Distribution of iPads to Teachers

It has been a week since we distributed the iPads to our teachers. This week has been totally amazing to watch! For the first time in a while we have teachers talking and sharing ideas about apps, using the iPad for instructional material, and using the iPad in classroom instruction. The engagement of the teachers covers a broad spectrum of the teaching staff, from the very new teachers to the most experienced. Everyone is engaged in learning how to use the device, what apps can they use and how to use them for instruction.  As educators we all know that the best way to learn is to teach and share. We at Bound Brook High have been striving for an engaging learning environment for our students with the best practices for all learners to learn.

This upcoming week we be spending time in our faculty meeting exploring the following apps for note taking and sharing of documents:

1.     Notability

2.     Dropbox

At the end of the session we will ask the staff what are the next three apps they would like to explore as we move forward in learning how to use the device for teaching and learning.

Ipad One to One Site Visit

This past month we have had a lot of activity planning to move towards a one to one iPad platform. We started with a site visit to Monroe High School. Tom Goodall was generous enough to allow us to visit with him and his staff to talk about how they developed their implementation and plans for using one to one iPads. First off I would like to thank Tom and his staff for the information and have to say that new Monroe High School is absolutely beautiful!

On our site visit we had access to the following: Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum, Director of Informational Technology, High School Principal, teachers and several students. A few of the first notable comments that were made during our time at Monroe was that the Principal has to drive the initiative, without the Principal being the driving force behind this type of change it will not be successful. The reasons for this comment was the fact that teaching practices and pedagogy must change in a one to one environment with the type of access students will have to information. Therefore, the Principal must instill in the staff the need to change some, not all, of the teaching methodology that is used in traditional classrooms.

One of the areas that Monroe did not have the luxury of having was time. They need to implement their program in four months from the time the Board of Education gave them an approval to purchase the equipment and move in this direction. With that said, the professional development with the staff was centered around the use of technology in the classroom and how to change staff teaching methodologies to make this a successful program. They did an intense professional development program in August to address the needs and concerns of the staff and students.

As we visited each classroom it was clearly evident that students are much more engaged in their own learning then a traditional classroom. The students explained to us how important it was to them to have these devices and tools in class. They demonstrated to us how they take notes on PFD handouts, PowerPoint’s, and general notes. They also explained how they loved to use the classroom wiki pages for discussions and exchanging information. Students articulated that this was a better way to learn and engage them in the classroom.

During our visit to the school, we had access to the entire building as we observed classes throughout the building we never observed a student with there head down or not engaged with an iPad or in a discussion! This is one of the main reasons for our school to be moving in this direction, we have too many students not engaging in their own learning.

As we reflected on our visit to Monroe we developed a plan to move forward on the following:

1.     Get our teaching staff iPad 2 in their hands now! Let them get comfortable with the technology and develop a list of apps for teachers and students for a September roll out.

2.     Develop a professional development schedule that works for us. The need to develop teacher leaders in the use of the iPad, technology instruction pedagogy, and best practices.

3.     Develop an imbedded structure of continuous improvement of curriculum.

4.     Implement online textbooks and materials for 24 hour access.

5.     Develop a list of online courses that can be use for a blended teaching environment.

6.     Develop a better system of teacher observation to ensure that teachers receive quality feedback and direction to assist them with changing the classroom environment.

I will continue to blog more frequently as we move forward with the implementation and teaching practices to share our experiences with the community, parents, teachers, students, and the educational community.

iPad One to One

In the past few weeks our school has committed to the development of a one to one iPad program for students and staff. Communicating and educating the key players in our district to move in this direction has taken some time. The first step was developing the capacity to have all of our textbooks online, which we have been purchasing paper books as well as the online versions for the last four years. Developing the necessary ability of the staff to use technology in the classroom, with laptops, whiteboards, LCD projects and speakers. Now that we have established a baseline of technology, we need to take the next steps to prepare for a complete one to one environment.

Over the next few weeks, several administrators and teachers will be completing sight visits to some local school districts in the area that have one to one programs whether it is laptop or iPad environments. The purpose of these visits will be to develop a professional development strategy for teachers, students, and parents to educate all of our stakeholders on the use and benefit of a one to one environment. Included in this process will be the coast savings that will be associated with this new environment; reduced costs of textbooks, reduction in printers, printer cartridges, paper, copier costs, and lost teaching time from our current mobile laptop program.

Currently, we have purchased an iPad2 for each of our staff members to begin the process of experimenting with different apps and functions in the classroom. Our current plan is to develop a list of apps that we will need to use on all student and teachers iPads for the next school year. Also, this is the first step in developing an iPad Academy for all staff members, students and parents. As we move along through this process, I will blog about each step of our process so that others can comment on what they see working in their districts and to learn from our experiences. 

Creativity in Schools

As educational professionals we are the people who educate and inspire the next generation and generations to come. One of the most difficult questions I recently was asked is, do you believe that schools are creative enough for today’s students? As someone who believes we need to be very creative for our students, it was interesting reflective question. I have spent a lot of time, energy, and funds to incorporate technology into the curriculum, updating curriculum materials, and trying to develop meaningful professional development for our staff, so the question at first was easy but the more I reflected on the question it was not as clear if I have been as successful.

Last week I had the opportunity to attend a professional development conference on the changes and direction of education. The keynote speaker for this conference was Milton Chen. For those of you who do not know who Milton Chen is, he was one of the creators of Sesame Street and Senior Fellow/Executive Director Emeritus at the George Lucas Foundation or better known as Edutopia. Dr. Chen is the author of Education Nation: Six Leading Edges of Innovation in Our Schools. He discusses that the best learning environments are those in which social and emotional learning are the foundation of the curriculum. Obviously, the second piece to his platform is an environment that fosters creativity and the use of technology.

One of the main thoughts and ideas he spoke to is the fact that we need to change our current delivery of education. We need to not allow the school walls to be the boundary of learning. Nor should we as teachers allow ourselves to limit our own creativity to deliver a curriculum with high standards, integrated technology, which caters to students’ creativity. With that said, I believe that technology's usefulness in education has not yet been fully realized as a means to deliver content and improve student performance. You added computers to schools that are still functioning on the old paradigm from the industrial age. Educators must use technology to rewrite how education is delivered and how students can use what they learn creatively in and outside the classroom.

Our children are growing eager to learn and quick to embrace new technology. Outside school technology is fully integrated in their lives, it’s how they listen to music, how they shop, communicate, socially interact, and how they read. As educators we cannot create an environment, the minute they step back into their classrooms, it's like going back in time.

Teachers are also hampered by antiquated rules and policies that do not allow they to create interactive creative classrooms. Educators each have their own strengths, some excel at lecturing, others excel with project based learning, and yet some are better at giving personal attention. Administrators need to create a structure, where teachers work together as a team to provide a better learning environment, and to remove the obsolete rules, procedures and policies that do not allow teachers to create interactive creative rich classrooms.

10 Parent Tips

10 Parent Tips

I read an article in Principal Leadership today that I believe is very valuable and should be used by all school leaders. Here is the document I created for my district.

1. Be involved in your child’s academic program.

• Make sure that your child is challenged and taking courses now that will help meet future goals. Math course selection is vital and the single most important class decision for the ninth-grade year.

2. Get your child involved in a positive activity, but don’t overextend.

• Research says that students who are involved in an activity, club, sport, music, etc., are much more likely to have a positive high school experience and get better grades than students who are not involved.

3. Know your child’s friends.

• Research says that when a teenager is faced with a critical decision, the influence of peers (positive and negative) and parents/families make a difference.

4. Register for Parent Access to Genesis.

• This will enable you to track your child’s attendance, discipline, grades, and communicate directly to your child’s teachers right from you computer or smartphone.

5. Have you and your child attend the freshman barbeque.

• More information to follow

6. Don’t allow your child to get lost in the shuffle.

• Students can get lost or fall through the cracks during the school year. Research says that when a student makes positive connections with adults (teachers, guidance counselor, coacher, etc.), it stops this from happening.

7. Attend Back to School Night and Parent Conferences

8. Remember that all teenagers (including straight “A” students) need proper supervision.

• This supervision includes online and technology supervision. Remember, good kids make mistakes too. Your child should always know that you love them, but make sure he/she knows your expectations. Know where your child is and who they are with at all times.

9. Get to know your child’s teachers and guidance counselor.

• Stay in positive contact with teachers and don’t be afraid to ask for help. Remember that e-mail is a great tool for quick information, but it’s not such a great tool for dealing with more difficult issues. Don’t fight the small battles for your child, keep things in perspective.

10. Get involved in school yourself

• The most successful students I have seen are the ones whose parents are at the school, attending functions, join the PTSO or athletic boosters, or serve on the advisory council or some other group. In a sense, these parents are the ones who are in the know, and they use this information to support their children and the school!

Formative Assessment

Formative assessment is a means to evaluate students learning and metacognition of new instructional material. Classroom assessments when used correctly generate data demonstrating student knowledge and progress in the curriculum. Teaching and learning are reflective practices. One of the lost processes are teachers not thinking about thinking. One of the most important instructional initiatives has been writing across the curriculum. School districts choose this initiative for a good purposes, writing is a demonstration of internal thinking and expression, good writing skills, and as a reflective process for students. As educators, we are always looking for value-added practices that will enhance how to assist our students to learn. 

One way is formative assessments to be used as a reflection of what students have learned, what they need to learn, and more importantly asking the students to be co-collaborators in helping guide classroom instruction. For this to work effectively in the classroom, teachers have to give timely feedback to students and create an environment of understanding and without fear of repercussions and criticism. Formative assessments are not assessments for grades, but for feedback that is designed as part of the lesson planning process. Excellent lesson planning that incorporates the design loop theories are the best to measure student learning and progress in mastering the curriculum.

Administrators should have teachers trained and use formative assessments in the classroom to guide instruction. School leaders should use the data to develop professional development to address needs identified through these assessments. It also can serve as an evaluation tool when assessing the performance of students on standardized assessments, as well as curriculum revisions. Overall, the uses for formative assessments are great. When used properly they can create a classroom culture of learning that student, parents, teachers, and administrators find very rewarding.

Formative assessment really has three functions if used properly:

1. Formative assessment is a form of metacognition assessment to identify what students know and still need to learn.

2. Teachers should adjust instruction for students based on the feedback from the assessments.

3. The data from the assessments should be used to complement the data from standards-based assessments, this also can be used to evaluate teachers.

Community Education

This is the time of the year that we prepare for next years budget. Numerous discussions normally take place during the development of a budget, such as, program improvements, facility needs, curriculum development, and professional development. Unfortunately, the last few years all of our budget discussions have been about staffing reductions, program reductions, and elimination of administrative services. With our current budget short falls any program improvements must be met with program reductions. While this makes sense in these economical times, the problem is some of the program improvements that I would like to discuss would not have cost the district budgetary funds. 

The one program improvement that I desperately wished to discuss was to start a community education program. In this proposal the initial cost of the program would have been raised by private funds donated from local businesses. We had several commitments for corporations for the start of this program. This would have allowed us to offer specific courses that may have had a small cost associated with course materials for those individuals interested in signing up for a course. The model that we were looking to use has been very successful in several neighboring communities.

The need for our district to have a community education program is great, we have a low socioeconomic section in the community that requires cost effective education. This we assist the school in educating these parents to better assist their children academically at home as well as build a connectedness to a population that has not been active in the school community. This is paramount to our district as voter turnout for budget adoption is low, which in the last fifteen years the district has not been able to successfully pass a budget.

In these economic times we as educators need to start thinking outside the normal budgetary revenue streams to develop programs that can enhance our communities. We need to constantly add value to what we do as educators for our communities. Programs staffed by our teachers allows for opportunities for parents, community members, and senior citizens to be a part of our schools. This is a win-win situation for everyone in the community, teachers, parents, students, and citizens. Teachers can tech specific courses that they are particularly interested in and can be paid based upon enrollment and course taught. We have several very talented teachers with specific expertise in digital photography, arts, CPR and AED training, math, science, engineering, bio-medical, and general education. 

With the needs of our students and community members the interest in a program was tremendous! The school district could have for the first time in over two decades had serious community involvement in the schools and service to the community. Unfortunately, our short sightedness is not allowing us to connect with our community. 

Deficit Thinking

The world that we are living is changing at an astonishing rate, far distinctive then at any other time in history. The explosion of technology and the Internet has flattened the world like never before. Economics, employment, and social interacts have moved from the borders of towns and countries to anywhere in the world. Being in education for the last twenty years, I have seen drastic changes in how this sudden increase in technology has affected people and the learning process. For the first time we have children in schools who are totally digital natives being taught by teachers who have not embraced the use of technology as a way of delivering content and project based learning. To further the learning gap is the need for this generation to be connected socially at all times. Educators today should embrace and use social networks to advance the learning process of our children and students.

Most teachers today view their students through a deficit lens. When teachers say students are not motivated, unprepared for the academic rigor, students are at-risk, or live in a high minority or low-income community we do the best we can. This is deficit thinking, is when a person views another person or situation in a deficit nature without really knowing the student or situation. They use this deficit thinking to justify the means of low academic achievement or the reasons as to why they cannot do more activities in the classroom. We also see this deficit thinking with teachers about technology, social networking, and change in general. Teachers have a strong need to be in control of students, why? They control the workload, the acceptable academic products, and acceptable classroom behavior. 

With the increased numbers of minority students attending primary and secondary schools for a longer period of time, a defined achievement gap rise between whites and minority students. Technology access will be a defining factor for low-income students. This to will lead to an increase in deficit thinking paradigms in education. We need to develop professional development activities to help teacher over come the deficit thinking paradigms that they bring to the class to increase student achievement.