The Classroom of the Future

The classroom of the future will depend on the technology available to students and teachers. In addition, it will be dependent upon teacher knowledge and skills of using the technological pieces. Students, I believe, will be more technologically savvy, but due to shortages of technology availability, there will be a technology gap that will divide students.
In classrooms where technology is available and implemented, students will probably have personal digital writing utensils. Whiteboards and chalkboards will more than likely be done away with completely and reaplaces by Elmos and overheads. The only manual material available will probably be in teacher small instruction groups. Computer to student ratio would have likely increased tremendously with computer outnumbering students. Cell phone use will be permitable and even encouraged for projects such as research report interviews and Internet use for research. Student State exams would be completed online for monitering and quick feedback on their performance. Student assignments would also be done electronically to descrease paper uses, to assist teachers with organization, and for easier grading. Fluency assessments will also be taken electronically without the assistance of the teacher. They will be more accurate and detect student prosody through voice levels in rise and falls of pitch.
If student classroom technology has not increased, students classrooms can be expected to look similar to classrooms where little technologically was previously implemented. Students in impoverished neghborhoods will continue to lag in technology capabilities. In addition, they will be less qualified for jobs and higher education.
If technology is properly advanced in the classroom, students and educators can look forward to having a more teachnologically aware students.