4.1 Digital Equity
Candidates model and promote strategies for achieving equitable access to digital tools and resources and technology-related best practices for all students and teachers. (PSC 4.1/ISTE 5a)
The Current Reality Report was created for ITEC 7460. The purpose of this artifact was to study and understand the current digital reality at my school by analyzing the School Improvement Plan (SIP) and to determine how the school uses the different types of technology programs and devices to implement and modify the vision for the school technology use. My individual contribution to this artifact was to identify how the school vision is being implemented, pinpoint areas for improvement, and provide solutions for these areas that align to the School Improvement goals.
This artifact demonstrate mastery of this standard because it shows how I model and promote strategies for achieving equitable access to digital tools and resources by explaining how during the 2020-2021 school year due to the COVID-19 pandemic my district and school adopted a Hybrid Schedule where the students came alternatively for face-to-face instruction two days a week with three Digital Learning Days (DLD) virtually at home. During this time our SIP was limited to in-person Literacy strategies, however, these strategies needed to be modified to incorporate the massive amount of technology that we were using at the time. In order to meet these new needs, I helped to create the Technology Committee. The Technology Committee meets continuously to plan, develop and implement strategies on how to include technology in the classroom to enrich the SIP goals. This artifact also demonstrates mastery of this standard by explaining how I assisted this committee in aiding teachers to access technology-based best practices by the developing digital learning lessons, digital assessments, multimedia projects and the implementation of new technology for in-person instruction and for virtual instruction, as well as how to better utilize CANVAS for face-to-face learning and digital learning. I was part of ensuring that each student had access to technology-based best practices either by bring-your-own-device or by assigning students who do not have digital devices a laptop computer.
I learned from completing this artifact that there is an immediate need for Professional Learning sessions that focus on Instructional Technology strategies and how to develop these strategies and deliver them to the students. I also learned of the need that the students have on how to accurately access the assignments on the CANVAS LMS and that we need to create specific lessons to teach the students how to access the assignments. What I would have done differently is that I would have develop a lesson for the teachers to teach students how to access the lessons on the LMS and create a survey for the students on how well the lesson worked to help them.
The work that went into creating this artifact impacted school improvement, faculty development, and student learning because now the SIP includes specific standards on how DLDs should be manage, what strategies to use in the event of an emergency DLD. This impact is already being assessed through the collection of data through CANVAS on student usage, and how long they spend working on their DLD assignments.
This artifact demonstrate mastery of this standard because it shows how I model and promote strategies for achieving equitable access to digital tools and resources by explaining how during the 2020-2021 school year due to the COVID-19 pandemic my district and school adopted a Hybrid Schedule where the students came alternatively for face-to-face instruction two days a week with three Digital Learning Days (DLD) virtually at home. During this time our SIP was limited to in-person Literacy strategies, however, these strategies needed to be modified to incorporate the massive amount of technology that we were using at the time. In order to meet these new needs, I helped to create the Technology Committee. The Technology Committee meets continuously to plan, develop and implement strategies on how to include technology in the classroom to enrich the SIP goals. This artifact also demonstrates mastery of this standard by explaining how I assisted this committee in aiding teachers to access technology-based best practices by the developing digital learning lessons, digital assessments, multimedia projects and the implementation of new technology for in-person instruction and for virtual instruction, as well as how to better utilize CANVAS for face-to-face learning and digital learning. I was part of ensuring that each student had access to technology-based best practices either by bring-your-own-device or by assigning students who do not have digital devices a laptop computer.
I learned from completing this artifact that there is an immediate need for Professional Learning sessions that focus on Instructional Technology strategies and how to develop these strategies and deliver them to the students. I also learned of the need that the students have on how to accurately access the assignments on the CANVAS LMS and that we need to create specific lessons to teach the students how to access the assignments. What I would have done differently is that I would have develop a lesson for the teachers to teach students how to access the lessons on the LMS and create a survey for the students on how well the lesson worked to help them.
The work that went into creating this artifact impacted school improvement, faculty development, and student learning because now the SIP includes specific standards on how DLDs should be manage, what strategies to use in the event of an emergency DLD. This impact is already being assessed through the collection of data through CANVAS on student usage, and how long they spend working on their DLD assignments.