Sunday, December 8, 2013

School Evaluation Summary




Reflection

After evaluating this school and going through the Maturity Model Benchmarks, I found that I was surprised at the amount of information that one would need to evaluate the technology of a school.  

I came into this project thinking that the school I was going to evaluate was much lower than what I concluded.  The areas that surprised me was the administrative support and the overall planning of the technology at the school.  I was surprised by this because my initial thought was that the planning was very weak and unorganized   The more I was able to investigate the more I came to understand the importance of technology integration within the school.  What did not surprise me was the lack of training when it comes to integrating the curriculum when the school turns 1:1.  The professional development training has been seen as a waste of time because it is scattered  un-organised and not focused on the current needs of the teachers within the school.  

Overall, the school scored very well and it is exciting to have a starting point now to see how the school will improve as time goes on! 

Here are my links to the forms:


Sunday, November 17, 2013

Technology Use Planning Overview






Start with defining technology use planning--how would you describe it?
     Technology use planning is creating a plan to implement the use of technology into everyday classroom uses.  In creating this plan there must be an importances of the need and vision of the educational organization that the plan is being created for.  

How might the new National Educational Technology Plan 2010 be an effective and powerful resource for technology use planning?

     After looking over the National Educational Technology Plan 2010 I think that it can be a great resource for technology planning.  Looking at the plan overall, there are excellent observations about where the future of teaching and learning is going and how it needs to have a relationship with technology.    
     As a technology planner, an understanding of the challenge of our education system is essential to creating a complete and successful plan.  Using the NETP as a guide, a student centered learning plan is the future within education.  As the plan looks at assessment, the plan states that having technology-based assessments will allow conditions of learning to be modified for the students.  Using these assessments, student learning becomes more focused on the individual.  This being said, I believe that this is still in the future.  This is not an argument for more standardized testing, but rather for an assessment supported by technology that allows us as educators to become student centered.  
     The Plan also goes into details about teaching and the importance of having quality learning experiences for teachers in regards to technology.  The plan mentions that it is evident that education is behind in both training our teachers and our students within technology.  The ability to train our teachers in new technology uses will allow our student's to grow in their learning as well.  
     The National Educational Technology Plan 2010 is a great framework resource for implementing a technology usage plan.  Each area that the plan touches on (learning, assessment, teaching, infrastructure, productivity  gives excellent framework to help guide an implementation plan.  In using this plan, there would be differences of use depending on the vision  of the school, parents, students and teachers.  


Do you agree with See about tech use plans needing to be short, not long term?
Thinking about tech use plans I believe that goals have to be short.  John See wrote that technology moves to fast for a long term plan to be effective.  I agree with See in his idea that if a school  creates a 5 year plan and invests in a specific technology, there is more than a possibility that the technology purchased is going to be out of date.  


What do you think about his comment that "effective technology plans focus on applications, not technology?"
When I read this quote in See's article I found myself agreeing fully with the statement.   The fact is if we give a computer to a student, that student will be able to learn a great deal of information.  The information though might not be conducive to their learning.  If the technology plan is focused on the outcome of what the students will achieve greater success will be seen both in students and teachers.  

Do you agree/disagree?
Personally I agree with See's argument that tech plans should be focused on the outcome and not the technology.  In order for the integration of technology to be successful it must be something that can help achieve the vision.  If we choose the purchase the technology before we have the vision of how it will be used, we will be burdened with a big bill and no direction to go.  The application must be the most important part of the tech plan because we are not cantering our learning around technology but rather we are enhancing our learning with the help of technology. 

What experiences have you had with technology use planning and what have you seen for outcomes (both good and bad?)

Currently our school is in the midst of a technology change.  Currently this year we are testing having laptops 1:1 within our classrooms.  There are 4 test teachers, each using a classroom set of laptops for a quarter.  After they are done with their quarter, they report on their experience with the computers.  I believe that 1:1 is where our school needs to be.  Unfortunately the weakness of this change is the preparation for teachers.  As I look ahead at the proposed 1:1 plan within our school the adjustment is not going to come from the students, they are already very technologically literate, the adjustment will need to happen within the teachers.  our teachers are not being given the training of altering our curriculums to be 1:1 friendly.  For example, if a teacher uses many paper worksheets, then an adjustment might need to happen on how those assignments are supplemented .  Also, decisions need to be made on the applications that we are using.  For example, google drive, Evernote  skydrive, dropbox are all applications that can be used to take notes.  If a student with a 10 class schedule is using a different program for each teacher, the student becomes distracted and confused.  I hope this plan is coming, but we will see what comes from it.

Wednesday, November 13, 2013

Digital Inequality



Here is my presentation on Digital Divide and Inequality.

I chose to focus on the impact of the digital divide on students in the US that are coming into high school without the technology experience required for university life.

Enjoy!


Digital Divide

Monday, October 28, 2013

Tech Trends



(This is not my feeling about technology...just thought it was funny!)



Follow the link to my discussion on cloud computing and how it is just beginning to become a relevant tool within education!

Tech Trends

Sunday, October 13, 2013

EDTECH Research



For my objective I found there was a good amount of information.  I felt that using Google Scholar made my organization much easier in doing research.  I wasn't having to transition between windows in order to look up different articles that could be used in my research  I could stay on my document and still conduct a meaningful search.  Many of the articles that I found were in pdf format, so I was not able to use the preview function as described in the assignment.  This though was still much easier research option than what I have experienced in the past.

EDTECH Research Assignment

Wednesday, September 25, 2013

RSS Feeds in Education






Hello!

This has been a week of learning for me!  My video will explain that I have had very little experience with RSS feeds.  As I read more about it and researched how it could be used in the classroom, I found and tested an idea of how it could be used and it worked!  RSS feeds are great and I am excited to be putting them to more use!  The biggest thing I think I learned this week is the broad uses of RSS feeds within education if the school is built, or in need to use the feeds!

I hope you have had a blessed week!




Thursday, September 12, 2013

Elements of Educational Technology

         

     This week our assignment was to investigate the elements of Educational Technology.  Coming into this program, my definition of edtech was very thin.  When I thought about edtech I considered the immense amount of technologies and tools that are available.  I did not however think about how a process of filtering tools to best fit learning would also be considered a part of the edtech world.  After studying "The Definition of Educational Technology" by the AECT Definition and Terminology Committee I realized that this field was much more detailed than I first had thought.  The more I thought about it, the more sense this document started to make.  We as edtech professionals are responsible not only for the training, facilitating and introduction of new tools and technologies, but we also have an immense responsibility to present systems that will encourage greater learning both for the teacher and the student.  No longer am I simply looking at a new app thinking "hmm could I use this in my classroom" but now I begin to think about how this app would work in my peer's classrooms?  Could the students truly benefit from this resource or is it a distraction from their learning path?   I am so excited about the world of edtech and I cannot wait to continue to learn more in the coming weeks!

My thoughts on three important elements of the 13 are place here in a google doc.  Though I did pick three to be the most important in my eyes, as I read I continued to learn more and more.

All for now!  Be Blessed!

Tuesday, August 27, 2013

Welcome!

Hello!

My name is Taylor Williams.  I am currently living and working in Hong Kong teaching 8th grade Bible.  We have lived overseas for the past 3 years and simply love the adventure! We are working at ICS Hong Kong (International Christian School).
Our Happy Family.  Taylor, Stacia and Baby Atley



I am looking forward to learning more about the EdTech field!  Teaching has become a new career for me since moving to HK.   I became interested in EdTech through our school's EdTech specialist and the process our school is going through in being 1:1.


I was orignally working out of college as a youth pastor in Colorado, and my wife a teacher.  Through nothing but the grace of God we were brought to Hong Kong where I transitioned into the classroom.  I am now looking to expand my horizons and skills in the education world and I cannot wait to see what is in store!

Have a wonderful day!

Taylor