Here are some of my notes on the essential components of what I believe should be invovled in a technology course. Basically, I believe there is a need to change the format of technology courses that teach student how to use specific programs and for transferable skills. Technology solves problems for our society. They problems it addresses come from many different disciplines. Therefore, any technology should involve these elements: problem solving, data modeling, and various types of graphic displays. If you'd like to add your ideas here, please feel free.

Beliefs

Essential Questions
What is technology?
What role does it play in our society?
Does it improve our society, or cause more problems?
What is the effect of continued technological improvement on our environment?

Essential UnderstandingsTechnology solves problems for society.
Solving problems involves knowledge from many different disciplines.
Major areas of society that use technology to solve problems include: communication, energy, health and medicine, information management, security, and transportation.
Technology increases productivity, allows society to store, retreive, analyze, and display information from various disciplines, and helps us to express ourselves.
Any educational exercise should be based on problem solving and promote a process of research, data analysis, data modeling, cooperation, global awareness, and social responsibility.Technology requires the use of energy. Our current energy source (fossil fuels) is limited and hurts the environment.
Technology is used to explore, extract, process, transport, use and dispose of natural resources.

Big Ideas
Computing is a creative human activity that engenders innovation, exploration, and knowledge creation.
Abstraction is the process of reducing information and detail to focus on concepts relevant to understanding and solving problems.
Data and information facilitate the creation of knowledge.
Algorithms are tools for developing and expressing solutions to computation problems and for exploring and creating data.
Programming results in the creation of executable artifacts.
Computer systems and networks enable and foster communication and innovation.
Computing enables innovation in other fields (communication, graphic visualization, health and medicine, sports, transporation)