Different Approach to Technology Staff Development

Okoboji Community Schools started taking a learning team based approach to our staff development this past school year. Next year we will attempt to expand that approach to the technology portion of those staff development days. We have been fortunate this past year to have about 2 hours per professional development day for "Tech Time."




This "Tech Time" will begin to look very different next year. This past year we delivered our technology staff development in a classic way with some sit-and-get led by me usually to the whole 5-12 group of teachers. This time was followed by work time to work on either what was just shown or some other technology related activity. As research shows, this is not an extremely efficient method of delivering technology staff development. The material being presented is usually only relevant to a small portion of the audience and the rest of them spend the time off task doing other things.



Next year we are going to attempt to deliver our technology related staff development using the learning team approach to our (and hopefully everyone's) advantage. We are going to let the learning teams tell us what they want to learn the next P.D. day. They will be responsible for letting us know what resources they think they will need to learn what they want to learn. We are also planning to rely heavily on collaboration between learning team members rather than instructor led learning. We would like to see a bunch of "this is what worked in my classroom" type conversations. No one is exactly sure how this is going to look and I am sure it will be extremely fluid in its "appearance."



I envision the different teams all exploring different aspects of technology in the classroom. Some being led by an facilitator and others simply having conversations and demonstrations by other team members about hoe tech is working in their rooms. I feel these conversation and demonstrations are going to be a huge key to the success of this approach. Peers getting the ideas flowing with other peers.



Towards the end of the session we would come back together and share what was learned by each group during their "tech time." This sharing will also be crucial to assist in the formation of new ideas between groups. Cross group sharing could also take place during the tech time if the need is there.



I am very much looking forward to this new approach to our technology staff development for next year and I will keep posting about how it's going, new developments, struggles, and triumphs. Keep checking back!