Technology for School?

Question

I am a Second Grade Teacher. My school badly needs help with its technology program. It believes that having new computers is the only way to keep up with technology. There are no smartboards or projectors in the entire school (K-12) There are 2 Tv's breing shared in the elementary school. I would like to present some ideas for technology grants and money to be spent in better ways. What are some ideas? (We really don't have any cool programs either) Please help so I can have a good presentation.

Answer 1

A compelling model that is pretty hot now in the federal and private funding community is the use of technology to increase both student success, faculty competence, and student retention from P through 16.

So, if your elementary school picked a partner secondary school and then a partner college (4 year and/or 2 year college), you all would sit down and assemble the SMART technology and determine (based on research based best pratices and evidence) on what faculty across the different levels of schools can do to modify their curriculum so that the technology can be used in "inquiry based learning" opportunities for the students at all the levels. You would then have meaningful workshops for faculty so that the elementary school faculty could hear what secondary schools need for students to really master to do well at that level....then both elementary and secondary schools could hear what postsecondary schools say is needed of students in order for them to do well on their level. Then each levels and ask what can they do with their technology to help support the levels lower than them.

The sky's the limit with this expanded 2+2+2 model. What you proposing to do, though, is to create a seamless pipeline of relevant learning for students so they can be very competent in this technologically advanced global community.

Your tech companies in your area would support something like this and so would federal funders like the Dept of Ed and the National Science Foundation.

Hope that helps!