Technology
& Learning
Implementation Plan
2005 --- 2008
Executive Summary
Student learning and achievement for all students is the driving purpose behind all efforts of Dorchester County Public Schools. The use of technology in the system’s classrooms, media centers, labs, and offices is a tool for the accomplishment of that purpose. Studies show that well-planned use of educational technology in classroom instruction can be effective in raising student achievement (Gahala, 2003; Schacter, 1999). Among the strategies called for in our Master Plan is heterogeneous grouping, in such classes all students will be held to the same high standards, and pedagogy will be based upon differentiated instruction. The integration of technology into the daily instructional routine can become a valuable tool in differentiation. The need for classroom technology has become apparent as recent textbook adoptions have included a spate of instructional software and web-based student-centered learning activities.
Culture and economics worldwide are affected daily by the influence of digital information that is increasingly available on the World Wide Web. That information expands and evolves rapidly, as does the technology that supports it. We will meet the Maryland Technology Literacy Standards for Students, now in draft form. To meet those standards, the Dorchester County Public School System realizes that we must educate for technology literacy beginning in early elementary school. Such early inclusion of technology facilitates integration of technology literacy into learning in all subject areas. Technology skills will progress as our students advance through the curriculum. In Dorchester County we strive to graduate students who can manipulate and contribute to the growing body of digital knowledge successfully throughout their lives.
Dorchester County Public Schools’ technology emphasis in 2002-2005 was focused on establishing our infrastructure with collaboration between the Dorchester County Board of Education and the Dorchester County Council. This collaboration resulted in a high-capacity broadband intranet during 2004-2005. In addition, we have joined Maryland-based technology grant-funded consortia, which have enabled us to network with various local education agencies, and add to our technology tools. Although we have made progress since 2002, we have not been able to keep up with the rapid rate at which technology is advancing. We have built the infrastructure, now we need to focus our efforts in 2005-2008 on sustaining the infrastructure and upgrading the hardware and network software. We must increase the technology available in classrooms for student use as a normal part of instruction. To that end, Dorchester County Public Schools will seek grant funding and partnerships with business and government agencies to enhance local funding.
Having access to technology and digital content is of little value if teachers are not fully prepared to integrate technology into their classroom instruction (Gahala, 2003). Additionally, it is imperative that our teachers and administrators have proficient skills in the use of technology for administrative and instructional planning purposes (See Appendix C.). An information technology teacher (IT teacher) was hired in 2004 with educational technology grant funds to begin professional development for our staff. During the 2004-2005 school year the Dorchester County Public School System launched an intensive effort in professional development in the areas of productivity and management software as well as the integration of instructional software into the classroom. Our teachers, administrators, and support staff have responded to these professional development opportunities eagerly and have requested more. To meet the call for professional development, Dorchester County now has two IT teachers.
Well-planned, focused, and on-going professional development opportunities for teachers as well as administrators will enhance their capacity and efficacy in the application of technology and digital content. For the next three years and beyond, Dorchester County must develop professional capacity in the integration of technology as a tool for analyzing data, planning, and delivering instruction. Engaging all of our learners with technology must happen, if we expect to realize the improved student learning that research has proven is possible (Willis, Thompson, & Sadera; 1999).
In this vein, the Dorchester County Public School System developed a vision for the next three-year Technology & Learning Implementation Plan:
Dorchester County Public Schools will become learning communities comprised of students and staff who are technologically literate; self-directed life-long learners; able and critical thinkers; creative problem solvers; articulate communicators; and, efficient managers and evaluators of information. In our schools, teachers and administrators will plan, produce, monitor, and evaluate learning experiences for all members of the community to enhance and promote high achievement for all students.
Detailed strategy to guide us in the realization of this vision is presented in Section 1 of this plan. Informing the strategy are the Dorchester County Master Plan; technology standards established for administrators, teachers, and students; the technology needs set forth in the Maryland Technology Literacy Standards for Students and the VSC (See Appendix I); and the Maryland Instructional Leadership Framework(2005). Community and system stakeholders have helped to develop Dorchester’s technology focus through collaboration at the county government level and at the central office level through technology committee work. These stakeholders will monitor and evaluate progress toward achievement of our vision through the next three years.
SECTION 1: INTRODUCTION, VISION, AND STRATEGY
Introduction
“Technology itself is not the curriculum. Technology is a key that opens opportunities for students to learn in the classroom. It is a way in which we can bridge what in the past have been large gorges that have separated students from opportunity.”
John Dossey, Illinois State University
(National Academy of Sciences, 1995, p. 6)
The Situation
Dorchester County Public Schools are in an exciting position to move forward with real integration of technology into classroom instruction. We still have needs in our infrastructure for upgrading servers and our system software. The hardware and software is aging and will need regular replacement and upgrades (See Appendix E.) as technology advances, but the investment in broadband provides the school system much greater capacity for gathering and communicating ideas.
Now that our ability for integrating technology into learning experiences has increased, our teachers will need professional development. Dorchester has hired two Information Technology Teachers who will train, co-teach with, coach, reflect, and monitor classroom teachers for embarking in new roles as facilitators of student-centered constructivist learning in their classrooms. Educational technology resources, such as video, audio, web-based research, email, computer simulations, discussion boards, digital learning objects, online courses, and databases, will play a large part in empowering students to become more technologically literate but also self-directed and metacognitive about their own learning. Although Dorchester’s staff has been using email and productivity software for years, advances have been and will continue to be made in digital technology that require new capacity in our professional and support staff. Professional development in technology is provided for administrators, teachers, and support staff as well.
Professional development and follow-up support must meet the technology use needs of the Dorchester Public Schools’ staff. While Dorchester County provides four days during the school year for staff development, one-day events will not affect the proficiency that our staff needs to meet the Dorchester County Public Schools’ goal and vision. We must continue to offer our evening and summer opportunities for professional development, which means stipends for participants and staff developers (Rodriguez, 2000; Foltos, 2002). Funding for such staff development is dependent on technology grants. Should those grants no longer be available, local funding will be needed.
Dorchester’s Progress
Over the past three years, Dorchester County has begun to address the digital divide in our public school system. The school system developed a partnership with the Dorchester County Council, which provided high-capacity broadband in 2004-2005. This upgrade drastically improved the speed and integrity of the WAN and individual LANs, but the IT department is still upgrading each individual server on an as-needed basis and the school system has been slow to replace out-dated hardware.
Technology grant funding allowed Dorchester to hire one IT teacher for the purpose of working with middle school teachers, who were not comfortable using email, productivity software, the student management system/grading program, and digital resources that accompanied the new English/Language Arts textbook series. Since the advent of the IT teacher, we have offered productivity software trainings and a summer Technology Academy, a two-week differentiated training that allowed all participants to practice with the available technology, the SIRS database, and management systems to create products to take into their classrooms at the end of the summer. The IT teacher became a county employee after a year, and Dorchester has added another IT teacher at the high school level for the school year 05-06.
Dorchester County partnered in several grant-funded technology consortia: Technology Literacy by Grade 8, Project OPEN, Curriculum Management Systems, and Learning Management Systems. These involvements have sparked several initiatives in Dorchester schools. An Instructional Technology Steering Committee was formed and created a draft scope and sequence for Technology Literacy by Grade 8 (See Appendix G). Although the safe and ethical use policy was already in place (See Appendix B.), there was no policy that addressed universal access. The Instructional Technology Steering Committee produced an instructional software adoption policy that addresses universal access and alignment with the curriculum (See Appendix D.), and the new policy was adopted. Project OPEN has provided training for eleven Dorchester teachers to teach online courses or mentor students in online courses. The Curriculum Management Systems grant has allowed us to train our special education staff and many administrators in the use of the online IEP software that is now part of our student management program. The Learning Management Systems grant has allowed Dorchester to become partners with the state adoption of Desire2Learn, which resulted in the formation of several e-communities, one online graduate class designed after a needs assessment taught by a Salisbury University professor, Dr. Randall Groth, and a hybrid course offered in one of our high schools. Currently, a hybrid technology class is in session for Dorchester’s staff using the D2L platform.
Charting the Future
If the Dorchester County Public School System is to successfully prepare our students to be productive citizens in a rapidly changing world, more attention needs to be paid to our information technology resources and our educational technology program. As described in the previous summary, Dorchester County placed the acquisition of broadband capacity as the priority item for its 2005 technology funds. New funding needs to focus on upgrading the aged LAN servers, network software, and email system to support current operating systems and allow students to save work-in-progress as they build educational portfolios. In addition, computers in classrooms and computer labs need to be upgraded where possible or replaced to bring them up to high-capacity status. If our teachers are unable to access the variety of digital tools available because their equipment is inadequate, integration into lessons is impossible. Local funding alone will not be adequate to populate our schools and classrooms with the hardware and connections necessary if technology is to be used daily by students to develop high achievement in curriculum content and processes as well as become technologically literate. Therefore, Dorchester County Public Schools will seek to establish partnerships with business and government agencies in addition to grant funding in order to meet our needs.
Access alone will not ensure effective use of technology by teachers and students. Professional development is going to be of paramount importance for Dorchester County teachers and administrators. Teachers will need to know how to connect digital content and tools to the curriculum in their classrooms and the needs of their students as a natural and daily part of instruction. The focus needs to be on the content of the lesson and not the technology; technology is to blend with lessons almost invisibly. Technology use in learning cannot be a novelty, or something that must occur outside of the classroom. This means that teachers and students need to have the facility with technology that will allow it to be a normal tool in their learning repertoire. Students need to know how to use productivity software as well as how to safely access data, determine the value of the information they encounter, and how to use it ethically and purposefully. Administrators and teachers need to know how to analyze data digitally to plan successful learning experiences for their students. Professional development opportunities need to be planned with these expectations in mind, and monitored to ensure that they align with the Maryland technology standards for students, teachers, and administrators.
As we increase the number of classroom computers and connections, the capacity for technical support will need to increase as well. The Milken publication, “Technology in American Schools: Seven Dimensions for Gauging Progress” asks public education to examine “adequate technology, networks, electronic resources and support to meet the educational system’s learning goals” (Lemke and Coughlin, 1998, p. 28). This document describes a project founded in Olympia, Washington, Generation WHY, which involves secondary school students in an important role as partners in the maintenance, trouble-shooting, and creative problem-solving. Each middle and high school in the district has a group of technical assistants available throughout the school day to help maintain the infrastructure. Dr. Dennis Harper, the technology director at Olympia and founder of Generation WHY, says, “These students are doing real work with real results. In addition to creating more meaning and purpose to their role as students, they are helping their community, and are seen as positive role models” (Lemke and Coughlin, 1998, p. 29). A similar program will help Dorchester County Public Schools in meeting the growing need for technology support as our educational technology expands.
Beyond the Classroom
Dorchester County Public Schools uses technology tools for school administrative functions, the planning, and monitoring of operations. Aside from internal operations, our schools use technology as a means of communication with the community. The system plans to stay current with best practices in its business administration technology to maintain efficiency and economy in its operation.
Communication with the community is of vital importance to the achievement of our system goals. Only when the community understands and supports us as an involved partner, will we be able to raise the achievement of all our students. Our district wide network will provide access to parents and community members in order to share the system’s vision and goals, but also to enable interaction among parents, schools, teachers, and the members of the community at large. Therefore, websites, district and school-level, must be monitored and updated regularly. The sites must be user-friendly, and responses must be made promptly to questions, concerns, and suggestions. To facilitate this communication and involvement, parents and community members will be invited to participate in training in the use of the digital tools available through Dorchester County Public Schools.
Dorchester County does not have a back-up system for its digital data. Should a natural disaster hit our area or major systems failure from other causes occur, it is possible that the system could lose financial, student, and staff records that are vital to the operation of the system and meeting state and governmental reporting requirements. During the period of 2005-2008, Dorchester County will investigate options for protecting data.
Vision
Dorchester County Public Schools will become learning communities comprised of students and staff who are technologically literate; self-directed life-long learners; able and critical thinkers; creative problem solvers; articulate communicators; and, efficient managers and evaluators of information. In our schools, teachers and administrators will plan, produce, monitor, and evaluate learning experiences for all members of the community to enhance and promote achievement for all students.
Our vision for 2005 to 2008 is that our schools become true learning communities in which teachers incorporate technology into their lessons naturally and seamlessly to improve the quality of the learning experiences they design as best to meet the demands of curriculum and needs of their students. Through the incorporation of technology into student learning, the teacher is able to assess student needs and prescribe scaffolding and enrichment for the students. During the Riall Lecture, delivered at Salisbury University, Dr. Carol Ann Tomlinson discussed the use of classroom use of technology as one important tool for differentiating learning experiences because all students are engaged in working for the same high standards, while their teachers are making sure the “right kid gets the right thing at the right time” (C.A. Tomlinson, E. Pauline Riall Lecture, September 28, 2005). From participation in such technology-enhanced lessons and learning activities, students in all of our subgroups will improve their achievement.
Our administrators, teachers, and students need to meet standards that are written for technology literacy. Students will soon have Maryland standards for achieving technology literacy by grade eight, while teachers and administrators have technology standards to meet as well. (See appendices G and H.) In meeting these standards, all three populations will be able to access, evaluate, manipulate, apply, and produce digital information efficiently and effectively to improve student learning.
Dorchester County plans to realize its vision by 2008. By that time, improved student achievement will be demonstrated across the curriculum as well as in the knowledge and skills of technology that will be transferred to endeavors in life beyond the schoolhouse doors, throughout life. A real transformation will take place in many classrooms, and the norm for our schools in 2008 will be to find teachers as facilitators of student learning that:
- Is planned for the specific needs of the student
- Engages students in interactive learning experiences
- Challenges each student to become the best that they can be
- Surrounds students with a rich variety of content in multiple formats that include print, non-print, digital, multimedia, and student-created materials
- Involves students in project-based learning collaboratively and individually
- Includes the use of a variety of simulations and models that enrich curriculum and enhance student learning
- Uses real-time real-world data to solve problems and create original solutions
- Holds each student accountable for high standards
- Invites and achieves community involvement
In implementing this plan faithfully by following the objectives to achieve the vision and goal, we will vastly improve educator proficiency in stepping back from the role of deliverer of knowledge to that of facilitator and guide to the world through the effective use of technology. Students will no longer be the recipients of knowledge but self-directed, engaged learners, who rely on technology to connect them with experts and real-world information right in the classroom as an integral part of learning. Hardware, networks, and software will be reliable and able to meet our instructional and administrative needs. The integration of technology into our schools will, indeed, be seamless.
Strategies
Student performance data demonstrates that there is room for growth in pedagogical practices in Dorchester County classrooms if we are to achieve the motto, “Every Child a Success.” This plan offers a powerful method of reforming the way in which technology is used in the educational settings in this county. As we submit it, we embark on a three-year journey to achieve its vision and goal through following the steps set forth in our objectives. The plan will need to be communicated clearly and frequently during its three-year cycle.
In monitoring the achievement of our lower performing students and subgroups, Dorchester has established a Personal Education Plan, or PEP for all students in elementary and middle school who are performing below benchmark levels in reading and math. The PEP is completed by a team of educators who work with the student and must make educational decisions about the child. Data from numerous assessments is analyzed for each student and, based on the input of everyone, interventions are determined. The PEP is monitored twice during a quarter and modified as needed. Technology use may be part of the intervention, such as math interventions provided online from the publisher, or software programs such as virtual manipulatives, “Captain Jack’s Math Facts,” on-line interactive materials for students, “Larson’s Pre-Algebra and Algebra,” and items from the Princeton Review website. While reading intervention is currently being conducted through standard programs, such as, “Corrective Reading,” “Success for All,” “Read Naturally,” and core reading program interventions in the elementary, we are currently investigating computer-based reading programs for ninth and tenth grade students. Publishers have provided software and interactive websites for students with the adoption of new texts.
Management of the PEP has been cumbersome, as teachers have had to keep the plans in a notebook in the main office. Monitoring and modifying of students’ PEP sheets required visiting the official copy in the office, which meant that teachers did not connect with the plan often.. Dorchester plans to add the PEP template to the student management system, Power School, where demographic, FARMS, attendance, discipline, special education, assessment, and academic data now reside. Not only will the teachers be able to review the current student data and interventions, but also archived PEPs will be available for the planning team. Student data would automatically follow the student from school to school, as the system administrator makes transfers. Students who had achieved benchmarks and no longer had active plans would be easily flagged by the system for need of intervention should benchmarks decline. A paper report of interventions could be generated, but teachers would be able to call up a plan for the students they work with right at their computers. Similarly, administrators could call up plans for any child on the PEP list or a report could be generated from Power School. Naturally, where changes occur in the administrative software, on-going professional development will be needed.
As student schedules fill and specialized teachers are in short supply, online high school courses will become more of a solution for high school, and, in some cases middle school students. The courses available from the MVLO would satisfy original credit and would be less costly than providing bus transportation from one site to another, both in terms of instructional time and dollars. All Dorchester students and parents should know about the online option, have access to the courses, and be provided a mentor. In addition, online courses for HSA classes can be used for intervention for students who may have passed the course but failed the test. Another avenue for students is the wide range of Advanced Placement Courses online. While the Apex and AP courses have been listed in the high school program of study, students have not been encouraged to follow this option. Online courses will be valuable tools for Dorchester students in alternative settings. The online option needs to be considered for students in Dorchester County and scaffolding provided where needed. Presently, eleven teachers have taken the online facilitation course. It is anticipated that as the demand grows, more of our teachers will participate in similar courses.
Over the next three years, Dorchester County Public Schools will need to support the targets set forth under each objective. While we have made progress, we have improvements to make, and funding will be needed to make this plan a reality. Available grant funding will be pursued, but local commitment to funding this plan will be needed as well.
All stakeholders including parents, community members and leaders, educators, and students must understand not only the vision and goal, but also the path we have set with the objectives and targets for the next three years. Careful monitoring of the plan’s progress and the effectiveness of our efforts to meet objectives must take place. The evaluation should be done by a representative group of stakeholders. Only through involvement of the entire community will we realize complete success in this effort. It is imperative that all stakeholders understand and support the implementation of this three-year technology plan.
