On Friday last week I was lucky to present to a small group of staff interested in on-line and tech options to enhance their classrooms. I was surprised any came as the person who put out our Pro-D agenda wrote ‘Technology’ for my session. And if there’s anything that seems to turn many on my staff off it’s the idea that ‘technology’ is now needed/ useful for their classroom. The group that I presented to was really varied real – in both years of teaching experience (2-25 years) and subject matter (Home Ec to PE to Math).

I presented ideas that would allow teachers to enhance kids learning even when they were not actually in class. This was not a hands-on presentation – by choice. I find people are often pushed into a technological tool with no idea how it will really be useful for them. So instead I wanted to ‘sell’ them on these tools – that is ‘sell’ in its purest form – find a need that they have and meet it with something that I was offering. These included (and my handout is here):

• Vocabulary Reinforcement/Review with Quizlet
• Video Review/Enhanced Learning via curated YouTube Playlists
• Video review by making your own videos with Snagit
• Self Paced Learning/Checking in with Educanon
• Learning, Self-Testing and Feedback with Google Forms/Flubaroo (my original post on using it here)

In addition I focused on the 3 tech tools that I had outlined in a previous post. What was key was not to leap into using ‘technology’ but rather – to really find out what a teacher wanted/needed in their room. For example, every one of these teachers, regardless of subject, have students who need to interact with vocabulary – and Quizlet is the ‘tool’ (not the goal) in helping them to do that.  Another key for me was to clearly show just how long a process this has been for me. It starts with a lesson, then a unit, then a course…one course …not everything changing at once.

After the presentation I spent some time visiting each teacher who had attended and offering further clarification/support. One teacher said that she had always been hesitant with options on-line – as they had always been presented with the focus on what it was –  not what it could do for her. She said “You know, that Quizlet is one small thing that I think I could use.” We have an appointment set aside to talk further about it.

As someone who has been quick to adopt new tools and has been frustrated for/with those who view it as ‘technology’ and not just a new ‘tool’, I learned it is more key to “sell” the service it can provide, not the ‘tool’ itself. Equally key is one-on-one followup to offer more explanation and support. And finally, I cannot stress more and more that those adopting new tools only do one at a time. It is more key to take a step than paralyze a teacher with all that they ‘could do’.

Baby steps…big payoff…

Colleen