But I don’t blame the teachers as much as administrators and city politicians. Having watched the new TC being put together (from the vantage point of a neighboring district), it was clear the city was determined to make this a “show place”.

In their big budgets, however, they left out the major revisions to the curriculum and teaching practices necessary to take advantage of the power in the tools they were buying. This is one more example of the “if you install it, they will learn” philosophy of instructional technology.

Here are teacher testimonials from the high school website that highlight the positive use of technology.
http://www.acps.k12.va.us/technology/tip/quotes.php

Students are not writing poorly because of computers, they are writing poorly because they don’t own the assignment. Being passionate about something forces you to be thorough and I hate to say this as a former English teacher, but it isn’t always about the grammar either. Its got more to do with the content and that comes from authentic learning experiences. My writing has just now started to come alive because of my interest in blogging. I know that a larger audience will be reading what I write so I think about the end result a bit more. This mindset comes with maturity though not from reverting back to a paper and pencil.

What this school needs is a group of teachers whose only responsibility is to offer follow-up and assistance to those who are using the technology and to provide training to those who would like to.

Ahh…in a perfect world!

In our failed model, the teacher is the primary authority and font of information. In that model, you must have strong aptitude for traditional academic skills, especially the abilities to process words and to take tests. Most teachers, myself included, are teachers because we were pretty good with those skills.

The majority of intelligent learners, however, have different learning strengths. The power of technology in the classroom is that it offers viable learning tools for learners with alternative learning modes. Unfortunately, it is almost impossible for many educators to recognize this.

The biggest problem with schools, and the greatest impediment to beneficial change, is that schools are run by people who were good at school. The expectation is that all learners should be like us. –Paul

Or maybe these teachers and technologists just need to throw the doors open and see what the kids come up with.

The community is the issue. We have an education system that is largely based on an us versus them system- teachers versus students. Teachers may talk about teaching and helping students learn, but how much of a daily classroom instruction is spent on maintaining a sense of authority, top down instruction – How many teachers give tests that are true/false/multiple choice- easier to grade, sure, but does it really let a student show you what they know and have learned? Shouldn’t we use tests as diagnostic of mastering material rather than a way to simply pass judgment on students? If a class does poorly on the test, how much of that is due to the student(s), and how much of it is the test or the teacher’s fault for not emphasizing those points in class?

Once we get teachers and students on the same side of learning, instead of in opposite camps, then we’ll be able to make unbelieveable progress in education. Face it- grownups hate to work for bosses who don’t trust or respect them; why should we assume students are any different?

The tech is just a tool- the lack of a compassionate educational philosophy is the true problem.

It saddens me because they are not seeing the connection between students use of technology and learning. There is a lack of willingness to change with the times.

There has been a lot of damage done here that it would be hard to repair. I hope this one person’s opinion is not representative of those in the school. It sounds like he needs to find a new place to work!