Activity Types

The "Activity Types" (AT) approach to lesson planning is surprisingly simple: determine what you need your students to learn, and then determine how technology can be of service. As straightforward and even as obvious as this may seem, there is little doubt that teachers of all levels of experience and exposure to technology might base the lesson around the technology simply for the sake of having students use a novel teaching method. To do so, however, as Drs. Hofer and Harris have explained, is to present exposure to technology as the primary "lesson," and this is very seldom the case.

There are many steps to planning one's lesson and incorporating the use of technology into the lesson as an enhancement. The AT approach guides us to first choose our learning goals, to then make pedagogical decisions about the type of learning experience we want our students to have, to thirdly combine our desired activity types, then select our assessment strategies, and only then to select the technological and other tools we will need to teach the lesson. This approach is not contradictory to that which is taught in methods courses (at least, for social studies methods courses), as the function of these courses is to learn how to design lessons that accomplish certain strategies (i.e. step one of the AT method). Thus, the AT method is really nothing novel; it is simply a reminder that incorporating technology should not necessarily be a goal, but it should rather be a strategy if deemed appropriate and useful.

I do not have any particular questions about the AT method. I believe its design is quite clear. However, I would be curious to know about any research that has shown which technologies (from those made available in different segments on the inventory) appear to be most useful in various combinations of the pedagogical decisions outlined in the AT theory.