in a virtual environment. One of the simulations called Energy Skate Park was effective in teaching students about physical science concepts such as the different forms of energy and energy conservation. With the simulation, the students were able to manipulate the length of the track, the number of loops, the height of the track, and increasing the mass of the skater. Ajredini et al (2013) conducted a study comparing real experiment and PhET simulation involving electrostatic charging. Both the real experiment and PhET simulation had similar experimental results and improved the students’ understanding of the concept of electrostatic charging (p. 61-63). PhET simulation-based learning provided visualizations and teaching aids that help students understand content knowledge, resulting in improved academic achievement and motivation levels (Banda & Nzabahimana, 2022, p. 135).

3. Google Apps For Education (https://edu.google.com/intl/ALL_be/workspace-for-education/editions/overview/)

Google Apps for Education also known as Google Workspace for Education, is group of cloud-based productivity app tools designed specifically for education. Google app tools offers numerous benefits for middle school teachers such as collaborative document editing to organizing classroom resources (Kumar et al., 2020; Widodo, 2017). The Google app tools that are commonly used by our students are Google Docs, Google Sheets, and Google Slides, and Google Drive. These apps are great collaboration tools for small group activities such as composing laboratory notes where each section is assigned to a group member, presentations where each student is assigned a particular slide to present or creating data sheets for data analysis. GAFE is free for our school district while regular Google accounts can also access some of the same Google Apps. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the DoDEA schools used Google Apps for Education (GAFE) as its learning management system (LMS) by incorporating Google Classroom and various Google Apps (Google Doc, Google Slides, Google Presentation, Google Form). Widodo (2017), found that using GAFE as a learning management system improved the mathematical communication skills of primary school preservice teachers in the experiment group (p. 895).

Google Classroom allowed me to collaborate with other educators as well as push instructional materials to our students throughout the pandemic. Google Classroom allowed teachers to continue to meet virtually with their students as well as set up meetings with PLC (professional learning communities) groups. Google Classroom continues to evolve as they have added new features like Google Meet. The DoDEA school district used Google Meet as its video communication tool while other school districts used Zoom. Currently, Google Meet is added in all the other Google App tools (Google Doc, Google Slide, Google Presentation) for seamless collaboration or presentation with other group members. A Google App tool that educators can use to easily create online surveys or formative assessments is Google Forms. I have used Google Forms to create end of the quarter surveys for students and parents to help me improve as an educator.

Incorporating technology into the middle school classroom can significantly enhance the learning experience for both students and educators. Kahoot, PhET.com, and Google Apps for Education represent a powerful trio of educational resources that provide engaging, interactive, and collaborative opportunities. However, educator presence is still necessary for everything to work out as planned. Stone & Springer (2019) state that an educator has a vital role in student engagement through discussion and reflection (p. 158). Using technology to promote student interaction and engagement require educators to properly plan out their lesson. According to Bedenlier et al. (2020) blogs, mobile learning, and assessment tools were the most effective at promoting engagement, but that any use of technology that does not provide explanation or direction can lead to students feeling overwhelmed and disengaged from learning. Even though educators must incorporate technology into their classroom instruction, educational technology tools are not designed to replace the traditional learning process in its entirety, rather it is designed to enhance the student’s learning experience.