Technology plan development and implementation

Schools have been looking for ways to make good educational use of computers for nearly as long as small, affordable computers have been built. In the last three decades, school districts around the country and throughout the world have struggled with what might be the best way to use computer technology to supplement and improve education (Fouts, 2000). In the year 2000, United States schools had 10 million computers, and 97% of the country's teachers used a computer either at home or at school for teaching-related activities. Over 50% used commercial software in their classrooms (Fouts, 2000). It is apparent now that computers and other microchip-based technologies have earned a permanent place in schools, and it is up to educators to find ways to make the best possible use of such equipment.

COMPUTER USE in SCHOOLS

However, schools lack direction for computer-connected education. Some schools use them only for drill and practice, while others use them to teach keyboarding or programming. In some schools, the students learn to use the computer to enhance information gathering, while some use the computers to either generate new information or find new ways to present old information. Meanwhile, opinions about computers un schools vary widely: some believe that simply having the technology in the classroom enhances learning while others think computers in the classroom a waste of money (Fouts, 2000).

A balanced computer program should have computers available for all truly educational uses, and be open to new technologies as they develop. So, for instance, the ability to hold telconferences is growing. Some businesses have made use of it. In schools, one obvious application of this developing economy would be in foreign language classes. German students studying English could work, in real time, with both video and auditory feeds, with American or English students studying German.

At the same time it would be foolish to throw out older, more mundane but educationally sound programs. Using "drill and practice" programs has fallen into disfavor. However, when used to supplement regular classroom teaching rather than supplant it, it has been demonstrated to increase achievement (Fouts, 2000). While it would be hard to insist that school computers be used only for that purpose, the use of them for drill and practice should be available when needed.

Computers should also be available for simulation programs. Ad with drill and practice programs, they should not be used in isolation, but a simulation that allows students, for instance, to change the climate variables in an Amazon rain forest to see a simulated result would dovetail nicely with various curriculum topics including geography, biology, weather, and ecology. Use of such programs should be enhanced by having the students work in groups or as a class to try to predict what the changes would do. Such a unit of study could also include the introduction of dependent and independent variables and the need to change dependent variables one at a time to be sure which changes cause which effects. It could also introduce the concept of synergy: what would more sunlight do; what would more rainfall do; and what might be the effect of more of both at the same time? The philosophy should be one of the teachers always looking beyond what the programs themselves do, involving the students in critical thinking, prediction, and interpretation at every step.

Computers can also be use to increase student access to information. The difficulty with this is that not all information is created equal. There's junk science on the Internet as well as sites written by people who simply make the information up as they go along. This provides a teaching opportunity; students should be taught to think critically, to double-check facts and to consider whether the information they have found is documented in any way. Also supporting this use, students need to learn basic keyboarding so they can use the computer efficiently.

Another common use is in the generation of written work. Students can learn to revise and edit using a computer word processing program. Again, this supports the use of computers to learn keyboarding just as we teach manuscript and cursive writing: the keyboard is merely a third way to record information and generate data. Students can also learn to use spreadsheets and databases (Fouts, 2000), which can give them the tools to use computers in another way: to organize information, present it in a new way, or even to generate new information. For instance, even first graders can use a simple spread sheet to count how many red, blue, green and yellow m & m's are in a package, combine the information, average them, and with one or two keystrokes, produce a bar chart. In this way, computers can make higher levels of information available to students.

CHANGES in EDUCATION BROUGHT by COMPUTERS

The use of computers can have significant effect on how teachers teach (Selwyn, 2000). Once students have basic computer competence, they can take more responsibility for their work. They can work at their own speed and correct many of their errors on their own. Meanwhile, the teacher may be more monitor and facilitator, at least sometimes. When students are generating their own new information, the teacher demonstrates how to generate the information, not what the information itself is (1). This will probably require some opportunities for teacher retraining, and should probably also include time for teachers to network with each other and share ideas.

The use of computers can dovetail nicely with other important movements in education, such as the move toward authentic, hands-on learning rather than the older, more traditional lecture / textbook / test style (Selwyn, 2000). One author used the example of a class who created a computer-based museum of information on the topic they had studied. This approach became multidisciplinary, but required larger chunks of time than the traditional 50-minute class (1). Thus, the use of computers in inferential ways and for generating new information may be incompatible with the traditional organization of middle, junior and senior high schools, as 50 minutes may simply not be enough time. In addition, the school may need a way to make the computers students work on during the day available to them after hours.