Each year I send out a technology survey to my teachers to get a read on their “technology temperatures.” The survey provides me with a picture of how they perceive their use of technology and of their preferences for professional development. This year my district generated the list of questions. I used the free version of Survey Monkey for the survey, so I was limited to 10 questions. That didn’t leave any space for questions of my own, but the information I received was helpful. After I received the results, I used Open Mind 2 to convert the results to a web page: Tech Survey 09-10.
The start of school this year has been particularly challenging due to so many new technology products in our district: new Windows domain, new Outlook email that replaced Groupwise, PowerSchool replaced SASI, and PowerTeacher gradebook replaced IGPro. There have been so many glitches and frustrations. In some ways the “tools” have eclipsed instructional support in the areas of time and need. Now that it’s time to generate the first term report card, PowerTeacher has become a major time consumer.
The survey results, however, provided me with a good dose of encouragement! Most of my faculty seems to be developing some self-confidence in using technology in the classroom. They’re also showing interest in learning new technology skills and in exploring a variety of tools for improving and enhancing learning. Unfortunately my opportunities for providing professional development sessions are very limited this year. My district adopted a new literacy coaching model this year, and the literacy coaches visit our school every 3 weeks. This plan eats up designated training time that the math coach and I used to have to meet with grade level teams. I have found, however, that one-to-one mentoring is actually my best strategy anyway. I try to meet with teams as they work on collaborative planning so that I know what standards they are planning to teach. Then I’m able to go to individual teachers with project ideas that will address those standards. This is the part of my job that I love! I’m hoping that after we get this first round of report cards printed that I’ll begin finding the time to fully focus on teaching and learning.
I have been blogging with students for 4 or 5 years. I am convinced that it is one of the best instructional tools that we have. Sadly, it is also probably one of the most under-used. Several years ago I created a little video, “Top 10 Reasons to Blog with Students,” in an effort to promote student blogging. Now that YouTube is unblocked for teachers in my district, I recently added it there.
What are the most important features of a blog engine? A secure environment with options for monitoring student posts and comments is a must. The ability for students to upload a variety of file types is definitely a plus. Edublogs is a great blog engine, and I have used it for my personal professional blog for years. In today’s financial climate, cost is an inevitable issue, which unfortunately eliminates Edublogs Campus for me.
In the beginning I used Blogmeister with my students, which is David Warlick’s wonderful protected learning community for student blogs. After that first year, we decided we wanted our students to have a few more options for customizing. I’ve used 21 Classes in recent years, which is fairly user-friendly. We did encounter some computers locking up when attempting to save, but we haven’t determined if that’s an issue with our network or on their end. ClassPress is a relatively new blog engine that is currently being tested by another TIS friend, and I’m waiting to hear a report on that one. In the meantime, I created a comparison chart of features:
Our district has developed a very impressive 5 year technology plan based on technology bond money. By the end of 5 years, all high schools will be involved in 1:1 computing, middles schools will be 3:1, and all classes in grades 4 and 5 will be 5:1. The 5th grade 5:1 roll-out is scheduled for next year, 2010-2011. As a Technology Integration Specialist, I find this plan exciting and highly ambitious. My question is this: “Will receiving 5 laptops per class do anything to change the way teachers teach?” That was actually a rhetorical question, because the answer is so obviously “no.” So the real question becomes, “What can I do to help my teachers make the necessary shift in pedagogy to enable them to embrace a 21st Century Learning model?” I’ve been researching, but I’m not easily finding a road map.
There are lots of motivating videos about 21st Century Learning, such as “Engage Me.” There are certainly more flashy ones, but I like this one because it features elementary-aged students.
I am now on a quest to discover the answer to my question. My first step is to think about some key ingredients in a 21st Century Learning environment. Here are 5 that I’ve adopted so far.
1) NETS: All curriculum should be framed by the National Educational Technology Standards. The 6 strands are: Creativity and Innovation; Communication and Collaboration; Research and Information Literacy; Critical Thinking, Problem Solving, and Decision Making; Digital Citizenship; and Technology Operations and Concepts. All content areas should be taught within the context of these standards. The NETS-S 2007 Implementation Wiki contains some great resources for the application of these standards.
2) Student-centered learning: Teachers need to gain a new vision of their role in the classroom as they shift their focus from “teaching” to becoming “facilitators of learning.” Students need to take greater responsibility for their learning and become more self-directed. This will only happen as they have greater freedom to make choices within their learning environment.
3) Differentiation: This is really just an extension of student-centered learning. We have long known that students learn at different rates in different ways. The use of technology tools is a fabulous way to provide differentiation. Tracey Hall’s research about Differentiated Instruction provides a very informative overview, including a diagram of the learning/planning cycle.
4) Problem-based learning: In this type of learning, students explore possible solutions to “real” problems and work collaboratively to determine the best solution. Through this process students learn “how to learn” by focusing on authentic issues. This approach is very student-centered and open-ended. IMSA’s PBLNetwork is a fabulous resource.
5) Online collaboration: To establish a 21st Century learning model, it’s important to base it on the foundational understanding that classrooms today are not contained within 4 walls or even within a single building. Today our classroom is the entire world, and we can learn from and with people around the globe. Cultivating collaborative partners from various corners of the world will broaden our educational resources and will help our students learn what it means to be a global citizen.
I’m still searching for a road map! Obviously Alan November has done ground-breaking work in this area, but his resources are all commercial products. By far the best “grass roots” resource that I have seen is Kim Cofino’s work at the International School Bangkok. The ISB 21st Century Literacy wiki sets forth a clear vision of the 21st Century Learner and a framework for planning instruction. An ability to translate theory into practice is crucial! I hope that as my district moves further into this ambitious technology roll-out plan, that our leaders will develop a similar framework that will provide structure and guidance in empowering our teachers to make the pedagogical shift necessary to prepare our students for the unknown world that awaits them. These are exciting times to be an educator!
We’ve been training for about 2 weeks, and students will begin on Wednesday. I’ve always loved the beginning of school! It’s a chance for a fresh start, new dreams, and new opportunities for growth. I’ve been tossing around some thoughts about what I’d like to focus on this year……
Here are my initial thoughts:
1. Promote Greater Collaboration
Collaboration is a research-based best practice that generates improvement in student achievement (Schools as Learning Communities). In addition to the research, I had first-hand evidence this past year when my school embraced Professional Learning Communities and experienced phenomenal growth in student achievement.
A. Teacher Resource Center
After spending the past 2 years working with a small group of TIS colleagues on the development of a district-wide Resource Center, it’s finally ready for debut this year! It is a database of teacher-created instructional materials, including SMART Notebook lessons, PowerPoints, spreadsheats, lesson plans, units, hand-held activities and more that is searchable by keyword, content area, and grade level. The TRC will allow our teachers to move beyond collaboration within their own building to collaborating across the district.
B. Social Bookmarking
I have set up a Diigo account for use by my school which is fairly well accessed by students and teachers. We also have a prominent link on our school web page so that students can access resources from home. Unfortunately, up until this time, teachers usually send their links to me, and I post them to Diigo. This year I intend to make sure that the Diigo toolbar is on each teacher’s laptop, and I hope to train them to bookmark their own great finds instead of just saving them to “Favorites.”
C. Grade Level & Individual Planning Meetings
Regular communication with teachers is the only way I can provide support for instruction. They many more responsibilities than there are hours in the day, so it’s important that I take the initiative to find out about their units of study and the standards being taught. This means that it’s important for me to schedule regular visits to grade level collaborative planning meetings. As I hear what they are teaching, I can make suggestions of ways technology can be used to facilitate the learning. One of the most success strategies I’ve used to encourage technology integration is to individually approach teachers with ideas for project-based learning activities. I have never had a teacher say, “No.”
2. Instructional Support
A. Assessment
My faculty made great leaps last year in learning how to create and use common assessments. Using common assessments is one of the best ways to measure growth in student achievement. There are lots of ways that technology can be very assistive in the administration of common assessments. Here are some tools I plan to share with teachers:
Hot Potatoes: free online assessment tool with crossword, matching, and cloze activities; great for formative assessment.
Google Forms: with the addition of a little html code, you can create self-checking quizzes in Google Forms.
Quia: a reasonably priced “subscription” service that is tried and true with multiple quiz types available.
SMART Response Sysytems: (formerly known as Senteo): this year each grade level will have 2 sets, and this will be fabulous for instant feedback!
B. Differentiation
I’m still convinced that the use of iPods in the classroom is one of the most motivational, effective tools available for differentiation, so I plan to continue to locate and create instructional content in mp3 and m4v formats. Student blogs offer another path for differentiation. We will also continue to use Riverdeep (Destination Reading & Math) , First in Math, and Ticket to Read.
C. Project-Based Learning
During my 4 years of teaching in the 21st Cenury Classroom, I learned that project-based learning motivates student learning and addresses multiple standards in a time “cost-effective” way. As I collaborate with teachers, I will actively make suggestions of PBL activities to address targeted standards.
3. Teacher Productivity
A. Outlook
Our school email has switched from GroupWise to Outlook. Besides the basics, teachers need to learn how to create distribution lists and use the calendar. (Love the calendar features!)
B. PowerSchool / PowerTeacher
As part of the big migration, our district has moved from using IGPro to using PowerSchool. PowerTeacher seems fairly easy to use. At our initial introductory session, teachers were favorable about the interface. Some features can’t be accessed until school actually starts. This will be a continual learning experience for a while.
C. Google Docs
I’m going to make an effort to go more “paperless” with my training materials. As part of my beginning of the year training I’m making sure each teacher has a Google account, and I’m sharing technology “cheat sheets” this way, hoping they will see the value in online collaboration. So far, so good!
D. Document Cameras
Our district has adopted an ambitious 5 year technology roll-out plan based on a bond referendum. This year all classes in the district are scheduled to receive an Elmo Document Camera. I’m already collecting resources to help train teachers on the many ways a doc cam can enhance instruction.
E. Teacher Blogs
About 12 teachers have indicated that they are interested in having their own class blog through our district iWeb server. That is evidence to me that they are beginning to see the power of Web 2.0 tools for the classroom!
It’s going to be an exciting and busy year! I look forward to observing growth in students, teachers, and myself!
This was my 2nd year to attend UTC. Last year I presented, but this year I just wanted to go as a sponge and absorb. I must say that I was very impressed and pleased with my experiences! The Greenville County School District provides this conference free to participants. Obviously their main target audience is their own teachers, who receive a trade day for attending. But at the same time, the conference is open free to anyone. What a gift!!! In my opinion, this conference is much better than the state-wide Ed Tech conference held in the fall, because most of these presenters are teachers, people who are sharing what works in the trenches.
The keynote speaker was Chris Craft, a Spanish teacher from Crossroads Elementary in Irmo, SC. Chris has done some phenomenal work with a global project, Life Round Here, and is currently working on completing his Phd. His informative, entertaining presentation, “Superpowers for Everyday Heroes,” shared great tips of ways he incorporates technology in the classroom. Chris is an expert at preparing interesting presentations. During this presentation, he had an entertaining “dialogue” with his computer, “Maria.” That same day, our governor, Mark Sanford, admitted to an affair with an Argentinian woman named Maria. Just an ironic coincidence, but a little humorous!
The sessions I attended were great! I got some wonderful ideas for assessment that I plan to share with my faculty. One is a free web-based interactive program called Hot Potatoes. This tool includes templates for crossword, matching quizzes, and cloze activities and provides instant feedback. Michelle O’Malley led this great session. Another session that focused on assessment was a session called “Creating Online Polls and Self-Grading Quizzes” by Kim Pauls. Kim demonstrated how to use google forms to create quizzes and how to set up formulas for the quizzes to be automatically scored.
Some of the other awesome sessions included:
In “Using Collaborative Tools,” Cathy Jo Nelson and Fran Bullington had a great dueling showdown between wikis and google docs.
My friend and colleague, Mike Edwards, did a terrific presentation on “Augmented Reality.” This has been a cutting-edge, personal exploration for him, and I have been privileged to delve into this a little with him.
Amanda LaBlanc did a useful hands-on session on Flip Video Cameras. Each grade level at my school is getting one this coming year, so that was a great training session.
Ellen Gordon did a fabulous session, “Goodbye Overhead…Hello Doc Cam.” In the new school year, my district is providing a doc cam for every classroom, and I left this session with lots of ways to use it in various curricular areas.
Another fun experience was a “Tweet-up” held at Wild Wings Wednesday evening. It was so cool to meet people face-to-face who are part of my PLN. Twitter is one of my best sources of professional development, and the people in my PLN are very helpful to me. It was fantastic!
Thanks to Greenville County School District and all the presenters! It was a very valuable personal growth experience.
Several weeks ago the Washington Post reported that 46 states have agreed to the establishment of common core standards. I knew before I even finished reading that my state, SC, would be one of the states not participating. Our governor has a history of grandstanding in an effort to make his name well-known before the next presidential election, and this was another opportunity for him. Outrage at Gov. Sanford is nothing new for me! He has never been a supporter of public education, as evidenced by his push for tax-dollar vouchers for private schools. His last big grandstand was his refusal to accept stimulus money for schools, and I participated in a protest rally at the state house over that issue. Now he doesn’t want the federal government telling us what our students should learn. Okay, it might be different if our state was leading the pack in achievement, but it seems like a no-brainer to me that we could benefit from some collaboration. Common standards could raise the bar nationally for what students are expected to learn. In order for our students to be globally competitive, it’s imperative that we raise the bar.
After reading Clay Burell’s post about Secretary of Education Duncan, I’ve been questioning the methodology for determining these standards. Burell identified the groups that have been selected to write the standards from an article from Education Week:
Achieve, a Washington-based group made up of state policymakers and business leaders; act Inc., the Iowa City, Iowa-based nonprofit organization that runs the college-entrance exam of the same name; and the College Board, the New York City-based sponsor of the sat admissions exam and the Advanced Placement program.
State policymakers, business leaders, and college entrance exam creators…hmmm, there is no mention whatsoever of educators participating in this process. The same article reveals that subject-matter groups such as the NCTE and NCTM have expressed concern about being excluded from the “Common Core” process. I, too, have some major concerns about this. It would be so disheartening to have such a much-needed initiative go awry due to standards being determined by non-educators. With ACT and the College Board writing the standards, it’s easy to see the next step could be that they would create (and profit from) a national test. It’s not that I’m opposed to a national test. I just don’t think that the same entities should determine the standards and write the test.
States have already poured lots of money into developing standards and tests. Although SC is still at the bottom of the barrel in performance, we have some of the most rigorous standards and testing in the nation. That’s one reason we rank so low nationally. Our tests more accurately demonstrate student proficiency (or lack of) than other states. The same Washington Post article I referenced earlier said:
In Mississippi, for instance, 90 percent of fourth-graders passed the state reading exam in 2007, according to U.S. Department of Education data. But only 51 percent had at least “basic” or “partial mastery” on the test known as the Nation’s Report Card.
SC has many obstacles to improving student achievement. A large number of our students live in poverty, and our current level of unemployment has reached 12.1%, one of the highest in the nation. We have a state legislature that is satisfied with only mandating that each child in our state has the opportunity to receive a “minimally adequate education.” Our governor has demonstrated at every turn that he disdains public education. We have school buildings in the Corridor of Shame that are a hundred years old and would not be seen fit as a prison facility, but our state has been unwilling to take action. President Obama raised awareness of the situation in his inaugural speech when he invited Ty’sheoma Bethea, an 8th grader from J.V. Martin Junior High School in Dillon, S.C., to sit with his wife and then told her story. Even still, help for her school did not come from within our state, but from a furniture supply company in Chicago.
I recount these educational and political woes as evidence that we are in desperate need of change. Common core standards won’t solve the above mentioned problems, but could at least put us on a more level playing field for measuring academic success. I was encouraged to read our state Superintendent of Education, Jim Rex’s, comments in the Spartanburg Herald Journal about the movement towards common core standards:
Although South Carolina is prevented from being an “official” participant due to Gov. Mark Sanford’s refusal to sign on, I have been assured by the effort’s leaders — including the National Governors Association — that we can participate unofficially.
That’s good news! The people of SC continue to fight for progress, in spite of a governor who spits in our faces at every turn. We have a long way to go, but as an educator, I’ll never give up hope all of our students will one day receive the kind of quality education they deserve.
Research shows that collaborative planning and the use of common formative and summative assessments are key factors in improving instruction and achievement. I observed this first-hand in my own school this year as my principal led change to transform our faculty into a professional learning community, based on the concepts in DeFour’s On Common Ground. Our students made a dramatic improvement in achievement due to this culture change, so much so that we were specially recognized by our district office. Since collaboration is so effective within a school, it only makes sense that national collaboration for the development of a core curriculum has the potential to yield great results. If the development of national standards is handled correctly and if educators are given the opportunity to participate in the process, this initiative could be a first step in molding our educational system into one that will prepare our students to be globally competitive.
I’ve had one week of summer vacation, and I’ve now had enough mental rest to objectively reflect on the growth of technology integration in my school this year. This was the first full year that every classroom had a SMART Board, projector, and audio system. That was a huge catalyst for change for teachers in instructional practice. Additionally, my school experienced phenomenal gains in student achievement this year, which was hugely due to the increase in teacher collaboration and common assessments through the PLC model. But as indicated by Marzano’s research, I also partly attribute the increase in achievement to the increased use of interactive whiteboards.
As part of my self-evaluation process, I conducted a survey of my teachers to gain some insight into their perspective on growth. (View the results here.) I was impressed that over 70% of the teachers felt that their use of technology had grown between 50%-100%. Even more eye-catching was that 97.6% tried something new using technology with their students this year. During the 2 years I have been a TIS at my school, I have been so impressed with the openness of my faculty to new ideas for technology integration. Every time I asked a teacher to participate in a project, each one has always agreed!
One example is that this year my 2nd grade team really branched out with PBL. Every 2nd grade student in my school learned about using the Internet for research (I got to teach that lesson!), used Open Mind 2 mind-mapping software to organize research findings, exported OM 2 to PowerPoint, refined the PPT, and then presented an oral multi-media project. It was an amazing leap in technology growth for our 2nd graders. I can’t wait to see what these students will accomplish in the future!
I know that all of my teachers had tremendous growth in the area of technology this year. I had 15 teachers who were new to our school and district. Many of these came from districts that did not have the technology resources we have. They were required to take the TTCA, our district’s level 1 technology competency test. After some tutoring, they all successfully passed the test and have made great personal gains in their use of technology. It was a great year at my school, and I’m already beginning to think about how to guide growth next year!
I recently had a conversation with my district Director of Technology, a TIS friend, and my former Global Horizons teacher partner about the merits of Twitter and the possibilities for the educational use of Twitter. Here are some of the links that have helped shape my perspective:
Here’s a link to all of my DIIgo bookmarks about Twitter. The list includes Twitter apps, news articles about Twitter, lists of Twittering teachers, and Twitter in education. This doesn’t even scratch the surface!
As digital educators, we’re always looking for new ways to engage our students through technology-enhanced learning opportunities. At this point, Twitter is blocked in my district, so I’m always on the lookout for other options for student collaboration and “realtime” conversations. On Twitter today, Chris Webb did some “thinking out loud” and wondered about using a backchannel for student interactions while they watched a video. He had previously blogged about how a teacher in his school, Pat Gerding, had used Today’s Meet as a backchannel during class. This looks like a great way to engage students in conversation about learning in a somewhat private format. All you do is go to the Today’s Meet website and create a room. No account is necessary. Once you create the room, you share the url with your students so they can enter it. Can’t wait to try it out!
It’s amazing how something so simple as a 140 character reply to the question, “What are you doing?” could have such a huge global impact on society. Tech Crunch reports,
Worldwide visitors to Twitter.com increased 95 percent in the month of March from 9.8 million to 19.1 million.
Businesses use Twitter as a source for free advertising. Politicians use Twitter for campaigning. Celebrities use Twitter to increase their celebrity status. (Can anyone explain why Oprah felt a need for this?) Twitter is having such an impact on the corporate world that according to BusinessWeek, some companies are developing social media codes of conduct for employees:
To prevent sensitive information leaks, blemishes on a reputation, and other potential liabilities of a Twittering workforce, companies are drafting new employee codes of conduct and educating workers about what they should and shouldn’t say on the site. The basic rule: Don’t be stupid.
Why is Twitter taking the world by storm? Clive Thompson sums it up:
Individually, most Twitter messages are stupefyingly trivial. But the true value of Twitter … is cumulative. The power is in the surprising effects that come from receiving thousands of pings from your posse. And this, as it turns out, suggests where the Web is heading.
So why has Twitter been so misunderstood? Because it’s experiential. Scrolling through random Twitter messages can’t explain the appeal. You have to do it — and, more important, do it with friends… It’s practically collectivist — you’re creating a shared understanding larger than yourself.
I love the phrase, “creating a shared understanding larger than yourself.” I have been Twittering for about a year and a half, and I only follow educators. My primary purpose is personal professional learning. Twitter is my best source for professional development. I’ve been slow and selective about choosing people to follow, but I have developed a wonderful network of like-minded professionals around the world. As I interact with these people in ongoing short phrases, we have a shared understanding of what it means to be passionate about the role of technology in education. We share great ideas, our successes, our frustrations, and things we’ve learned in the midst of the sprinkled tidbits of our personal lives. Teacher collaboration has been identified as a key factor in raising student achievement, and through social networking tools like Twitter, I can collaborate and learn from the best around the world.
So my question is this: since Twitter is such a powerful learning tool, how do we go about harnessing that collective learning energy for use in schools? Great Britain is considering recommendations for updating the primary curriculum, suggesting that children should be familiar with blogging, podcasts, Wikipedia and Twitter by the time they go to secondary school. They may consider dropping traditional content in favor of emphasizing informational technology, according to the Times. Although my district is very proactive in the area of providing technology equipment for schools, it still has a very conservative stance on blocking many useful social networking tools like Twitter that enhance learning.
Imagine a classroom where differentiated instruction results in students using MP3 players, cell phones, laptops, and gaming devices to pursue individual learning goals. They interact with students around the world via Twitter, Ning, or other social networking vehicles to ask questions, collaborate, share resources, and share learning in real time. Immediate response, immediate feedback, immediate dialogue about learning. Twitter is changing the way the world communicates. Why should our students be the last to benefit?
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