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It’s Not Just Teachers: Tech Coaches Must Become Facilitators, Too

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It’s Not Just Teachers: Tech Coaches Must Become Facilitators, Too

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The EdSurge Fusion conference back in October surfaced some unexpected "aha" moments for me. The theme was personalized learning and heading into the conference I anticipated gaining a broader view of technology products promising to provide adaptive learning experiences for all students. Instead, the deep conversations around professional learning for teachers left me wondering how I could redefine my role to better support teachers in making learning personal for students.

As a technology coordinator and math teacher, I work with both teachers and students, but I spend most of my day helping teachers meaningfully infuse technology into their classroom practices. After the conference, I began to consider the similarities between the relationship of student-to-teacher and teacher-to-technology coordinator-and how my role should shift too.

There is a lot of talk about how the role of the educator morphs to facilitator to meet the needs of students when implementing personalized learning-but it's rare to see pointers for how the role of technology coordinators, integrators and coaches should shift to meet the needs of teachers during this transition. Perhaps it starts with rethinking these titles to better match the responsibilities of the position. Are we losing something by leading these titles with "technology?" Is there something to be gained by leading with "innovation," "redesign" or "change-agent?"

To figure out how what changes to make, I reflected on my own journey as a teacher. At the start of my career, I wanted to control every step in the learning process so my students would always know I was right there to catch them should they stumble. I wanted them to feel confident and supported at every moment. As I've grown, I have realized that is not what great teaching is all about. Instead, it's about empowering students by providing them with great resources and guidance, and then allowing them the time and space to find success on their own.

Transitioning from leader to facilitator has been transformative in my teaching. With that in mind, I find myself asking: How can I apply the transformation I've made in my work with students to my work with teachers?

Technology still provides many solutions for the challenges my teachers are faced with, but my approach to thinking about tech integration is wildly different from how I thought about it several years back. Instead of rooting my work in the effort to get students using the newly distributed laptops they are required to bring to school, my focus has shifted to providing more holistic professional learning on lesson redesign. Instead of simply helping teachers become more savvy using tech tools, I want to inspire them with ideas that allow them to create student-centered learning experiences. Here are a few big ideas I'm exploring as I rethink my role.

How Transforming the Physical Space Impacts Lesson Design

As schools transition to student-centered learning environments, we often see them redesign learning spaces. Walls come down to encourage fluid movement and collaboration, and the teacher's desk is removed to put an end to rows of desks facing the "front" of the room. Traditional furniture is traded in for standing desks and rolling node chairs to empower students to learn in comfortable positions, and whiteboard space is replaced with windows to provide an abundance of natural lighting, which research shows increases student outcomes.

These are the kinds of changes we are making at Bullis School, in Potomac, MD.

Schools all over the country are looking to create flexible, open spaces in their schools for collaboration. But how do we help teachers fully realize the impact of these changes?

Tweet from Derek McCoy, principal at West Rowan Middle School in North Carolina

Physical alterations provide a great foundation for change, but true transformation will only happen when the teaching changes too. But how should teaching change and whose role is it to help teachers navigate the change process? I believe I should play an important part in this shift-so how do I tweak my tactics?

Take this simple issue: Without a desk at the front of the room, how do teachers redesign lessons so they can listen and students can talk?

Before I might have modeled a lesson standing at the whiteboard, engaging the class in a conversation on a given topic. We would unpack the problem as I scribbled on the whiteboard and used the projector at the front of the room. Were we using technology? Yep. Was the lesson student-centered? Nope. I needed to get them scribbling.

If the goal is for students to work with their peers and learn from one another, then the teacher needs to step away from the whiteboard.

With a more innovative space, and a focus on putting students at the center of learning, I might rethink this activity.

Maybe all students log into Pear Deck to engage with a series of questions with increasing complexity designed to encourage learners to make big picture connections on their own. In this scenario, each student can think and respond on their own device, but rather than responding in isolation, students work in pods and moments where students ask a neighbor for help are celebrated. As we tackle each question, student responses are displayed on the screens that surround the room so we can view and discuss the multiple approaches students took.

Now we see peer-to-peer learning in action.

From Bite-Size Tech Tips to Microcredentials

A year ago, I was sending teachers emails with a tech tip or bite-size PD activity focused on a particular tech tool. For example, after modeling the lesson using Pear Deck, I might have sent out a tip about an update or new feature with some instructions on how to use it.

Email tech tip from 2017, Image Credit: Stacey Roshan

Today, I am developing a series of mini-courses to help inspire teachers with bigger-picture ideas. My first one is a mini-course called "Layering in Metacognition Using Pear Deck," which goes beyond a tutorial or set of tips for using the tool, to give teachers an opportunity to explore how to use it to help students learn howto learn-and they can earn a microcredential for their efforts.

In fact, we are creating a series of microcredential offerings for teachers at my school. We're still marinating on how to incentivize teachers to earn them, and developing an implementation plan, but we're very excited to see how this new approach supports innovative practices.

Mini-course in development in 2018, Image Credit: Stacey Roshan

Redesigning Lessons With Students at the Center

There are edtech buzzwords that come and go, but I don't believe that "student-centered" is one of them. At our school, we are making great strides putting students at the center of the learning environment, but it's a big change and teachers deserve deep support and strong modeling.

Popular catch phrases such as "elevating student voice," "taking ownership of learning," "increasing student choice" and "shifting the role of teacher from leader to facilitator" are easier said than done. There is actually a substantial change process that needs to happen in order for teachers to be able to put each of these phrases into action.

When I first started my job, I was excited to share how leveraging technology could enhance existing practices, how it could help teachers gather data more effectively and efficiently and how it could be used to increase engagement.

Now, instead of focusing on what the teacher can add to their pre-existing lessons, I'm considering how we can leverage technology to design new kinds of lessons or to redesign existing ones to transform how students learn. This requires both the tactical work of thoughtful lesson planning as well as strong modeling of how to implement these new practices.

Teachers are expected to change so much about the way they teach and so the way they learn should change drastically in response. To honor that, I'm committing to taking some active steps toward transitioning from tech integration to being a leader in reshaping learning experiences to best meet the needs of our students.
Stacey Roshan is Upper School Technology Coordinator and Math teacher at Bullis School.

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It's Not Just Teachers: Tech Coaches Must Become Facilitators, Too - EdSurge News

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The EdSurge Fusion conference back in October surfaced some unexpected "aha" moments for me. The theme was personalized learning and heading into the conference I anticipated gaining a broader view of technology products promising to provide adaptive learning experiences for all students.

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Then one teacher one classroom model needs an upgrade.

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Then one teacher one classroom model needs an upgrade.

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Emerging school models are supposed to ease the transition to personalized and blended instruction-or at least make it possible. But new ways of teaching like station rotation and fluid-schedule flex models can hit a snag when they run up against the familiar one-teacher-one-classroom setup. According to the authors of a new report, it's not schools that need a "rethink" as much as school staffing.

"The mental model of how schools are organized is very strong, especially when it comes to staffing," says Bryan Hassel, the co-president of Public Impact, which authored the report along with the Clayton Christensen Institute. "So changing that requires some effort."

For the report, called " Innovative Staffing to Personalize Learning," the two organizations scoured their personal networks and lists of high-performing schools to find ones that took a different approach to classroom organization, eventually finding eight schools and school networks with instructive lessons to share.

Staffing models varied, but most schools featured in the report used a variety of new but related roles. Some created teacher leaders who head up small groups of teachers to instruct students together. Others used non-certified support staff to mentor and tutor one set of students while teachers worked with a different set.

8 Key Staffing Elements

From the research, the authors pointed to eight key elements that can help make new staffing models a success. They include providing:

1. differentiated roles for educators, like teacher-leaders, collaborating teachers, support staff, and teachers-in-training;

2. intensive collaboration on small teaching teams;

3. cultures of intensive coaching;

4. paid fellowships and residencies that enabled schools to build their own pipeline of future educators;

5. school leaders who reinforce high standards;

6. educator schedules that allow for school-day collaboration and coaching;

7. higher compensation for teachers and teacher-leaders at many schools, within existing budgets;

8. facilities created or adjusted-generally not at great expense-to support team teaching.

Challenges and Solutions

To kick things off, "Many of the schools had a startup grant to help them get things off the ground," says Thomas Arnett, a Christensen Institute co-author. While the grants supported the transition to new staffing models, after they ended, schools "went back to operating in their fixed budgets."

The report singles out a number of schools that have made staffing reconfigurations a priority. Among them: a model called Franchise Schools in Nevada's Clark County School District. There, principals in high-achieving schools take on multiple campuses attempting to replicate the successes they had at their "flagship" or original schools. The idea is to prevent schools from having to start from scratch when new models are introduced. Additionally, teachers are split into three distinct roles-subject-specialized lead teachers, certified temporary tutors and growth analysts-depending on how they work with students.

Realizing that teachers would need extra support in these new models, many schools focused heavily on professional development. The California charter network Navigator Schools and the private Cristo Rey San Jose Jesuit High School used an approach known informally as "deep coaching" where teachers were observed daily and provided with feedback on a weekly basis to help bake teacher growth into the overall culture.

Yet the authors found challenges as well. Among them: How to coordinate classes with many moving parts, as well as how to plan lessons together or to teach multiple small groups in the same room. "One thing that's convenient with a one-teacher-one-classroom model is that the teacher has full discretion to figure out how to operate," Arnett says. In non-traditional models, however, "you had teachers who were co-teaching or team teaching with different support staff in the room."

Teacher compensation was another prickly issue, and many of the schools highlighted in the report had previously struggled to retain staff under more traditional staffing models.

To help secure teacher buy-in, many schools looked for ways to pay them more for added responsibilities. To do so, some places like North Carolina's Cabarrus County Schools, stretched student-teacher ratios to their legal limits, meaning teachers were responsible for more students and thus eligible for more pay. But in practice, they "used technology to reduce their student-to-teacher ratios during teacher-led instruction" to help lighten the load, according to the report.

Both Ranson IB Middle School, also in North Carolina, and Franchise Schools threaded a fine needle by collapsing grade levels, increasing class sizes and (in Ranson's case) reducing the number of teachers hired for a grade level. At Franchise, growth analysts earned an extra $2,400. Other teachers received up to $15,000 extra depending on their duties.

At other schools, lower-paid support staff, pre-service teachers and even volunteer tutors were recruited to shoulder some instructional duties rather than hiring additional experienced teachers. The reason? Cost savings.

The Brooklyn LAB School in New York, for example, used a tiered salary program. Lower-level staff received about $15,000 a year plus some student loan forgiveness, before graduating to $50,000 annual salaries. Eventually, they would be eligible to earn about $60,000 as experienced teachers. At Navigator, pay for part-time small-group instructors was as low as $15 per hour.

All schools profiled in the report claimed its students were high achieving learners, although the authors take pains not to explicitly say whether staffing changes were responsible. With that in mind,"the school leaders believe that this combination of staffing changes and how they're using technology is key for them to get the results they're getting," says Public Impact's Hassel.

The authors add that the inevitability of technology means tomorrow's classrooms will probably be staffed differently than the ones many of us grew up with. And that's not a bad thing, provided that a strong emphasis is placed on developing and nurturing good teaching.

"These case studies point to some new ways schools can start to think differently from the ways they typically have, which is how can we fill up our existing structure with the best possible people we can find," Hassel says. But without rethinking teaching roles, he adds, "that's proven over the years to be a strategy that only gets you so far."

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The One-Teacher, One-Classroom Model Needs an Upgrade. Here's What's Next. - EdSurge News

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Emerging school models are supposed to ease the transition to personalized and blended instruction-or at least make it possible. But new ways of teaching like station rotation and fluid-schedule flex models can hit a snag when they run up against the familiar one-teacher-one-classroom setup.

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ISTE Standards and Benchmark use by ISD for Technology

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ISTE Standards and Benchmark use by ISD for Technology

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The ISTE Student Standards guide educators toward student-driven learning practices that prepare students to thrive in an evolving technological landscape.

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Let’s Stop Talking about Teaching with Technology, and Start Talking about Teaching

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Let’s Stop Talking about Teaching with Technology, and Start Talking about Teaching

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"We had good teachers before the explosion of technology, and we still have good teachers now."

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Those that know me might be confused by this. I've built my career around education technology. My job is to help teachers integrate technology into their classrooms. In my current job, and my previous role as an educator, I've learned about (and used) learning management systems, flipped classroom methods, e-portfolios, personal learning networks, collaboration tools, and behavior management software. I am constantly exploring digital tools and resources, creating tutorials and instructions, and delivering professional development to educators. I've spoken at conferences, worked with school districts, and collaborated with other technology integrators.

I have learned a lot -and I still have a lot to learn- but the most important thing I have learned so far is this:

Most teachers don't care about technology.

Here's the more important thing I've learned: they shouldn't.

When I went through the education program at my college, I wasn't interested in learning how to 'create and share a Google Doc' or how to 'flip my classroom'. I wanted to teach English. I wanted to teach kids how to actively read, how to engage in thoughtful discussion, how to communicate effectively, and how to be lifelong learners. I wanted to teach kids to be collaborative, persistent, and reflective.

I didn't want to spend time sifting through iPad apps, learning about different content management systems, or sitting through workshops about QR codes.

I see a disconnect between pedagogy and technology right now: in many school districts, there are curriculum directors and administrators working to improve educator effectiveness through curriculum redesign, evaluations, and initiatives like PBIS... and on the other side, there are technology directors working to put technology devices and tools into educators' hands.

The result is that we have teachers who know how to build authentic learning experiences, connect with students, and drive learning- and then we also have teachers who know how build websites and flip their classrooms with video lectures. We have teachers who know how to teach- and we have teachers who know how to use technology.

Here's the thing: using technology does not necessarily make a teacher effective. I am going to repeat that, because I want this to be very clear: technology is not pedagogy. I actually learned that lesson the hard way. I spent my first two months as a teacher building a paperless, hybrid-online, flipped classroom using Moodle, and marching students through standards by having them click through links and complete digital quizzes and activities.

Was I efficient? Yes. Was I engaging students? No.

Good teachers do more than just teach content. When people tell me that they are afraid that computers will eventually replace teachers, I laugh- because the only teacher that a computer could replace is the one who is simply marching students through hoops towards a standardized test.

Good teachers create authentic learning experiences for their students by building rich, performance-based assessments. Good teachers encourage students to solve problems and take an active role in their own learning. Good teachers teach skills like critical thinking, collaboration, communication, and curiosity. Good teachers know how to create learner-driven environments where failure is considered learning and persistence is an expectation. Good teachers know how to inspire students and build a love for learning that can last a lifetime.

And good teachers don't necessarily need to use technology to do that.

We like to say that teaching has changed, but I'd like to argue that it hasn't. Teachers still have the same major tasks today as they did before the Internet. Two hundred years ago, teachers still:

1. Collaborated with students and other staff

2. Communicated with students and parents

3. Found and shared resources

4. Managed student behavior

5. Delivered direct content

6. Built rich, performance-based assessments

We had good teachers before the explosion of technology, and we still have good teachers now.

If I care so much about teaching, and so little about technology, why did I become a technology integrator then?

To answer that question, I'm going to explain two scenarios that involve working with student writing. Bear with me... this will all make sense in a bit.

The teacher stands in front of the room and models an example of prepositional phrases, after noticing that many students are having difficulty in their writing. The students copy the information and practice some of the examples in their notebooks. After this mini-lesson, the students log on to the computers and continue working on their essays, paying special attention to the prepositional phrases in their documents. The teacher walks around and comments on the student writing. At the end of the day, students are told to work on the essays at home- they save the document on a flash drive and work on the document from home (hopefully). At the end of the week, students print their essays and hand them in to the teacher. The teacher spends about a week going through each essay with a red pen, occasionally checking for plagiarism issues, and hands the papers back to the students. Some students redo portion of their essays, while other students stuff the essays into their backpacks.

All students log onto the computers and access their essays online- they are using Google Docs, a cloud computing software. All of the students have shared their documents with the teacher, so she is able to go in at any time and comment on student work, wherever they are in the writing process. Because of this, the idea of "draft" has gone away- the writing process has become fluid, and students are constantly working on different aspects of their essays. The teacher notices that some students need work with prepositional phrases, while others need help with a variety of other issues: writing topic sentences, contractions, adding clarity, etcetera. She goes through the documents and adds comments that include links to grammar games on noredink.com, websites that give writing examples, and short videos that teach specific writing topics. When the class starts, all the students go through their own individualized mini-lessons, receiving instant feedback, and then call the teacher over to explain their understanding. They move on to their essays and continue to write. They use the research tool in the document pane to quickly look up information or cite research. At the end of the class, the teacher asks the students to look at their revision history (which shows the timing of how each sentence and paragraph were written) and reflect on their writing process. Students who need to work on their documents at home access their documents from their mobile phones on the bus, iPads, or computers- simply by logging in to Google.

The teacher wasn't teaching technology in scenario B- she was teaching writing, just like she was in scenario A.The difference is that she was leveraging technology to be more efficient (by speeding up the feedback loop and putting students in a situation where they had 24-7 access to their work) and more effective (by individualizing responses to their needs and giving them access to view and reflect on their writing process).

She wasn't effective because she was using technology.She was effective because she was giving students instant, formative feedback. She was effective because she was individualizing and differentiating her instruction.

Technology was only a tool that was helping her be more efficient in doing that.

Look back at those six tasks that teachers do. The basic work of teaching has not changed. Teachers still collaborate, still communicate, still find and share resources, still manage student behavior, still deliver content, and still assess students.

The difference is that we now have more tools and resources to improve our efficiency.

1. Cloud computing is nothing more than finding a more efficient way to collaborate with students and staff

2. Content managements systems are nothing more than finding a more efficient way to communicate with students and parents

3. Personal learning networks are nothing more than finding a more efficient way to find and share resources

4. to give formative feedback of soft skills and tBehavior management software is nothing more than finding a more efficient way rack student behavior

5. to Flipped classrooms are nothing more than finding a more efficient way deliver direct content

6. Electronic portfolios and digital quizzes are nothing more than finding a more efficient wayto assess student knowledge

Think for a second about how much the world has changed since the rise of the Internet. Technology has completely transformed the way that businesses operate, and yet, they don't have the term "business technology". Technology is only a tool to make what they were already doing more efficient and more effective. We need to start viewing technology in education with the exact same perspective, and nothing more.This is why I am calling for an end to the term "education technology". Our focus still needs to be on those tasks that teachers do; our focus still needs to be on education.

Our teachers became teachers to teach. Let's respect that and focus back on what they do every day in their classrooms.

Let's stop giving workshops on "Google Docs" or "Flipped Classrooms". Instead, let's give workshops on "More Efficient Ways to Collaborate with Students" or "More Efficient Ways to Deliver Direct Content".

Let's focus on finding ways to make their daily tasks more efficient so that they have more time to focus on building those authentic learning experiences, on individualizing and differentiating their instruction, and on building creative, inspired, and persistent learners.

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Let's Stop Talking about Teaching with Technology, and Start Talking about Teaching

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Those that know me might be confused by this. I've built my career around education technology. My job is to help teachers integrate technology into their classrooms. In my current job, and my previous role as an educator, I've learned about (and used) learning management systems, flipped classroom methods, e-portfolios, personal learning networks, collaboration tools, and behavior management software.

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These days, ed tech coaches are in high demand, thanks in part to the Common Core State Standards (CCSS), which require educators to integrate technology into the classroom. Much like the ISTE Standards , the CCSS clearly link technology with effective teaching, in addition to calling for mastery of the basics, more rigorous learning and creativity, and more emphasis on soft skills, such as critical thinking, communication and collaboration.

This new set of requirements has some teachers worried. Technology changes fast, and some fear they won't be able to keep up or do their jobs well if they have to use tools they aren't comfortable with.

This is where tech coaches can help put them at ease. Both the CCSS and the ISTE Standards emphasize learning and teaching, two issues educators are already very familiar with. If coaches focus on learning first, they can start the conversation on the educators' home court â€" not outside their comfort zone, where technology often falls.

Link technology to learning

Too often, coaches focus their efforts on sharing tech tools at staff meetings, hoping that teachers will make a connection to a learning activity and adopt the tool. Unfortunately, this is "just in case" learning. Coaches are helping teachers learn about new tools just in case they might find a use for it in their classroom. This approach could work if the teacher identifies an immediate need for the technology, but if not, another dilemma surfaces: Although the blackboard seemed to have the same half-life of plutonium, technology's shelf life is closer to that of milk. If teachers don't adopt the tool instantly, it may not even exist by the time they decide to use it.

Instead, coaches should aim for just-in-time learning, which means the new technology the teacher is learning about must have a purposeful and immediate link to the goals of a specific activity.

Both the ISTE Standards and the CCSS ask students to communicate, collaborate, gather and analyze information, and express their learning in creative ways. Most likely, students will be using hardware and software to accomplish these tasks. Coaches can improve this process by helping teachers first define the skills they want students to learn, such as communication and collaboration ( ISTE Standard for Students 2), and then use that as the starting point for identifying and using the tech tools that best meet those requirements.

Coaches should also work with their learning partners to explore the activity they are trying to improve and identify tasks that encourage creative expression, communication, collaboration, and the collection and organization of information. Together the coach and teacher clearly define these and other educational needs and then determine whether a given technology can meet them while enhancing learning. If the answer is yes, the teacher, students and coach can learn just enough about the technology they want to use, just in time to use it in the project.

Just-in-time tech training

The ISTE Standards for Coaches call for coaches to help teachers select technology that students can use for research, collaboration, and development of creativity and higher-order thinking skills. Let's explore what this might mean in the classroom.

The second grade teacher who wants to encourage her students to use images, video, sounds and narration to demonstrate their learning may need help identifying relevant tools to assist with this. The teacher may feel it is important that her students spend their time expressing their ideas clearly instead of learning and manipulating complex video-editing software. The teacher may also need help learning to use the tool. The coach could suggest that this teacher follow her students' lead, or she could provide some training.

At this point, coaches face the same dilemma as teachers: Technology changes so quickly that they can't possibly know how to use all of the available tools. But they don't necessarily need to. They just need to know where to find tutorials that they, their peers and students can use. Internet4teachers.com , , , or or tutorials for educators are great starting places.

The strategy of identifying common tasks in the learning activity focuses on the core of teaching: How will students learn and then demonstrate what they have learned? When coaches ask if the task requires students to gather information, collaborate with others, present their findings and get feedback, they are asking teachers to work in a realm they know and understand.

Help them choose

To help teachers determine how to find a tool that will enhance an activity's ability to support a given learning objective, a coach can begin by asking a series of questions about the existing task. Then she will have enough information to provide technological resources and ideas to help the teacher transform the lesson.

If the teacher wants to support communication in the classroom, a coach could ask:

Does the learning activity encourage students to communicate with peers?

Are the students reaching beyond the classroom to get ideas or suggested solutions to problems?

Are they seeking input from subject-matter experts?

The coach could suggest to her collaborating teacher that he use a website such as , where educators can find students from around the world who are working on a project similar to the one the teacher is planning for his students.

If the teacher wants to support collaboration, a coach could ask:

Does the task ask students to collaborate with others in their local or global community?

Are students inspired to solve real-world problems?

Are the students asked to get feedback on their proposed solutions?

If, for example, this teacher's students are studying the impact of fracking in nearby natural gas fields, the coach could suggest they use Skype to discuss their findings and solutions with an outside expert, such as a chemist, geologist or petroleum company executive.

If the teacher wants to support information gathering, a coach could ask:

To complete the learning task, do students need to gather information to draw conclusions and create knowledge?

How will students be assessed on their ability to gather useful, relevant information?

For a project to improve water quality in their own town, the coach could help the collaborating teacher create a Google Form his students could use to collect water-quality data from other students who live in cities along a river.

If the teacher wants to support information organization, a coach could ask:

Is the task shaped in ways that require students to organize the information they have gathered?

Are they required to analyze the information in any way?

When they report their findings, does the task require them to synthesize their data into meaningful applications?

A coach may help a teacher and students find online resources about environmentally friendly practices and then design a webpage where they can organize and share what they have learned more broadly.

And if the teacher wants to support student expression, a coach could ask:

Are students demonstrating their learning by sharing their solutions with authentic audiences?

Does the task encourage students to present their work in creative ways that are meaningful to them?

Is the ability to include images, video, music or dialogue important to expression?

Say a teacher asks her students who come from families that recently immigrated to the United States to draw on their family's experiences to reshape and retell John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath. Her coach can help her record a video of a stage production of the students' story, upload it to the web and gather online comments from the viewing community.

In this way - with learning and teaching as the starting point - coaches can emphasize how a specific piece of technology might help students reach their learning goals and perform the tasks their teacher has defined. And coaches who play this role help meet another valuable but largely unmet need: encouraging teachers to use technology routinely, so that they become more comfortable with it.

Les Foltos, PhD, is the founder of . He served as director of instructional technology for Seattle Public Schools and helped develop the ISTE Coaching Academy. He is also a co-author of ISTE's coaching white paper. This article is adapted from his book Peer Coaching: Unlocking the Power of Collaboration(Corwin, 2013).

Want to learn more about coaching teachers to use technology effectively to improve student learning? Sign up for our self-paced Coaching Academy for step-by-step guidance on proven ways to help your colleagues embrace digital age teaching.

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Put me in, coach! I'm ready to teach with technology

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These days, ed tech coaches are in high demand, thanks in part to the Common Core State Standards (CCSS), which require educators to integrate technology into the classroom. Much like the ISTE Standards , the CCSS clearly link technology with effective teaching, in addition to calling for mastery of the basics, more rigorous learning and creativity, and more emphasis on soft skills, such as critical thinking, communication and collaboration.

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Seven Technology Trends that will Transform Learning in the Next Five Years

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John Spencer

Posted on September 2, 2016

I knew social media had hit mainstream the moment that my mom sent me a friend request. Suddenly Facebook had become a place where "mom" and "friend" were synonymous. I knew that Facebook had lost its cool, edgy, college vibe. Since then, Facebook has become such a normal, habitual part of life that we rarely think twice about it. I check it in the morning after spending time writing. I check it when I'm bored in the afternoon. It's how I interact with people and it's where I find funny videos.

It's easy to forget, then, just how seismic a shift social media has been. Each social media platform is a fusion of space and tool. When we use a phrase like, "I was on Facebook for an hour," we treat it like a space. When we say, "even my grandma knows how to use Facebook," we treat it like a tool. That wasn't the case in the past. We had places. We had tools. Now, our places and tools are one in the same.

As a classroom teacher, I watched how social media changed student relationships. Some of these felt positive and powerful, like the shift from a social hierarchy to a web of relationships where people could shift between cliques easily. I also like the how social media helps kids fight adolescent loneliness by connecting with friends. Other trends felt more dangerous, like the use of metrics in relationships (counting likes, friend counts, etc.) or the death of boredom and solitude. For all the talk of people "not being present," I see the opposite problem. We are too present, too connected, and too relational. We need to daydream and get lost in our thoughts a little more often.

I watched students move from idolizing athletes to venerating YouTube stars and in the process, kids who had never been interested in science were suddenly relating to Neil deGrasse Tyson or replicating experiments from Steve Spangler. They were teaching themselves how to make things by watching YouTube videos. I watched students talk about building brands and starting businesses through social media. On one level, this was really cool. But another part of me thought, "just be a kid and worry about money when you're older."

It has been both exciting and terrifying to watch the coming of age of the first generation raised around social media. So, it has me wondering what technology trends will reshape education in the next five to ten years.

A word of caution here: many of these trends aren't new. In some cases, these are technologies that are just now hitting mainstream. In other cases, these are technologies that have been around for years but we are just now dealing with a generation who will use these tools without seeing them as new or groundbreaking. They will simply be normal.

#1: The Rise of the Curators (aka "Geeks Who Love Sharing Stuff")

This is a trend that has already begun. You see it in the rise of blogs like Farnam Street and Brain Pickings. In a world of information overload, curation has become a critical skill. Curation goes beyond simply collecting items online. The best curators know how to find what is best by immersing themselves in a niche area while also making surprising connections between ideas in seemingly unrelated worlds. Great curators find specific excerpts that are relevant in the moment but also timeless. They can explain the purpose, the context, and the necessity of what they are citing.

Often, a great curator adds a perspective and a lens without quite reaching the place of commentary. Maria Popova has certain points that she illustrates often but they never feel like talking points. They seem to arise from material instead of feeling like she is cherry-picking source material to back up her ideas.

This has me thinking about schools. I wonder what it would look like for students to learn the art of curation. In a world of constant information, where kids are fooled by ClickHole and Onion articles, curation teaches students how to be media literate by analyzing sources with a critical eye. However, true curation takes it a step further by learning how to categorize, identify what's best, and share it in a meaningful way. Here, they can find trends and share patterns in what they are seeing and then share it through a unique lens.

#2: The Distortion of Time

It's become so common you almost don't notice it. However, on most platforms, news feeds are based upon interest rather than chronology. So, as you scroll down, you aren't looking at older posts. You're looking at posts that might be a day or two old but feel recent. This might not seem like a big deal, but it's actually a shift away from a linear view of time and toward a more connective, relevance-based concept of time.

Another shift involves the blend of synchronous and asynchronous communication. In the past, you had things like phone conversations or video chat that were synchronous and then texting or email that required asynchronous exchanges back and forth. Now, you're seeing apps that blend both synchronous and asynchronous communication. Take Voxer. You can talk synchronously in a walkie-talkie mode but you can listen to it later and send pictures and text back and forth.

Students are now growing up in an age where the definition of time is changing. It's an era where time is compressed and extended, where it is synchronous and asynchronous, and where it is both linear and connective. I'm curious what this will mean for things like deadlines, project management, and collaboration.

#3: Virtual Reality

You're already seeing the initial sparks of virtual reality with the popularity of Google Cardboard and Google Expeditions. However, Google Cardboard is still in the Oregon Trail stage of virtual reality. It's fun and it's novel but it's still pretty limited in what it can accomplish. Students have few choices in what to do and where they go. Someday, we'll get nostalgic about it.

However, virtual reality is becoming cheaper and more sophisticated. Within the next few years, we will see virtual reality gaming systems becoming more mainstream. It will be interesting to see what this means as far as our concept of space, time, and reality. How will schools utilize this beyond the occasional virtual field trip? And will students have a chance to be makers and creators in virtual reality spaces? Or will it reinforce the consumer culture?

#4: Worldview by Algorithm

This is a shift we are already seeing. As we move toward data mining and targeted content marketing, social media streams create even tighter echo chambers. You can see this in the Blue Feed, Red Feed experience from The Wall Street Journal. Social media filters mean we move further and further toward what we already believe, because companies have an incentive to provide content that we will like, share, and comment on. If you are annoyed or offended by content you don't like, you might just leave the space - which is awful for advertisers.

This coincides with the trend toward narrowcasting (the opposite of broadcasting), where people find content in specific, highly specialized niche markets. However, it takes it to another level, where your entire worldview is specifically designed to be narrow.

In the past, students held on to worldviews based upon physical geography and social relationships. While those still hold true, there is an added layer of algorithms sorting, categorizing, and shaping how they view the world - a worldview that is often narrowly focused. People are quick to point to data mining and the death of privacy online. But I think the stronger force here is actually the way the algorithms shape our beliefs about the world.

This isn't entirely bad. Physical geography and social institutions can create a worldview that is just as myopic as the narrowcasting worldview of the algorithm. However, it's important to realize that a student's definition of reality and normalcy has been shaped, in large part, by algorithms designed to increase ad revenue (which can also lead to an obsession with novelty and amusement). This is all the more reason to have open conversations and to push critical thinking in schools. It's also why empathy, a key idea in design thinking, is more valuable than ever. We need broad ideas. We need a deeper understanding of one another.

#5: Augmented Reality

Augmented reality isn't new. The idea is simple. The phone adds a layer of reality above the physical reality that you see in front of you.A few years back, Google Glass allowed people to add a constant layer of new reality right before their eyes. And yet, it didn't take off. People mocked Google Glass, calling people "glass holes." People questioned ethical issues of privacy. Fear set it and suddenly restaurants began banning the devices. Eventually, Google let the whole project go.

However, it didn't hit mainstream until this last summer. Suddenly, I saw kids running around our neighborhood in 113 degree weather chasing after the Rapidash just around the corner. Pokemon Go was everywhere.

You're already seeing augmented reality affect learning with apps that allow people to scan a math problem and look at potential solutions or tutorials. Museums and historical locations have created AR apps that allow people to see a layer of information on top of what they see in front of them. It will be interesting to see what all of this means for schools. How will we leverage AR? And how will we think critically about the way AR continues to reshape our concept of reality?

#6: Artificial Intelligence

Growing up, I believed artificial intelligence would lead to robots and androids. I imagined a world where we would order food from a droid like Data (from Star Trek: The Next Generation) and it would be hard to tell who was human and who was a robot. That hasn't been the case.

Instead, artificial intelligence has been more like a system or service. We use artificial intelligence when we talk to Siri or when we do a simple Google Search. We use AI when we use a smart refrigerator or a self-driving car. In many respects, AI has been more like an integrative thinking tool rather than a replacement for thinking or even an external product.

However, the advent of AI presents some interesting challenges in education. For example, in an era with self-driving cars, who decides the value of a life and what does it mean for schools? Suddenly, philosophy becomes critical. What does it mean to have an original thought? What does this mean for plagiarism and copyright? We already have companies using AI to write news articles. We'll see an increase in AI products around budgeting and other analytical jobs. It would seem, then, that the humanities will become more and more relevant and that divergent thinking and creativity will become that much more critical.

#7: Rapid Prototyping

A few months back, Amos Dudley, a college student, printed his own braces with a 3D printer. It raised an interesting question around patent law and 3D printing. It was a reminder that 3D printers have done to physical objects what Napster did to CDs and the music industry. In the past, it was nearly impossible to copy something that had been manufactured. You now have people 3D printing customized equipment like machine parts.

The 3D printer opens up tons of opportunities to create realistic prototypes. However, it also creates challenges for intellectual property and manufacturing. These are things to think about as schools embrace maker spaces and STEM class. What does it mean to be a creative thinker and a digital citizen when a 3D printer can transform ideas and plans into actual objects? What does this mean for students who want to be entrepreneurs? How do we help students navigate issues around patent law while also fostering creativity and innovation in engineering?

So, what do we do?

On some level, we are still trying to adapt to these changes in schools. Some districts have responded with fear, by banning devices and creating scare tactics around cyberbullying. Other districts have blindly embraced technology by implementing personalized learning systems and ignoring the need for technology criticism. But I can't help but wonder if maybe the best response is humility. Maybe we should admit that these changes are huge and hard to understand - and that's okay. Maybe we could embrace the power of technology but also think critically about the dangers of power.

It has me thinking that maybe what students of the future truly need are the same things they have always needed. These are things that are timeless. But they've become more vital than ever. Things like empathy, wisdom, creativity, and critical thinking. If we get that right, they'll be able to make sense out of a world that is constantly changing and maybe even thrive within it.

Listen to the Podcast

Just click on the audio below to listen to this Creative Classroom podcast. You can also listen to it on the go by subscribing on iTunes (ideal for iPhone users) or Google Play and Stitcher (ideal for Android users)

http://www.spencerauthor.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/blog-to-podcast-9216-4.34-PM.mp3

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Seven Technology Trends that will Transform Learning in the Next Five Years

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John Spencer Posted on September 2, 2016 I knew social media had hit mainstream the moment that my mom sent me a friend request. Suddenly Facebook had become a place where "mom" and "friend" were synonymous. I knew that Facebook had lost its cool, edgy, college vibe.

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A guide of basic principles.

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Technology Coaching Menu from one of the coach at the International School of Bucharest I met at the workshop ICT in PYP in Berlin.

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Technology Coaching Menu from one of the coach at the International School of Bucharest I met at the workshop ICT in PYP in Berlin.

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She puts this together to give an overview to teachers on how she could be supporting their unit of inquiry.

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P43: "ICT is best considered as a tool for learning albeit wit its own set of skills, as opposed to an additional subject area..."

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Following the goals outlined for Technology Integration at Abingdon, the Technology Coach assists teachers in using technology effectively for differentiating instruction and providing rigorous, relevant, and engaging learning experiences. The goal is for teachers to integrate technology in such a way that it is a natural and authentic tool for learning for teachers and students. Technology integration is not a separate subject or a once-in-a-while project but a tool leveraged to engage and extend student learning otherwise unattainable in a traditional classroom environment.During the 2015-2016 school year, the focus for the Technology Coach is kindergarten through second grade and specialists.

What does the Technology Coaching Program look like at Abingdon?

Gather & Analyze Evidence The Technology Coach attends grade level meetings to review and analyze data and student work to determine specific aspects of student performance and teacher needs. The collaborative team works to identify specific academic and technology objectives to target in order to maximize student performance. They also determine areas where technology coaching is needed.

Design an Action Plan The Technology Coach holds coaching meetings with teachers and grade level teams to develop, plan, implement, and evaluate technology-infused lessons or unit plans focused on predetermined academic and technology objectives. During these meetings, the technology coach assesses area of need for professional development and creation/co-creation of resources for staff members.

Implement Action Plan The Technology Coach and teacher or grade level team implement the action plan. The Technology Coach's role in the action plan includes, but is not limited to, assistance in vetting resources and available technology tools, creation of content and technological materials, model teaching, co-teaching, or troubleshooting with the classroom teacher or grade level team.

Monitor & Adjust Action Plan The Technology Coach and teacher or grade level team monitor student performance through both formal and informal formative and summative assessments. The action plan is adjusted based on the results of the assessments of student performance. Through this process the Technology Coach and teacher or grade level team discuss ways in which the technology integration can be applied or adapted for a variety instructional uses.

As teachers take over more of the technology integration instructional planning and delivery the Technology Coach transitions to a consulting role.

Explore Examples of Student Work Below

Kate Neal - Abingdon's Technology Coach

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What is the mission of the Technology Coaching Program at Abingdon? Following the goals outlined for Technology Integration at Abingdon, the Technology Coach assists teachers in using technology effectively for differentiating instruction and providing rigorous, relevant, and engaging learning experiences. The goal is for teachers to integrate technology in such a way that it is a natural ...

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How School Districts Can Adopt the Technology Coach Model

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Many school districts employ a technology coach model to assist teachers with integrating technology into their classrooms, but the process isn't easy.

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"Can a computer teacher, even a master teacher, integrate technology with classroom content without the involvement of a classroom teacher? No!"

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"Can a computer teacher, even a master teacher, integrate technology with classroom content without the involvement of a classroom teacher? No!"

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Written in the PDF below, from ISTE.

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A flexible schedule to meet teachers need.

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A flexible schedule to meet teachers need.

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Photo credit: Brad Flickinger

Many schools will be receiving new technology in a few weeks, and they'll need a plan for supporting and coaching teachers through the process of using this new technology effectively in their classrooms. This week I received an email from a friend and fellow educator who was seeking ideas for a new technology coach position at her school this fall. Here are three pieces of advice I gave her.

1. Define the Coach's Schedule

It is really difficult trying to coach teachers in between periods, on your prep time, or before or after school. This can be done, but it cuts down on your ability as a coach to meet with each teacher. I really like being able to sit with teachers and talk about their classroom, their instructional goals, things they want to try, things that terrify them. Then I like to observe, co-teach or just do a quick check-in to see how things are going. Some of this can be done through technology, especially if you have an LMS that allows the technology coach to create a "course" for the teachers.

2. Be a Good Listener

A technology coach is not there to come in and say, "We're all doing this now, so listen carefully." The coach's job starts with listening. Sometimes, he or she will listen to a teacher's plan and say, "You know what? I don't think you even need technology to accomplish that." Sometimes the coach will listen to a teacher's plan and say, "You know what would really take this up a notch? Such-and-such app or website."

3. Learning Comes First, Not Tools

Before everyone goes and downloads a million apps or gets too excited about bright and shiny technology, it's important that teachers really think about whether bringing that app into the classroom will enhance or transform the learning. For instance, just because an app gives kids great practice on their math facts, does that mean that they should be doing it in class? Isn't that the same thing as handing out a worksheet and saying "practice!" instead of making the best use of your in-class time with them? What if they used the iPad to capture right angles in the classroom or to create visualizations of math problems? What if they wrote their own math problems, challenged each other to solve them, and then used an app that allowed them to record themselves solving the other person's problem? Not only could they document that classmate's success in creating a workable challenge, but they could also keep the video for other classmates to view and learn from.

Those three suggestions to my friend aren't the only sources of advice. Some other places to start are the Substitution Augmentation Modification Redefinition (SAMR) model, which stresses transformative applications of technology, and the ISTE NETS for Technology Coaches. What advice can you add to this list?

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Advice to New Technology Coaches | Edutopia

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Photo credit: Brad Flickinger Many schools will be receiving new technology in a few weeks, and they'll need a plan for supporting and coaching teachers through the process of using this new technology effectively in their classrooms. This week I received an email from a friend and fellow educator who was seeking ideas for a new technology coach position at her school this fall.

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Job Description of a tech coach in a high school

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Job Description of a tech coach in a high school

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How It's Done

Funding: How They Got Started

Hampton High School initially received funds from the state-funded "Classrooms for the Future," Pennsylvania's three-year grant program that gave schools technology equipment and required them to turn a classroom teacher into an instructional coach to help support technology use. The idea was to bring technology into the schools along with a practitioner who would be trained to help teachers learn and integrate the technology in their classrooms. After the funding ended, Hampton High School approached its school board and made an argument for how the instructional coach role had developed their capacity to collaborate, increased student engagement, and was essential to their school's continued growth. The board has been funding the full-time instructional tech coach position ever since.

Bringing Teachers on Board

Principal Jeff Finch admits that the first year of having an instructional coach to integrate technology was a hard sell for teachers. Some were resistant to technology, while others didn't have the time or interest in changing their lesson plans. The school administration found that a good way to initiate momentum is to start with those teachers who are already willing and excited to work with technology, or who like experimenting with new opportunities and collaborating. Working with this group during year one is a good way to bring others on board by showcasing what has been accomplished.

During staff meetings and professional development days, Principal Finch would ask Andrew Halter, the instructional tech coach, and his teacher partners to present some of the work they were doing. As teachers learned about the coach's role, witnessed what others were actually accomplishing, and saw the praise they were getting for their collaboration, school-wide momentum began building. During that first year, Andrew had to go out and rally teachers to work with him. Now, his schedule is packed as teachers willingly and happily want to work with him and learn how tech can enhance their curriculum and deepen student engagement. Eventually, the school got to the point where they had very few teacher holdouts, and instructional coaching with Andrew became part of teachers' yearly goal setting.

Key Questions for Integrating Technology

A key part of understanding how best to integrate technology grasping that no one should use technology for its own sake. Technology is more than the bells and whistles of new tablets or laptops in the classroom. Sometimes, introducing technology can ruin what is already working well in the classroom. The goal should be thinking about using the technology to effectively change or enhance instruction, so that you are doing something greater or more efficiently by using it.

Starting with a solid instructional idea is a key place to begin. Then you can figure out how technology can enhance the unit, lesson plan, curriculum, project, assessment, etc. Here are some key questions to consider when thinking about technology integration:

Why do you want to use this technology here?

Why hasn't the approach that you've been doing in the past worked?

How do you hope the technology will change it?

Can the technology make this idea more relevant to students?

Can it push the lesson up a notch, or can it enhance things for students by allowing them to do something that they couldn't do without the technology? For example, does the technology allow students to collaborate beyond the classroom walls?

Is the technology making possible a certain level of transparency for the teacher to assess where students are individually?

Does the technology provide a platform for students to be creative without overbearing them with gadgets and apps?

Thinking through these questions can begin to give a direction on how best to use technology in your classroom.

Role of Tech Instructional Coach

The instructional coach provides a range of support and resources to teachers around technology integration. This isn't the tech support guy who comes into the classroom to fix the printer or install software. The coach is here to help teachers to improve practice, whether it's using technology, trying different strategies, exploring new classroom or literacy approaches, or finding resources to support them in their day-to-day teaching. The coach also acts as a conduit of best practices, working with teachers across the school, and sharing what's worked, what can be adapted, and how to do it.

It's important to remember that the instructional coach is not a content expert in all areas. Rather, teachers remain the content experts, while coaches bring some creative ideas, resources, and support to the table.

The Coaching Cycle

Like many instructional coaches, Andrew uses the BDA (Before, During, After) coaching cycle with teachers.

Before meeting with a teacher, he will touch base with them. Sometimes it may be informally, like in the teacher's room, where he asks how their semester is going and tries to get a sense of how he might be able to help. If the teacher is interested, he starts generating ideas around their particular classroom needs. Andrew will then prep some resources and materials for specific lessons or units before formally meeting with the teacher. He'll collect information on navigating all the different technologies out there, and come up with some tech applications to enhance the lesson. During their formal meeting, Andrew will share ideas or useful things that other teachers have done with technology in their classrooms, and a plan will begin to emerge around redesigning the lesson with meaningful tech integration.

During the course of working together, Andrew will sometimes co-teach the class. Sometimes, he is there as classroom support while they implement a new lesson utilizing technology. Other times, he works with students in the class as additional support while the teacher is using the technology. Occasionally, he leads the class and models for the teacher how to work with a specific technology.

After implementation, Andrew follows up with teachers to find how things went. This process of reflection and refining takes place for individual lessons as well as whole units. In these evaluations, he asks:

Do they need to troubleshoot something, so that it's easier next time around?

Did the implementation bring up new questions or needs for the teacher?

What was successful and what still could be tweaked for a more refined delivery?

What does the teacher still need help with?

Professional Development

Ultimately, the coach takes the burden of technology off the teachers. They no longer feel the pressure of needing to know all the ins and outs of how technology works, or of how to do it all themselves. Instead, they can focus on understanding the collaborative tools available to students, the multiple means of showing their understanding, and the ways to create a lesson that will engage different types of learners who have grown up with technology.

In addition, Andrew designs professional development workshops for teachers in technology. Among many other topics, he has provided workshops on flipped learning, developed online courses for teachers on Web 2.0, and explored universal design for learning and differentiated instruction. His role is bringing tech integration into the school on several levels.

A Flexible Schedule to Meet Teacher Needs

The coach's schedule is fairly flexible, allowing him to best meet teachers' needs. They can schedule an appointment or drop by Andrew's office any time he is available. They might show up during their prep period to discuss working together, or to follow up on something they're already working on. Andrew typically works with several teachers during the course of the day, prepping, observing, or implementing a lesson. The rest of that time is spent on planning and researching what was discussed with a teacher. His schedule allows him to do the research, find resources for teachers, and do the things that teachers may not have time to do in their limited planning periods.

Teachers can write working with an instructional coach into their professional goal setting for the year. They can plan to meet with Andrew X number of times and design lessons related to tech integration. If things are ever slow in Andrew's schedule, he will "drum up business" by chatting informally with teachers, observing them in class as a non-evaluative peer, and providing ideas based on how what he's seeing could be enhanced through technology. These conversations often lead to co-planning and working together.

The role of the instructional tech coach has been immeasurable at Hampton High School. It's brought even the most resistant teachers on board once they had someone who could support and guide them. It's provided the school with more meaningful instruction, engaged students more deeply, and given teachers the tools to best meet their students' needs.

Resources

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Hampton High School initially received funds from the state-funded "Classrooms for the Future," Pennsylvania's three-year grant program that gave schools technology equipment and required them to turn a classroom teacher into an instructional coach to help support technology use.