Category: General

The North Dakota K-12 technology conference (Teaching and Technology) is this week. The keynote presentation was given by Susan Patrick U.S. Education Department Office of Educational Technology (sorry about the image – I wanted to emphasize the message on the screen). The message — there is a major role for technology in NLCB. Integrating technology to improve student and school performance is the key. Access to technology is no longer sufficient to generate federal support for school proposals.

I enjoy attending sessions and I try to pick out things I need to learn about. I can take pictures of Cindy without permission.

More tomorrow on some of the sessions (even on Windows products).

One observation – after listening to the keynote (technology integration as viewed from the federal level) and also attending a session on the state technology plan (pretty much the same message) – I started paying attention to the attendance in other sessions. Those who attended sessions seemed to prefer “how to do it sessions” over sessions emphasizing curriculum examples. I wonder why? Perhaps many feel they have yet to get to the point at which they feel integrating technology is possible. Perhaps classroom integration is very teacher, school, and content area specific so that there is less interest in how someone else does it. Perhaps people who pay to attend technology conferences really enjoy learning about the technology and will worry about the planning stuff when they get back home.

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This question is often a good way to generate some discussion (or a minor riot). Search Engine Watch is an online source for lots of information about search engines. Recently, Associte Editor Chris Sherman attempted to generate an answer to this question by asking the search engines. The answer – “Even the search engines themselves can’t agree.

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Jamie McKenzie’s online journal – From Now On – has an interesting article entitled Writing the Right Way. The article addresses the false assumption that writing with a computer will automatically create better writers and suggests that teachers revisit the idea of process writing.

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The No Child Left Behind Act charges the Secretary of Education with developing the nation??s third National Education Technology Plan. If you have comment or are interested in this process, you might explore the official web site for this process.

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When you write about technology in schools, you constantly search for current statistics. Things change fast and it is difficult to provide a description of what is typical. Some commonly cited statistical sources are fee based — these sources appear to be oriented toward those making business decisions. Education Week offers an annual review of educational issues and trends under the title of Technology Counts. The 2003 issue is now available. If you visit this site or read the paper version (I think I paid $6), you still need to watch the dates for the data Tech Counts 2003 provides. You will see that some of it was gathered in 2000.

On more thing about this publication. Each year, in addition to giving updated state by state data on technology use, the publication has a topical focus. This year’s focus addresses the role of technology in assessment (online testing, online test preparation, computer essay grading).

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Cindy has a very exciting opportunity this summer. She is going to spend 6 weeks in Japan as part of an educator exchange program.

There is strong technology emphasis in this project. Every Sunday evening at 9, Cindy uses CUSeeMe to meet with her Japanese language instructor online. I assume the unusual time has something to do with the time difference between here and Japan. When we happen to be out of town we have to look for a hotel with a fast Internet connection in the room.

While the teachers associated with this project get to travel, students in Japan and the U.S. will also communicate and work on projects collaboratively. Cindy, her colleagues and Grand Forks middle school students have been working on a web site as part of this collaboration. We welcome you to follow this project as it develops.

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June 2003 has been designated as “National Internet Safety Month” by I-Safe Anerica. I-Safe is sponsoring activities for kids, parents, and educators.

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