Powering up schools

Think about your current job. Imagine that you are required to work independently, even when your colleagues are completing similar tasks. The workplace has no electronic hardware or software of any kind, and you are not allowed to bring your own in from home (the boss says he will confiscate your gadgets if he sees them in your hands during work hours). You are not sure how the work you do connects with anything that is going on in the world outside the office doors.

How would you feel about working in this environment? Would this job develop skills that increase your marketability to future employers?

Replace the word “boss” with “teacher”, “colleague” with “classmate”, and “job” with “school” and you get a picture of many K-12 classrooms in America today. Many classrooms do not use the same tools or collaborative processes found beyond the classroom doors. Students, acutely aware of the discrepancy, feel like they step back in time when they enter most schools.

Instructional designers are poised to support the convergence of classroom instruction and student preparation for global economic competitiveness. There are three things designers should do prior to making recommendations relating to technology integration.

First, collect and share stakeholder’s data. Gather and share data from local and national surveys. Share findings in a format that is easy to interpret by all stakeholders. The charts below report findings from Project Tomorrow’s 2008 Speak Up survey. Aggregating stakeholder data is a nice way to compare usage of specific tools which informs a tailored technology plan for sites.

Second, facilitate an understanding regarding the use technology as tool for learning versus technology as the outcome of learning. Explain updated ways to support traditional instructional goals.
K-12 classrooms today vs. K-12 classrooms in the future

• Subject matter authority is the teacher/textbook
• Access to multiple sources: Electronic reference books, Internet, discussion groups, podcasts/vodcasts
• Teacher controls rate of informational delivery
• Learner has option to fast-forward, pause, rewind/replay the flow of information
• One person speaks at a time, discussion occurs in classroom as time permits
• Multiple, simultaneous, conversations that are unbounded by physical or geographical borders
• Teaching a single process to demonstrate learning
  
• Equal emphasis on the means and the ends
  

Third, include a plan to provide on-going support and professional development for instructors. Teacher resistance to technology integration can be difficult to overcome. The front-end work of technology integration efforts should include a cause analysis to identify and find solutions to teachers’ reluctance.

The slide show  provides a list of ten teacher-centered ways to support instructional technology integration in K-12 schools prior to turning on the first classroom computer.

Instructional designers who incorporate the considerations mentioned above into their design documents will promote stakeholders buy-in and a support structure for implementers of instructional technology.