10. Effects on Teachers

Effects on Classroom Management and Presentations

Although our conceptual model and, hence, our observations stress giving technology tools to students, teachers also can take advantage of the capabilities provided by new technologies for presenting and organizing information in ways that were not feasible in the past. Technologies such as laser disc, satellite- and cable-transmitted video, and projection panels to display computer screen images were in common use within many of the classrooms at the case study sites. At Bay Vista Elementary, for example, a third-grade teacher used a projection device to allow her students to view living bacteria in a petri dish. At the School of the Future, a system that connects student terminals to a teacher's workstation allowed a teacher to display almost instantly the consensus of the class during brainstorming sessions. At East City High School, students in a geometry class took turns demonstrating different ways to construct a triangle with a geometry software package, with the computer screen image shown to the entire class by means of an LCD projection panel.

Less common but significant was the teacher use of software to prepare computer-based activities specifically for their own classrooms. At the Progressive School, where the teachers had the advantages of paid consultantships to engage in this kind of work and ample technical support, we observed a number of exciting teacher-developed applications. A primary teacher built a HyperCard-based application that links student computer drawings with their compositions and with a standard English version of the composition that the teacher develops in conference with the student ("That is how the word sounds, but this is how adults spell it."). When the results are printed, students, their parents, and the teacher have a record of the student's original art and writing along with a standard English version that is much easier to decipher.

A teacher in a class with a year-long curriculum theme of marine ecology used HyperCard to create a "Planet Ocean" simulation in which students go deep-sea exploring in a bathyscaph to collect video clips (from a laser disc) of underwater life. The simulation contains four increasingly difficult " missions," which students must complete within specified time limits to maintain adequate oxygen, given different ocean depths. An on-line "research book" provides text information that students can use in trying to identify and understand the marine creatures shown in the laser disc images. Students use the video clips they collect and their text notes to prepare research presentations for the class.

Another way in which technology enhances teachers' ability to present information is by providing capabilities for easy tailoring of materials for individual students or groups. One of the classrooms studied at the Progressive School made this kind of tailoring a general practice so that the teacher-developed exercises students worked on were better linked to student interests and abilities and to the activities of their specific projects.

Like our first step in the commission book [a portion of the city-building project] this time-we wanted them to find facts. So with the computer it was really easy to make the basic outline to finding facts and adapt it for each book and each commissioner so that it was really exactly on target for what they were doing and what the book was about. Instead of...giving each child the same thing that wasn't perfect, we got eight different commission things that had the same basic idea but that were very related to what they were doing.

--Elementary school teacher

Teachers who have access to computers for personal use and who have been given the support to develop technical skills are much more likely to produce their own instructional materials with the aid of technology than are those who are not given these types of resources. The extensive support in both these areas provided by Apple to the teachers at the Progressive School led to the creation of highly innovative and sophisticated instructional programs and materials, such as those described above. At John Wesley, the entire faculty was reported to be using computers for the preparation of classroom materials after each teacher had received a Duo computer for his or her professional use.

Technology can be used also to support teacher management functions, such as instructional planning, grading, report preparation, and attendance monitoring. Many of these functions are built into the software that comes with integrated learning systems (ILS), for example. The classrooms we studied were not ILS labs, however, and use of technology for management purposes was spotty. The most consistent use of such tools was at South Creek, where all teachers used Class Master for attendance and grading purposes. A number of teachers talked about the software as a tool that can reduce the time and effort that goes into routine tasks, allowing for greater focus on more substantive issues. A mathematics teacher felt that it had advantages also for reflecting on the efficacy of her instruction:

It [technology] frees a lot of our time to spend getting things ready for lessons, looking for things to do in the classroom. Otherwise, we would be constantly grading papers, averaging and stuff like that, and the computer does it for us. We just grade the papers and put it in and it will weight it, average it, and everything. It frees us up.... I can take the information that the computer will generate and I can do different things with it. I can organize it in different ways to show me where there's a weakness, where the majority of my kids fall when there's an activity.... It allows me to focus in on..."Did I not teach it well enough for the kids or was it something that was beyond what...they could do?"

--Middle school mathematics teacher

Teachers at several other sites used software for attendance and grading, as well as for such purposes as cataloging instructional software or other resources. At the Bay Vista school, for example, databases are used to catalog instructional materials, schedule staff development activities, chronicle special events, and record the results of teacher and student surveys.

A number of teachers used general-purpose applications (such as HyperCard) in their instructional planning. Teachers in one classroom made oversized banners displaying the titles for their major curriculum units and put them up on the wall as a way of giving their students a sense of the plan for the year and where they were with respect to it.

The School of the Future undertook an ambitious attempt to use software in planning and monitoring individualized instructional programs for their students. School staff worked with programmers from a nearby software firm to develop the Pupil Growth Planning (PGP) system. The system supported teachers in creating course syllabi, asking them to identify key process and product outcomes within the course, and providing a template for monitoring and reporting student progress on these outcomes. The system was designed also for use by students, parents, and faculty advisors in defining the student's individual academic and personal goals, identifying courses and resources to help fulfill those goals, and monitoring progress against the resulting action plan. When students and their advisors entered individual goals, the system would use a keyword search to identify appropriate courses, mentorships, and other resources. Although never fully implemented, the system also provided an electronic mail feature that could be used for communication among students, parents, and teachers.

Many teachers used technology in one way or another as part of assessment activities. In some cases, such as the CSILE classrooms, teachers took advantage of the computer's capability to store a record of student activity to review the development of student products as a way of getting a better handle on the areas in which the students experienced difficulty. In schools with local area networks, teachers often had ready access to student file folders, which enabled them to monitor their students' work and individual progress with greater care and ease. Teachers also remarked that students' use of the computer made their work much easier to read, making it easier to assess the substance of the work without struggling over legibility or reacting to a poor physical appearance. Portfolios of technology-produced work (essays, multimedia presentations, videos) were fairly common. Many of the teachers were involved also in preparing narrative reports of student progress, and word processing software was typically used for this purpose.

Teacher Collaboration within the School

Reflecting on her school's 7 years of experience with the extensive use of technology, one of the site principals remarked:

If we've gotten nothing else out of all of this [technology], it...gives teachers an invitation to share their ideas about instruction. This is something they're not expected to know already; it's not competitive.

--Elementary school principal

Staff at several sites remarked that the introduction of technology had put them into the position of being learners again. Their common struggle to master something new led to increased contact, both in terms of receiving from fellow teachers the same kind of support for technology use that was described above for students and in terms of sparking discussions about what they were teaching and how technology fit into their instructional goals.

My team [other teachers working with the same group of middle school students] was the most supportive group. If one of us didn't understand and somebody else understood it, during our team planning, we'd sit down and we'd teach each other.... We all felt a little bit overwhelmed, because a new school is overwhelming, but throw the technology on top of it and we really felt overloaded, but we had a wonderful team. We've always had a wonderful team, so we worked well together.

--Middle school teacher

At John Wesley and Bay Vista, joint activity in framing education reform and technology implementation grant proposals increased the amount of teacher interaction around issues of curriculum and instruction. At East City High School, South Creek, and the Progressive School, the provision of supported time for teachers to present and talk about their technology-based activities led not only to sharing of information and strategies dealing with technology, but also to an increased sense of camaraderie and better articulation of the curriculum.

We've had faculty meetings where we have presentations, so the teachers that have done projects using technology, they've presented it to the whole faculty; and we saw what was going on, so we knew and could say, "Hey! Maybe we could make it easier for you if we introduce this skill at this level and then in seventh grade take that skill and take it to another level, and by the time they get to you, it's going to be a snap for the kids."... If we didn't have the opportunity to see [what others are doing with technology], there would be much more overlapping and not taking it a step further. We're trying to spiral it as much as possible.

--Middle school mathematics teacher

Nathaniel Elementary provided support for teachers participating in specific technology projects (CSILE and Project GALAXY) to work together and share insights.

The provision of teacher planning time is a key underlying factor in determining both the extent to which technology gets used and the level of teacher collaboration that occurs within a particular site. In schools where supported time was provided for planning and sharing what the teachers were doing with technology, such discussions appeared to be both an important unifying factor and an instigation for the spread of technology use to additional classrooms. In other technology-using schools, where time for joint planning or observation of each other's technology-based activities was not provided, the technology introduction per se did not produce a sustained climate supporting teacher collaboration, and widespread technology use was less likely.

Another way in which technology can support teacher collaboration and cooperation is through the use of electronic mail for teacher-to-teacher communication. At South Creek, teachers reported using the electronic mail system to communicate with other teachers within their team about students they share:

The e-mail is wonderful because the whole concept of a middle school is to communicate and to try to have a core block of students going from teacher to teacher to teacher [within a team].... So if I have a question about a child in my room...I can e-mail and find out who has them next, and say, "Look, I've noticed something; I'm not sure if it's just me or they've had a bad day, but let me know what you think." And we can get responses within minutes; they just e-mail us right back and say, "I noticed the same thing yesterday," or "I'll keep my eyes open."

--Middle school teacher

South Creek teachers also had set up e-mail groups around different curriculum areas (e.g., social studies, science), and teachers used the system to circulate enclosures with ideas for projects to do together.

In addition to South Creek, teachers at East City High School made extensive use of electronic mail to communicate with each other. Other single-school sites made less use of electronic mail for communication within the school. In most cases, they lacked a system at the time of our site visit. (John Wesley, for example, brought in electronic mail after our site visit.) In some cases, however, schools with electronic mail reported that teachers continued to depend on the exchange of hard-copy notes, rather than taking advantage of the technology that was available to them. In general, our observations indicate that the existence of the technology infrastructure per se is not enough to overcome a general attitude of teacher independence and lack of widespread interest in group planning or coordination. These attitudes must be addressed before electronic communication technology can provide its full benefit for teacher communication and collaboration.

Teacher Interactions with Outside Collaborators and Resources

Technology has the potential also to support a much greater degree of communication and collaboration between teachers and others outside the school walls.

I don't know of any other profession in the world that isolates themselves more from what others do than teachers. We walk into our classroom. We close the door, and there is no connection with the rest of the world. Networking is going to change that.

--TeacherNet teacher

TeacherNet was designed in large part to fulfill the need for interactions and sharing of resources across schools. Most of the materials in the TeacherNet curriculum library, in fact, were developed by groups of teachers from multiple schools collaborating over the network. In this sense, the project offers demonstrable proof of the capabilities of telecommunications to support broader collaborations among teachers. At the same time, the majority of teachers in TeacherNet schools are not using the network to interact with peers at other schools. The same access issues that limit the network's use by students hinder its effectiveness in supporting teacher interactions. Most teachers in TeacherNet schools do not have their own e-mail addresses, and many lack training in how to use the network.

Teachers at some of the other sites reported communicating with teachers or others outside of their school around aspects of their technology-supported projects. At the Progressive School, one of the teachers we interviewed had done a number of joint projects with teachers at another school. Both students and teachers have shared ideas and project products over the network and through the exchange of videotapes. Teachers at Progressive and at East City High School ACOT communicate with other classrooms supported by Apple. At Nathaniel, there were plans to connect the teachers using CSILE with other CSILE classroom teachers in 1994-95.⁽⁶⁾ Project GALAXY was supposed to include communication among teachers at different sites, but problems with getting the technology (in this case, satellite-connected facsimile machines) to work properly led teachers to give up such efforts. At South Creek, the industrial arts teacher uses the network to communicate with other industrial arts teachers and the coordinator for his district, and the computer literacy teacher communicates with her peers throughout the state, but other teachers we interviewed did not report active use of the network for such purposes. At Maynard, the computer coordinator makes extensive use of the network to interact with people interested in educational uses of telecommunications on a national level. The mini-school's other teachers have made little use of their wide area network connection for such purposes, however.

In addition to telecommunications support for interacting with people outside the school's walls, technology-based innovations may provide the motivation for non-network-based collaborations (just as they can motivate such collaborations within the school, as discussed above). One aspect of technology-related professional development activities, to be described below, is the fact that they bring teachers into contact with outside resources, including not only other teachers but researchers, politicians, software developers, and administrators.

Teacher Professionalization

One of the major effects of the technology-supported education reform efforts for teachers was an increase in their involvement in professional activities. Project-related teacher professionalization enhancements can be roughly classified into two categories: (1) activities and changes in circumstances that were a part of the reform effort or technology implementation per se and (2) increased opportunities for professional activities and state- or national-level exposure that arose as a side effect of involvement in technology innovations.

Activities that were part of the projects themselves included:

• Grant writing (for teachers at John Wesley, Progressive School, Maynard Computer Mini-School, East City High School, and Bay Vista).

• Training in technology use (for all nine sites).

• Greater access to technology for own use (for John Wesley, Progressive School, School of the Future, South Creek, East City High School, Maynard Computer Mini-School).

• Collaborations with outside researchers (for Nathaniel, Progressive, and Maynard Schools).

• Increased role in school decision-making (for John Wesley).

• Collaborations with software developers (for Progressive and School of the Future).

Such activities are important not just because of what teachers learn from them but also because of their effects on teachers' self-esteem and morale.

The only reason I stay here is that they give you all this training, the tech training and the science training. They're not afraid to spend money on it, and that's really a feather in our caps as teachers.

--Fourth-grade teacher

Some of the most rewarding professional experiences described to us took place at sites with strong ongoing collaborations with external research or development groups. At the Progressive School, for example, Apple Computer paid teachers as consultants to work on developing instructional applications during their 3-week breaks. Teachers were involved also in field testing experimental software. At Nathaniel, teachers trying out CSILE had extensive interaction with the software developers and their site support team. While teachers received valuable insights into how the CSILE software might support what they were trying to do in their classes, the developers received feedback from the teachers on how the system was working. For example, teachers pointed out that the original interface was too difficult for their students to navigate; students were much more successful with the system after a new interface was implemented. In this way, the teachers gained experience as professional collaborators in a research and development activity. Similarly, at Maynard Computer Mini-School, the computer coordinator has had a long-standing relationship with external research teams, sharing in the development of research proposals and the ongoing design of research activities as well as in the resulting funding. Across the case study sites, many teachers reported that their involvement as field experts in the piloting of new technology tools and programs contributed to their sense of professionalism.

Exemplary use of technology in ways that support education reform are not widespread. For this reason, the experiences and perceptions of staff from the case study sites have been of great interest to a broader educational community and, indeed, to the general public. Professional opportunities stemming from involvement in technology-supported activities have included participation in state technology committees; election to offices in regional and national educational technology associations; receipt of funding for disseminating instructional uses of technology; participation in additional state pilot programs; consulting contracts with software developers and others, including the Edison Project; published articles in a wide range of education-related journals; being interviewed for broader mass media publications such as Newsweek, Fortune, Business Week, the Los Angeles Times, and the New York Times; and being the subject of national-level television documentaries (PBS and BBC). Table 10 provides a partial list of the conferences and publications where case study site staff gave presentations or published articles.

Table 10
Presentations and Publications by Staff at Case Study Sites

Conclusion

• High expectations regarding what all their students can accomplish

• New curricula emphasizing higher-order skills

• Constructivist, student-centered teaching methods.

Across the study sites, we found classrooms where technology was supporting movement toward these goals by providing students with new capabilities and teachers with both stimulation for their thinking about learning activities and evidence of what highly motivated students can accomplish with technology tools. At the same time, only a minority of classrooms even approached the model of technology use in the reformer's vision for classrooms of the 21st century. These were classrooms where teachers were already open to project-based, student-centered approaches and where the school environment provided supports in terms of opportunities for teacher collaboration, adequate levels of technology access, technical assistance and supported time for learning about technology, and recognition and encouragement for technology-supported projects. Although there is much to be done to develop a system that supports the broader application of technology use and constructivist teaching and learning approaches, the reports of teachers in classrooms where these innovations have been integrated suggest that the combination is a powerful one. Indeed, we found that active involvement in technology-supported innovations had become a source of inspiration and professional renewal for many teachers.

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[Effects on Students (part 2 of 2)]

[Implications for Policy, Practice and Research]