S Ta R Chart
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Sunday, November 29, 2009
The Texas Long Range Plan for Technology, 2006-2020- Educator Preparation and Development
Of all four areas of the Texas Long Range Plan for Technology, the one that I believe has the most impact of the rest, is the Educator Preparation and Development area. If we don’t have teachers equiped with the knowledge and skills necessary to fully integrate technology into instruction, all other areas become useless. What is the benefit of having hundreds of computers with the latest hardware and software at a campus, with all classrooms wired with LAN/WAN, if teachers don’t know how to take advantage of it?
The Educator Preparation and Development area is divided into 6 sections; Content of PD, Models of P.D., Capabilities of Educators, Access to P.D., Levels of Understanding and Patterns of Use, & P.D. for Online Learning. According to the Texas STaR Chart, our school scored overall at the Advance Tech stage in the 2008-2009 school year. However, I believe we are more at par with the state, at the Developing Tech stage. An overwhelming majority of the state’s schools, a 74.2% of the schools were at the Developing Tech stage in the 2007-08 year. Nearly 80% of Texas schools were at the Early or Developing Tech stage, up only 2 percentage points from the prior year. Our campus mirrors these same numbers.
Based on the Texas Campus and Teacher STaR Charts, in order to turn these trends around, we need to develop on-going professional development that focuses on providing tech application strategies for educators that will create learning environments where kids are empowered to think critically and where they have the means to collaborate with experts across business, industry and higher education. We also need to offer anytime, anywhere learning available through individually guided activities and inquiry action research, to name some. In order for teachers to be able to do this, we must also provide professional development that helps all teachers master the SBEC Technology Application Standards. They should also receive ongoing professional development training in order to create learning opportunities for all students and across all content areas.
It doesn’t matter how much administrative support or advance infrastructure we develop, incorporating technology in teaching and learning will not occur until teachers know how to do it.
The Educator Preparation and Development area is divided into 6 sections; Content of PD, Models of P.D., Capabilities of Educators, Access to P.D., Levels of Understanding and Patterns of Use, & P.D. for Online Learning. According to the Texas STaR Chart, our school scored overall at the Advance Tech stage in the 2008-2009 school year. However, I believe we are more at par with the state, at the Developing Tech stage. An overwhelming majority of the state’s schools, a 74.2% of the schools were at the Developing Tech stage in the 2007-08 year. Nearly 80% of Texas schools were at the Early or Developing Tech stage, up only 2 percentage points from the prior year. Our campus mirrors these same numbers.
Based on the Texas Campus and Teacher STaR Charts, in order to turn these trends around, we need to develop on-going professional development that focuses on providing tech application strategies for educators that will create learning environments where kids are empowered to think critically and where they have the means to collaborate with experts across business, industry and higher education. We also need to offer anytime, anywhere learning available through individually guided activities and inquiry action research, to name some. In order for teachers to be able to do this, we must also provide professional development that helps all teachers master the SBEC Technology Application Standards. They should also receive ongoing professional development training in order to create learning opportunities for all students and across all content areas.
It doesn’t matter how much administrative support or advance infrastructure we develop, incorporating technology in teaching and learning will not occur until teachers know how to do it.
Saturday, November 28, 2009
TA TEKS- A Spiraling Curriculum
The Technology Applications TEKS were designed as a spiraling curriculum. Therefore it is imperative that each grade level teaches their required curriculum, so that there are no gaps in the students learning. An example of this spiraling curriculum is as follows.
In Pre-K, 4 year olds are expected to know how to move and double‐click the mouse to interact with software programs. They are also expected to use basic terminology to describe work on the computer. In K through 2nd grade, these same students are taught to, in addition to the mouse, use the keyboard, disk drive, modem, voice/sound recorder, scanner, digital video, CD-ROM, or touch screen. They are also expected to know the use of keyboarding techniques, produce documents, proofread, and correct errors in a document. They are expected to use correct grammar such as correct punctuation, capitalization spelling, etc. They must also develop an appropriate speed for short timed assignments. In grades 3-5 students are expected to master all of the skills above mentioned at their grade appropriate level. In grades 6-8 students are expected to be able to use all of the technology devises above, plus microphones, digital cameras, disk/disc, and joysticks. At this level, students are expected to improve their keyboarding techniques while building speed. In 6-8, students are expected to, in addition to use correct grammar as above, use one space after punctuation, the use of em/en dashes, and smart quotation marks and use strategies for capturing digital files while conserving memory and retaining image quality. Finally, by the time they are in 9-12 grade, students are expected to have mastered all of the above, in addition to being able to use the variety of input devices by incorporating them into a product and use digital keyboarding standards to input data.
In Pre-K, 4 year olds are expected to know how to move and double‐click the mouse to interact with software programs. They are also expected to use basic terminology to describe work on the computer. In K through 2nd grade, these same students are taught to, in addition to the mouse, use the keyboard, disk drive, modem, voice/sound recorder, scanner, digital video, CD-ROM, or touch screen. They are also expected to know the use of keyboarding techniques, produce documents, proofread, and correct errors in a document. They are expected to use correct grammar such as correct punctuation, capitalization spelling, etc. They must also develop an appropriate speed for short timed assignments. In grades 3-5 students are expected to master all of the skills above mentioned at their grade appropriate level. In grades 6-8 students are expected to be able to use all of the technology devises above, plus microphones, digital cameras, disk/disc, and joysticks. At this level, students are expected to improve their keyboarding techniques while building speed. In 6-8, students are expected to, in addition to use correct grammar as above, use one space after punctuation, the use of em/en dashes, and smart quotation marks and use strategies for capturing digital files while conserving memory and retaining image quality. Finally, by the time they are in 9-12 grade, students are expected to have mastered all of the above, in addition to being able to use the variety of input devices by incorporating them into a product and use digital keyboarding standards to input data.
Pre-K Technology Applications TEKS- Laying the Foundation for Future Grades
Teachers must provide multiple opportunities pre-K students, as well as model the use of technology in their classrooms. At the end of the year, Pre-K students are able to follow basic oral or visual cues for operating programs, listen to and interacts with storybooks and information texts electronically. They are also able to move and double‐click the mouse appropriately. and can use the technical vocabulary to describe what they are doing with the computer. The are also able to use voice/sound recording and touch screen devices. They can insert and play CDs, create writing and draw, use audio, video and graphs to learn, using software. Finally, students are able to learn new information through the use of technology.
When Pre-K teachers follow the TA TEKS, their students are better able to move toward using technology for discovery of new information, for problem solving, and for asking and researching answers.
When Pre-K teachers follow the TA TEKS, their students are better able to move toward using technology for discovery of new information, for problem solving, and for asking and researching answers.
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
The Texas Long-Range Plan for Technology, 2006-2020
I was pleased to realize all of the research and work that was done before putting together such a comprehensive and ambitious plan. They first did a very thorough analysis on the nation’s educational needs, and a study on the learners of today. They also made sure to hear teachers’ voices. They wanted to know where teachers were in their level of knowledge about today’s technology and its use in the classroom. They concluded that in order for our students to succeed after graduating our schools, we needed to create 21st Century classrooms, and place in front of each one of those classrooms a 21st Century technology prepared educator. The plan includes a vision about how to provide professional development for teachers so that they are capable of teaching technology education and fully integrate technology in curriculum & instruction. It provides additional visions on teaching and learning, support for administrators and school leaders, and on developing the infrastructure that’s capable of supporting this huge endeavor. The plan offers many recommendations for all stakeholders from TEA, to parents and communities. Reading and visualizing how this ‘21st Century classroom’ will look like and operate, and thinking about how different teaching and learning will be, makes me want to go back to the classroom!
Sunday, November 22, 2009
After completing the Technology Applications Inventory and the SETDA Teacher Survey, I noticed that I am more technologically aware than I give myself credit. However, since I’ve acquired most of my technology knowledge informally or self-taught, the areas that I am the least familiar with are the ones that have to do with hardware, and a lot of the technical lingo, such as knowing the difference between primary and secondary memory, manipulating files in different formats and modifying data. Other than taking a very basic course in college on Microsoft Office Excel, I’ve learned everything else on my own, through practice and on-the job learning. My strongest Domain is Foundations and my weakest is Communication. As an Intervention teacher I do not design and implement procedures to track trends, set timelines or evaluate products, since that is done at the district level. I do not get to create or design databases to communicate information because we use district ones. As far as my campus, I found that data is not being collected to determine if technology is impacting student achievement in core content areas, students’ 21st century skills, technology literacy, or student engagement. Therefore we do not know if technology is positively affecting student achievement. Perhaps, because it is an elementary school, our campus teachers’ use of technology for instruction is pretty limited to streaming educational videos and having students use math or reading websites, such as Symphony Math and Ticket to Read for students to practice specific skills.
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