As many of my readers already know, in addition to teaching my wonderful 5th Grade students this year, I agreed to continue to be an advocate and resource for technology at our school. This is a continuation of a role I took on last year and I was so inspired with new ideas from my June classes I just had to find a way to introduce them to our staff. If you haven't read my posts from this summer showcasing some of the new technologies I learned about, just stroll back through the blog. In fact, this blog is one of my major opportunities to learn new ideas which I hope to introduce to my students this year.
As I thought about what I wanted to achieve this year, two things really influenced me. The first were some of the inspirational videos I have seen on how our world has changed (and is changing) and that the pedagogy (teaching technique) needs to change along with it for our students to be successful. There are many I watched, but I thought I would put one here for you to get a flavor of what I mean.
The other was a series of conversations I had with my good friend Stacy (Red to those that read the comments on my blog). She helped me crystallize my thoughts on how to have our teachers and our school see technology in a new way. After talking with her it was clear to us that in order to have the teachers embrace the use of technology, it had to move from "cool stuff" to another tool for teachers to improve their lessons. Technology had to become part of the classroom activities, not an extra-curricular activity like PE & Music. Another important part of our discussion was that everyone is at a different place on the technology curve and delivering technology at only one level leaves some bored, some overwhelmed and only a few satisfied.
With all that in mind, I took on a challenge to organize technology training at our Teacher Learning Day on October 27th. I first used Google Docs Survey's (what a cool tool- ha ha) to get input from the teachers on what they wanted to know more about in the area of technology. Next with the help of some teachers at our school I brainstormed a list of 9 possible classes to be taught. Another Google Survey (I suspect the teachers were getting tired of these) to see who wanted which class and ended up with 7 possibilities ranging from the basics of pictures on your computer, to building webquests with frames for student activities. Other classes included teaching lessons in the lab, digital storytelling, classroom websites, internet resources and using computer games and quizzes with your class. WOW ! I didn't realize what I had taken on.
The biggest job was finding instructors and designing each class to be at the right level, impart knowledge and lead teachers to think about using these ideas in their classroom. I ended up with a cadre of super instructors from Garden Gate and the District Office. Jamie, Stacy, Donna, Sandra, Cris, Laurel and I all put in tons of time getting the class material organized and prepared. Sandra even learned a new classroom website tool, just so she could teach it to our staff. Stacy taught two classes in addition to being a lead for the math portion of the day - what a trooper!
Not all our teachers have laptops, but to make the classes effective I had to borrow some from the district so as many of the classes as possible could be "hands on". Scott C let be borrow 5 laptops and the weekend before I had them all spread out in my dining room configuring thm and upgrading the software so teachers could use them. Bonnie was so understanding, she didn't even yell at me.
I must admit that organizing and executing this was probably one of the most exhausting things I have done in many years and without the help of all the other instructors, I would never have been able to pull it off. Bonnie will tell you that I was a maniac on the computer for nearly a month pulling together ideas and grouping the teachers to get the most out of the day. The weekend before the training we were in Orange visiting Sheryl and Del Mar for a Wavecrest owners board meeting and I spent hours and hours in the hotel room finishing all my presentations.Was it worth it?
The feedback at the end of the day and since then has been fantastic. The teachers really appreciated that the material was designed for what they wanted, not just something someone was pushing on them. I have already seen many of the them starting to use ideas from the classes. The next step will be to do some follow-up activities and sessions to take the initial training into full blown classroom activities for as many teachers as possible. Our newly formed tech team will be our SWAT team to accomplish this.I'll definitely do it again, but next time, I'll know what I am getting myself in for.
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