Databus Issue: 2009 2 04/01/2009
CTAP's Tour of California
Bonnie Marks Executive Director
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It’s been twenty-five years since every school in California received an Apple II computer through Apple’s “Kids Can’t Wait” program. That time period represents a generational leap, and the children of the students who used Lemonade Stand and Oregon Trail on those early computers are now enrolled in our schools. Given the passage of more than a quarter of a century, just how is technology being used in California classrooms today? In this article, we’ll take a virtual tour of the state, stopping in each of the eleven CCSESA regions to look at some of the ways technology is supporting learning today with help from the California Technology Assistance Project (CTAP).
We’ll start our tour in CTAP Region 1, at Leggett Valley Junior High School, a small rural school on the Mendocino coast. Students there are using TI Inspire graphing calculators in their math classes, where they work both collaboratively and individually on math problems. Students also use computers with probeware, conducting investigations that combine science and math learning. CTAP provides the school with information and professional development and has worked with them in developing their district technology plan.
We’ll head next to Region 2, stopping in Chico where Chico Unified School District has creatively leveraged funding resources to provide an innovative EETT afterschool tech program at five Title I schools in Program Improvement. The district combines Title I funds, 21st Century After School funds and EETT funds to provide students in grades 4-6 with credentialed teachers, computers, projectors, video cameras, document cameras, and other technology resources in the afterschool program. The students learn how to use technology and electronic resources to reinforce English Language Arts and Math concepts and then are available to assist all teachers and students at the school with technology integrated curricular projects. CTAP staff provide program and evaluation support to the EETT afterschool program.
Heading south to Region 3, at Rocklin High School in Placer County, students in Ryan O’Donnell’s AP World History class benefit from video podcasts their teacher creates. After learning about podcasting in CTAP Region 3’s Ed Tech Leadership meetings, Mr. O’Donnell realized that by recording class lectures with Power Point slides and making them available on iTunes and Blip TV, his students are better able to absorb the large amounts of information they cover at a fast pace. Students are also creating podcasts in Region 3. At Sims Elementary school in Elk Grove, teacher Denise Phillips instills a love of reading in her fifth graders through the KidsBookBlog, which features podcasts, student-created photo story comics, and slide shows. As part of the project, her students recently participated in MegaConference Junior, an international videoconference in which classrooms share with one-another worldwide.
In the San Francisco Bay Area, served by CTAP Region 4, students in fourteen districts are making history come alive by using the Calisphere website at the University of California. Through CTAP’s iTouch History collaboration with the University of California and the UC Irvine History project, teachers learned about themed collections on the Calisphere site and brought an iPod Touch back to the classroom to use for projects aligned with content standards. In other Bay Area districts, seventh graders are taking virtual field trips to Año Nuevo state park to see the Elephant Seals and learn from a park ranger using technology they received through a collaboration between CTAP and the California State Parks Online Resources for Teachers and Students (PORTS) project. Students use resource materials developed by PORTS to learn about the elephant seals. Then they connect to the park using videoconference technology to talk to a ranger and view the huge pinnipeds.
Continuing south, Cupertino middle school students in CTAP Region 5 are making use of Google tools, with support from teachers and administrators who
have been developing their leadership skills through CTAP’s Leadership in Learning with Technology program. Participants Laurel Henderson, Donna Axelson, and Sandra McGonagle are working together to move a Cupertino middle school into a fully Google-only application school allowing for open access to free tools and resources for all students, teachers, and administrators.
Now it’s on to the Central Valley. We stop in Modesto to look in on students in the Sylvan Union School district, where fifth graders are using Netbooks to enhance their science learning by collaborating on graphic organizers, creating presentations, and interacting with their teachers through Moodle. CTAP Region 6 has supported this project by providing grant writing assistance and professional development, with follow-up support to teachers through classroom visitations.
Heading south down highway 99, we visit Pioneer Union Elementary School District in Hanford, where CTAP Region 7 provided professional development focusing on "free" tech-integration tools for the classroom. Students are spending more time on-line using web tools and information resources to support their research and learning,
Continuing south and heading over the Grapevine, we reach CTAP Region 8, where the Los Alamos School District, a small K-8 district of about 200 students in
Santa Barbara County, is implementing the GenYES program with sixth grade students as a part of their EETT grant. Students learn technology and people skills, then partner with teachers to infuse technology and the Internet into their classroom lessons. CTAP Region 8 assisted the district with writing the grant, and is supporting implementation and evaluation of the program.
As we head south towards the border, we look in on students in Escondido Union School District in Region 9 where they use iPods to become better readers. Technology Director Kathy Shirley has spearheaded a program where students record themselves reading as part of a fluency practice program, which inspires them to improve their reading and enables their teacher to maintain an electronic portfolio of their progress. CTAP has supported the district in its efforts and showcased the project through meetings and events, so that other districts might learn from this innovative practice, which has been especially effective with English language learners.
Regions 10 and 11 have also focused on using technology to support English language learners. Working in collaboration, they designed a three-day professional development program called integrating Technology for English Language Learners (iTELL), which integrates technology into strategies that have been shown to improve teaching and enhance learning for EL students.
Math coaches who participated in the training created digital narratives with non-linguistic support to help students better understand complex concepts such as slope and symmetry. Primary teachers had their students use Photo Story 3 to create personal narratives; the technology allowed students to practice, record, listen, and re-record their stories in manageable chunks, allowing EL students to successfully present to their peers in a low-anxiety setting. A middle school science teacher created a unit map in Inspiration, creating a narrative flow of navigation and map concepts that was accessible to ELLs. Teachers responding to follow-up interviews indicate that students are appreciating the use of technology and revisiting the resources to reinforce their learning throughout the unit. Student use of technology has “given a voice” to one fourth grader terrified of speaking up in class, providing her with a way to participate and proudly share her work.
High Schools in California are using technology in new ways as well. In Region 11, ABC Unified School District has adopted a technology graduation requirement that requires students to demonstrate proficiency in ISTE’s National Educational Technology Standards (NETS), as applied to the core curriculum. Teachers in all subject areas are being encouraged to require student projects that use technology as a tool and incorporate the NETS. To help teachers design these technology-infused projects, ABCUSD has created a cadre of Site Technology Integration Specialists who act as coach-mentors at their own school. CTAP 11 has supported this initiative by leading the STIS cadre teachers through an intensive five-day Technology Integration Academy with a special emphasis on coach-mentoring.
So, having traveled the state from North to South, it’s clear that technology is being used in far more innovative and integrated ways today than in the days of the early computer games. The eleven CTAP regions play an important role in supporting the acquisition of funds to support these efforts, providing the professional development to make them successful, and disseminating promising practices beyond the borders of the region.
Often with new practices, the problem is not a lack of innovation, but finding out and developing a mechanism to rapidly disseminate the most successful innovations. CTAP takes on that role, serving as what Everett Rogers refers to as an Innovation Diffusion Network. By functioning as a learning community, CTAP is more than its eleven regions – it works as a whole to enable specialization and economies of scale, sharing strategies and resources at state meetings so that districts throughout California can benefit.
