|
|
| Involve tech coordinators
in instruction - Getting help with the African American
Scientists Quilt Project
|
 |
Katie Fitzner, the coordinator of
Murray-Wright High School's Technology Center, teaches
alongside the classroom instructors who sign up to use
the lab. Science teacher Julie Oberly has had extensive
training and experience in computer use, and worked
many hours with Fitzner to develop the African American
Scientists Quilt Project.
|
| Dividing the instruction
and management duties contributed to the success of the
project. At the beginning of each stage of the project,
Fitzner provided whole-class instruction on the technology-related
activities for that stage. For example, students learned
how to connect to the Internet, how to use search engines
to look for information about their scientists, how to
use PowerPoint, and how to download images and add animation
to their presentations. With Fitzner to look after the
technical aspects of the project, Oberly was able to focus
on content and give students the attention they needed.
|
|
|
| Team teach to
share skills |
|
 |
Von Steuben Center teachers Mary Jo Arnashus and Nancy
Schlack teach separate physics classes but do much of
their planning together. A shared lunch period enables
them to co-design units that cover the district-required
curriculum standards for regular, honors, and AP physics.
They began trying to incorporate
technology into their work five years ago, when a district-mandated
move to 50-minute classes eliminated Von Steuben's ability
to combine two 40-minute class periods to provide for
80-minute science labs.
|
Their hope was that the
science labs could be conducted more quickly with technology
supports since students could, for example, work with
computer-based simulations instead of always having to
set up equipment themselves, or could get the computer
software to generate graphs from their data rather than
having to plot each point by hand.
Arnashus and Schlack say that they taught each other how
to use technology such as Science Workshop, Interactive
Physics, and the PASCO sensor equipment, and they
keep resources on a cart to share between rooms. |
|
|
|
|
| Harness relationships outside
of school
|
 |
Von
Steuben Center biology teacher Linda Patton has been teaching
at Von Steuben for four years. Patton has a master's degree
in laboratory science and worked in a laboratory for a
number of years before going back to school for a master's
in education and entering the teaching profession.
|
|
Patton started using technology while earning her education
degree at Northwestern University, where one of her professors
was Brian Reiser, a researcher in learning technology.
Patton has made her freshman biology classroom available
to Reiser as a research site for prototyping a software
program on evolution called BGuILE. BGuILE presents students
with data and has them generate hypotheses and gather
evidence concerning evolutionary patterns. It includes
many opportunities for students to analyze data. In addition
to the software, Northwestern contributed computer equipment
and the assistance of graduate students to support implementation
of the program.
|
|
|
| Share
knowledge and resources across subject areas |
 |
When they
heard about the participation of Mumford Technology Club
students in helping members of the local genealogical
society use Family Tree Maker software, several teachers
saw opportunities to incorporate this technology into
their own curricula. |
|
An English teacher at Mumford High
School had her class use the Family Tree Maker program
in conjunction with conducting Internet research on
the writers of the Harlem Renaissance. Students were
asked to trace their own ancestry back to grandparents
and great-grandparents who were alive during that time.
A Social Studies teacher teaching a course
on African American History followed a curriculum
structured around the movie Roots with a class
project in which students did their own families' genealogy
using Family Tree Maker.
|
