Where should I start?

[Deven Black]

My middle school is so far off the cutting edge of technology we're not even on the knife. We just got computers into all the classrooms -- two per room -- last year. In mid year SmartBoards were installed in all the special ed and 6th grade classrooms, but our principal did not realize they need projectors and cables to make them work. We're promised those by September.

I work with a staff that thinks teaching students to do PowerPoint presentations is integrating technology into their lessons. I had to teach two of my colleagues how to use the school's Outlook email system last year.

Our school is refoming into a collection of small teacher-directed learning communities (its astounding how we can be so forward and so backward simultaneously). I've convinced my community of six teachers (five classes) that we need to push forward, at least into the late 20th century, and really start to use technology in our teaching and learning.

I've got a nice PLN on Twitter and they've taught me a lot, then I went to NECC and learned a lot more. There is so much I want to try (Audacity, Edmodo, Animoto, Skype and more) and get my colleagues to try, but I know I have to start off slowly so as not to scare them off from the start.

So, what should I introduce them to first? I've shown them Wordle and how easy it is. What should I show them next? Please help.

Thank you.
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[The Innovative Educator]

Hi Deven,

Thank you for sharing this. I don't think the place to start is with technology. I think you start with teachers goals and objectives for themselves and their students and then start helping students by supporting them with tools that will help them reach their goals more efficiently and effectively.

I also really believe that it is powerful for teachers to start using technology themselves before they dive into those waters with their kids. You can do this by working with teachers to start a school wiki. I would also recommend starting a school network like this one to support the small teacher-directed learning communities. That will be tremendously impactful.

[Irish OIT]

Hey T.I.E.,

With all due respect, the U.S. "education" (and I use that term loosely) system has been 'fradie-cats' to embrace technology since.............FOREVER !!!!

Deven and other educators in a similar plight need to get ahead of the curve and leap-frog all the 'wait n' see' techno-phobes . I've been exposed to Edu-Tech on both sides of the pond (i.e. Atlantic) and my 2 years in the European EDU system far surpassed my 12+ in the antiquated 'pen n' paper' paradigm of the U.S.

Irish OIT

[Deven Black]

Actually, this whole quest began with discussions among groups of teachers. These groups formed into academies which are chsrged with taking the school's curriculum maps and determining how to implement them. This freedom allows us to experiment to some degree.

In my academy's conversations about goals for our students two comment kept coming up. The first was an observation that maintaining student engagement seems to be increasingly difficult. The second was that our students are fascinated by technology but have little access to it. With these two ideas in mind, we decided to do two things.

The first thing we decided to do was to harness technology as a teaching tool and an aid to establish and maintain engagement. We also decided to explicitly teach students how to use technology as a learning, creative and presentation tool. We also realized that we cannot do it all at once. We don't have the experience or the capacity, and its not good pedagogy in any case. We also decided to admit to our students that we are learning along side them, that this is a mutual exploration of a rapidly evolving field. The only way we can overcome our huge deficit in technical knowledge is for teachers to teach other teachers and students, and for students to teach other students and teachers. In other words, we hope to create a learning community in the full sense of the words.

This brings me back to the original question I posted. Where do we begin? A school wiki is a good idea, and I will start one today. What next?

[Irish OIT]

Deven,

Sounds like you need a low-cost, all encompassing "Classroom Management" solution - Yes ???

We're Taking Techno-Educators to the NEXT LEVEL w/ a mind-blowing, state of the art "Classroom Management" software solution !!!

Interested ??? Just say the word and you can be our first pilot installation in the U.S.

[Deven Black]

First of all, I'm not in a position to make this decision for my school. Even if I were, I would not do so without a lot more information, Tell me how I can explore what you are offering and I will share what I find with the decision maker.

[chris gibson]

hi deven,
how are you? you know me from twitter as infodivabronx.
i feel your pain.
in my school i've targeted one or two teachers who are willing to try new strategies. once they have accomplished something (soon i hope), i will showcase their efforts for other teachers to see.
tweet you later.

[Deven Black]

Hi Chris, I'm doing my first PD on election day, showing the social studies teachers how to create lessons on their whiteboards. I'll find out who is really interested and take it from there pretty much the same way you are doing it.

Thanks for the support.

Deven

[Marilyn Winter]

Hi, Start by downloading smart board software to your computer and to every computer in the school. With one smart board in the school every computer can have the software. The get the the toolkit and design some lessons with it. Instead of getting a smart board for your classroom get the smart pad. Have students download smart board viewer on their home computers. Have them use smart board to make projects. Get photo story 3 from Microsoft and make projects with it for students to view and encourage them to use it at home and bring you back projects on a flash drive or email them to you. Sign up for a quizlet.com account and get an account for all of your students, it is free and students are engaged by it as a study tool. Use wallwisher with your students. Make animated power points and posters in power point. Make digital story reports, create a blog for teachers to post cool tools that they find to use in the classroom. If you start producing projects for the students to view then it will be easier to create lessons that students can do with web 2.0 tools. Use Google Earth, youtube, and Discovery Education streaming video. Try out glogster.com, slideshare, and animoto.com and try toondoo.com. All of these are free. My school has tons of technology and 2 labs we can access, another one is just for the tech teacher, and every classroom has a projector, laptop for the teacher, and a sound system and still we have teachers who cannot use power point and do not see the value of project based education. So, I too am frustrated and alone. Let me know if I can assist you. Oh, yes start a website with weebly.com or google sites for your students to view. Be the one that shows the others the way to the 21st century.