Revisiting SAMR

Two years ago, teachers had to “SAMR-ize” their use of technology within one of their units. Even though we don’t have an expectation like this for using SAMR at the moment, this model for infusing tech into your teaching and learning activities is still very relevant and important to consider.

With this in mind, let’s do a quick review of SAMR.

The goal is to move toward Modification and Redefinition with our technology use and lesson design. This doesn’t mean we ignore and don’t do Substitution and Augmentation. Those stages will alway have their role in the learning process as we use technology. What it does mean is that we should be going for Modification and Redefinition as we design summative learning tasks so that they engage, give agency to, and have the students build a deeper understanding of content and skills as they work toward mastering learning objectives or standards.

Here is a nice post that gives examples of lessons being transformed through the SAMR cycle.

I also like this model that brings in Bloom’s Revised Taxonomy into the mix (here is a good post about tech use and Bloom’s). Combining the two makes for even more deeply transformed unit, project, or activity.

Though all levels of Bloom and SAMR are important in learning, we should be working more in the Creating, Evaluating, and Analyzing (Bloom’s) and Modification and Redefinition (SAMR) stages if we really want to transform or units and summative assessments. It also tends to create a more truly student-centered classroom when working in these realms.

How can you SAMR-ize your use of technology to be more in the Modification and Redefinition realm? When we do our tech checks, we can chat about this.