The Problem as I See it!!

At first glance the district I work in is perfect in that there is an abundance of technology. There is a projector, interactive board, document camera and at least one student computer in every classroom. Every teacher in district has a laptop loaded with software: Microsoft Office, iLife, document camera software and interactive board software. So you might ask, “what is the problem?”

There are two problems, the district decides needs of teachers without asking the teachers and has centralized server set and maintained at district office (it used to be the lab managed responsibility to set up and maintain school servers).

The district deciding the needs of the teachers has a two fold result; teachers don’t have a “stack” in it and many times the teachers are not getting the equipment, programs and/or training they need for their program. Putting a projector/interactive board in a reading specialist room is a waste of resources. The reading specialist works with 1 to 4 students at a time, they don’t see the need to work at a board feeling it is not necessary. The district has installed the same set up in the speech therapist room, resource teacher’s rooms and the fitness room. Many times a project would have made the most sense.

Professional development works much the same way, with all good intentions the district puts out a massive amount of courses that the teachers can sign up for and also receive CPDUs. The classes maybe large with speakers that don’t know the teachers and goes at a relatively fast pace; great for the teacher previously comfortable with technology and probably already uses it in their classroom. This scenario is not a good experience for the teacher not uses in the classroom and would like to start. It is also not a good situation if one of the goals is to get these teachers using technology.

The school servers use to be maintained by the lab managers, allowing the school to set up and manage them according to the schools needs. The district has centralized them in the past several years. The problem with that is having one person deal with that many students creates a situation where it is impossible to take individual needs into account. All students must have the same formula for login (student first initial, middle initial, last name), great if the kindergartener or special needs student doesn’t have a long last name. This arrangement can’t take into account that a teacher wants to do a project and needs a particular account set up for her students, allowing them to share documents. Having the servers centralized does not allow the school to configure the server to that schools needs.

Having an abundant amount of technology in a school does not guarantee that the students will have a meaningful experience with technology.

Have learned how to incorporate wikis into my lessons - I am amazed how using them engages the students. I am sitting here on a Friday night (8pm) and keep getting updates from the wikis they created today.

Reflection

The 7th grade classes are well under way with this new Web 2.0 project. I have seen many things that I will have to adjust in order to give them a more positive experience.

Something New for Me.

The Web 2.0 workshop that I attended last Saturday has helped me open my mind to the many possibilities that Web 2.0 has in my classroom. I have already created and started using a lesson using Wikis.

Copyright, right? or Wrong?

In 2004, producer Danger Mouse released The Grey Album, employing an a capella version of rapper Jay Z’s The Black Album along with instrumentals lifted without authorization from The Beatles famous The White Album. Entertainment Weekly called it their album of the year. EMI, copyright holders of The Beatles White Album called it “illegal”.

The release of The Grey Album, complete with a cease and desist by EMI, brought back to the forefront the question of what is legal and fair in the often-murky waters of source sampling in this age of remixes and mashups. The question of right and wrong often comes down to intent. With the intent of education or if a posting was fair use (a minor argument can be made that the Jay Z/Beatle collaboration borders on parody), the use of sampling without copyright seems appropriate.

It should also be noted that though copyrighted, Jay Z’s The Black Album was released for the specific purpose of encouraging mashups and remixes. In addition, Danger Mouse green-lighted the free downloads on 170 sites on what came to be known as “Grey Tuesday.” Giving away a sampled piece, however, is no less illegal, especially if it hurts the commercial value of the property.

The question of Danger Mouse’s intent, however, has to be interpreted as commercial more so than artistic, incidental, or educational. For all of the talk about the legacy of sampling in hip-hop (which is considerable), the bottom line is that Danger Mouse wished to promote his career (which would result in financial dividends down the line) as much as he wanted to make an artistic statement. Coupled with the fact that the Beatles’s samples were clearly off-limits and this is a no-brainer.

Mid Level School

My school, King Lab, came out to be a Mid-Tech level school. I believe it actually falls between Mid- Tech and High-Tech. There are several essential conditions that I feel need to be worked on in order for us to move up to the High-Tech level, the conditions are: Shared Vision, Implementation Planning, Equitable Access, Curriculum Framework and Assessment and Evaluation.
Many of these issues go hand in hand and so I will be addresses them together. For instance, the problem I see with my district in the areas of Shared Vision and Equitable Access are interrelated. In District 65 the vision is created by personal that are not in the classroom and therefore do not address what teachers may need in order to be completely effective. These decisions include web and computer access to teachers. Teachers are locked out of websites that could be beneficial to their curriculum. It may take several days to a week to have these websites opened. This frustrates the teacher resulting in the teacher not wanting to use technology on a regular basis. In addition, teacher computers are locked down giving teacher limited access to their computers regardless of their level of expertise. There are many good applications that are a part of “Leopard” which teachers do not have access to, as an example: they can not add printers to their computer, locking them out of their personal printers at home. Teachers feel as though they are not being treated as professionals. I would like to see my department give teachers knowledge that allows them to know how to use many parts of their computers, if they abuse these privileges then take them away – don’t assume they will misuse the equipment.
Implementation Planning is the next condition I would like to see tweaked in my school district. We are great and getting equipment but the implementation of getting it out to the teachers and getting them proper professional development is lacking. This is mostly due to bad communication between the IT department and the teachers. Most installation is done over the summer and then in-services are not given to teachers at the school level where it can be done during planning periods are before/after school. Again, the IT department would have better results, I believe, if they would consult with the lab managers, who are not just computer literate but also have the teacher perceptive.
Curriculum Framework and Assessment/Evaluation in my school again goes hand in hand. We have started to have a framework of technology curriculum and have teachers who do a good job of integrating their curriculum and technology standards, however they do not do it purposely. In many cases when teacher work with me to team-teach a project, it is not their goal to use the technology standards that is my role. I believe, if technology were part of the teacher assessment and evaluation, the classroom teacher would work harder to integrate technology standards and their curriculum, using me as a resource.
In my opinion, my school is on the right track; I have a great staff that is willing to try to become a High-Level technology-based school. We have the equipment and many of my teachers are knowledgeable, however the district needs to work on their vision and work on seeing the teacher’s side of what is needed.