However this conversation continued on to describe how their teacher always just puts the work/notes onto google classroom and that is as much interaction that the teacher has with the students in their lessons. Now while I am sure this isn't entirely true and has some exaggeration to it, it does however bring up an important point about our newfound use of technology as teachers.
The point being, that just like the old textbooks, worksheets and dictionaries, any tool even a digital one can be used poorly. Google classroom in itself is a way to manage workflow, documents, share and ask questions, and provide a digital medium for feedback to students. This doesn't mean that our students don't still need us. They in fact need us now more than ever.
As we now don't have to writie pages and pages of notes onto the board for students to copy or to write up a list of activities that they must sit and diligently work through in silence. This means we have TIME. One of the most precious things to a teacher is just that, TIME. We have time to talk to our students about the topic we are learning, show our passion for the topic, spark some interest in our students, do more experiments and practical learning activities, ask them questions about what they think, find out how else they might work through a problem, support our low ability students, help our Maori/Pasifika/ESOL students in a way that we never had time to before now and so much more. Google Classroom and etools if used well, gives us TIME. But what we choose to do with that time is up to each one of us. As tempting as it might be, catching up on absences, or emails during our lessons are not the best use of our time in terms of our students learning.
So I am keen to know how you use your time in your lessons to best benefit your students. As always sharing is caring and helps us all become better at our craft. Please share your ideas in the comments below.