Things to consider:
- Time teaching/Age of student
- Time teaching varies
- Age of students - 11-15
- Current hardware used & suitability for instruction/learning
- Teacher desktops & connected Interactive White Boards (IWB)
- Chromebooks (teachers & students)
- Current software used & suitability for instruction/learning
- Microsoft Office (teacher desktops only) and Google Suite
- Variety of apps and other software
- Connectivity available on campus for devices
- Mostly wireless; few hard-wired labs; teacher desktops hard-wired
Time teaching/Age of student
Our innovators are typically our more experienced teachers (5+ years teaching), most teachers in their 1st or 2nd year of teaching are trying to stay afloat for the first few years. A few of our most experienced teachers (15+ years teaching) are happy to keep doing the same as they have have been for the last many years. Fortunately, most teachers are willing to try new technology, and many welcome it. We need an advocate for new technologies that can clearly explain, demonstrate, and help teachers try it so they can experience how it can be utilized in the classroom. Having a teacher on every campus, willing to continuously learn and share new technologies, and dedicated to providing that support to teachers would be amazing.
Some students coming to the middle school setting consider themselves pros when it comes to technology, and others have hardly had access to devices. One thing I've noticed that most students can work on is their typing skills. They're so used to typing with their thumbs that they haven't bothered to learn how to use a keyboard. With students, we also need to be concerned with accessibility and privacy since some sites require students need to be 13+ or have parent permission.
Hardware
Our campus could use more devices capable of photographing student work - hand-held devices like phones or tablets. Many of our students don't have personal devices. Also, we frequently have students that use one assignment for more than one class. If they turn it in for one class though, it's not available for the other. If they could take a decent photo of the assignment they could turn in a digital copy and keep the original for themselves, or vice versa. Each students could also use earbuds/headphones with mic and a mouse. It would also be helpful to have charging stations available in common areas.
Our 10-15 year-old teacher desktops are ancient in technology terms! I reboot my computer each morning and it slows to unresponsive almost daily. Since it's so unreliable I tend to use it only for projecting to the IWB - which isn't really all that interactive because of the slowness of my desktop.
Software
Do we really need to pay for Microsoft Office or Canvas when Google Suite is available for free, and it auto saves? Surprisingly, some teachers don't even know about Google Suite and that it is free and accessible anywhere! If we are going to have our students working in Google Suite, our teachers need to learn it too.
App use varies by department and teacher. The most frequent complaint of teachers is that students are off-task, playing games. Monitoring software has been discussed on our campus. Our hard-wired computer labs have software so the teacher can monitor use and even close tabs/windows on student devices from their teacher desktop. Something like this could certainly be useful in ensuring students are working on assigned material instead of playing games. However, would it end up making the teacher a desk-jockey and inhibiting face-to-face interaction with students?
Connectivity
Most days, our connections are sufficient for those of us that consistently have students use their Chromebooks in class. The only times I've noticed any problems are when we are doing school-wide testing or surveys online. We may need a bit of an upgrade to be sure we can consistently accommodate all 1100 students and staff on our campus simultaneously.
Summary of Needs
- Advocate willing to train teachers on new technologies
- Students to be taught/practice keyboarding
- Photo-friendly student devices
- Efficiency accessories for students
- Teacher desktop upgrades
- Transition to Google Suite
- Solution ideas for off-task behavior
- Increase bandwidth to accommodate 1100+ full-time users
I will also be conducting a Technology Survey with stakeholders on my campus. I'll post those results later.
No comments:
Post a Comment