TECHNOLOGY PLAN:

Educational Rationale:

As technology is thrust into every day life, the importance of preparing today's students to be information gatherers and users has become a popular, yet critical, topic. Two generations ago, college graduates competed locally for jobs; the last generation competed nationally. The current generation of graduates will compete internationally for employment. This global competition moves technology to the forefront. Literature is expounding upon the impact of technology, the need for technology competency, the importance of preparing teachers to use technology, and the critical issue of planning for the infusion of technology into education. While each of these individual issues is a vital concern, they must be addressed as an orchestrated whole; none can be overlooked and ignored when planning for the future of education.

Technology is a critical component to revive the content and delivery of education. In order to maintain a high quality educational system, technology must evolve with a direct correlation to instructional objectives, curriculum goals, and district philosophies. This process will require a strategic and comprehensive long-range plan for the use of technology at the district level coupled with a careful alliance between instruction and technology use in schools. Applying the advances in technology to the inherent practices of education will help achieve a vision of educational excellence previously unattainable.

A powerful vision for using technology focuses on learning, not technology. The full integration of technology into our schools is required for students to be successful today as learners, and tomorrow as workers in an information driven global economy.

Instructional technology provides unprecedented learning opportunities for students. Educators, legislators, private businesses, and community members see technology integration as a national policy. The following are indicators of the success of that the vision:

The schools and district provide paths for learning that integrate technology in the curriculum and give curricular opportunities for students to gather, analyze, and present information in order to acquire and produce knowledge.
The schools and district integrate technology to help teachers facilitate learning by developing and sharing a repertoire of instructional techniques that can be customized based on learner needs and an opportunity for teachers and students to share instructional roles.
The schools and district utilize technology to employ a variety of methods that assist in evaluating student learning as defined by local, state, and national standards, in order to continuously improve instruction.

While technology is an enabling force that brings new capabilities to the learning environment, the mere presence of computers guarantees nothing about their educational value. Technology choices represent value judgements about what is educationally important. There must be a legitimate educational rationale, which can be analyzed by addressing the following questions and/or concerns (Healy, 1998). These questions/concerns are meant to promote thinking and dialogue.

How can computer technology help achieve our educational goals? Are these goals compatible with the interests, abilities, and needs of today’s students?
How and why will technology improve the quality of learning sufficiently to justify the cost and time involved?
What will technology use replace (activities, silent reading, social playtime, art, music, gym, recess, foreign language) and is the trade-off acceptable?
What objective or problem is trying to be solved or augmented with technology?
Who makes software purchasing decisions and upon what criteria are decisions based?
What content can be taught, and how do we measure the outcomes? Are computers the best way to do this particular job? Could this same goal be met as well or better with a real-life experience?
What is being learned here? What mental habits are being encouraged? Could this same goal be met as well or better with a real-life experience? If so, you may want to go for reality, not the virtual stuff.
Are children being taught that all learning should (must) be entertaining and fun? In-depth learning and thinking can, and perhaps should be, rigorous and difficult. Encouraging children to ‘learn’ by flitting about in a colorful multimedia world may be a recipe for disorganized and undisciplined mind and may promote trial-and-error guessing over thoughtful problem solving, disregard of consequences, and expectation of overly easy pleasure.
Using technology does not automatically make learning and teaching better. Evaluate current research through the following filters (Healy, 1998):

What is the time span of the study? Who conducted the study?
Was the type, quality, and use of the software well controlled?
What were the outcome measures? Standardized tests usually tap only a limited span of skills
Were the teacher variables controlled? Many innovative and energetic teachers are often the ones that integrate new technologies – perhaps their expertise account for much of the positive gains.

The mere presence of computers guarantees nothing about their educational value.

Using a computer will not automatically make students smarter.
A facility with a computer signifies nothing special about a child’s intelligence, since even complex programs are not very hard to learn.
Using a computer may not necessarily prepare elementary or middle school children for the radically different technology and job market when they graduate.
Information is not the be-all, end-all of learning.
The key to positive use of any medium is the quality of the adult-child interaction.
Just because students are performing tasks that look technologically sophisticated does not mean they are learning anything important.

Implementation Strategies Technology Plan Index