Academic Technology

I accepted an opportunity to demonstrate a smartboard/intereactive white board to a group of elementary teachers for a school I would be joining the next school year as the Director of Academic Technology.  It was the beginning of the second semester in early January. The only free time the Headmaster of the school could provide was during a teacher’s meeting after the second full day of school.

You know this meant they were tired, just back from vacation, a thousand other things on their minds and educational plates. And I had only fifteen minutes.  Easy, right?

I walked into this roomful of teachers(4k-5th grade), looked into their weary eyes and thought, “this will be fun.”  And I really meant it.  The smartboard was a new concept to most if not all of them.  Many of them were thinking, “great, something else I have to learn and use.”

So, I pulled up a smartboard website and began talking to the teachers. I did one thing differently…I pulled up the website in German, and began presenting to them…in German. The teachers began looking at each other and me knowing I was crazy, or that their day had been much longer than they thought.  The Headmaster of the school gave me a look that said he knew he had made the wrong choice in hiring me.

I spoke in German, referring to the website and asking questions.  Then I stopped, looked at them as if there was a problem, and asked if they had a question. One brave teacher said, almost hesitantly, that none of them spoke German.

I feigned ignorance, and remorse, and then smiled and asked them if they had ever attended a technology workshop, class, or conference, where they felt as if the instructor was speaking in a different language than there own.  They all nodded their heads in the affirmative.  I then told them that would never be the case again with technology at that school.  And they GOT IT!!  They smiled and relaxed.  I then asked which teacher would be willing to say they were the worst at understanding technology and how to use it and integrate it in the classroom.  One teacher raised her hand and the rest of the faculty pointed at her. Everyone in the room laughed and relaxed even more.  And I asked her to join me at the smartboard. And everyone laughed again.

I asked her to give me a concept she felt was difficult for her students to grasp.  She said fractions, and “how much”, “how many” were tough for her and them.

I was able to pull up a pie chart that allowed you to pull pieces off and put them back again.  We worked for a minute or two and she realized how easy using a smartboard and teaching this concept could be.  Even the rest of the teachers said she used the smartboard as if she had used it for years.  And she had never used one previously.

Technology, with the right teacher, and the right understanding of how to integrate it, is simple to use.  It does not take a great deal of time to grasp. And, your students are using it at an ever increasing pace.

Technology is a great tool, but remember, it is just another piece of chalk.