Revolutionized Learning - Lucas Komara

Part of a Student series looking at student views/voice on technology use in District 230

Technology at Sandburg has revolutionized my learning experience in most of my classes. What I enjoy and benefit from the most is the organization that Canvas provides. Having access to notes from throughout the semester, and for some classes, a calendar for previous and upcoming assignments, has made my life significantly less stressful because I don’t have to worry as much about digging through notes from the beginning of the semester to study for finals nor dealing with as many panic-stricken moments from not remembering to study or complete an assignment.

In my classes, technology has added some unique features that have made learning more efficient and customizable and have expanded upon the ways that we can learn. In calculus, our teachers have created YouTube videos of each page within our note packets for when we couldn't complete the required notes for that day and for those who were absent. They also serve as great study material to go over a concept I didn't understand in class. In my Spanish class, we have been utilizing Skype to speak with other spanish speakers. We are currently in contact with a girl from Spain who we’ve been creating video compiltaions for. We’ve created videos with a variety of questions about Spanish culture, politics, etc. She then responds answering our questions as well as recently showing us a day in her life. Now we are working on a video that showcases our community, traditions, and experiences during the holiday season in response to her video where she showed us the town she lives in.

Despite all that technology has done for my education, my one problem deals with the unreliability of the wifi. Most days the signal strength is mediocre, yet manageable. Occasionally I have experienced days where the wifi was not working at all, causing some of my teachers to completely change their lesson plans for the day, or just for the period. Because of this, we tend not to use Skype in Spanish anymore because of the poor video quality. Other than the wifi, my experiences with technology at Sandburg has so far been rather positive.

Lucas Komara

Carl Sandburg High School Student