Leadership takes organization, creativity, and guts to facilitate CHANGE.
As students learn through today's Digital Learning Age, change agents DISRUPT traditional education and lead toward a better tomorrow.
What is the mission and purpose of change?
Goal...
...is to provide students with abundant opportunities for differentiated learning by facilitating the coaching and creation of technology environments that push education to the optimum level of engagement, investigation, relevance, and support.
This vision for CHANGE focuses on creating student-centered learning communities that promote collaboration, communication, innovation, and global perspectives.
From Goal to Reality
This mission becomes a reality in EVERY classroom through COVA: Choice, Ownership, Voice, & Authenticity.
COVA learning is how we create CHANGE!
Read more about COVA here.
Examples:
C - Choice
Choice creates change. Not every student learns and creates the same way. It's critical for learners to be given OPTIONS for how to share their final findings, research, and projects.
O - Ownership
Ownership creates change. Everyone grows when students actively take a role in leading their learning. Through personal feedback, students can reflect and connect.
V - Voice
Voice creates change. As students feel listened to and heard, they grow in knowledge and confidence. Giving students time and space is critical for the sharing of thoughts.
A - Authenticity
personal strengths of inquiry, creativity, connectivity, and perseverance.
My solutions-based, positive growth mindset will also cultivate a strong culture of community empowerment and ongoing analysis.
Accountability
Accountability for reaching this goal can be achieved through constant self-reflection, frequent data analysis, and consistent formative assessment from peers, colleagues, students, and administrators.
Example:
A quick two-question survey can be given at the beginning and end of the school year. Here is end-of-year feedback I received from one of my most challenging history classes. Their responses show and explain what I was specifically doing to create a safe and caring learning environment, allowing me to reflect and evaluate my teaching.
Equity
Gathering anonymous feedback; speaking directly with teachers about their questions, concerns, and technology needs; and analyzing student learning data and test scores are just a few ways in which I can begin to understand the gaps and struggles of a school's learners.
Painting a dimensional picture of a school building's needs is essential for any technology coach to begin working without bias. Each piece of evidence helps explain where and how to begin, while best meeting the needs of these specific learners.
Curriculum
When considering the gradual increase of student technology use and understanding from year-to-year, it must be ensured that students at each grade level are receiving the best information for their developmental needs. Researched timeline examples and best practice standards for this include exemplars from ISTE and CSTA.
A backward design (or learning by design) approach for specific technology implementation might also be an appropriate method for creating clarity. This plan would ensure success by directly focusing on the unique needs for each school community.
If a big-picture goal is to ensure that optimal digital learning takes place for all students, then it's best to take a step back and figure out what essential information the students should know and what skills they should gain. After these large ideas are clarified, then tasks, assignments, assessments, and activities can be planned for and expanded upon.
When deciding on the best course of action, it's essential to know the needs of the whole school district in addition to the needs of each specific, individual school building.
Resources
When a technology coach considers the resources at their disposal, this expands beyond physical computers and devices. People are resources too!
Coaching is NOT a lone sport.
Within a middle school building, for example, there are many people, organizations, offices, and departments which, together, support community needs for success. The principal is a beacon offering direction and unity, the IT office hosts hardware support and emergency troubleshooting, school clerks provide organization and are first-line-of-defense warriors, curriculum development officers guide learning needs, grade-level lead teachers foster creativity and perseverance, special education teams implement targeted needs, and the subject teachers bravely implement each new idea.
Beyond the middle school building itself, the district technology department allows for structure and clarity throughout all school buildings, the HR department ensures that the best new educators join each team, PD developers create lasting positive change through educational learning and understanding, assistant superintendents create cohesion and pioneer growth, and the superintendent is the mouthpiece for forming foundational district-wide understandings.
It takes a village to raise a child, and all these people throughout a school system will be essential for the success of an instructional technology coach.
A Coach's Definition
An efficient way to promote change and deliver effective technology education is through the use of an Instructional Technology Coach. Their goal is to ensure that every student receives the best education possible. They do this through directly supporting teachers, both in and out of their classroom settings.
A teacher could describe an Instructional Technology Coach as:
A partner that provides motivation, best-practice strategies, and personalized support for accomplishing their technology classroom goals and meetings student needs.
An administrator might interpretation an Instructional Technology Coach to be:
A guide that assists by leading the integration of technology in the classroom, effectively achieving the long-term goal of enhancing teaching and improving student learning outcomes.
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