EDLD 5366 Course Embedded Newsletter Reflection

While I have made many newsletters in the past, this was my first content based newsletter based on facts and not just informing my audience. I like how the assignment was open to interpretation but this also caused me a lot of issues getting started as it was so wide open I did not know exactly what was expected but thankfully it was very clear how it was being graded.  That is the only thing I would change about the assignment as the wide open assignment is great for creative style people but for practical based people like myself it was confusing. There were two things that helped me get started, one was the posted web conference where I could research what was discussed and expected in further detail. The second was the article from A. Lamb, where I read about starting with an audience and a purpose. Lamb made me focus on the main and secondary interest of my audience, our staff.  While they are mostly interested in engaging and motivating their students, I also know they are interested in learning more about 21^st century technology tools and are personally interested outside of work in things like social networking and Skype.  By thinking of these secondary interests of my audience as well as my purpose of motivating while disseminating information that Lamb suggested, I feel I was able to create a newsletter that was personally and professionally appealing for my targeted audience (Lamb, 2005).

The most important thing I learned while creating my newsletter was the importance of citing my sources.  As obvious at that sounds, I realized the importance of providing the audience with those citations in order to present the content as more professional, more reliable, and give them the opportunity to go to the link to further research, before this course assignment I thought of citations as merely an expected formality. I will definitely use this new understanding of citations in my future newsletters and other published works like my blog.

The other main thing I learned was the usefulness of white space, although I know I have lots more to learn on how to use this, as it goes against my being. In the past I believed white space was used to make things appear to be lined up (think the white space between pictures in a collage).  I always try to cram as much information as possible into things I publish from a newsletter to our school yearbook.  I figure the less pages of a newsletter the better so people don’t see it as a 5 page newsletter and just throw it away because it’s too long.  With the yearbook, I cram as many photos as possible into the set number of pages.  White space has never been of importance to me until I read the article by Dr. Yearwood where he points out that “the white space has been thoughtfully used to allow the reader’s eye to flow among and into the elements without getting trapped” (2009). Taking this idea into mind I tried with my newsletter and will continue to try to add more white space so there is a focal point that draws the attention of the reader and so that the reader is not overwhelmed and “trapped” in the elements resulting in “clutter and illegibility” (Yearwood, 2009). I plan to use this new understanding of white space while creating my school yearbook this year which will result in less massive collages and more focal points with supporting smaller images, I believe it will make my elementary yearbook look more professional like the high school yearbooks appear.

The newsletter assignment was also great way to apply the four elements of design.  I focused specifically on the new elements I learned about in this course: repetition and contrast to make the newsletter most appealing to my audience and useful for my professional purpose of educating the staff on 21st century technology tools. After reading about how “contrast is the single most important element in design” I tried to use contrast of colors to “make the design come to life” (Yearwood, 2009).    I focused a lot on repetition with the fonts in the article and headlines, the alignment of the articles, the image size associated with each article because I read about how “alignment reminds this visual cortex of the brain that there is something similar here, and this suggests there is a type of unity in the design”.  I am always very focused on the third element of alignment because I am a bit “OCD” with things being straight and lined up, which comes in handy while creating things like our school yearbook, and worked great for this element in designing my newsletter.  After being a yearbook editor for many years, the element of proximity comes somewhat naturally as well. I plan to continue using these elements to make my things I publish stand out from the rest and along with my personal logo provide a professional, useful, technology centered brand for myself.

References

Lamb, A. (2005). Planning Newsletters. Retrieved from http://eduscapes.com/sessions/publishing/planning.html

Yearwood, J. (2009, July). Basic Elements of Page Design.

Yearwood, J. (2009). Design Principles.

Basic Design Principles in Ancient Manuscripts

I was very impressed with these ancient manuscripts, specifically with the bold colors and unique illustrations. For this assignment, I chose to review the Bible from Ethiopia presented through the British online library.  I found this book most interesting since the bible is still a book of importance today.  I was especially intrigued by the numerous illustrations, bibles of the 20/21^st century mostly tell the stories through manuscripts whereas this 17^th century bible mostly uses illustrations. I was also impressed with the quality of the drawing of the illustrations and how well they have stood up to time, they preserved very well. Many basic design principles are shown throughout these early chapters of the bible.  I see contrast and repetition as the principles used most to communicate.  Contrast is seen in the bold colors yellow, blue, and red with a light background and also with the use of mostly black text and red bolded text.  Repetition is seen in many ways, a few examples being the repetition of the columns, birds, and borders in the illustrations.  Alignment is seen with the left to right writing and centering of the illustrations on the page. Proximity is seen with the use of title pages, illustrations on opposite pages of elegant scripted writings, the use of borders throughout the book, as well as the extensive meanings behind the chosen illustrations. For example, the author of these books showed us the time period based on the colors used in the columns, also known as “harags”. Overall, the design principles are mostly viewable in the illustrations, I find it amazing how the illustrations are so communicative and informative.

Updated Action Research Plan

The only thing that changed in this update is the selected sample.  Instead of 10 students from each grade level producing a 50 student sample, I will focus specifically on two selected classrooms.  One 3rd grade classroom with about 22 students, Mrs. Minor's homeroom.  And one 5th grade classroom with ab out 22 students, undecided specific teacher's homeroom right now.  I will talk with my principal Monday and decide which homeroom would be best for my research.

Goal: The goal is of this action research project is to determine the effectiveness of iStation on increasing student reading ability.  The planned outcome of this research is to determine if the program is worth the time we spend on it, if it is truly increasing student reading ability and understanding and whether this translates to increased achievement on reading assessments.

Activities:  All students in grades Kindergarten through 5^th grade will complete a reading assessment in the iStation program the first week of every month.  How the student does on this assessment will determine their Tier level.  Tier 1 students are not required to spend any time on the program the rest of the month.  Tier 2 students are required to complete thirty minutes twice a week on the program completing the reading intervention.  Tier 3 students are required to complete forty-five minutes, three times a week on the program completing the reading intervention.  Each month I will look at the data (of each of the 50 students in my sample) presented by the iStation.  After receiving TAKS scores at the end of the year, I will compare the results of the TAKS test and compare them to the data given by iStation to determine the accurateness of iStation data as well as the effectiveness of the program.

Resources:  

·         iStation program

·         Access to iStation data for each student

·         TAKS Test results for each student

Timeline:

Sept 13-17 – Students complete initial reading assessment in iStation

Sept 20- Oct 1 – Students follow their individual intervention plan in the program

Oct  1-5 – All students complete 2^nd reading assessment in iStation

Oct  5-29 – Students follow their individual intervention plan in the program

Nov  1-5 – All students complete 3^rd reading assessment in iStation

Nov 8  - Print and analyze data and reports for my sample students

Nov  8 – Dec 3 - Students follow their individual intervention plan in the program

Dec  6-10 – All Students complete 4^th reading assessment in iStation

Dec  13-17 - Students follow their individual intervention plan in the program

Jan 3-7 – All students complete 5^th reading assessment in iStation

Jan 10 - Print and analyze data and reports for my sample students

Jan 10-28 - Students follow their individual intervention plan in the program

Jan 31- Feb 4 – All students complete 6^th reading assessment in iStation

Feb 7 - Print and analyze data and reports for my sample students

Feb 7-25 - Students follow their individual intervention plan in the program

Feb 28 – Mar 4 – All students complete 7^th reading assessment in iStation

Mar 7 - Print and analyze data and reports for my sample students

Mar  7 – Apr 1 - Students follow their individual intervention plan in the program

Apr  5 – 5^th Grade Reading TAKS

Apr  6 – May 17 – 5^th Grade At Risk students continue reading intervention plan in program

Apr  5 – Apr 25 – 3^rd and 4^th grade continue reading intervention plan in program

Apr  26-27 – 3^rd and 4^th grade Reading TAKS

May  18 – 5^th Grade Reading TAKS Retest

June  1 – Evaluate TAKS data, Print and analyze data and reports for my sample students, Compare TAKS data and iStation data

Persons responsible for implementation:

·         Classroom teachers responsible for administering monthly iStation assessment

·         Classroom teachers responsible for having students complete their required intervention on the program each week

·         Students responsible for completing their intervention program to the best of their ability each week

·         Principal/TEA responsible for supplying TAKS results data

·         iStation program responsible for supplying iStation data

·         I am responsible for selecting the students in my sample

·         I am responsible for printing, analyzing, and comparing all data

·         I am responsible for determining results of the research and concluding to proposed change

Process for monitoring the achievement of goals: At the end of this study, at the end of this current school year, I will be able to evaluate the achievement of my goals based on the results of the sample students TAKS data (from one 3^rd grade classroom- Mrs. Minor- and one 5^th grade classroom) as well as the overall TAKS achievement of our school.  Data from the iStation program showing student growth and achievement will be helpful as well although I feel the data is skewed unless there is something concrete to compare it with, which will be the TAKS test scores.  Students passing rate and commended rate will be noted as well as their passing rate and commended rate from the previous year.  What level the student is reading on will also be noted in determining the overall effectiveness of the iStation program. I will be able to determine whether the iStation program increased student reading achievement and whether it should be recommended for use again next year, therefore whether it was “worth our time” or not.

Assessment instrument(s) to evaluate the effectiveness of the action research study:  The effectiveness of this action research study will be visible based on the iStation review given at the end of the study.  If the program did in deed increase student reading achievement and was shown to have worked based on TAKS data then a positive recommendation will be given.  Adversely, if not enough growth was shown and TAKS data shows that then a negative review will be given.  Of course either review will be presented with all the data collected during my action research study.  Overall, effectiveness of this action research study will be clear if I am able to come to a conclusion and give a data backed positive or negative review that hopefully the district will use in their decision for what to do for the 2011-2012 school year.

Action Research Plan

Background Information: Our district has a new reading software this year, iStation.  The program seems to be very well laid out and entertaining to the kids, although it is very time consuming and takes away from classroom instruction time by a real teacher.  Teachers around the campus are a little worried trusting their Tier 2 and Tier 3 students to a computer software yet are following their requirements by district office.  We all wonder if the program will translate to student achievement on TAKS.  This lead me to do my action research project on if this iStation program is effective in increasing student reading ability and whether that ability translates to students' achievement on TAKS.  

Goal: The goal is of this action research project is to determine the effectiveness of iStation on increasing student reading ability.  The planned outcome of this research is to determine if the program is worth the time we spend on it, if it is truly increasing student reading ability and understanding and whether this translates to increased achievement on reading assessments.

Activities:  All students in grades Kindergarten through 5^th grade will complete a reading assessment in the iStation program the first week of every month.  How the student does on this assessment will determine their Tier level.  Tier 1 students are not required to spend any time on the program the rest of the month.  Tier 2 students are required to complete thirty minutes twice a week on the program completing the reading intervention.  Tier 3 students are required to complete forty-five minutes, three times a week on the program completing the reading intervention.  Each month I will look at the data (of each of the 50 students in my sample) presented by the iStation.  After receiving TAKS scores at the end of the year, I will compare the results of the TAKS test and compare them to the data given by iStation to determine the accurateness of iStation data as well as the effectiveness of the program.

Resources: 

·         iStation program

·         Access to iStation data for each student

·         TAKS Test results for each student

Timeline:

Sept 13-17 – Students complete initial reading assessment in iStation

Sept 20- Oct 1 – Students follow their individual intervention plan in the program

Oct  1-5 – All students complete 2^nd reading assessment in iStation

Oct  5-29 – Students follow their individual intervention plan in the program

Nov  1-5 – All students complete 3^rd reading assessment in iStation

Nov 8  - Print and analyze data and reports for my sample students

Nov  8 – Dec 3 - Students follow their individual intervention plan in the program

Dec  6-10 – All Students complete 4^th reading assessment in iStation

Dec  13-17 - Students follow their individual intervention plan in the program

Jan 3-7 – All students complete 5^th reading assessment in iStation

Jan 10 - Print and analyze data and reports for my sample students

Jan 10-28 - Students follow their individual intervention plan in the program

Jan 31- Feb 4 – All students complete 6^th reading assessment in iStation

Feb 7 - Print and analyze data and reports for my sample students

Feb 7-25 - Students follow their individual intervention plan in the program

Feb 28 – Mar 4 – All students complete 7^th reading assessment in iStation

Mar 7 - Print and analyze data and reports for my sample students

Mar  7 – Apr 1 - Students follow their individual intervention plan in the program

Apr  5 – 5^th Grade Reading TAKS

Apr  6 – May 17 – 5^th Grade At Risk students continue reading intervention plan in program

Apr  5 – Apr 25 – 3^rd and 4^th grade continue reading intervention plan in program

Apr  26-27 – 3^rd and 4^th grade Reading TAKS

May  18 – 5^th Grade Reading TAKS Retest

June  1 – Evaluate TAKS data, Print and analyze data and reports for my sample students, Compare TAKS data and iStation data

Persons responsible for implementation:

·         Classroom teachers responsible for administering monthly iStation assessment

·         Classroom teachers responsible for having students complete their required intervention on the program each week

·         Students responsible for completing their intervention program to the best of their ability each week

·         Principal/TEA responsible for supplying TAKS results data

·         iStation program responsible for supplying iStation data

·         I am responsible for selecting the students in my sample

·         I am responsible for printing, analyzing, and comparing all data

·         I am responsible for determining results of the research and concluding to proposed change

Process for monitoring the achievement of goals: At the end of this study, at the end of this current school year, I will be able to evaluate the achievement of my goals based on the results of the 50 sample students TAKS data as well as the overall TAKS achievement of our school.  Data from the iStation program showing student growth and achievement will be helpful as well although I feel the data is skewed unless there is something concrete to compare it with, which will be the TAKS test scores.  Students passing rate and commended rate will be noted as well as their passing rate and commended rate from the previous year.  What level the student is reading on will also be noted in determining the overall effectiveness of the iStation program. I will be able to determine whether the iStation program increased student reading achievement and whether it should be recommended for use again next year, therefore whether it was “worth our time” or not.

Assessment instrument(s) to evaluate the effectiveness of the action research study:  The effectiveness of this action research study will be visible based on the iStation review given at the end of the study.  If the program did in deed increase student reading achievement and was shown to have worked based on TAKS data then a positive recommendation will be given.  Adversely, if not enough growth was shown and TAKS data shows that then a negative review will be given.  Of course either review will be presented with all the data collected during my action research study.  Overall, effectiveness of this action research study will be clear if I am able to come to a conclusion and give a data backed positive or negative review that hopefully the district will use in their decision for what to do for the 2011-2012 school year.

Web Conference Reflection - 10/17 & 10/19

I have enjoyed attending and participating in this course's web conferences.  I am glad to see I can participate at my own comfort level and do not have to use the microphone and camera. I am not scared to ask questions through the "chat room style" area while I am a little intimidated by the microphone.  It has been interesting to hear about other people's action research projects and see what they are analyzing.  I also really enjoy the tangents the conference goes on, for example last night I learned about the new STAAR test compared to the current TAKS test.  Even though the conference gets long towards the end, I really enjoy talking with people who are from so many different areas within the same profession and learning from everyone.

EDLD 5301 - Week 2 Reflection

This week we watched interviews about action research from 3 professionals that completed their doctorate degrees from Lamar University. All 3 professionals spoke about analyzing data in one form or another.  From these interviews I learned two main ideas.  First, Dr. Briseno spoke about not only the importance of quantitative data but also the importance of qualitative data.  He spoke about how kids are not just a number and how student identity is important. I see so much analyzing of data in the education system these days that I am glad to be reminded that beyond data is student identity and finding ways to reach these students based on their environment, lives at home, and things they like beyond just the percentage of their income level, ethnicity, and TEKS based question mastery.  Second, I learned from both Dr. Briseno and Dr.Lewis the importance of researching issues to find solutions.  They both talked about the idea of “not recreating the wheel” and looking at other campuses across the country and other districts for answers to issues.  Dr. Lewis spoke about how its critical to translate other district’s data and research findings to translate to your district and environment. I found it interesting that districts in different areas are similar enough to compare data and promote change from the findings.

Blogging in Action Research

Blogging is a online journal.  A reflective journal is a credible source during action research because it a place you can refer back and read to see your thoughts in chronological order.  While writing in the blog you to take time to think about your practices, write down and do a preliminary analysis of the data, write down thoughts and ideas that come to mind that may be helpful later in creating change, etc.  Reading back on the comments and posts in a blog allows you to step back into how you were thinking at the moment you posted which is definitely helpful when analyzing data especially for administrators as they are so busy and have a million things to do at once, it is hard to take time to focus on one thing and remember everything that happened and what you thought as it occurred, but it is easy to grab your phone and blog about it and later use that research to help yourself create change.  Leaders can also use blogs to get the opinions of other teachers at the convienence of their free time, and to get the opinions of other administrators and teachers not on their campus.  It also always those commenting to give a more unbiased opinion and a more focused thought out opinion.

Old Boring Research vs New Reflective Action Research

I must admit I was scared by the title of my new class, “Research”.  I was dreading reading long boring books by extensively educated professionals and writing reports about their research findings.  After this first week and learning about “action research”, I am excited to conduct research on my specific school and issues that I wonder about all the time here.  Action research is the process of doing a intention study of a practice, analyzing the data, and making change based on the results.  It seems to be a learning reflection and very useful. It pleases me to see educational research turning to this trend.  My school is member of the Teacher Advancement Program (TAP).  We are taught weekly how to teach the students based on their rubric and are taught strategies to use with the kids that are created through action research and field based data.  Two main things I have learned through this program is giving a expectation at the beginning of each lesson and giving time for reflection at the end of every lesson.  Through these expectations and reflections, students own their own learning and connect concepts to other parts of school and their own real-lives.  I feel that action research will have the same effectiveness on us teachers and administrators.  Through our own reflection and changes made during action research we own are learning and are constantly expanding our knowledge base to best help our school and students.

 I am looking forward to the action research question I will be studying in this class because I have always been bothered by point and click software, I’ve wondered its actual effectiveness and worried about wasting such wonderful 21^st century technology tools on a drill and kill program.  I look forward to analyzing the data on these programs, finding the actual effectiveness, and coming up with a plan to change based on the findings. 

Week 5 Course Reflection Responses

1. What outcomes had you envisioned for this course? Did you achieve those outcomes? Did the actual course outcomes align with those that you envisioned?

At the beginning, I envisioned this course would teach me a wide array of elements of Educational Technology. More specifically, I expected to learn about blogs, wikis, and fair use. I am excited to see I got to learn all these things in the first course instead of over the entire 18 month program. I also envisioned learning technology integration tools to use in my classroom with my students. I did learn to use blogs, wikis, and wordle with my students and am excited to have learned some project ideas from the readings on how to teach the kids ethical use of the internet. I did not expect to learn so much on how to teach students to dissect the information they find on the internet. I knew the importance of this skill but have always been confused on how to teach this to students. Thanks to my Technology Leadership book, I learned to teach the kids to “MAP” the information in order to dissect the URL, the author, and the author’s purpose. My internet research unit is coming up in a few weeks and I am optimistic I will be able to do a much better job in leading the students to evaluate the usefulness of the research they find this year.


2. To the extent that you achieved the outcomes, are they still relevant to the work that you do in your school? Why or why not?

Definitely! The many things I learned in the past 5 weeks are very helpful in my school. I now understand the importance of the Star Chart and the District Long Term Technology Plan. I understand the importance of having a school technology plan and using it to plan the purchasing of technology tools and resources. I have learned how to use blogs with my students and have now personally used a blog and am no longer intimidated by it. I have learned about the Technology Facillitator standards and am learning how to apply these at my campus and in my district. I already knew about Acceptable Use Policies but will apply what I learned in this course when I work in the district technology committee because I will have the research to back up the importance of updating our AUP to include web authoring. Overall, I have really enjoyed this class because it applies directly to what I do in my classroom, it is the first time in my education experiences that I have read and learned about things I can directly use.


3. What outcomes did you not achieve? What prevented you from achieving them?

I can only think of two things I did not fully achieve but I know that with more time in this program both of these things will be achieved. First, we learned a lot about the importance of technology integration and aligning things to the TA TEKS and the grade level specific TEKS but I still need specific ideas and examples. I am an example based person, once I see a few examples I can run with the idea. The other thing I did not fully achieve is understanding this internship. I am very unclear on the expectations of the internship and what exactly I am supposed to be doing. I think one reason for this is because of the mass amount of information given makes me have information overload. Another reason is because I need a example to look at so I can build off of it. A last reason is the online format, I believe if the internship was explained to me in words that I would be able to understand it better. I attended two web-conferences about the internship, the first one confused me more and the second one helped a lot. I wish the conferences were not always on Wednesday nights as it is the one night I’m not available. I know it is still early in the program so I should not fully understand the internship yet so I have hope that I will soon understand it better.



4. Were you successful in carrying out the course assignments? If not, what prevented or discouraged you?

Yes, I feel I was very successful in completing and turning in my assignments. The first week was a struggle for me because I thought I had to complete all the readings and all the videos before starting the assignment. The assignment the first week was so long and so time consuming. After learning the first week that I can start my assignment right away, I have been able to successfully manage my time and get all my assignments in easily. I feel like the assignments have been equally split up as far as work load each week which pleases me. I feel like I have learned very well how to manage my time to get my school work done as well as my Lamar school work done.


5. What did you learn from this course…about yourself, your technology and leadership skills, and your attitudes?

So far I have learned a lot about time management in this class. I have also reminded myself of the extent of my passion of technology. After teaching for five years, I have started to become a bit bored in my position. While I still love being a teacher, I forgot that my specific passion is in technology integration more than just teaching. I am glad this class has caused me to remember this. Also I have learned more about the leadership side of the position I am interested in and I know through my internship I will learn a lot more about leadership. I am a natural leader but definitely could use some strategies on how to get people to agree to a goal and work together to meet that goal. I have been much happier since beginning this program as I really enjoy learning and furthering my knowledge and skills, I do not feel so stagnant in my career and life.

Web Conference Reflection – Week 5

Tonight’s web conference was really helpful, I am very glad I was able to attend this week. I have been very stressed with the Internship plan this week, after today’s web conference I have a better understanding of what is required and a clearer understanding of how to “work backwards” with things I am already doing in my classroom and school. I am hoping as I go through my plan I will be able to apply these things and not be so overwhelmed with the plan. Tonight’s conference is the third one I have attended, it was nice to not have technical problems and lose a lot of time getting everyone set up and settled in. I still feel awkward using the microphone and am more comfortable typing in the chat section of the webinar. I also feel better every time I talk to someone else in the cohort and hearing/seeing their struggles, it makes me feel like I’m keeping up and doing better than I think I’m doing! Overall, it was a good and helpful conference tonight, I hope in the future they will not all be held on Wednesday nights so I can attend more conferences.

Overview of E-Rate and the Manor ISD Technology Plan

Overview of E-Rate and Manor ISD Technology Plan

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National Educational Technology Plan Summary/Reflection

Education is the key to success of the American Economy. By 2020, President Obama expects 60% of Americans to have some sort of a college degree and a 100% high school graduation rate. To increase these graduation rates, the National Educational Technology Plan (NETP) calls for our education system to not only provide engaging learning experiences but also to measure student achievement in more meaningful ways and suggest that technology-based learning and assessment systems are the keys to reaching these goals. Students today are surrounded by technology, they are “digital natives” the education system must appeal to this new generation by creating engaging, relevant, and personalized learning experiences to increase student motivation and achievement. Teachers are the biggest contributors to these experiences, it is essential they collaborate together and stay connected in order to provide meaningful learning for students.


The NETP presents five goals that address assessment, teaching, infrastructure, and productivity.

1. Learning - All learners will have engaging and empowering learning experiences in and outside of school that prepare them to be active, creative, knowledgeable, and ethical participants in our globally networked society (p.12). Educators must use things such as the TA TEKS and apply them to all content areas using 21st century technology tools. We must also offer 24/7 access to learners to provide information truly at their fingertips at all times.

2. Assessment –Measure what matters and use assessment data for continuous improvement. The education system must create effective assessments and take that feedback to make changes to aide in reaching these goals. We must also research and be on top of technology in the world and offer the students the most up-to-date tools.

3. Teaching – “Professional educators will be supported individually and in teams by technology that connects them to data, content, resources, expertise, and learning experiences that enable and inspire more effective teaching for all learners” (p.12). To meet this goal, it is recommended that teachers collaborate and have many resources and online learning communities. Also, staff development for integration, assessment, and instructional practices is a key in meeting this goal.

4. Infrastructure – Provide a comprehensive infrastructure to all students and staff offering adequate broadband and wireless inside and outside the school. Ensure every student has internet access to resources inside and outside of school and promote “meaningful use” of this technology.

5. Productivity - “Our education system at all levels will redesign processes and structures to take advantage of the power of technology to improve learning outcomes while making more efficient use of time, money, and staff” (p. 14). It recommends we use technology-powered programs and interventions that promote students completing their education with the skills necessary to be prepared for the workplace and citizenship.

Overall, I feel this National Technology plan is right on track for success. They seem to be right-on with the current times and trends. They realize the importance of technology integration and providing teachers and students resources and tools to integrate and have engaging real-life experiences. I am glad to see students and teachers are the focus of this plan, by focusing on them, the infrastructure will be forced to keep up. I am glad to see they understand the importance of assessment in reaching these goals but feel more specific details as to assessment expectations could allow greater achievement of the technology plan goals.


National Educational Technology Plan: Transforming American Education: Learning Powered by Technology. (2009). Retrieved September 4, 2010, from http://www.ed.gov/sites/default/files/NETP-2010-final-report.pdf

Manor ISD Long-Term Technology Plan

The Manor ISD Long-Term Technology plan is a 3 year plan detailing how the district will progress its tools, staff, and students. I was actually on the committee that did this technology plan 2 years ago. Some important goals Manor ISD is focusing on in this plan include:

• Administrator and teacher proficient in technology applications skills, software, and integration strategies.  
• Students technology literate by end of 8th grade
• Focus on technology integration
• Instructional technology specialists employed on each campus
• Technology plans on each campus
• Hardware and network upgrades maintained annually

In order to reach these goals, our district focuses on professional development that provides training for software, develop integration workshops, sets up a Online Training Module, offers campus-based technology staff development and incentives for attending these trainings. The people in-charge for providing these elements include the Instructional Technology Coordinator, administration, campus technology teachers, and classroom teachers. The budgeting for professional development comes mostly from from Title II Part D funds. The tools used to monitor the progress include Star Charts, staff surveys, informal interviews, and training participation documentation.

 Manor ensure improved student learning by replacing 100 computers, having laser printers in every classroom, increase bandwidth capabilities, add open computer labs for technology integration, and provide 33% of teachers projectors for instruction. The people in-charge for providing these elements are the Technology Coordinator and Technology Support Services. Local fund, bonds, and E-rate provide the budgeting for networks, hardware, and maintenance. The district Technology Committee is in charge of ongoing monitoring of the technology plan and making corrections to ensure the district meets these goals.

Technology Assessments: Pros and Cons

In my opinion, assessing student technology knowledge and skills is important because it holds teachers accountable for student knowledge. Students are expected to be “technology literate” by the end of 8th grade, by having assessment to measure student knowledge and skills we can measure our progress towards this goal. In my district, we currently have each student take a technology assessment when they finish 8th grade. To support the middle school, as an elementary computer teacher we began assessing our students in 5th grade. The data from this assessment allows me to refocus my teaching to specific areas for my next 5th graders. More specifically, this last year my end of year 5th grade assessment data showed my students were high in internet safety but low in evaluating the effectiveness of websites. As a result of this data, I have begun this year teaching internet safety to get into things and then we are doing a 6 week focus on searching/finding information on the internet and determining its’ effectiveness. A con of these assessments is that my students know how to complete tasks but have a hard time reading and understanding the assessment questions. Not understanding what the question is asking does not show students’ actual ability. For example, if we are in Microsoft Word and I have the kids’ center a picture they can do it yet they cannot answer on the assessment a question like “when using a word processing application what is the correct form of justification for this clip art”.


For educators, we annually use the Texas StarChart to assess their technology knowledge and skills. I feel there are many issues that skew this assessment data although I am thankful for having the assessment because district at least has some form of data that shows them the need to increase technology focus across the entire district. I am in charge of getting everyone on my campus to complete their StarChart, one problem I see is that teachers speed through the survey because they are busy with other things more important to them. They also often do not understand what the question is asking, much like I spoke of for the students. The StarChart only asks teachers questions, it’s an opinion, it does not ask them to show or prove their knowledge and skills and classroom use. The respondent can choose any answer they want whether it is accurate or not. For example, one teacher in my school answered developing tech for everything and did not begin to understand what the questions were asking. On the other side, there is a question about using the TA TEKS, where teachers answered it is not a focus on our campus when in reality there are two teachers (including me) who’s full time position is focusing on these specific TA TEKS and many teachers across campus who integrate technology and use the TA TEKS for their projects but a pre-kinder teacher who answered incorrectly does not know what goes on on the other side of the school with the older kids and does not understand that by having her pre-K students use the mouse and correct technology terminology she IS teaching towards the TA TEKS.

Week 2 Web Conference

This web conference about the internship was a bit overwhelming. I’m sure the internship will be a constant work in progress and that the program will direct us as we go - what to do and when to get it done, at least I hope so! I have a perfect candidate to be my mentor, we have a great instructional technology coordinator, and I hope she is willing to help me. The overall web conference format is a bit confusing because the microphones do not work for everyone and there is a delay. I know lots of businesses these days use web conferencing, it seems it would be a difficult platform for communication; I prefer the old conference call so far because technical difficulties are less likely. Although, I enjoy watching people answer on their web cameras by nodding their head. I found myself nodding my head as well, even though I don’t have a camera. Overall, I am glad I have the web conference as a resource, it makes me feel more connected, and I hope I will be able to attend the future Wednesday evening conferences.

Week 1 Web Conference

This web conference was very beneficial because it allowed me to learn how to use the program as well as connect my microphone and adjust my settings. At first I had problems connecting to the program, I could not make my microphone work and did not think a button that “starts camera and voice” would be the solution as I do not have a camera. Another issue I had was when I spoke into my microphone while introducing myself, there was an echo. I’m not sure if this is due to the cheap laptop I purchased (Toshiba instead of a Mac) or if it’s due to the external microphone I am using. When purchasing this laptop, online web conferencing was not on my mind. This gives me a great reason to go get a new toy, a laptop made for 21st century learning. Overall, I am very glad that I chose to attend tonight, I feel more comfortable about my web conferencing abilities for next week’s required conference, although I look forward to being able to join the conference completely after I receive my camera.