Assignment 5

I read the title of the class, Instructional Leadership, and had no idea what the course would be about. The syllabus explained the learning outcomes for the class. I looked over the outcomes for the class so that I could have a better perception of what I would be learning over the next five weeks. The syllabus discussed students being able to describe the Texas Long-Range Plan for technology, identifying how to integrate technology on a campus using technology standards and recognizing that students are digital natives. Other outcomes included examine different data sources to make informed decisions about technology, ways to meet technology goals and identify social, legal and ethical issues related to technology.

After studying the syllabus, I envisioned that I would effectively be able to describe and give examples of the Texas Long-Range Plan for Technology. I achieved this outcome because I was able to correlate the similarities with my campuses technology plan and was able to identify ways to integrate technology on campus. In the Katy Long-Range Term Plan for Technology I found the objective, “Investigate and expand opportunities for student and teacher collaboration through the use of interactive tools such as discussion boards, podcasting, blogs, wikis, or other social media learning environments” (Katy Long Range Plan, 2009, p. 10). I will be able to implement these interactive tools at my campus because I have participated in discussion boards and blogs within this class.

I found that blogs can improve classroom instruction by engaging students. Students can collaborate and peer tutor with other students all over the world. While doing this, they are teaching themselves how to learn and interact with groups of students. A student could post a blog and students from around the world could post comments. I am still worried about student’s safety. After the discussion board with other students, the answer was never determined on how to protect students on blogs. I am not worried about students getting on the wrong websites because I rarely have that issue. My students understand that they are only to get on proper websites about the curriculum we are covering. I monitor to ensure that they do as they are suppose to. Not only can students use blogs but so can administrators.

I will use blogging to communicate with all stakeholders when I am an administrator. I will create newsletters and weekly updates to keep all stakeholders informed and up-to-date. It is important that stakeholders are apart of the school community and the only way to do this is to keep them abreast with school information. An open line of communication must be formed. I will learn, on my own through trial and error, the podcast and wiki technology. I would have liked to be able to set up a wiki with our graduate class where we could share classroom curriculum with each other. Articles I read spoke about podcast and wikis but never said how to set them up or gave step-by-step directions.

Another outcome from the syllabus that I achieved was understanding and determining students are digital natives. I read numerous articles in the class to learn that I am a digital immigrant because I was not raised with technology. Technology does not come first hand for me. I need staff developments to show me how to properly use the technology or I must spend many hours figuring out how to use it. Digital natives are most students because they were born into or with technology. Digital natives save documents on the computer; where as digital immigrants are more comfortable with a hard copy of the material. I will be able to be a leader with technology because I have an open mind to learn new things. I have encountered teachers that would rather teach the way that they always have. I have shown my own PLC members that it is easy to incorporate technology in the classroom. They were first against the idea but are now accepting. I will do the same as an administrator. I will show teachers the easy accessability of implementing technology in the classroom.

Additionally, another outcome that I am able to determine is data sources to make informed decisions about technology. One type of the many data sources that I learned was the STaR Chart. I analyzed the STaR Chart to determine the strengths and weakness of my campus. I found the greatest strengths on the STaR Chart were in Leadership, Administrator and Instructional Support (Key Area III) and Infrastructure for Technology (Key Area IV). The campus’ greatest weakness on the STaR Chart was Teaching and Learning (Key Area I) and Educator, Preparation and Development (Key Area II).

Lastly, I was able to identify social, legal and ethical issues related to technology. The articles and lectures were very useful. One of the laws confused me. The law discussed material made by a teacher belongs to the district. I would like more details and clarification.

In conclusion, my vision was closely aligned with the course outcome. I stated a few areas that I would have liked additional explanation and information. I also explained the many areas that I accomplished the learning outcomes. I will currently and always be able to utilize what I learned in this course. I can use what I learned as a teacher or an administrator because technology will always be at the forefront of education. The course assignments have helped me achieve the learning outcome in this class. I was not always sure what parts of the assignment wanted me to do. I used the discussion board to communicate with other peers. Together we figured it out. This only goes to show how important discussion boards are.

Week 4 Assignment: Technology Action Plan

Part 1:

Title	Job Description	Roles/ Responsibilities
Instructional Coach	The Instructional Coach assists in the implementation of technology in each and every classroom. This person will help each and every teacher with their specific needs. Also, they must produce and assist the implementation of data based decisions with TAKS, benchmarks, six week tests, teach grades and teacher observation data.	>Lead and provide trainings >Provide one on one help with technology >Observe teachers using technology in the classroom
Instructional Technology Facilitator	The Instructional Technology Facilitator will be geared towards training teachers how to use technology and instructing them in the classroom. He/she will be on campus two to three days a week for half of the day.	>Will be the ITF for three campuses >Will provide and lead trainings with all types of technology such as the SmartBoard, elmos, airliners, etc.
Administrators	The administrator will assist in the implementation of technology in the classroom. They will gain teacher input for technology needs and model different types of technology.	>Provide or approve trainings for teachers >Observe teachers utilizing technology by completing walk-throughs
Teachers	The teacher will ensure students are using technology in the classroom. The teacher will model technology use by creating lesson using different types.	>Assist students in gaining knowledge >Create projects where students use technology >Have an up-to-date websites available to the parent
Parents	Encourage the use of technology. Model using technology by viewing student grades and teacher websites. Show child how to access the information on teacher websites.	>View student grades >View teacher websites
Principal	The role of the principal is to make sure all stakeholders fulfill their requirements to ensure students are successful with technology. The principal makes sure that teachers have correct material, schedules appropriate trainings and provides substitutes for teachers to attend trainings. The principal will complete walk-throughs to see teachers utilizing technology in the classroom. Lastly, he/she will make certain that teacher’s needs are being met on data desegregation and technology acquisition.

Part 2:

Teachers and administrators use technology and information systems to identify campus curriculum, instructional and professional development needs. The different systems include data gathered from AEIS, ADM, AYP and the STaR Chart. The AEIS is the TAKS data that shows the strengths and weaknesses of each TEK objective. The data is broken down into different subpopulations such as ethnicity, socioeconomic status, male, female, district, campus and campus group. McDonald Junior High considers the AEIS report, as of now, more important than the AYP report because AYP only has standards for Reading (English/Language Arts) and Mathematics. The pass rate for math this year is 67 percent and Reading is 73 percent. This does not compare to the State Accountability Standards (AEIS) that requires the pass rate of 80 percent in Reading/ELA, Writing, Social Studies, Mathematics and Science. Thus, currently the AEIS has higher standards that we are to abide by and we use it to create staff developments.

At the beginning of each year there is a professional development centered on teachers learning how to correctly gathering, analyzing and use data. At the development teachers get into their professional learning communities and gather data by viewing last year’s AEIS report. The teachers begin to analyze the data by finding the six strongest and six weakest objectives. This information is recorded on a chart. We use the data by discussing with our PLC why we feel these TEK objectives were low? What can we do to increase the pass rate for those TEK objectives? Then, we develop lesson plans for the weak areas.

MDJH also views ADM data, which is similar to the AEIS report. The teachers use ADM data on a continual basis to analyze six week tests, semester exams, curriculum objective tests and benchmarks. This form of data gives teachers a better analysis than the AEIS report because it breaks down the information by individual students. The report shows the answer choices that the students pick that are right or wrong. It also shows the percentage of each answer choice whether A, B, C or D. If the percentages are scattered, then students were guessing. There may be two answer choices where each was chosen fifty percent of the time. This means that students were confused between the right answer and a distracter.

Staff development is created to gather and analyze ADM data. Recently, I was involved in gathering ADM data from the fall science benchmark. I analyzed the data by printing a list of students in order from lowest to highest grades. I used the data by placing students in advisory, block class or after school academy. Students who were in the thirties to fifties were placed in science block classes. The students that made a fifty to a seventy five were placed in academic advisories. Lastly, students that made a 75 or below were highly encouraged to attend after school academy. I also analyzed the data by printing out the pass rate for each TEK objective. I found the lowest objectives so that they could be used to create lessons for advisory, block class and after school academies.

Lastly, administrators use the STaR Chart to evaluate the level of teacher’s knowledge about technology. The STaR Chart drives staff development at MDJH by providing information that tells what teachers need the most assistance in developing their technology skills. There are two people at our school that leads staff developments in technology the instructional coach and ITF. Currently, we had trainings on Discovery Education and the basics of the SmartBoard. Professional development planned for the future includes both the SmartBoard and the ADM data reading trainings. The SmartBoard training will improve instruction by engaging students by creating a fun, interactive environment. The training that improves curriculum is Discovery Education because it has small clips, videos and interactive material to increase teacher and student knowledge on a topic. Trainings on ADM data improve teacher knowledge on assessment data. They would be able to know which TEK areas students are doing well in and areas that need improvement. The staff developments are aligned with the campus and district technology plan.

The campus’ greatest weakness on the STaR Chart was Teaching and Learning (Key Area I) and Educator, Preparation and Development (Key Area II). I agree that these are my school’s strengths. Teaching and Learning is a weakness of ours because most teachers do not meet on a weekly basis to access and use technology such as in the classroom, library, lab, mobile labs, etc. Some teachers, not all, still have the “one-size fits all” approach. They are not used to change and trying new types of technology. Also, most teachers do not relate web-based lessons such as web quests. Instead the primary use of technology is to direct instruction. Educator, Preparation and Development is another weakness. More teachers at our school should be required to attend professional developments to enhance their abilities to integrate technology in the classrooms. Most teachers on our campus demonstrate two of the three SBEC Technology Application Standards. Approximately 9-18 hours of technology professional development is available per school year for all teachers. McDonald Junior High would need 19-29 hours to meet advance technology status.

Part 3:

There is a great need for technology at our school. Students crave the use of technology. Some teachers at McDonald Junior High use technology on a daily or weekly basis, while others hardly use it. “I want to use technology to enhance my learning experience and to make learning more interesting and fun,” a student said. He discussed how he noticed some teachers use technology consistently and others do not. They want to be actively engaged in the lesson and for it to be exciting. A student gave me a great idea by telling me, “I like woodshop technology because it is mostly virtual activities. I would like to have a virtual theatre to study the solar system or other topics.” This would be an excellent way to incorporate technology and engage students in all content areas. I found that the Katy’s Long Range Plan for Technology included this as an objective, “explore and implement the use of virtual schools for delivering curriculum to students on an anytime, anywhere basis which meets the district and TEA guidelines” (Katy Long Range Plan, 2009, p. 11). My campus plan follows Katy’s Long Range Plan for Technology.

The campus plan describes the use of technology to enhance curriculum, instruction and learning. The district plan follows the Long-Range Technology Plan and gives information for what all schools in Katy ISD are expected to do. Teachers are expected to communicate with all stakeholders. One way to communicate with parents is by the Parent Information Center, PIC. Parents are able to, “sign up for Meal Pay Plus, eNews, Online Grades and KISD updates” (Bridging the Technology Gap, 2009). “Campuses are to have scrolling TV announcements set up in the lobby for parents and visitors to view” (Bridging the Technology Gap, 2009). Current campus announcements will help inform the campus guests. The presentation is in the form of a looping PowerPoint presentation that is started every morning before school (Bridging the Technology Gap, 2009). Also, campuses must broadcast their morning announcements. MDJH broadcasts the announcements during advisory (Bridging the Technology Gap, 2009). The computer to administrator ratio is 1:1, teacher to computer ratio is 1:1 and the student to computer ratio is 3:1. There must be 2-3 computer labs for each elementary, 4-7 for each junior high and 17-22 per high school (Katy Long Range Plan, 2009, p. 5). Other technology objectives include:

• “Align the Technology Applications TEKS into all curriculum areas within KMAC (Katy ISD Management of Automated Curriculum)” (Katy Long Range Plan, 2009, p. 7).
• Using “appropriate online resources to facilitate the integration of Technology TEKS in the classroom” (Katy Long Range Plan, 2009, p. 8).
• “Expand yearly online subscriptions and technology based references for information acquisition related to curriculum and professional development learning opportunities” (Katy Long Range Plan, 2009, p. 10).
• “Investigate and expand opportunities for student and teacher collaboration through the use of interactive tools such as discussion boards, podcasting, blogs, wikis, or other social media learning environments” (Katy Long Range Plan, 2009, p. 10).

Assessment/ Monitoring Reports

	Assessment/ Monitoring Reports Measuring Professional Development	Assessment/ Monitoring Evaluating Professional Development
A description of what is currently being done.	Currently, the administrators conduct informal walk-throughs to see how teachers are utilizing technology in the classroom.	The principal relies on voluntary teacher input to discuss their opinions of the professional development. Teachers are able to request certain professional developments such as SmartBoard, Discovery Education or other technology trainings.
A description of what I would do as an administrator.	As an administrator, I would require that when a teacher is observed, one of their lessons must incorporate technology. I would monitor the use and degree of competency with the technology.	Staff members would be required to answer a short survey after every professional development. I would have a section on the survey for comments. Staff input is extremely important and I feel it is mandatory. I would provide technology support or training based on the survey and comment sheet or from requests.