This chapter was a little weak for me. I found the strategies for community partnerships more like guidelines for building successful partnerships. I was looking for more step by step strategies on how to incorporate technology and partnerships within the classroom effectively. I felt that the reading was more geared to what a partnership should be and should not be.
However, with that said, I was still able to gleam some important ideas from the chapter.
“Successful school-business partnerships are built on an understanding of each other’s needs and constraints, mutual respect and honesty, and projects that are beneficial for all involved” (p.113).
Programs where community businesses can involved will benefit everyone if and only if they are mutual goals and understandings between the companies and the schools. The educators want to show the students basic and real life applications of what they are doing in the classroom. And respectfully, the companies are looking for endorsements and free advertising. When I was in high school, we would partner up with community businesses to provide financially support for our productions. In turn they were given a advertisement slot in our program. I find that it is easier to have successful and meaningful partnerships in high school and perhaps junior high but not so much in elementary. My experience with partnerships in elementary school is limited. One experience that does come to mind however, was the Book It Reading Program with Pizza Hut. We got a free pizza for our class/ourselves when we read a certain amount of books.
That brings me to the next idea. “Schools are looking for project-centered curricia that provides a context for learning and use real-world applications that demonstrate the relevance for the skills that students are learning” (p.114). When I was student teaching, the school brought in a yo-yo man. He was supposed to be a motivational speaker. However, the children were more preoccupied with buying and playing with his yo-yos then what he was talking about. Also, the yo-yos were a week long distraction in the classroom. We, as teachers, did not see the relevance for the children in that assembly accept for the students to buy over priced yo-yos. A yo-yo was 15.00-60.00. Talk about exploiting the students. Most of the students can even afford to buy lunch or a pair of gloves, but here they are encouraged to spend money on a yo-yo… that was too expensive in my mind and broke constantly in addition. Richards sums it up nicely when he says “ Schools are places were students need to feel safe… and where they will not be exploited. It [Businesses] is in the nature of their world to identify and exploit marketing opportunities . Schools are a prime target for products allowed into the school receive implicit endorsements” (p.115).
It was hard to follow the BBN and CO-NECT design. However, the one partnership that I did gleam a lot from was the Cable in the Classroom Partnership. The website was very useful. http://www.ciconline.org.
At our school, we also have the Navy come in and mentor to our students who are struggling in reading. The Marines also come in and advertised the importance for healthy live styles with their marathon in October.
Richards, John. (2001). Stratgies for creating successful corporate partnerships. In LeBaron & Collier (eds.). Technology in its place. Jossey-Bass, CA: San Franisco (p.113-124).
Monday, March 26, 2007
Saturday, March 24, 2007
Professional Development
Collier offers four approaches for professional development to teach teachers about technology integration.
The first approach is to use technology mentors. The concept is to pair a teacher with someone who is an expert in technology and have the expert show the teacher what are the best ways to use the technology in the classroom, very much like student teaching. Collier (2001) suggests that the school could then use these mentors to lead several professional development activities within the school. Ideally this would be cost effective because then the school would not have to pay an expert from the community to come in and do a presentation.
The second approach focused on student involvement. “Technology-savvy teachers are no the only resources a school can draw on for staff development for technology integratetion. Many Students are also experts in some aspects of technology use” (p.65). I think it would be hard some teachers to take directions or guidance from a student. In my school, professional development is considered a full day of workshops or meetings with the principal. I don’t think that staff would consider students helping in class with technology how-tos staff development. Collier suggests, “teachers can count on student experts to get a printer working or answer an unexpected technical question that arises during instruction” (p.65). I don’t think my principal would allow that to be defined as professional development. He would term it as part of instruction. Collier also suggests having two student experts in the computer lab for each class. What happens when both of those students are absent? There would also be a great deal of extra time needed from the teacher and the student to train and educate these “mentors”.
The next approach talked about using the standards and developing curriculum plans that would incorporate technology across all subject areas. “Toward this end, districts may create teams of teachers to lead the effort to map standards to local curriculum and classroom practice” (p.67). In my mind, this may be the most beneficial way to show and teach educators how to integrate technology. I would not mind sitting though presentations or workshops on how to apply technology standards across the curriculum.
The last approach was research how well these different ideas work. “Designing and developing technology-integrated projects and units is not the end of the story. Assessing how well these units work in practice in an important step in effective, wife-scale technology integration” (p.68). So using assessments with technology would be another area for professional development.
I think it would also be important to have the professional development activities where everyone could participate. I feel that we are required to go to the sessions that are least beneficial. Then when a program is offered that would be useful, it is given at a time that most teachers cannot participate in. For example: We were offered a staff development session on how to use the smartboard in our classrooms. The principal brought someone from out of the school staff to teach use about them. However, the smartboard training was during parent conference. The only people who were able to attend were their specialists. The principal then said that it was a waste of time and money and that there would not be another session. How frustrating is that?!
Collier, Catherine. (2001) Staff development for techhnology integration in the classroom. In John F. LeBaron & Cathering Collier (eds.), Technolgy in its place. (pp. 61-72). Jossey-Boss, CA: San Franciso.
The first approach is to use technology mentors. The concept is to pair a teacher with someone who is an expert in technology and have the expert show the teacher what are the best ways to use the technology in the classroom, very much like student teaching. Collier (2001) suggests that the school could then use these mentors to lead several professional development activities within the school. Ideally this would be cost effective because then the school would not have to pay an expert from the community to come in and do a presentation.
The second approach focused on student involvement. “Technology-savvy teachers are no the only resources a school can draw on for staff development for technology integratetion. Many Students are also experts in some aspects of technology use” (p.65). I think it would be hard some teachers to take directions or guidance from a student. In my school, professional development is considered a full day of workshops or meetings with the principal. I don’t think that staff would consider students helping in class with technology how-tos staff development. Collier suggests, “teachers can count on student experts to get a printer working or answer an unexpected technical question that arises during instruction” (p.65). I don’t think my principal would allow that to be defined as professional development. He would term it as part of instruction. Collier also suggests having two student experts in the computer lab for each class. What happens when both of those students are absent? There would also be a great deal of extra time needed from the teacher and the student to train and educate these “mentors”.
The next approach talked about using the standards and developing curriculum plans that would incorporate technology across all subject areas. “Toward this end, districts may create teams of teachers to lead the effort to map standards to local curriculum and classroom practice” (p.67). In my mind, this may be the most beneficial way to show and teach educators how to integrate technology. I would not mind sitting though presentations or workshops on how to apply technology standards across the curriculum.
The last approach was research how well these different ideas work. “Designing and developing technology-integrated projects and units is not the end of the story. Assessing how well these units work in practice in an important step in effective, wife-scale technology integration” (p.68). So using assessments with technology would be another area for professional development.
I think it would also be important to have the professional development activities where everyone could participate. I feel that we are required to go to the sessions that are least beneficial. Then when a program is offered that would be useful, it is given at a time that most teachers cannot participate in. For example: We were offered a staff development session on how to use the smartboard in our classrooms. The principal brought someone from out of the school staff to teach use about them. However, the smartboard training was during parent conference. The only people who were able to attend were their specialists. The principal then said that it was a waste of time and money and that there would not be another session. How frustrating is that?!
Collier, Catherine. (2001) Staff development for techhnology integration in the classroom. In John F. LeBaron & Cathering Collier (eds.), Technolgy in its place. (pp. 61-72). Jossey-Boss, CA: San Franciso.
Thursday, March 15, 2007
Technology and Urban Schools
Urban schools have tons of challenges. I hate to be negative, but my experience tends to lend itself to the fact that these schools are usually more concerned with safety and test scores than with obtaining the newest and latest technology with regards to student education. With that said, Gallagher makes some good points. Technology although important, is expensive (p.31). When I was teaching kindergarten, 64% of my class was on free and reduced lunch. Why do I know this—besides its obvious who brings and pays for lunch and who does not---I had to ask the PTA for funds for these children so that they could go on the fall field trip.
Technology also competes with programs that are deemed more important and which also provide immediate results. “Technology must compete with these programs and other, such as preschool education, for the limited funds available for the district. All of these programs are important and many produce more immediate, quantifiable results than technology, so they are more likely to get funded” (p.33). However, couldn’t there be a line item note for technology in each of these programs. Take the head start program, and after the funding for food is calculated, couldn’t administrators and community leaders tag on a technology expense as well?
I love the idea that one of the suggestions was to rearrange the class schedule. When I was teaching kindergarten, it was dictated when my core subjects would be taught. It was more effective in my mind to teach science and math together in the afternoon than to teach Language Arts and Science in the morning. I would have rather taught Language Arts and Social Studies together and therefore having opportunities to extend the teaching block. Since I tend to integrate Social Studies and Language Arts together anyways. My Kindergarten class always was scheduled to go to the computer lab right before lunch at 12:45. That was a pain because despite having snack before the lab, the students were focused on lunch and not on being productive in the lab. I would have much rather preferred an earlier lunch, recess and then lab after recess to settle them down and get them focused back on learning. I don’t think that many class schedules use time effectively for technology, but I also understand it is hard to coordinated a large number of classes for specials and lunch.
LeBaron, John F., et al. (2001). Technology and its place. Successful technology infusion in schools. Jossey-Bass, California: San Francisco. (Chapter 3).
Technology also competes with programs that are deemed more important and which also provide immediate results. “Technology must compete with these programs and other, such as preschool education, for the limited funds available for the district. All of these programs are important and many produce more immediate, quantifiable results than technology, so they are more likely to get funded” (p.33). However, couldn’t there be a line item note for technology in each of these programs. Take the head start program, and after the funding for food is calculated, couldn’t administrators and community leaders tag on a technology expense as well?
I love the idea that one of the suggestions was to rearrange the class schedule. When I was teaching kindergarten, it was dictated when my core subjects would be taught. It was more effective in my mind to teach science and math together in the afternoon than to teach Language Arts and Science in the morning. I would have rather taught Language Arts and Social Studies together and therefore having opportunities to extend the teaching block. Since I tend to integrate Social Studies and Language Arts together anyways. My Kindergarten class always was scheduled to go to the computer lab right before lunch at 12:45. That was a pain because despite having snack before the lab, the students were focused on lunch and not on being productive in the lab. I would have much rather preferred an earlier lunch, recess and then lab after recess to settle them down and get them focused back on learning. I don’t think that many class schedules use time effectively for technology, but I also understand it is hard to coordinated a large number of classes for specials and lunch.
LeBaron, John F., et al. (2001). Technology and its place. Successful technology infusion in schools. Jossey-Bass, California: San Francisco. (Chapter 3).
Friday, March 2, 2007
Lebaron et. al (Technology in its Place) Chapters 2 and 4
It took me a couple days to wrap my mind around the readings for this week. LeBaron is very wordy, much like Dewey. Basically, LeBaron points out that before a teacher can begin planning, that teacher needs to examine their philosophy and the nature of their classroom (types of students, types of learners, resources, etc.) He supports a constructionist approach to planning. “A curriculum dedicated to optimizing human potential will find comfort in a learning theory that stresses individual differences” (p.21). He goes on to say that “Technologies for this approach would be integrated throughout the learning environment supporting research and knowledge construction through local databases worldwide networks, data manipulation, software, and multimedia production” (p.21).
LeBaron also gave importance to collaborative planning where all resources (equipment and specialists) can be explored and shared. Jarvela’s article also focused on collaborative planning. My experience with collaborative planning has been a very positive and successful one. When I was student teaching, the kindergarten team would plan together and invite specialists on certain days to collaborate across the curriculum. When the children went to music, library, PE and computer lab, they would continue to learn about the things in class… such as Groundhogs day, Columbus Day, shapes, numbers or colors. At the planning sessions which would be one hour each morning, all of the teachers would bring their own resources on the SOLs that was the topic of instruction for that week. One day would be dedicated to planning for social studies and science, another for math and a third for language arts. (Day four was for a meeting with administrators and the last day was open for personal planning like photo copying.) It was very useful and a very productive use of time.
LeBaron, John F., et al. (2001). Technology and its place. Successful technology infusion in schools. Jossey-Bass, California: San Francisco. (Chapter 2 and Chapter 4).
LeBaron also gave importance to collaborative planning where all resources (equipment and specialists) can be explored and shared. Jarvela’s article also focused on collaborative planning. My experience with collaborative planning has been a very positive and successful one. When I was student teaching, the kindergarten team would plan together and invite specialists on certain days to collaborate across the curriculum. When the children went to music, library, PE and computer lab, they would continue to learn about the things in class… such as Groundhogs day, Columbus Day, shapes, numbers or colors. At the planning sessions which would be one hour each morning, all of the teachers would bring their own resources on the SOLs that was the topic of instruction for that week. One day would be dedicated to planning for social studies and science, another for math and a third for language arts. (Day four was for a meeting with administrators and the last day was open for personal planning like photo copying.) It was very useful and a very productive use of time.
LeBaron, John F., et al. (2001). Technology and its place. Successful technology infusion in schools. Jossey-Bass, California: San Francisco. (Chapter 2 and Chapter 4).
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