Avoca Technology Committee Blog

Attached below is the draft of our Action Plans for use at the meeting Thursday May 3rd.

Draft of Action Plans

There is strong consensus from the committee to purchase eBooks along with the paper texts for all students grades 1-8 as part of the new LA adoption. Teachers at the primary level would find it useful for students to be able to access their reading assignments from home. In addition, both publishers offer additional online functionality such as planning, assessment, and leveled readers.

One concern brought up by the committee was how students without Internet access at home would be affected by this shift in instruction. I know there have been surveys done in the past regarding computers at home and accessing the Internet with high percentages in both affirming most of the Avoca students do have access while at home. However, should we be thinking about the group that does not and how we will serve them as their teachers begin using these new online resources?

Practice Action Plan

Access Committee Action Plan

Remining Steps in the Technology Committee Process

1. Each subcommittee complete action plans/budgets by April 24

• Email completed action plans to Chris
• Use release time if needed

2. Chris and Joe compile all decisions and documents into a draft report during the April 24-May 3 timeframe.

• Goals
• Action Plans
• Budget
• Mission and Beliefs(draft created by technology team)

3. Final whole group committee meeting takes place on Thursday, May 3(12:30-3:30pm with lunch provided)

• Review draft report
• Suggest final revisions
• Final consensus on plan
• Brainstorm ideas for presentation to the Board

4. Joe, Chris, and Steve Feldman create the final report document and prepare the presentation for the school board. This takes place from May 3-May 15

5. The School Board meeting will take place May 14 or May 15. The entire District Technology Committee is present for the presentation.

Technology Timeline – Updated 4/12/07 10:30am

Access Report

Click below to view the Equity committee report

Equity Report

The following documents will be discussed at the April 10th Technology Committee Meeting

Technology Timeline
SmartGoals

Action Plan Description

Access Action Plan Template

Practice Action Plan Template

Proficiency Action Plan Template

Equity Action Plan Template

A few updates from the Language Arts committee:

1. The new basal adoption that is being highly considered by the group has several technology components embedded into it such as web-based textbooks, online assessments, and access to libraries of tradebooks. It seems like the publishers are just now getting materials out to customers that include these technology components and those that we are in conversation with understand how valued technology is to our district. We have not yet considered any additional technology resources outside of the publisher’s materials; discussions regarding this have suggested perhaps at the end of the first year of implementation of the new LA curriculum, finding where the weaknesses lie and making a better decision on software/subscription services then.

2. Included in the LA scope and sequence are handwriting/keyboarding skills, which are aligned as follows:

2nd grade–Introduce Keyboarding (which would happen during Encore Tech if we do switch it to basic skills)
3rd grade–Reinforce basic keyboarding skills
4th grade –Teach formal keyboarding skills
5th grade–Build on keyboarding skills for speed and accuracy (20 wpm)
6th grade–Keyboarding 30 wpm
7th grade –Keyboarding Required
8th grade–Keyboarding Required

I compiled all of the comments from our last tech committee meeting – enjoy!

Feedback Forms

Check out the Promethean Web Site to learn more about the interactive boards!

Equity Committee Survey ResultEquity Committee Survey Result

Here is an Excel spreadsheet of our survey results.

Below are the presentation and report from the Systems and Leadersip group.

Systems and Leadership Presentation

Systems and Leadership Report

We’ve attached a copy of the practice indicators for the March 15th Technology Committee meeting.

Practice Indicators

A quick note about tomrrow – the presentations will be scheduled as follows:

Equity and Practice – morning

Access, Proficiency, Systems and Leadership – afternoon.

The proficiency sub committee has completed our draft for the March 15th meeting. Take a look by clicking the link below!

Proficiency Indicators Update

Interesting stats and information re: tech in schools nation-wide. This is a pretty large document with bits of helpful information for all sub-committees! Found on: http://www.ed.gov/about/offices/list/os/technology/plan/2004/site/edlite-default.html

NETS-2004

We will be meeting on March 6th at 3:30 in the Creative Tech Lab at Marie Murphy.  We will be finishing up our loose ends!

I came upon two articles dealing with a new test by ETS regarding student tech literacy skills – they are attached below.

County schools put students’ computer skills to the test

ETS Tech Literacy Test

The main points from our meeting were:

1. Flush out computer inventory to identify location and age of hardware in order to build a new refresh plan…completed by Monday Feb. 26th.

2. Schedule vendor visits to review possibilities and costs of mounting projectors to the classroom ceilings.

3. Is OpenSource software a viable option for students and faculty, beginning with Office apps?

4. New indicator = Policy–> focusing on damaged computers that are not covered by the Apple warranty

Next Meeting Date: March 7th @ 3:30pm AW

Brady and Hyung discussed the practice portion – surveys and focus groups talking about skills being used and not used, keyboarding is a major issue. Some sort of communication portal for kids is a need(for example First Class) – kids at middle school want to use technology like they use at home. Revision of student tech skills needs to be rewritten and clarified, simplified. New skills list would need to be created.

Julie discussed the access team – 3 indicators are sorted out – working on the technology hardware part. Difference between K-2 and 3-8 – move towards teacher focused instructional tool, SmartBoards in the primary grades. 3rd is the middle point – possibly another cart or a K-2 setup would be better ideas than 1:1 – other technology options may help speed of setting up cart – different accounts or First Class envrionment. Increase in bandwith may be needed over the next few years. Restructure of the technology team may increase time with teachers for integration and professional development.

K-2(3) may need to move to an encore tech class to basic tech skills, including typing, while 3(4)-5 will be technology enrichment leading to 6-8 creative tech.

Jen spoke about proficiency – we went over questionairre, personal survey, online survey – last meeting we shared data – currently reviewing data – next meeting we will decide on indicators. Major emhpasis would be on developing the team meeting time as a tech professional development time – more formalized than we have been doing previously.

Hugh spoke about the equity group – needs will be in special needs and training gen ed teachers in special ed programs – specific laptop setup for certain students. Making IEP information available online – more access for assistants to do modifications. Align our teachers with the state/national technology standards. Community of Avoca will need to be included as possible referendum nears. Involve more community leader presentations through tech open house with students – made as a part of current open house – involve students in community class work.

Joe spoke about the administration role with Systems – needs are constantly changing especially in roles of technology team members.

There is no meeting on Febrary 23 – look for a new meeting date a week or two before Spring Break.

To keep pace with the changing demands of a new global economy, the International Society for Technology in Education is revising its nine-year-old National Educational Technology Standards (NETS), a pioneering set of guidelines for what students should know about, and be able to do with, technology. ISTE has released a draft version of its new NETS for students and is seeking feedback from educators.

ISTE Student Standards

The Access Subcommitte met to review data, decide continuum ratings, and begin writing rationale. We spent a considerable amount of time reviewing survey data and discussing various possibilities. We have completed the first three indicators and will be meeting again Wednesday, Feb. 14 @ 3:00pm at Avoca West to finish the remaining work with indicators.

Article deals with the adoption of the $100 laptop into US markets at a slightly higher price

http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/features/55577.html

The Practice sub-committe has completed the indicators. We shared information from student focus groups. There is a recorded document of the interview with the middle school students attached as well as a copy of the Practice Indicators. Our next meeting will be with the full Technology Committee on 2/12 .
Practice Indicators

Interesting article by Marc Prensky that has stimulated several discussions in my grad class regarding how students of this digital age learn differently as a result of their hi-tech surroundings. This article emphasizes how today’s students are no longer the people our educational system was designed to teach and boldly states our digital immigrant instructors, who speak an outdated language (that of the pre-digital age), are struggling to teach a population that speaks an entirely new language. 

 Click here to read the entire article.

Click here to view Marc Prensky’s Webpage.

I wanted to share the reality of how the ‘push to paperless’ isn’t always so seamless and some lessons it presented.
1.  At AW we have  “Beach Day ” the last Friday in January, and letters usually go home for students to order a special lunch.  There were several glitches this year that resulted in some last minute chaos.  Thanks to Mary H. in the office and the Arbor crew everything came together, but some observations:

The letter was either e-mailed home or posted on the website…I’m still not sure.  Some students brought in letters and when other kids asked where they got them, the kids didn’t know and I couldn’t answer. Sure I could have researched it, but I was not the only teacher not to know.  Thought for future: as we continue to make this transition to paperless, e-mail teachers of important mailings going home so we can help guide parents on what to find where.

2. My fifth grade class is beginning a pilot to take their laptops home.  Last Monday, an e-mail was sent home with the important forms for parents to read and sign with their children.  The first day, I received requests from 3 of my 20 students to have paper copies, as they knew they couldn’t print or knew their parents would have problems accessing the e-mail.  We had one e-mail get returned, another who requested a re-send, and at least three more request paper copies due to glitches with the receiving or printing.  One parent deleted the e-mail the first day, thinking it was junk.  That represents approximately 50 percent of one class that experienced difficulties with this very important, directed e-mail. The other fifth-grade class had 7 students with difficulties.  (Ironically one family having difficulty is a board member and another is on this committee…)

I’m not sure what it all means, but it seemed like useful data to consider as we move forward.

The proficiency subcommittee met to share the results of our online and focus group surveys. We reviewed the data together and talked about some of the commonalities amongst the focus groups. The need for more teaching training and sharing in some of the more fundamental skill and application areas came out loudly. We will come back to the next meeting ready to begin our indicator evaluation and objective setting after pulling out common strands from the data.
Our next meeting is on February 22nd at 3:30 at AW in Jen’s room.

I have posted a summary of the multiple choice survey questions at the following web link:

http://www.avoca.k12.il.us/summary.html

Also linked below is the open ended response summary – enjoy!

Open Ended Responses

Chris

We reviewed the five indicators for the practice sub-committee.  We evaluated the data from surveys, focus groups, and observations in order to give ourselves continuum ratings.  We finished four of the five indicators and will meet again on February 5th to address the last indicator and review further feedback from a student focus group.

Notes

Next Meeting February 9 at 3 at Avoca West

These are the Teacher State Standards for Technology from the Illinois Administrative Cod, dated 2002.

The sub-committee concluded a general overview of technology skill use across grade levels was needed to determine whether the indicators of practice were indeed being implemented. We decided the sub-committee also needed to determine which tech skills are being thoroughly covered and which ones need to be addressed at certain areas. New data will be needed to analyze when specific technology skills are introduced and when skills are practiced at different grade levels.

The sub-committee will send out teacher surveys based off of the Student Technology Skills Chart created by the previous committee. The survey will ask and address the following:

What projects or lessons utilize technology skills?
Do these projects favor student technology use in smaller groups or on a individual basis?
Which skills are specifically introduced at this grade level?
Which skills are practiced with guidance at this grade level?
What other technology practices or skills would teachers like to implement into their lessons?

Different members of the sub-committee will meet with groups of teachers throughout the course of the next few weeks and collect feedback and data. The teachers at Marie Murphy will have a chance to provide feedback during their team meetings, while the teachers at Avoca West will have a chance to provide survey feedback during grade-level meetings or individually. We also hope these meetings will encourage collaboration and communication in technology use for teams and grade level teachers. The committee will analyze the feedback and data from teachers during the next meeting (1-26-07).

The sub-committee also looked into revising the district website. We are researching and looking at other websites in order to better utilize our website capabilities. Chris Brown introduced the First Class program, which contains a variety of opportunities for schools including a web-based storage system, student email, and around the clock accessibility.

Meeting Minutes Equity, January 12th

The Access subcommittee met to discuss technology resources, connectivity, technical support, technology-ready facilities, virtual learning, and administrative processes. We began by looking at the current inventory of equipment and discussed the current reality as it applies to each indicator. We also discussed ways to improve upon the resources we already have including possibilities of expanding 1:1 laptops into 3rd grade, developing a refresh plan that would replace desktops in primary classrooms with laptops, and mounting LCD projectors in every learning space. In addition, we discussed the possibilities for integrating new technologies such as Promethean boards, collaborative online learning environments, etc.

The subcommittee decided that we would need to develop three surveys targeting K-2, 3rd, and 4-8 teachers exploring questions related to how they are currently using technology and what they would like to see differently. We also plan to use video footage of several classrooms as a data source.

The next Access subcommittee meeting will be on Tuesday, February 6th from 1-5pm at Avoca West.

At the January 26th Practice subcommittee meeting, Keith Mann from Graphtech will be presenting an application called First Class. This is a little hard to describe but it is an environment that all student, teacher, and administrators could work in that would bring many disparate things we do together. I would be interested to get teachers perspective on this opportunity.
The invitation to this presentation is open for anyone and will go from 8:30 to 10:30 or so.

The Proficieny Subcommittee had our first meeting today and talked about many topics relating to increasing teacher technology proficiency. We reviewed our own technology survey and analysis from the past two years. What we would like to see increased towards the agree/strongly agreee is the statement “Having Laptops in class has changed the way I teach” or more generally “Having technology in class has changed the way I teach” to adapt to all grade levels.

Sue reviewed with us the Technology Academy structure at her school. Teachers applied to be a part of a three year committment for technology development and were rewarded with hardware and/or salary lane change for completing the course. Other schools have incorporated hardware purchasing into professional development where teacher would research and write lesson plans with a certain piece of hardware/software in mind and upon completion would be supported by district funds to purchase what they needed – for example a SmartBoard.

We reviewed the Irving ISD tech plan Professional Development section – we liked the district wide teacher portfolio idea – where teachers would be required to submit a few “techfusion” lesson plans each year. Other teachers could then look at the database to acquire new ideas. Evaluation of these submitted projects still needs to be discussed.

To dig deeper we are going to create an online survey and speak with each team of teachers. Both of these data acquistion methods will be based around ideas from an “Exemplary Technology Integration Survey” found in the Journal of Computing and Teacher Education vol23/2 Winter 06-07. Although last year’s survey has some similar data it did not survey the K-4 faculty.

We will also adapt each of the enGauge Indicators into a simple question so we can truly collect where the district is at in regards to the enGauge levels. This will be modeled after the question in the JCTE survey “Rate your current level of computer proficiency”. Jen is going to compose the questions for “Planning and Design” and “Implementation”, Sue will compose “Assessment” and “Professional Productivity” and I will compose “Social, Ethical, and Legal Issues” and create the survey in surveyMonkey.

Jen and I will meet with each team of teachers to discuss the open ended questions from the JCTE survey. Sue will organize the data when finished.

Our next meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, January 30th at 3:30pm in my office at Marie Murphy.

We now have an account on Survey Monkey that we can share – if your subcommittee wishes to survey as part of data collection this should be an easy way to gather information.

The link to Survey Monkey is below:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/

If more than one subcommittee wants to use a survey we may want to make one combined survey to ease the burden on the survey takers. Multiple people can edit the surveys we wish to distribute.

Please let me know if you would like the username and password to access our account.

Minutes, 12/20/06

This is a really great article listing technology innovators from around the country in 2006.  The kinds of ideas they have pursued demonstrate the kind of creativity and innovation we are looking for in our new tech plan.  I hope this article may inspire your work in the subcommittees.   Enjoy!

 THE Jounal: Innovators

I have been emailing with Will Richardson to try to get him to present at Avoca next year – below is one of the articles he sent me about his work – good recap of the web 2.0 tools we have talked about and how Will promotes them for use in classrooms.

Blogvangelist

visit Will’s blog at

http://weblogg-ed.com/ 

The first Proficiency subcommitte meeting will be on Monday January 8 at 3:30 at MM.

Here is the updated arrangement of our subcommittees:

Practice – Gail, Lily, Brady, Kris T, Hyung
Proficiency – Chris B,  Jen, Sue
Equity – Hugh, Katie, Vas, Aziz, Diane

Access – Julie, Steve, Rob, Jeff

Below is a copy of the Data Collection and Analysis Report template.

enGauge Template

Planning meeting on Dec 20th, 4pm at Marie Murphy.

Next meeting tentatively planned for Jan 12th, 2:30pm.

We will be meeting Jan. 10th @ 3:30pm Avoca West ITC.

We will be meeting in room 166 at Marie Murphy at 3:30 on January 9, 2007.

LoTi is a term referring to Dr. Moersch’s Level of Technology Implementation Framework designed to accurately measure authentic classroom technology use. The LoTi Framework focuses on the use of technology as a tool within the context of student based instruction with a constant emphasis on higher order thinking. While technology is an important tool in engaging today’s students and preparing them for the future, the LoTi Project recognizes that technology is not the best tool for every lesson. That is why the the LoTi Framework focuses on the instruction that is occurring in the classroom first and the technology tools being used second. Research has shown that classrooms that engage students in making decisions about their learning process and that utilize higher order thinking skills are most likely to prepare students for their future.

LoTi website 

Below is the report from the last tech plan’s Systems and Leadership subcommittee.

2003 Systems and Leadership