I
have the good fortune to work in a technology-rich high school with an
administration that puts technology at the top of the list of priorities. (For
example, when two of our computer labs were dismantled and ‘re-purposed’ this
year, our principal used administrative funds to buy 60 notebook computers (on
two carts) so that our student/computer ratio didn’t go down.) As for the state
of my faculty’s technology skills, I can only really speak for myself and what
I’ve observed…but I get the general sense that there’s a lot of teacher buy-in.
I personally have the feeling that unless I work hard to keep up, the
technology train is going to leave me behind. And so I take advantage of the
staff development opportunities as they arise and as I have time to attend.
All
teachers are expected to use D2L – what we call eClass. The trouble is that
current innovations and advancements are making parts of that platform obsolete
before many of us have learned to use them. That’s technically a good thing. This
past week I attended a mandatory training on Google Apps for Educators. It
looks to me like the county is mirroring what’s happening in the university
system…through Google, all students and faculty will have a school email
address and cloud drive as well as a You Tube account and access to Google docs
and forms. The Google cloud drive is MUCH easier to use than the D2L Locker –
which I have tried teaching my students to use – but which is not nearly as
user friendly as Google Drive.
Faculty
members are consistently encouraged to find ways to integrate technology into
lessons, and I have done this through projects such as Radio Plays of Poe short
stories, book trailers using Photo Story, and having kids respond to each
other’s work through the eClass discussion board. Science teachers are using a
student response/clicker system and math teachers are using Smart Boards. The
new literary magazine sponsor is implementing our first online lit mag this
year. I would bet there is a lot more going on, but I am so ensconced in my
classroom most of the day that I know I’m not aware of many things.
It
is hard not to get excited by technology and its instructional possibilities at
my school. We have a curriculum AP who conducts an Instructional Leader Academy
every year - the cohort meets twice during the school year for all day ‘staff
development’ in instructional technologies and strategies. Technology use is
actively encouraged by the principal in many different ways – including using “BYOD”
apps during faculty meetings where she models things we can use in our
classrooms. Gwinnett County is going full steam ahead with integrating
technology into instruction – it hosts a Digital Learning Conference each
summer which fills up quickly after registration opens. Additionally,
technology staff development is explicitly and regularly offered through “Lunch
and Learn” opportunities (for which participants can earn an SDU if they attend
all of the offered sessions). A Language Arts department colleague conducted
one on using Pinterest (for instructional planning) and last week our media
specialist conducted a session on using Screen Cast-O-Matic.
The
main barrier to technology staff development at my school – from my own
perspective – is the time crunch. It doesn’t get much more convenient than the
Lunch and Learn format, but I have to be very motivated by the topic to turn
away from my other obligations.
As
for how I would provide technology training/staff development to teachers as
the media specialist (in addition to the Lunch and Learn format)…I already plan
to model myself on my current media specialist who is fulfilling her role as technology
coach according to ISTE standards. As a ‘technology integration leader,’ she
advocates for the use of technology to make lessons more engaging and student-centered
by first encouraging teachers she knows to try something new (and helping them
be successful at it), taking pictures of and getting ‘testimonials’ from those
teachers to use to attract other teachers to try it themselves. For example,
she spoke to a math teacher about using a graphing app on the new notebook
computers. He used it in a lesson with his students and took pictures of them
working. Then she attended a math department meeting where she showed the
pictures and he raved about how excellent the app is. Other math teachers have
signed up to try it.
She also showed me how to use Newsela to differentiate content
for language arts students as they work on document-based essays. Finally, on
the day I had You Tube links on my eClass page for my students to use in the
media center AND they didn’t work (I had forgotten that student access is
blocked at the county level), she sat and showed me how to rip the videos to
post directly on my eClass page. She saved my lesson that day. As a former (and
well-respected) language arts teacher, my media specialist has a strong
grounding in pedagogy as well as in technology use, and she has applied both
things to the staff development sessions she’s conducted. She models proper use of digital information by,
for example, asking people’s permission to use photos they take in their
classrooms that were on notebook computers or tablets, and she helps the
counseling department create PowerPoint lesson to send out for use by teachers
in their advisement classrooms about ‘digital citizenship’ such as “Minding Your
Digital Footprint.”
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