VCU Course of Technology for School Leaders, Conclusions and a Technology Plan!

   When taking the course of Technology for leaders, very often, one cannot avoid feeling that you wished you had been more conscious about Technology implementation in education. You start seeing how your technology fantasies must start becoming a reality in classrooms around the world. Education is calling for an urgent renovation and reconsideration of school practices, and also it has made evident the need for a redirection of views about technology, not like just a simple supportive source to display somenthing, but as a basic component of instruction from the elementary school and through Superior Education that empowers students with the ability to understand better, think better, analyse better, and create better.

   Today's world is one that requires individuals to possess technology literacy in order to be successful and efficient. Information technology has become the corner stone for Multinationals and Corporations and hence more and more jobs require that potential employees be trained in the effective use of computers and other information technology. This reality is making it imperative for education institutions to implement emerging technologies in the education process of out future generations. Furthermore, Students need to be trained to face change, to solve problems, and to visualize information with a critical approach. See this video about how students must be trained today:

 


   As a future education administrator, I will make sure I am always pushing for more and more technology being used in classrooms. Teachers will be trained to use pograms and  technologies that not only will make their job more interesting, but their outcomes more comendable and desirable. I do believe teachers are still underprepared and need to be provided with the necessary technology tools they need in order to positively impact the instruction they provide day by day at schools. I do believe that thousands and thousands of students still need to get engaged. I do believe in change,  not for the sake of change but for the sake of a better world for everyone.


    A more diverse world will always be richer. Technology allows diversity. Diversity of tools, ways, modes, presentations, formats and outcomes. We want to stimulate creativity, we want to instill the seeds of innovation, improvement, advancement and the protection of important social values like respect and dignity. We teachers can do all of this by using a friendlier and more engaging approach when educating our children. Let's talk to students in their own language, let's approach students with knowledge served in their favorite flavors, let us teach them rocket science by using the toys they play with. Let us get closer to them and our thoughts will certainly reach them deep in their minds, hearts and souls. Let us be the inspiration  our future generations need; let us be the guides they so many times rely on. Let us be the spark that ignites their potential, let us be providers of hope for a better world.


   There is a saying by a Colombian Educator ( Agustin Nieto Caballero 1889-1975 ) that always accompanies me in my teaching job every day, his words are my inspiration when definig what a great teacher is : " Un Buen Maestro es Aquel que Hace las Cosas Dificiles Faciles!" "A Good Teacher is That Who Makes Hard Things Easy!" This is certainly true. I  do believe that a good teacher will ensure instruction is delivered in a friendly language for young minds. I do believe students can learn even hard things if they have a loving teacher who is demanding but at the same time aware of complexities. A good teacher is someone who grabs complexities and chop them down, in front of students, so they can all take the easy smaller chunks to analyze them and understand them better. That involves talent, preparation, design and the ability to implement technology as a powerful learning tool in classrooms. Let us inspire our children!

   Throughout the course, my peers and I were exposed to many different web 2.0 tools that teachers can use for instruction, and we started using them more confidently in our schools. That is commendable! At the end of it all, we even came up with  Technology Implementation Plans! Personally, I worked with Karen Robinson and Noemy Rosales to design a plan to implement in a High School. Take a look at it and let us know your opinion, your suggestions and your recommendations. Thanks, dear readers for following us! Thanks, dear Professor Britt Watwood for your patience and guidance throughout the course! We hope you can find the plan helpful for your future experience as School Administrators! You can see it either at a slideshare, or as a screencast video, and even as a wordle! Remember you make your own decision! Enjoy it.

SLIDESHARE:

Technology Implementation Plan.

View more presentations from Miguel Perdomo.

SCREENCAST VIDEO:

WORDLE:

Should students be allowed to use cellphones at school?

   Every night, powerful communication companies cast catchy tv commercials in order to sell phones and plans. The largest companies even team with Apple and Motorola to offer the latest pieces of communication technologies on earth. Touchscreen phones that look like taken from the future are offered like a newspaper suscription for very convinient prices ( only that minimum for two years). Such muscle phone companies also offer unlimited texting, unlimited air minutes, unlimited internet access on the go and unlimited applications to make you " smarter ". It is not rare that those tv comercials have cought the eye of young kids who at early ages start asking mom and dad to give them a cell phone, and they promise they will do good at school and behave well! First of all, what is a child's role but to study, be respectful and behave well, anyway and no matter what, or if.

  The whole idea of giving a 10 or 11 year old a mobile phone does not make sense for some people, although for others, it is just the most wonderful thing to do! As an educator who has been learning to teach for 8 years,( and as a teacher who worked for a couple of colleges in my hometown in Colombia for four years) I must say cellphones are extremely disruptive. You can get very tired of telling your students to "turn off!" their fancy pocket computer-mobile-phones. Yes, they are beautiful, wonderful, marvelous, unprecedented pieces of high tech in your pant-pocket spot but, are they really needed in an academic center? Students have been cought using their cell phones to send pictures of themselves naked, they have been found using their mobile phones to sell drugs, they have used phones to spread rumors and affect attendance to schools, they sometimes use them to bully, to cheat on exams, to take inapropriate pictures of other kids in the locker rooms or in the bathrooms, to text sneakily in the middle of classes, to play games in the middle of a lecture or when a teacher is delivering class instruction. Many police officers also believe that students with cell phones may make it harder to handle a crisis situation effectively:http://www.schoolsecurity.org/resources/nasro_survey_2002.html.

  Cell phones can distract students of what really matters at school. Academics will pass to a second place, after texting or phone calls. Students are supposed to be learning, not texting or surfing the internet pointlessly from their phones. Teachers, I think, are going to have an unnecessary and unwanted extra challenge: Students being carried away by their pointless socializing texting with their sophisticated phones. See this video and see that many people, including students and teachers, do think so, too.

   Some parents believe their children should have mobile phones so they can call and locate them in real time, fast and directly without having to call the  receptionist at school. They also believe it is wonderful whenever there is a crisis and they can touch base with their children to make sure they are fine. It might sound like a noble and good thing, but parents are not thinking about the exceptionalities that surround schools in terms of safety and operations. Logistics for emergency plans suggest that students, teachers and administrators should avoid to use cell phones during some emergencies, like, a bomb threat, for instance.
 
  Cell phones work with signals that can activate explosives, or can interfere with vital telecommunication systems needed during a real emergency. Students if allowed to use cell phones freely in a school setting can even trigger a false alarm or bomb threat to sabbotage a school day, and in the worse case, they can make a network collapse, by using it massively, when it might be needed the most! Check this link for more info: http://www.schoolsecurity.org/trends/cell_phones.html. Only administrators, in-school police officers, and teachers, should be allowed to have them. Now, students say that if teachers can have them so can they. I do believe teachers are mentors and students' guides and guards! Teachers should not be equalled to students in terms of rights. Teachers must be given a higher authority, they should be vested with special exceptions that will ensure the safety of the students they have not only to teach to but to take care of.

  Some other parents, more reasonable, support the school policies on prohibiting cell phones on their campus. They believe students are not mature enough to use them wisely, and they understand they would pose a disruptive distraction for their children in their academic development. Parents know, however, that cellphones can be useful when there is an emergency at home, or whenever there is the need to track their kids down and that is why they provide a cell phone to their child, with very strict restrictions though, like to turn it off and keep it in the locker and use it only during an emergency or when they legitimately need it. Schools are safe places and must be kept that way, no matter what. Cell phones pose a potencial threat to safety standards and must hence, be banned.