Learning Step by Step

Last week I had another "aha" experience while watching some first graders doing photo editing. Several first grade classes have been coming through the lab doing a project where they have a picture taken of themselves dressed as a cowboy with a green screen and after making the background transparant they copy and paste themselves onto a background with a horse. They are then going to write a story about what is happening with the horse.

One of the classes I worked with has been coming to the computer lab and using computers in their classroom regularly. Although it was a challenge for them to follow all of the directions they had the background they needed to easily do the editing. They were comfortable moving the mouse and switching to different tools and dragging corners to resize something. They were comfortable finding a file in a folder and opening it, renaming it and saving it.

Another class has rarely come to the lab and when they do it is usually to go to a website and play some learning game. For them this project was more difficult. Some of them could not make the mouse do what they wanted it to do. Some did not know how to find a file in a folder or how to save. Working with this group had to be slower and was a bit more stressful for them and for the teacher.

I have wondered sometimes whether it makes sense to be teaching Kindergarten and 1st graders technology. This was a definite example of how all of the experiences they have will help them as they do other things in the years to come. I don't want to underestimate what these kids can do. It is pretty amazing.