Technology, PD, and Leadership

In my fist course for the Educational Technology Leadership program at Lamar University, I was asked to comment on technology in the classroom, professional development, and leadership. I recently went back and re-read my answer and realize that even though it's been nearly a year since I wrote it, this is still very true today.

The last two years for me have been transformative in how I have integrated technology into my teaching style. I teach theatre arts and for a long time I honestly thought that there was no way that using technology was going to help me in my classroom or apply to my subject in any way. Then I took a Google educator certification class online for exchange hours in the summer. This class was taught through Google classroom and integrated technology beyond Google apps like Flipgrid, Kahoot, and Quizlet. We also created a learning community through Twitter. Who knew?! Last year I made it a goal to integrate technology in a meaningful way in my classroom. Our campus was 1:1 with chromebooks and I went nearly paperless for the year. My students were far more engaged in the more "boring" lessons about vocabulary and factual information about theatre history. Not only were the kids more engaged, but through Google classroom they had documentation of the things they had learned. When we worked on our reflective project at the end of the year, I had them create a digital portfolio of what they had learned. They had videos, images, and projects to include and reflect upon. I feel like the group of students I taught last year had a more complete understanding than any of my previous groups because of the technology that we used. As an added bonus, I could prove growth to administrators on the campus and district level at the click of a mouse. 

I've been to all kinds of professional development sessions and many of them blur together for me. They either fall into the "Let's Get Motivated" or the "Here's a New Way To..." category. My favorite PD have all been web based. I have completed book studies and two Google Educator Trainings using google classroom and our principal even had a Flipgrid staff meeting last year. For me, these were great because I got to participate without feeling anxious for raising my hand, and I could do it when I had time, not on someone else's schedule. It was way better than the "sit and get" method because I had some choice in the matter and I was more engaged because I had to respond thoughtfully. Being able to think about my questions and answers and review them before submitting was much less intimidating than speaking them out loud in front of the entire faculty. 

Leading by example is one of the best ways I can think of for an administrator to initiate changes in instructional practices. Don't tell me how to do something. Show me. I've had principals pass out lists of technology applications that we can use in class but when our principal held a faculty meeting on Flipgrid, it showed the staff how to use the tool and gave us an example of how it could be used in our classes. This, in turn, encouraged teachers to try it in their class with some enlightening results. Through Flipgrid, Google Classroom, or another discussion board (like this one) students can take the time to come up with thoughtful responses and both the teacher and the rest of the class get to learn from each other.