Class Reflection

As I started Instructional Leadership: The Technology Link I was very excited about getting to learn new facets of technology. I was hoping to learn more bells and whistles for things such as Power points and Excel, but instead ventured into the world of blogs and wikis. I did learn some new aspects about Power points. The ability to post it to a blog was something that I had no idea how to do. This is going to be a great asset in the future. I can see blogs taking away the need for mass e-mails in the future. The course outcome did not align with what I thought we would be learning, because I did not expect to tackle blogging. However, I was very happy to learn more about blogs and hope to better use them for my class and hopefully my staff one day.
Blogs are not relevant in my school at this time. I do think that the time is coming soon where administration and teachers will use blogs everyday to communicate. I also think blog use between students and teachers will start to pick up in the near future. The main concern I have is how to monitor what students write on the blogs. I want them to feel free to express their opinions, but want to make sure they are following proper etique while posting their views.
One of the things I would have liked to been able to learn more about was Excel. I know the basics of the Excel program, but wanted to learn more about charts and graphs. I was hoping we would get some pointers on how to make our graphs look better or those special functions they do not teach you when your covering basic Excel in college.
I was successful in carrying out the assignments for this course. I was a day late on the Week 4 assignment and that was all my fault. I just couldn’t get going during week 4. Keeping up with the discussion board during this course was very time consuming, but all in all the discussion board helped my knowledge. The discussion board also helped give me other points of view that I had not really thought about and that lets me understand that when I become an administrator I need to be open to everyone’s opinion.
The main thing that I learned from this course is that technology is not going away. I already knew that, but I guess this course showed me new ways to use technology that just strengthed the argument. I learned that I really enjoy using technology in the classroom. I also learned the benefit of using technology when I become an administrator. I hope to be on the cutting edge of technology and inspire staff members to jump on the technology bandwagon. Really and truly I just want staff members to embrace technology and not to be overwhelmed or scared of it. Again, technology is here to stay!
Blogs have a place in education. I believe that moving forward with blogs in the classroom is only going to help student participation. Some students are far more likely to voice answers, ideas and opinions in a blog. The chance for them to be embrassed is far less in the blog than in the normal classroom setting where students could laugh at them. The question is how to use blogs and when could blogs be appropriate for class use?
The concerns of blogs or blogging in education is pretty much limitless. I have several concerns that will keep me from using blogs in my class until I come up with concrete answers. First, if a student post something unappropriate or even unlawful can I be held responsible if I created the blog for my class. I did not post it the student did, but is their any way that the students action could come back on me. Let’s face it, we have to protect ourselves as teachers now days. Next, I think blogging is ideal for use outside of the classroom. As we know all students do not have access to a computer or internet outside of school. How do we fix that problem and level the playing field for all students? I cannot answer questions on a blog if every student does not have the opportunity to benefit from it. That would not be fair to my students without computer access. Last, is good old fashion ethics. Who teaches ethics about what to post on the computer? The parents? The teachers? Today ethics is falling under the job of the teacher more and more. How do we teach this? Students can be bullies on the web just as easy as in the classroom. To use a blog as part of my class I have to be able to find good answers to all of the concerns.
I think blogging is the future of communication with school stakeholders. Instead of exchanging several different e-mails with people questions can be answered and viewed by all people involved. This will save time for administrators and people who have a question and might not be inclined to ask it will still get their answers. I think blogging is a very important component of education going forward.

Action Plan for Technology

CENTRAL OFFICE

Jim Hirsch - Associate Superintendent for Academic and Technology Services
The Associate Superintendent for Academic and Technology Services oversees and manages the operation of the Technology Department which includes Instructional Technology and Technology Operations.

Mary Hewett – Executive Director of Instructional Technology
Instructional Technology consists of student database managers, cluster support teams, and Learning Media Services.
The student database managers' responsibilities include supporting our district wide classroom electronic gradebook and attendance system (Pinnacle), and the School Messenger automated calling system.
Each cluster support team consists of a technology coordinator and technology specialists. The coordinator role includes assigning work direction to the technology specialists, collaborating with technical support services and telecommunications to provide needed services to the campuses and providing overall planning leadership to the cluster schools. The role of the specialist is to act as liaison between district program needs in curriculum, technology and the campus needs. Specialists are also assigned a particular curriculum area to support. They support campus initiatives as diverse as creating Internet pages to integrating a video image device into a social studies unit of study and everything in between. In addition to supporting an identified curriculum content area K-12, we ask the specialists to also be "generalists" when it comes to various curriculum and grade level applications.

John Alawneh – Executive Director of Technology Operations
Technology Operations directs and manages the services provided by the Technical Support Services Department as well as coordinates all of Plano ISD district wide systems integration with CIMS and Prologic Technology Systems, Inc. Specific systems included TEAMS, CIMS, eSchool Solutions and Curriculum Planners.

Kathy Dry – Student Record Officer
Student Records provide coordination, support and training to each campus, and all central office staff requiring access to student record information such as grades, transcripts, attendance, discipline, scheduling, and health & immunizations. It is also responsible for coordinating the coding for the state (PEIMS) reporting and the federal (Civil Rights) reporting coordinating with various departments such as Special Education, Bilingual/ESL, Gifted/Talented and Title I. Student Records conducts regular audits of elementary attendance records, and all campus entry and withdrawals. Other department responsibilities include maintaining the street index system, coordinating and processing grade reporting and campus scheduling assistance.

Dan Armstrong – Director of Technical Support Services
The Technical Support Services department is responsible for the installation, maintenance, and support of the district's computing systems, networks, and data communications technologies, including hardware and software. The department also coordinates all facets of the district telephone system, cellular and paging services, voice mail, long distance service as well as the district cable access television system.

Steve Durbin – PBX Manager
Telecommunications work to meet the telecommunications needs of the district staff including all facets of the district telephone systems, cellular and paging service, voice mail, and long distance service.

Jim Macaluso/Mark Fetchko – Cable Access Television (CATV)
Cable Access Television (CATV), through close coordination with Library Media Services and our local cable provider, work to insure cable access television service to all district facilities and each classroom.

Randi Weaver – Help Desk Supervisor
The Help Desk provides centralized phone help for technical support. All problems that require on-site support are entered into a tracking database and assigned to the appropriate group for resolution. Once calls are entered into the database, they stay on an open call list until fixed, ensuring that we do not let problems "fall through the crack". During school year 06-07, the Help Desk handled over 30,000 calls.

Dan Savage – Deployment Center Supervisor
The primary responsibility of the Deployment Center is to maintain a large inventory of computers, computer components, printers, and data communication equipment for our network needs. This group also moves computing equipment as required throughout the district.

CAMPUS LEVEL

Renee Godi – Campus Principal
Campus Principal is to make sure that ample amount of professional development is available/required within their campus. The campus principal should work hand and hand with the district’s technology director in order to provide resources needed for classroom teachers to be successful. Also, the campus principal needs to monitor data such as AEIS and STaR charts to make sure the campus in on target with state required TEKS technology requirements. Any problems with the flow of technology to the campus should be reported to the district.

Lois Schock – Campus CTA
The campus CTA will basically take care of all the campuses technology needs. The campus CTA can load software needed on a particular computer or help with minor technology problems. Any large scale problems will be reported to the district’s CTA.

Patrick Davis – History Department Chair
The subject department head will work closely with the campuses SBIC to make sure all technology needs are being met within their department. Department heads also need to assess test scores to see if technology is working the current way it is written into the curriculum.

Russell Budai – Texas History Classroom Teacher
It is the classroom teacher’s job to use the technology in the classroom. Professional development strategies have hopefully be taught for ways to implement technology into the classroom.


Professional Development Planning

Blog training for all staff - Administration will start a blog for all updates. This will take the place of the e-mail Monday Memo and now the Monday Memo and all other important announcements will be posted on the admin blog. Teachers will be responsible for checking the blog each week and can post comments and questions for all to see. Hopefully, this will help reduce the amount of repeat questions due to e-mail.


Pinnacle Gradebook Training – Training each year for our gradebook system called Pinnacle. Every year something changes on Pinnacle and we are not trained for the changes. When it is time for grades then we always have a problem. Just an hour training each year could easily stop this and keep parents update with parent portal. Parent portal allows parents to view their student’s grades.

SAS Information – We have a very good Student Assessment System in place in my district. However, there are many teachers who do not know anything about it. Currently, you can access all of your student’s test scores. Test such as TAKS, MAP, CoGat, etc. This is very useful information when you are trying to meet the needs of students and each teacher should be taught how to access and upload any scores they need. Also, teachers need to be taught what their current target scores are for their subject.

My.pisd.net Training - mypisd.net allows teachers to post calendars, assignments and messages to students and parents. This web based site allows parents to check grades, stay in contact with teachers and check when assignments are due. This is a great tool for my school district, but teachers are not using it. This could take care of countless e-mails. The main reason teachers do not use it is because they do not know how. This training will get teachers on track for using mypisd.net for their class and it will be mandatory that each teacher maintains a mypisd.net page starting the 2nd six weeks.

New Technology Training – As new technologies are implemented, staff members are required to attend training seesions, or demonstrate competency, before the technology is introduced into their classroom or office enviroment. The district offers a multitude of courses that range from introductory offerings to advanced, content specific classes.

Evaluation

PDAS
My Learning Plan – this is an electronic portfolio of our Professional Development
STaR Chart, AEIS, AYP (adequate yearly progress) Report
Staff sign-in sheet for Professional Development
Attendance sheet
Minimum of 30 hours Professional Development each year
Scope and sequence for core classes

Texas S Ta R Chart

the executive summary of your resentation

Texas S Ta R Chart

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Teaching and Learning

Today’s challenges in teaching and learning in the school setting are not as clear as they once were. New technology comes out every year and as teachers we have to prepare students to be successful in a more global economy. The Texas Long-Range Plan for Technology says that, “the roles of teacher and learner must continue to change.” I believe that is true. Today I can learn just as much from my students as they can learn from me when it comes to technology. Matter of fact, I learned something new about a PowerPoint presentation today from a student that I did not know. Progress is being made everyday by the state to help teachers zero in on the technology that students need to master to become successful adults. The Texas Long-Range Plan for Technology and TEKS help set guidelines for teachers to follow. No Child Left Behind is setting academic achievement levels for technology for all students through the eight grade. Both the state and national levels are promoting on-going professional development and advance based research to continue for the continued improvement of technology curriculum. So, how can we make things better? I think as teachers we have to let our guards down a little and listen to what the students are telling us. They want more technology, so let’s give it to them. I believe today’s students are far more engaged with instruction when technology is used and even more engaged when they are the ones using the technology. I think more and more teachers are willing to incorporate technology into the classroom. Now we just need the money to fund our technology ideas!

Technology Applications TEKS

The TEKS for technology set in place by the state of Texas do a good job of outlining skills that today’s students will need in order to be productive in today’s global economy. These TEKS are set in place as early as Pre-K. Some of the highlights to the Pre-K technology TEKS is that the state encourages doctors to encourage parents to read to their children. The other is to hold high expectations. Another part that I found interesting was the part where the TEKS outlined behavior and emotional control.

A spiraling curriculum will hit on a topic for a day or two and then come back to it in another week or month. It is like that topic will spiral back around in a week or two and you will focus on that specific skill again. My district uses a spiraling curriculum. TEKS that spiral are ones that come in each level of the TEKS. For example, Grades 3-5 TEKS 10(C) use appropriate applications including, but not limited to, spreadsheets and databases to develop charts and graphs by using data from various sources. This TEKS spirals back around in Grades 6-8 TEKS 10 (C).

Long-Range Plan for Technology

Texas Long-Range Plan for Technology, 2006-2020, lays out the framework for further implementation of technology in schools. The Long-Range Plan gives a teacher, parent or administrator a good idea of where the state sees strengths and weaknesses within it’s’ scope of technology. Having now been introduced to the plan it will help me first off in my classroom. I understand where the state sees technology going and I can stay on top of my responsibilities to make that happen. My favorite part was the Introduction to the 21st Century Learner. It gives a good example of the type of student we are dealing with today and tomorrow. Today’s learners are different than learners from even ten years ago. The Texas Long-Range Plan lays out how we will help the new learners in the classroom. As an administrator, this new information will help me know what will be expected from my campus when it comes to technology. Also, it shows me want the state is willing to do funding wise to help my campus implement more technology in the classroom.

Technology Surveys

As we move into the future it is essential that administrators become more and more familiar with technology. Technology is the key to tomorrow for our students. Technology is not going away and it is time for us all to embrace it. Having said that, I completely understand where my strengths and weaknesses fall under the technology umbrella. I feel very confident with word processors, spreadsheets and the internet as a whole. I know that my weakness falls under the video aspect of technology. I am able to access videos from a website and play them; however I need more training on how to publish videos.

I believe the two assessments were very fair assessments of myself and my campuses technological ability. The Technology Applications Inventory was a good look at my strengths and weaknesses when it comes to technology. One thing that stood out was how basic some of the technology was. For example, the ability to keyboard or type does not seem like technology to me. I guess that goes to show how little some of us give ourselves for knowing anything about technology. The SETDA survey allowed me to compare some of my strengths with that of my campuses strengths when it comes to the use of technology. I filled out the Teacher Survey, since that is my current position. One thing I really liked about this survey was that it asks questions about the amount of time teachers are given to prepare and collaborate for the use of technology in their classroom. I think this is an important practice that many teachers do not have the time to do.

All in all, after looking at the surveys and getting a better picture of my use of technology, I feel that I am progressing with the knowledge and use of technology at a good pace. I need to spend more time with it. I am hoping that our campus will incorporate more technology into staff meeting and professional development in the future.