T H E Journal (Technological Horizons In Education) articles from July 2007

T H E Journal (Technological Horizons In Education) archives from July 2007

Striking a new tone: our fourth annual collaboration with SETDA finds that, even in the face of political peril, ed tech supporters have plenty of reasons to be hopeful.(State Educational Technology Directors Association )(Column)
July 1, 2007... THIS MARKS THE fourth year that the State Educational Technology Directors Association (SETDA; www.setda.org) and T.H.E. Journal have partnered to produce a special July issue. This edition, however, will read differently from the three that...

Systemic school reform: following up on ... Maine.(SETDA ISSUE: ONLINE ONLY)(Brief article)
July 1, 2007... Where most government-funded programs target specific groups based on factors such as high poverty, geography, and ethnic diversity, the Maine Learning Technology Initiative serves all students and all schools, www.thejournal.com/articles/20889...

Professional development: following up on ... Oregon.(SETDA ISSUE: ONLINE ONLY)(Brief article)
July 1, 2007... The Oregon EdTech Professional Development Cadre evolved from a meeting five years ago that introduced professional development providers from Oregon's math, science, English, and social science professional organizations to interactive web...

Whittier Union HSD links parents, teachers.(High School District)(Brief article)
July 1, 2007... Introducing a new technology tool often has unexpected results. At Whittier Union High School District, south of Los Angeles, teachers and parents are having more face-to-face interactions since the district introduced an automated system for...

Second Life: do you need one?(online social network)(Brief article)
July 1, 2007... Second Life is perhaps the biggest online community to ever hit the internet. It's a 3-D digital world, imagined, created, and owned by its residents, which number over 7 million from more than 100 countries, www.thejournal.com/articles/20871

Disaster recovery: personal and up close.(HOT TOPICS)(Brief article)
July 1, 2007... What does business continuity have to do with security? Both are based on anticipating and planning for bad things. So don't be surprised when your boss wants you to be on the organization's disaster recovery team....

Virginia school reinforces learning with support site.(Valley Vocational Technical Center)(Brief article)
July 1, 2007... Students at Virginia's Valley Vocational Technical Center, which prepares high schoolers for careers as IT technicians, are reinforcing their classroom learning by sharing information, encouragement, and their own quizzes and flash cards on a...

Attain: the means for a mandate.(making educational technology mandatory)(Brief article)(Column)
July 1, 2007... If we're going to mandate technology in education, we need to make sure that teachers and students are prepared to use it. To this end, legislators have introduced into the US House of Representatives a bill called Achievement Through...

Adobe Creative Suite 3 Web Premium.(web designing software)(Brief article)
July 1, 2007... The Web Premium bundle features former Macromedia products brought together with Adobe stalwarts in an all-star lineup of web production bliss. That's the idea anyway--out in the field, the suite is a blend of fantastic features and worthwhile...

WEBINARS.(what's ONLINE)
July 1, 2007... www.thejournal.com/the/learningcenters/webinars Maximize Budgets, Engage Students with Modern Projector Technology Archived In one hour, learn how to increase student engagement through ad hoc networking, provide for closed...

Keynotes: wisdom from this month's pages.
July 1, 2007... "We ain't no country school no more!" --A rural Tennessee student on the arrival of computing tolls into his classroom] "We're not where we want to be, but we definitely know where we're going." --Donna Ream, elementary education...

Pass::fail: what made the grade this issue, and what got left back.(keynotes: Wisdom from this month's pages)(Brief article)
July 1, 2007... PROJECT-BASED LEARNING + Contemporary instructional model turns students into decision makers and problem solvers. TEXTBOOKS - Outmoded teaching tool doesn't support 21st-century...

A guiding hand: a systemic approach to school reform demands leaders with vision, who understand how every step of their efforts fits together to support teachers and benefit students.(Systemic School Reform)(Column)
July 1, 2007... ONE DAY AS I was teaching fifth grade near Richmond, VA. my principal. Ms. Murphy, walked into the classroom. I was using a laser disk on invertebrates and had asked the students a question about amoebas and paramecia. The students loved the...

South Dakota 2.0: you may still find the occasional barn raising and one-room schoolhouse, but a plan for technologically advanced schools that first took root more than a decade ago has ushered the state into the digital age.(Systemic School Reform: South Dakota)
July 1, 2007... IF YOU WERE to picture South Dakota in 1910, you might imagine things like barn raisings, farmhouses, horses, and perhaps small, one-room country schoolhouses. Even though some of those one-room schoolhouses remain, much has changed in the last...

Immersed in learning: Texas, TIP program packages six key technology resources to create a digitally rich environment that has helped turn at least one low-performing school into a recognized success.(Systemic School Reform: TEXAS)(Column)
July 1, 2007... WHEN SCHOOLS IN TEXAS applied for participation in the Technology Immersion Pilot (www.tea.state.tx.us/ technology/tip), they were embarking on a new, exciting journey in school reform. Technology immersion impacts every student, every teacher,...

Teaching outside the box: Wisconsin officials recognized a need to turn their attention from the technology tools themselves and focus on how the tools could be used to stimulate learning.(Systemic School Reform: Wisconsin)
July 1, 2007... IN WISCONSIN, WE realized that our focus was too much on technology--the box--and not enough on systemic reform. A preoccupation with access and connectivity as a result of the mid-'90s digital boom drew state educators away from seeing...

An eye on the future: employers say that US schools are not teaching students the skills they must have for the 21st-century workplace. What may be needed is a sweeping change in how we think about curriculum.(Curriculum-Based Reform)(Cover story)
July 1, 2007... "To succeed in today's workplace, young people need more than basic reading and math skills. They need substantial content knowledge and information technology skills; advanced thinking skills; flexibility to adapt to change; and interpersonal...

Collaborative! Experiment! Discover! Addressing three key areas of need identified by the state, a West Virginia district has rolled out a program dedicated to project-based, student-directed learning.(Curriculum-Based Reform: West Virginia)
July 1, 2007... GREENBRIER COUNTY PUBLIC SCHOOLS in southeastern West Virginia believes its students can be competitive in the 21st century. But to be competitive, the district's educators realized they needed to change the way they do business, and they have...

Leveraging laptops: EETT funds allowed several Florida districts to roll out laptop programs. The common mission: transforming curriculum through real-world projects.(Educational Enhancement Trust Fund )
July 1, 2007... FLORIDA'S DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION used Enhancing Education Through Technology funds to pilot Leveraging Laptops (etc.usf.edu/laptops4learning) in 2006-2007. a project that enabled 11 districts in the state to launch laptop programs. The...

Get real! Missouri's eMINTS program gives students access to advanced technology while engaging them in authentic, compelling problem-solving tasks.(Enhancing Missouri's Instructional Networked Teaching Strategies)
July 1, 2007... TYPICAL HIGH SCHOOL chatter about clothes, weekend plans, and last night's game subsides as students enter their New Franklin High School (MO) social studies classroom and begin listening intently to the newscast playing on the television...

From technophobes to tech believers: high-quality professional development can turn the most reluctant teachers into enthusiastic users of classroom technology. It's key to any effort to reform the way students are taught and data is collected.(Professional Development)
July 1, 2007... OVERSIZED THREE-RING BINDERS, overhead projector sheets, die-cut bulletin-board displays, and other dated teaching supplies packed my spare bedroom closet until this April's spring cleaning. Though not a traditional pack rat, I still had mounds...

An online course of action: limited funds forced Ohio to look beyond conventional methods of professional development. What it came up with was an eLearning program that offers opportunities for every educator.(Professional Development: Ohio)
July 1, 2007... IN 2003, the Governor's Commission on Teaching Success, a diverse group of Ohio educators and business leaders, issued a report titled "Achieving More: Quality Teaching, School Leadership, Student Success." In the report, the commission called...

Investing in people: an unconventional initiative embedded full-time technology coaches in Tennessee public schools, resulting in demonstrable boosts in teacher confidence and student engagement.(Professional Development: Tennessee)
July 1, 2007... RISK-TAKING, innovation and imagination are not typically the hallmarks of state government, but a risky, innovative, and distinctly imaginative route is exactly what Jerry Bates, director of applied school technology for the Tennessee...

A sustained effort: in Arizona, one-and-done workshops are a thing of the past, replaced by ongoing professional development that enables teachers to use classroom technology to full effect.(Professional Development: Arizona)
July 1, 2007... IN MARCH, the Arizona Department of Education made bold move by adopting a policy to infuse the National Staff Development Council's standards for staff development (www.nsdc.org/standards) into the agency's work. According to Donna Campbell,...

Putting their heads together: a North Carolina school reform model relies on collaborative brainstorming sessions to inspire teachers to create engaging learning opportunities for their students.(Professional Development: North Carolina)
July 1, 2007... NORTH CAROLINA'S IMPACT model, the core of the North Carolina Educational Technology Plan as outlined in "IMPACT: Guidelines for North Carolina Media and Technology Programs" (www.ncwiseowl.org/impact/docs/impact.pdf), is a school reform model...

Extracurricular: for technologists who do their homework.(Brief article)
July 1, 2007... The benefits of integrating technology into K-12 education are being demonstrated nationwide. Here is an illustration of the quantitative impact Texas' Technology Immersion Pilot has had on the Floydada Independent School District. ...