Tech Implementation Strategy
Christine Lively
Personal Statement: As the school librarian, my goal is to work collaboratively with classroom teachers and specialists to ensure that any technology is implemented thoughtfully and creatively. I hope to make our school library into a “libratory” where classes can come to work on new technology and collaboration. In the spirit of a laboratory, my hope is that successful technology implementation that is practiced in the library can then be fanned out into classrooms. My goal is to implement technology practices that encourage exploration, collaboration, and creativity for the students. Working with students and teachers to examine “big ideas” and find common themes across literature, research, and project based learning is my long term objective. Thoughtfully planned technology implementation can facilitate this kind of learning and empower students to tackle new skills and knowledge.
Overview:
- Collaborate and evaluate what is needed.
- Consult to find the best technology fit
- Evaluate and adjust to meet student’s needs
- Reflect to ensure the technology implementation process was successful
When implementing technology into lessons and projects, I will begin by consulting with teachers to clarify the objectives of the lessons and the skills of the students in the classes affected. In addition, collaboration with the teachers will include finding an understanding of the students’ prior content knowledge, as well as their prior technological skills, and individual learning needs. In keeping with the TPACK framework, all of these parameters will inform my lesson planning and determine which technologies will be of best use for the class.
Second, I will consult with the technology support at the school and if necessary, the county technology specialists to determine what technology will meet the learning targets. With the UDL parameters in mind, I will adjust the teaching and use of technology to ensure that all the parameters of UDL are met for all learners.
Third, during and after the lessons, I will ensure that the technology chosen and the features of the technology are facilitating student learning. Through formative assessments and informal feedback from the students themselves and the teachers, I will determine if needs are being met and if any adjustments to representation, action and expression, or means of engagement will be necessary.
Questions to be considered to ensure alignment with UDL principle:
- Is the content presented in multiple means – auditory, visual, and kinesthetic – to reach all learners to meet the students’ needs?
- Are students able to access the content with the technology in a way that is engaging and active?
- Is the technology enabling students’ needs in while sustaining engagement and facilitating self-regulation?
These questions will ensure that the technology chosen is the best match to the students and content. Adjustments will be made during instruction and after to address any unforeseen difficulties.
Finally, I will again collaborate with the teacher and technology specialist to reflect on the success of the technology integration and to ensure that the lessons were successful. This debriefing will inform subsequent technology integration and ensure that later integration is successful.
- Did the final assessments show the learning goals were met?
- Were all students able to access the content and process it through the use of the technology chosen, or were there still challenges?
- Would this technology be useful for other content areas for this grade level or for other grades/ages?
- What changes in instruction should be made to ensure that the students have all the information and skills they need to use the technology effectively?
Reflection
After reflecting on other classmates’ strategies, I decided to look back at my own strategy and create a more succinct list of steps that would be easy to access when explaining the process for myself or potential employers or administrators. In that process, I realized that I really had four steps in the process I had outlined, not just three, and that the final step of reflection and evaluation is a critical one.
I also decided to add in several questions to the reflection section of the process to ensure that I will keep in mind specific issues that should be addressed before moving on to another project or process with this technology. As this is a document that never has to be totally finalized, I am sure that in using this process, the process itself may need to be changed once I’ve used it in a real situation.
This assignment has been interesting to me as the idea of revising this document has made me think about the scientific process – the steps of gathering information, developing a question, posing a hypothesis, testing the hypothesis and then testing the hypothesis to see if it was correct. That’s really what this has been for me. I suppose that putting this process into action will be testing the hypothesis and a new hypothesis may be necessary after that.
hippodilly circus 