Posts Tagged ‘21st century schools’

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Predictions for 2012

January 31st, 2012 by Butch Owens

Yogi Berra once said, “It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future.”

That’s especially true in the world of technology today, but I think we can, at least, predict what the hot topics will be as we head into 2012.  Most important is how we respond to these issues.  Let’s take a look at some of my top picks which should be on every administrator’s radar.

BYOD – Bring your own device:  We have been talking about  1:1 computing for a number of years with very little progress other than a few pilot projects.  With the current budget situation I don’t foresee any changes in funding coming forward to make this a reality.  If we truly embrace getting devices into student’s hands we must look past the restraints of budget.  By embracing a “Bring Your Own Device” (BYOD) model we will succeed in getting devices into a lot more student hands in the classroom this year rather than have the devices sitting at home because of current school policy that forbids their use on campus.  I spoke of this earlier this year in a TBLOGICAL post called Digital Deprivation.  All students having access to digital devices capable of enhancing their educational experience is becoming even more realistic when you consider cheaper and cheaper devices such as the Kindle Fire, inexpensive netbooks, tablets, and Smart Phones on the market today.

Key topics to address:  BYOD Policies, Wireless Access, Bandwidth, Devices supported

24/7 Access to Information: Just a couple of years ago sites like Khan Academy were seen as a novelty.  A few tech savvy teachers might download a video to help explain a topic or give students a link to follow if they needed extra help with a concept.  Today it is no longer a novelty to see a short video clip on a subject.  Just go to YouTube and type in a topic you would like to know from replacing a valve cover gasket on your car to DNA replication.   These sites and videos are growing at a phenomenal rate, both proprietary and open source.

Key Topics to Address:  Teaching students to discriminate the good from the bad,  Providing Open Access at School,

24/7 Delivery of Course Content:  Yes, this does relate to 24/7 access, but takes it a step further.  Not only can students find information anytime and from any place, they can also elect to take all of their courses this way.  What that says to me is that if we don’t have it, they will go somewhere else to get it.

I recently had an opportunity to hear Dr. David Hagland, Director of Educational Options with the Riverside Unified School District, speak.  He has found that students don’t necessarily want to take a course completely online, but rather like to expand the classroom and teacher’s influence to an online blended format that includes lectures, class notes, videos, et cetera posted for student access before and after the traditional classroom lesson, and to have 21st Century technology tools available in the classroom.  For example, as I sit here typing this post in Google Docs, I know that I can access it on my computer at home, my iPad on the road or even share it with colleagues to get input and advice.  I’ve also clipped a few articles from the web into my Evernote account to reference as I write.  All of these tools and resources need to be incorporated into the teaching and learning environments of our students.

Key topics to address:  Learning platforms/management systems, online storage capabilities, teacher training for blended instruction, access to information.

School Libraries:  I know this prediction will not be a popular one, but the changing purpose and function of the school library needs to be addressed.  Schools are no longer getting the best bang for their buck when it comes to building and sustaining the traditional school library.  In a recent conversation with Dr. Devin Vodicka, Assistant Superintendent of Business for the Carlsbad Unified School District, we were discussing the new high school they were in the process of building. He stated that after much discussion on whether or not to build a traditional library it came down to the following question, “If we are really having such a difficult time deciding whether or not to build and stock a new library with books in the traditional way, we already know the answer, which is no. It’s just that it’s uncomfortable for our generation to picture a library without rows and rows of books.”

Are we still making decisions on what is comfortable for us or best for today and tomorrow’s students.  I’m not saying we need to do away with the library, just look at its role and function in our schools.  It will always be needed as a place to meet for that first date using the excuse as getting together to work on a school project.

Key Topics to address:  Digital books/textbooks and a system to checkout them out, installation of access points for students to connect at school, mobile devices,  workstations

 

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Posted in Integration, Leadership | 12 Comments »

Educators’ interest and enthusiasm for digital learning grows!

June 13th, 2011 by Sandra Miller

What’s driving educators’ enthusiasm for digital learning?  The latest Project Tomorrow Speak Up Survey suggests three factors:

 

 

  1. Teachers and administrators are using technology to improve their own productivity.  They use mobile devices, online classes and digital content; and this causes them to think creatively about using these same tools in the classroom.
  2. Students (and many parents) are demanding a different kind of learning experience, almost forcing teachers and administrators to reevaluate their ideas of the value of technology within learning.
  3. The economy and financial pressures on school budgets create a need to investigate how technology can help meet instructional goals with less expense.

The Speak Up Surveys have shown that teachers and administrators realize that students want to be “Enabled, Engaged, and Empowered,” yet there has been hesitancy in using technology to facilitate student learning.  District administrators and principals know creating a change in the values and skills of teachers to use digital content is a challenge.  These latest findings point to factors that may facilitate, even push, change.

Since 2008 twice as many administrators and teachers have smart phones, and 44% of teachers and 45% of administrators use Facebook.  Almost all teachers (96%) and administrators (99%) are tapping into communication tools to connect with peers or parents, but only 36% of teachers use these tools to connect with students.  (And students highly value this type of communication.)  The following chart shows teachers’ use of technology to facilitate student learning still has a ways to go.

Homework and practice is used most often, with other areas giving mixed results.  This suggests for administrators the need for teacher professional development, as well as tools and digital content to facilitate learning in new ways.  The use of online professional development may be one area that will assist, and the emergence this year of more and more inexpensive digital devices (tablets) offers administrators a starting point.

Teachers want to be effective in their teaching and researchers indicate the most solid predictor of student success is teacher effectiveness.  Getting teachers to report an increase in their effectiveness is a result we all want to strive toward.  In 2010, nearly a majority of teachers K-12 report technology helps them be more productive.  Sixty-eight percent of new teachers (1-3 years experience) say technology has increased their effectiveness by making them more productive, and 45% of these newest teachers say technology enables them to create more interactive lessons.  These are all positive indicators as we move toward facilitating student learning using technology.   

This look inside today’s classroom is just one part of Speak Up’s report: The New 3 E’s of Education: Enabled, Engaged, Empowered—How Today’s Educators are Advancing a New vision for Teaching and Learning.  Other key trends: Mobile Learning, Online and Blended Learning, and Digital Content are presented with interesting statistics to help administrators move forward toward a “new vision for learning.”

See this and other Speak Up reports.

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Posted in Data-Driven Decision Making, Leadership | No Comments »

What Technology Do Students Want?

May 2nd, 2011 by Sandra Miller

Boy with smart phoneResults from the latest Project Tomorrow Speak Up Survey suggest today’s  students are looking at a different paradigm in their learning experiences.

Students today are inseparable from their mobile technologies; instant messaging and texting is a way of life.  And they want to use their technology at school.

It’s tempting to dismiss that idea out of hand, but actually,  I’m impressed with the answers kids give when asked, “How would you use your mobile technologies for help with your school work?”  Older students—those in 9th–12th grades— would use them in ways we would describe as traditional.

  • 74% would check grades.
  • 59% would take notes in class.
  • 50% would use the calendar.
  • 44% would access online textbooks.

Younger students—those in 6th–8th grades—want to leverage emerging technologies in different ways to help with their schoolwork.

  • 68% would do Internet research, anytime, anywhere.
  • 53% would collaborate with peers and teachers.
  • 37% would create and share documents.
  • 35% would record lectures/labs to review again later.

While their teachers may cite lack of preparation, antiquated equipment or slow networks as impeding the use of technology in the classroom, 53%t of middle and high school students say the largest obstacle they face in using technology in their school today is their inability to use their own devices!

While many teachers and administrators have begun to approach new ways of using technology in classrooms, this latest Speak Up research says there is more than a gap between what many schools offer and students want—there’s a chasm!  When administrators were asked, “How likely are you to let students use their cell phones?” only 22% said likely; 63% said NOT likely.

By contrast, 67% of parents said they would buy a cell phone for their student to use at school, and 54% would also buy a data plan to support their student’s work.  And we’re not talking only affluent parents.  The Speak Up Survey results did not find significant differences among parents responses for any of the demographics that were tracked.

In fact, parents’ pressure on schools may just be the next trend in moving technology forward in our schools.  Today’s parents use technology daily in their work as well as in their social lives.  The Speak Up survey showed 57% of parents today consider instructional technology to be “extremely important” for their child’s success.  Only 37% of teachers see technology as that important.  Indeed, for leaders wanting to integrate technology in their schools, this is a challenge!

Students definitely have a clear vision of the potential of mobile learning to enable, engage, and empower them as 21st century learners.  Their parents see technology’s value.  As educational leaders we must spread this vision to our teachers and help them acquire the skills and technology needed to teach in more meaningful ways that match the tech-intensive lives of today’s students.

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What path innovation?”

October 12th, 2010 by Butch Owens

Are common standards and national tests the panacea for our nation’s woes?  Some seem to think so, but I’m not so sure.    Just last April I had the opportunity to hear Yong Zhao, author of Catching up or Leading the Way,  speak at our annual Leadership 3.0 Symposium.   He argues that while for years, politicians and the public have been looking for what is wrong with American education by constantly comparing the test scores of American students to those of students in such places as Russia, Japan, Singapore, and China, test scores don’t measure how well a country itself is doing. One striking example is how far America is ahead of all other countries in the number of patents issued; China, by contrast, is ahead in toy production.

The irony is that while we are busy trying to catch up with countries that have better test scores, those very countries are trying to emulate our educational system—or at least the one we used to have.  China, Korea, Japan and Singapore, for example, all have national initiatives to move their educational systems toward more local control, more autonomy, less emphasis on test scores determining a student’s or school’s future, and greater choices for the individual.  These are traditional characteristics of our system which have contributed to our success in turning out well rounded and innovative citizens.  And all of the latest literature argues that the ability to innovate is what we need in the future.

How would you judge an effective school?  Here are some top criteria on my list:

  • The number of  varied opportunities a student has beyond the core academics
  • The degree that students enjoy their school and feel they are important
  • Teacher behaviors that convey the expectation that all students can learn
  • Opportunities for students to progress at their own rate
  • Strong art and music programs and curricular activities that connect students to school

When you look back on your school days, is it the test scores that really motivated you to excel, or all of the opportunities you had to be an individual and find your own purpose and passion?

Take away those things that have enabled our system to produce the inventors and innovators of today and what will be left?  At best, a technically capable American engineer competing for the same job as an equally capable engineer from India who will do the job for $7500 a year.  A better alternative is an educational system that creates an American engineer with not only the technical skills but the imagination, innovation and creativity to design the new ideas that will need the $7500 a year engineer in India to help develop.

In an earlier post I wrote about what students really need to know and learn in school in this 21st century and ended with  the comment, “If it’s easy to test, it’s easy to digitize, and if it’s easy to digitize it can be done easily by a computer.”  What we really want are well rounded, innovative students prepared for a lifetime as productive, innovative citizens.  Will common standards and national tests ensure that outcome?

As you ponder that question, listen to Harry Chapin’s “Flowers Are Red“; how common do we want our standards to be?

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Mentoring for Student-Centric Learning

July 31st, 2010 by Sandra Miller

Students are motivated differently and want to learn in new ways.  One way to help teachers adapt to diverse and changing students may be to encourage them to think of themselves as mentors.

In his book Disrupting Class, Clayton Christensen talks about student-centric learning, “customized” learning, and teachers mentoring students.  Technology for customizing learning is being used across the country, and on-line learning institutions are becoming specialists in this area.  Christensen’s ideas on mentoring make sense and could be shared with teachers.  In particular, his discussion of  “challenges” and excuses as to why education has or hasn’t changed are well expressed.  Principals could use Christensen’s ideas as a springboard for faculty discussion about just what can be done to make our schools more successful.

The 2010 National Education Technology Plan,  Transforming American Education: Learning Powered by Technology echoes what Christensen and others are saying about changes to the traditional classroom program.

“…put students at the center and empower them to take control of their own learning by providing flexibility on several dimensions.  A core set of standards-based concepts and competencies should form the basis of what all students should learn, but beyond that students and educators should have options for engaging in learning…”

Christensen’s book and the new federal plan are great resources for us as we work to take on new roles and better utilize technology that can make us all more effective educators.

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Posted in Leadership, Pondering, Professional development | 2 Comments »

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