Tech Integration Paves the Way for Kindergarteners’ Critical Thinking
The teachers say their students are constantly surprising them with how they pick up on information or make connections.
“When we come to January, lightbulbs start going on, so I start getting excited for things to click,” Pinto says. “They’re aware now that Jessica’s class is ahead of us in time. Before, when I told them, ‘They’re three hours ahead of us,’ I tried to explain that when we were asleep, they were already starting school. So now sometimes they ask, ‘What’s New Jersey doing right now?’”
The experience of working with another classroom in another part of the country gives the young students a sense of the bigger picture. From the weather updates and the time difference to the experiences of other students, technology shows the kindergarten classes that the world is larger than just the community they know.
“Our collaboration reframes the way they see and approach the world, because they have a really deep understanding that what is happening around them is only one person’s experience and one perspective, in a very different way than most 5-year-olds do, because we see outside of ourselves and outside of our space on a daily basis,” Twomey says. “I think that children learn to take in the world differently, and they learn to wonder differently, and their curiosity expands.”