Progress?

Are you finding the resources you need?
No. At school the resources I need to further integrate tehcnology into my classroom are not available. What I do have (a projector), I make extensive use of, but new technology is difficult to come by in a district that hasn't passed a school levy since 1992, and is facing large budget cuts due to the failure of the most recent levy.

Do you need to modify your action plan?
Possibly. One of the steps my action plan required was the acquistion of new technology. I have been denied one grant and the grant my school was approved for gave teachers projectors, which I already have. I may have to change my plan to take into account the fact that my students may not be able to use computers in school during science class.

What have you learned so far?
That many teachers, even some of the younger ones are not comfortable with, or do not even know how to use technology in basic ways. Of the five other science teachers in my department at school, I would say that three of them have very limited ability to use computers beyond email and word processing, one of them is adequately computer literate, and the other one is very computer literate. So my second goal of teaching other teachers to use technology is a definite need in my particular school.

What new questions have arisen?
How do I deal with trying to integrate technology into my curriculum when I have no access to computers? We have two computer labs in my school that are blocked out for use by the important classes (math and reading) and never available for use to my students. I could get a couple classes in during the course of a week, but there are some periods where the labs are literally never available when my students would be in my class. Do I just say some is better than none and forget the kids that are in the wrong period?

Enacting the Plan

What resources do I need?
In order to accomplish the goals outlined in my gameplan I am going to need more computers to start. Getting computer lab time as a science teacher is basically impossible at my school so one step I need to take is getting some sort of computer access for my students.

What info do I need?
Once I have access to computers I will need ideas. I have a few already, but in order to "seamlessly integrate" technology into my instruction I will need more and more ideas for how to use the technologly and not let it get stale. If you do anything enough the students will get tired of it.

What steps have I been able to take so far?
So far I am in the process of acquiring ideas. This course has made me think about different scenarios and ways that technology can be used in the classroom. I have also filled out a grant and am supposed to be getting a new classroom projector and possibly a SmartBoard, which is great, but it is student access to technology that I am really struggling for.

GAME Plan

Goals
~To be able to integrate technology more fully into my teaching
~To be able to teach other teachers how to use technology effectively in their own classrooms

Actions
~I need to acquire more and newer technology for my own and other teachers' use
~I need to learn new strategies and techniques for using my school's current technology more effectively
~The possible formation of a committee or work group needs to be discussed for teacher who are interested in learning how to effectively use technology

Monitor
To monitor my progress towards these goals I will set up periodic peer evaluations from my collegues. Their feedback will provide me with information on my progress towards these goals. I will also give a student feedback survey at the halfway point and end of the year to ask how the use of technology has impacted their learning.

Evaluate
At the end of the year we receive the students' scores from their state achievement tests. Now obviously these tests are not the be all and end all of student evaluation, but a positive performance trend after a year of introducing new technology into the curriculum would be a nice indicator of success. Not to mention the fact that my school is evaluated basically only by performance on these tests.