Second to last meeting

It is our second to last meeting tonight and I am contemplating life without it. This course has provided a fresh look at a wide variety of technology available to us as educators and for use in our personal lives. I am actually dreading (a little bit) the end of class because the topics have been focused on positive issues and provided many growth opportunities, which has been seldom the topics in our school lately as we deal with the financial crisis we are faced with. Thanks to all of you who have helped to make this class rewarding.

Tonight's class was very thought provoking in terms of educational philosophy (thanks RSA) and technology ideas for staff and students. I see using Garage Band or an equivalent to work with teachers this coming August.

Todd, your TeacherSource looks awesome. We began a similar, but one dimensional, relational data base to record courses, units, lessons, and resources but without the current capacity for video and sound. I hope that we will have opportunities to explore it more. Thanks.

Help Needed

I enjoyed today’s class and it stimulated a lot of new ideas, too many ideas. As I plan my final project I would love to attempt to do some heavy duty video editing, database development and web page development. However, time is a scarce resource so I need to begin to narrow my focus. In order to do this I could use your help. Do any of you know of a database that already exists that tracks student graduation progresss in relatrionship to Oregon grad requirements? If there is such a beast out there that is user friendly and free then I can choose to pass on that as a final project. Your thoughts are much appreciated J

Staff Survey

Staff Survey

Hole in the Wall

Professor Mitra’s “Hole in the Wall” experiment reinforced my continuing belief that we need to change the structure of our schools, or at least provide easily accessible alternatives for those whom our traditional model does not work for. Our traditional model does work for many students but it also inhibits many and without a willingness by our system to open up alternatives, without placing a negative connotation on them, we will continue to fail a large number of very intelligent students.

Better late than never :)

Our district has a strong vision for technology and it’s use in the learning process for quite sometime. However, our financial resources have limited the acquisition of hardware/software and training for staff to in order for us to fully utilize the many opportunities that technology opens up for our students.

Our current tech plan was written in 2005 for 2006-2009 and has been updated but not published as of yet. However, there are a few forward looking statements that can be found in this dinosaur, for example, “The student will become an “information architect” who uses the technology resources available to bring personal meaning and expression to knowledge.” In addition, as you look at our Education Technology Vision Statement you will see that our desired use of technology is centered on “learning”.

Education Technology Vision Statement

Technology is the catalyst that will continue to transform schools from what they were, into what they must become to meet our students’ needs as they grow into productive adults in the 21st century.

Our students will have the skills and knowledge necessary to make appropriate use of technology during their education, as members of the workforce, and as participating citizens in a global society.

Our teachers will embrace technology to enhance their teaching and their students’ learning. Technology will allow information, combined with human intelligence, to impact the power of knowledge to our students.

What Do I Want To Learn?

How can I find more time for my family and myself? How to catch a winter steelhead? If you can assist me in these two endeavors I would be forever in your debt. However, if this is even beyond the reach of this class I would like to figure out how to use technology to better communicate with my staff, students and families.

Currently I write a weekly newsletter for my staff called the “Monday’s Musings” where I focus on the positive things our folks are doing, highlighting their successes, and reinforcing their positive behaviors which are desired in our building. As of late I have been a bit negligent in publishing each weekly musing and blame it on a lack of time. Therefore, I hope that I can find a new medium, or more, to assist me in delivering these valuable messages.

In addition, I would like to develop a database that can be used to track our student’s progress towards meeting graduation requirements (CRLS, Essential skills, OAKS assessments, education plan, and work samples)

First day of class

It is 48 degrees, sunny, and dry outside for the first time in quite sometime here in the beautiful Portland metropolitan area and I am stuck inside taking a six hour class on “Leading with Instructional Technology.” As I woke up this morning thinking about my long day ahead, after a home basketball game and dance last night, I dreaded spending my Saturday inside and listening to a professor pontificate on his/her expertise or interests. However, fortunately twelve upbeat fellow students and professionals greeted me and brought with them a diverse background in educational leadership and technology. In addition, our instructor is an upbeat positive personality with a passion for the integration of technology in education.

As the morning quickly went by I was amazed at the wealth of ideas being shared among our relatively small group and was introduced to a wide variety of excellent resources for my future investigation. However, the most thoughtful experience today was viewing the video of Sir Robinson on the changing landscape of our society and how schools need to adapt to before we lose millions of children and their precious minds in our current "old paradigm". This video, and/or the RSA that corresponds with it will be great tools to use with our faculty to continue our discussions on how to adapt and change to our students of today. I will keep you posted if I have the time to share with our staff…