There’s also the challenge of getting teachers and administrators to embrace tablets and smartphones as the norm in schools — and to ensure staff and students are properly and constantly trained to operate the devices as tools to enhance education.
“Now students have access to and know how to use devices as early as kindergarten,” Lang said. “Technology is here to stay, and we have to teach children how to use it.”
And also make sure teachers are enthused about technology.
The tech-savvy Lang said it’s just as important to put technology in the hands of students as it is for teachers to be knowledgeable about how to use the technology.
“The technology is only as good as the teacher,” Lang said. “It’s all about how the teacher uses the technology to enhance the lesson.”
Trained teachers
Having a trained and experienced media specialist at each school is important for a school’s technology morale, Walter Jackson Elementary librarian and media specialist Todd McDonald said.“Teachers are more likely to try new things if they know someone is there to help them,” McDonald said.
Karen Tucker, IT director of Limestone County Schools, said nine of the system’s 12 schools are equipped with full-time technology facilitators whose only job is to help teachers with technology and teach them how to use the resources.
“Next school year we’re hiring three more, and at that point all 12 of our schools will have a facilitator,” Tucker said.
Tucker said facilitators are required to have a minimum of five years of tech experience, and also are certified teachers.
Decatur City Schools technology supervisor Kathy Rains said each school in the system has a technology contact person. That person is usually the library media specialist, but at some schools it may be a teacher. The system also has three technicians who travel from school to school addressing tech questions and problems.
Hartselle City Schools and Morgan County Schools’ approach is similar to the one at DCS. In Hartselle, each school has an instructional resource facilitator whose job is to teach teachers how to enhance their lessons by using technology. Superintendent Vic Wilson said the facilitators handle minor troubleshooting, but any major tech problems are handled by the system’s two tech coordinators.
In Morgan County, each school has a tech representative who handles basic problems.
“If it’s not something that can be fixed or figured out within about five minutes, then a work order is submitted to the central office and someone from our IT department fixes it,” Morgan County Deputy Superintendent Lee Willis said.
Each Lawrence County school is equipped with a tech support volunteer who is responsible for helping teachers resolve technical problems, tech coordinator Larry Smith said. If the volunteer, usually a teacher or an aide, is unable to resolve the problem, the system’s IT department is contacted. The system also has a tech innovation committee that is responsible for helping teachers integrate technology into their lessons.
Athens City Schools’ intermediate, middle and high schools have one instructional tech specialist each, and the four elementary schools share a specialist, instructional tech supervisor Beth McKinney said.
With good communication among schools and teachers, administrators and staff, McDonald and Lang said, talent can be found and leaders usually emerge.
Over the years, McDonald said, teachers and staff at Walter Jackson have stepped up. He said fifth-grade teacher Christy Lockhart has become an asset to him because she is better at explaining and teaching concepts to other teachers.
“Sometimes she’ll explain how to do something while I walk around and help the teachers with troubleshooting,” he said. “We make a great team.”
When McDonald isn’t available, teachers call on custodian Roger James for help. McDonald said James knows how to fix projectors, wiring problems and troubleshoot devices. Another teacher at the school is a sound system expert, McDonald said.
Utilizing apps, coding
Lang and Decatur High School media specialist Philomena Compton said an app called Screen Chomp is one of the best tools they’ve found to enhance communication among administrators and teachers, and teachers and students.The app allows users to upload documents and record their voice. Lang said she uses it to make faculty meetings more productive and engaging.
She uploads the agenda and records her voice going over all of the information, and then sends it to teachers for them to review before the meeting. On the day of the meeting, teachers ask questions if they have any, and the rest of the time is used for professional development, which is usually technology related.
“It’s made our faculty meetings more productive,” Lang said. “The teachers like it so much better, and it allows them to see the value of technology.”
Once the data is downloaded to a device, it can be viewed without a wireless Internet connection. This is helpful for students without access to wireless Internet at home because they can download lessons at school and still view it at home, Compton said.
Lang and McDonald mentioned coding, programming and robotics as emerging topics in education. Lang said she is keeping up with the different programs that may be helpful in teaching those subjects.
“There’s a lot of buzz about teaching computer coding, even in elementary, so that students have a basic understanding of what coding is and how it works,” McDonald said. “Having that skill will be very important as these children grow up and become a part of the workforce.”
During the 2012-13 and 2013-14 school years, McDonald taught HTML coding to fifth-graders. Some students grasped the concept and enjoyed learning about it, while others weren’t as interested, he said. The school’s robotics team continues to learn about coding.
Students visit the computer lab once a week for lessons with McDonald. This year, McDonald isn’t teaching coding. Instead, he’s focusing on digital citizenship, a district-wide effort.
“Introducing children to technology at an early age and teaching them what’s appropriate and what’s inappropriate helps when it comes to digital safety and things like cyberbullying,” McDonald said. “If they become familiar with it at a young age, they don’t view it as a new shiny toy when they’re older.”
Cyberbullying
Although cyberbullying is more prevalent in middle and high school, Lang said she’s starting to see more of it in elementary. She said cases of cyberbullying began increasing about two years ago among fourth- and fifth-graders.She said teaching digital citizenship is the best way to combat it. Fifth-graders at Chestnut Grove are working on digital citizenship projects and will present them to second- and third-graders near the end of the school year.
“We have to start as soon as they enter school, because now students have access to and know how to use devices as early as kindergarten,” Lang said. “Technology is here to stay and we have to teach children how to use it, but at the same time it’s important that they use it the right way.”
©2015 The Decatur Daily (Decatur, Ala.) Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC
