TECHNOLOGY IMPROVES
COMMUNICATION IN SCHOOLS
A Presentation About How Schools In
Northeastern Connecticut Communicate with their
Communities
By Amber Daigle
Thomas Jefferson says…
"I look to the diffusion of light and education as the
resource to be relied on for ameliorating the
condition, promoting the virtue, and advancing the
happiness of man."
Why I Investigated This Topic
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CCCT
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II.6. Teachers recognize the need to vary their instructional
methods by: …b. varying their role in the instructional process in
relation to the content and purposes of instruction
III. Teachers Demonstrate Professional Responsibility Through:
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4. Teachers seek out opportunities to grow professionally
2.c. identifying appropriate agencies in the larger community,
businesses and professional organizations that can provide resources
for students, classrooms or schools
4.a. sharing practices with professional colleagues within the school or
district
4.b. enriching their knowledge about content, learners, pedagogy,
TECHNOLOGY and the U.S. Public School System…
Personal Reasons I Investigated
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Teachers don’t share enough, especially
between districts
It’s a small world after all…
Personally wanted to create a website
w/homework, projects, syllabi so parents
would stop emailing me
Cheaper and easier ways to juice up the
classroom
The TV Effect
Communication in Two Directions
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School to Community
 Board
of Trustees
Announcements
 PTO Meetings
 Athletics & Extra
Curricular Activities
 Achievement Awards &
Ceremonies
 Daily Schedules
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Community to School
 Booster
Club
 Job/Internship
Opportunities
 Sharing Between
Schools
 Academic
Opportunities
 Check where tax
money goes
Technology & Communication: What’s
Out There
Websites
•GradeQuick
•Edline
•“Going Paperless”
•eBooks
•Text Messages (Alerts)
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Websites: What’s Out There
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http://www.christophermorin.org
http://shs.westport.k12.ct.us/jdamico/
http://shs.westport.k12.ct.us/lin/
http://www.historyteacher.net
http://www.thompson.ctschool.net/
http://www.thompson.ctschool.net/Teachers/GDaigle/i
ndex.html
www.woodstockacademy.org
http://www.ashfordct.org/
http://www.schoolmatters.com/
Websites: What’s Coming
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QUESTION: Do you foresee teachers (at Woodstock Academy or on
a widespread basis) developing their own websites? What would
be involved in this? Professional development? How would the school
set it up in regards to web-space?
ANSWER: Absolutely! We are piloting this concept this semester
with about 20 teachers. We are using Edline (which is tied into our
grading software GradeQuick) as a classroom management
tool. Teachers can post assignments, keep a class calendar,
post class activities (such as the powerpoint they did in class
that day). Next year we hope to make it mandatory that teachers
use it for at least their class syllabus, assignment calendar, and
progress report grades. We’d love to eliminate mailing home the
quarterly progress reports and just mail out the four report
cards. Saving postage and saving trees.
GradeQuick
Not that it
makes
grading
quicker
(English
Teachers…),
but it does
save paper!
Available Online & Accessible From Home
Class lists, Seating Charts
Student Reports
Edline: http://www.edline.com/
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GradeQuick Service that also provides web-space for education-related fields
“Secure, Integrated and Interactive: With Edline’s LCMS, teachers can publish secure progress reports
(including grades, attendance, missing work, comments, etc.) en masse at their teacher pages with the click
of a mouse. They can launch their gradebook from the same system with which they manage their
lessons or post homework online. Students and parents participate in online discussions, find practice
exercises, complete assessments online, or hand in homework at the same classroom web page where
they find personalized reports from the gradebook application. Because all of the teacher web pages
are deployed as part of the umbrella LCMS, parents can quickly see a consolidated view of calendar
information from different classes, teams, or groups, all in a central location. And webmasters can manage
the entire school (or district) web presence as a whole.”
Environment vs. $$$
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Use of Technology is undeniably expensive:
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Many public schools would have to rely on state grants, federal grants,
etc.
One school in northeast Connecticut says, “We’d love to pilot a one-toone laptop program with the students (eliminating some of the physical
labs such as sophomore writing work shop, etc) but a program like that
takes too much funding. For instance, if the freshman class was given
laptops @ $400 each, that would be approximately $126,000. The
next year, when those machines rolled up to the sophomore class, you’d
need another $126,000 for the incoming freshmen. So after four years
you would have all four grades having their own laptops, but you’d be
devoting approximately $504,000 each year to keep the program
going, assuming that after the 4 years the laptop is no longer in good
enough condition to keep using it for the program. That is a heavy
investment.”
Other Notable Innovations
Text Message Alerts
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Since the Virginia Tech
shootings, many
schools (including
UConn-Storrs) have
implemented a text
message alert system
eBooks
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Kindle:
More Notable Innovations
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Tablets & Smartboards
Projectors
Ipods/Mp3 Players as
tools instead of
reprimand-worthy
Cell phones
WiiFit
Skype Chat
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Virtual Classroom
Virtual Science
Experiments
Works Cited
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“Education: Jefferson Quotes.” Monticello Research
Organization. Monticello: Home of Thomas
Jefferson. 22 March 2009 Thomas Jefferson
Foundation, Inc.
<http://www.monticello.org/reports/quotes/educat
ion.html>.