Technology Plan of Improvement: Northridge Elementary

Technology Plan of Improvement

Northridge Elementary
Amy Armstrong
University of Oklahoma

Technology Plan of Improvement: Northridge Elementary

Technology Plan of Improvement
Edmodo, Evernote, Type to Learn, Kids Pix, Notability, Screenchomp, and so much
more! These computer programs and tablet applications are becoming increasingly popular in
society. Students of today know technology and use it daily. Papa refers to todays students as
being digital natives, meaning they have keen insight into the ways technology may be used to
enhance their understanding both in and outside of the school system (Papa, 2011). As students
become increasingly engaged in technology, schools must find ways to captivate students. The
International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) is fervently working to create
standards for students, teachers, and administrators. ISTE standards were formerly known as the
NETS. These standards are available to educators. If schools, are aware and using the ISTE
standards, the teachers are more likely engaging students through technology.
Like most schools, Northridge is a part of a district that strongly encourages technology
integration into the classroom and uses the ISTE standards to write district technology plans and
curriculum. All three sets of standards are used to promote technology integration (M.
Kennemer, personal communication, June, 2014). Putnam City is one of the largest districts in
Oklahoma City Metro area. Through district technology plans, bond proposals, and tech
professional development, it is apparent that Putnam City supports technology integration.
Although the district promotes technology integration, Northridge, one of eighteen elementary
schools in the district, as a whole is only scratching the surface of proper technology integration.
After speaking with the principal, media specialist, and two teachers, it is evident many teachers
lack the enthusiasm to integrate technology in any way, let a lone in meaningful ways. The
personal and email interviews conducted, provided examples of technology strengths and
weaknesses at the district and site level (K. McLaughlin, personal communication, June 2014).

Technology Plan of Improvement: Northridge Elementary

Technology is readily available to the teachers at Northridge. It is personal preference as to how
technology is integrated into the curriculum.
Northridge has a wealth of old and new technology available for teachers to check out
and use throughout the year. B. Miller, the library media specialist responsible for device
checkout, provided a list of technology available to the teachers. Each teacher checks out a
projector, document camera, and iPad. On top of the checkouts, each classroom has a desktop,
and printer. There are sixteen Smartboards mounted in different teachers rooms (Personal
communication, June, 2014). According to the principal, K. McLaughlin, the primary grade
teachers that will use them, will all have a Smartboard. Grades 3-5 all have access to multiple
iPads and some of those classes have class sets of iPads (Personal communication, June, 2014).
The school has over 300 iPads that are distributed throughout every grade. Nine teachers in the
building have a class set of iPads. Some of those who have class sets use them to beneficially
integrate technology into the classroom while others are simply substituting something they have
always done with an app on the iPad (K. McLaughlin, personal communication, June 2014).
Strengths of technology integration
One of the greatest strengths of Northridge is simply the availability of technology for
teachers. As shown above, the school owns and distributes a large amount of technology to its
teachers to be used by both students and teachers. Northridge also benefits immensely from the
districts vision and goals of technology integration. If it were not for the Visionary Leadership
at the district level, Northridge would not have all the technology it does and it would not have
the professional development provided. Through the district office Northridge has access to the
district technology plan and funds to purchase up-to-date technology. Northridge also has access
to the free technology workshops offered both in the summer and during the school year.

Technology Plan of Improvement: Northridge Elementary

Although K. McLaughlin said she would really like all her teachers to attend classes, it is not a
requirement (Personal communication, June, 2014).
To focus on the strengths of the individual school, the ISTE standards for both teachers
and administrators need to be consulted as some strengths are found in the leadership and others
are found directly with the teacher.
ISTE Teachers: 1 Facilitate and inspire student learning and creativity
B. Miller indicated that 10% of the teachers at Northridge are top technology users,
meaning technology is integrated in meaningful ways within those two classes. From
observations of the projects and tasks completed and required of the students within the
individual classroom, Miller sees that student learning is inspired and creative (Personal
communication, June 2014). After speaking with A. Oneth, a fifth grade teacher identified by
both B. Miller and K. McLaughlin as being a high technology user, an interview was completed
with her. Using Edmodo as the platform, A. Oneth created a game based reading program. This
is only one of the ways technology is integrated (Personal communication, June 2014). Other
teachers in the building are also using technology to inspire student learning and creativity.
Through Google maps, students are able to relate to the geographical location different historical
events that took place. Some of the classes at Northridge provide opportunities for students to
research a topic of their choice (A. Oneth, & A. Armstrong, Personal communication, June
2014).
ISTE Administrators: Visionary Leadership
After talking with the principal, K. McLaughlin, she strongly encourages her teachers to
write grants and pursue Donors choose projects in order to receive more technology. As the
building principal, she solicits the ideas and desires of the teachers when using district or cite

Technology Plan of Improvement: Northridge Elementary

money to purchase technology. When a teacher presents an idea to McLaughlin, she wisely
consults the budget but works to provide the technology for the staff. In an interview with K.
McLaughlin, she said, I would love for them to use it to engage students and be comfortable
enough with technology that they feel they can use the technology to enhance instruction. Her
desire is to have a high tech school with a technology vision.
ISTE Teachers: 2 Design and develop digital age learning experiences and assessments
Although not every teacher in the building does this, there are lower and upper
elementary teachers who truly are using technology to create phenomenal learning experiences
for students. Some of the second grade teachers use technology, Blabberize, to engage students
in biographies of different historical people. This is only one example among many others that
describe the digital age learning experiences happening at the school.
ISTE Administrators: 3 Excellence in professional practice
Northridge has a technology committee headed by one of the top technology integrators
in the building and media specialist. This committee was started this past year and met twice.
Although a weak committee at this point, the school has begun the process of having a learning
community that stimulates, nurtures and supports administrators, faculty, and staff in the study
and use of technology (International Society for Technology in Education, 2014).
Another strength within professional practice is the communication within the school.
Each week K. McLaughlin sends out updates to the teachers and staff. The school
communicates upcoming events, special days at schools, etc., through a program called
SchoolMessenger. ISTE Teachers: 3 Model digital age work and learning ties directly to
the communication strength at Northridge, but takes the focus to the teachers. Each of the

Technology Plan of Improvement: Northridge Elementary

teachers communicates with parents through email. Approximately 40% of the staff utilizes the
website program provided by the district.
ISTE administrators: 4. Systemic improvement
Northridge participates in Professional Learning Communities (PLC) by grade level.
Within the PLCs, the teachers are required to bring data about their students and collaborate
with the other teachers. According to K. McLaughlin and the teachers interviewed, Data is
brought in multiple electronic forms. One program that has been used for a few years is called
Mastery Connect. Mastery Connect is the district site to house benchmark assessments and
scores. Charts and graphs that show areas of strengths and weaknesses are produced with one
click. Teachers can use this data to identify areas in which their students are thriving and those
with which the students are struggling. Another website that has only been used a few times is
ALCA. This program houses all state testing scores for the students in the building. Scores can
be sorted by gender, grade, and ethnicity. The last and main program used by the teachers was
new this past year. It is AIMSweb. Through AIMSweb, students who are falling behind are
tracked. The data provides trend lines after interventions have been implemented. The data is
talked about with the committee of teachers and plan of improvements for the students are
implemented (K. McLaughlin, personal communication, June 2014).
Weakness of technology program
The biggest strength of the technology program for Northridge was the amount of
technology readily accessible to teachers is also one of the weaknesses. Because the technology
has been so easily accessible, teachers have not had to attend appropriate technology professional
development. Without the proper training, much of the technology is sitting in classrooms
unused.

Technology Plan of Improvement: Northridge Elementary

ISTE Administrators: 1 Visionary Leadership
Northridge does not have a goal or mission statement for technology usage (Euting &
Stephenson, 2013). According to Euting and Stephenson, without a vision statement, teachers
cannot know the true direction that the leaders of the school want to go. Although some of the
teachers are highly fluent with technology, there are many other teachers who are not and choose
to not use technology in their classrooms. Only some of the faculty are inspired to use
technology and it is only because of personal interest. To ensure all teachers are using
technology in powerful ways, administration must create evaluation systems for technology
usage and help teachers to expand at their current level of comfort.
ISTE Administrator 2 Digital age learner
Although technology is readily available to teachers, many are not using the technology.
Instructional innovation is not required for teachers. K. McLaughlin said in an interview,
although this is ultimately what she wants, she has other issues that take precedent over ensuring
teachers are using technology for innovative learning. Without the push from administration,
some teachers in the building will stay where they are comfortable and refuse to implement new
strategies and techniques.
No site professional development is available for the teachers. Although the principal
encourages teachers to access the online calendar and attend off site professional development,
the distance and time keeps teachers from attending (Papa, 2011). The lack of on site
professional development hinders teachers from experience continuing growth and more
individualized training. Each teacher is at a different level and professional development would
be more beneficial if it was differentiated. As said before, teachers must be met at their level of

Technology Plan of Improvement: Northridge Elementary

comfort, just as teachers meet students, and pushed from there. Differentiated instruction for
technology integration must occur for teachers.
ISTE Teacher 2 Design and develop digital age learning experiences and assessments
Teachers have access to plenty of professional development tied to technology, but in an
already busy career, many times the exhausted teachers go home to tend to families instead of
driving over to administration and attending an all evening workshop. Without the proper
training of the technology many teachers lack the motivation to progress. On top of the time
constraints, the district with the expectation that it would be used has already provided
curriculum. This causes a problem when technology is not written in or attached to the
curriculum (Ertmer, Ottenbreit-Leftwwich, Sadik, Sendurur, & Sendurur, 2012). To address the
curriculum issue, the district curriculum committees are going to have to start inserting
technology integration practices directly into provided curriculum. Many teachers need to see
quality tech integration.
ISTE Administrators: 4 Systemic improvements
The district has worked hard to provide an infrastructure that can handle and maintain
high number of devices within the building. Even with the changes that have been made, within
the school, the Wi-Fi drops different computers and devices depending on the location in the
building. The infrastructure is not something that the school site can fix, but it is a problem that
is being addressed at the district office and continually pursued.
ISTE Administrators: 5 Digital Citizenship & Teachers: 4 Promote and model digital
citizenship and responsibility
To teach something well, it is important to understand the concepts. A main problem at
Northridge Elementary is the lack of understanding of digital citizenship. Digital citizenship

Technology Plan of Improvement: Northridge Elementary

encompasses a variety of things from copyright laws to social interactions online. One way
digital citizenship is taught at school is through modeling. Some teachers at Northridge break
copyright laws daily by using pictures from Google on PowerPoint without citing sources. Other
teachers play movies or books that were purchased once but shared multiple times. Students are
unclear of expectations and rules when they get on technology. Although the district provides an
Internet agreement form that must be signed by parents before students get online, not much
follow through happens with the agreement. With the uncertainty of expectations and
guidelines, students cross lines without thinking. Many times students use pictures from the
Internet for projects just like their teacher does. No one is teaching the students any different.
The digital natives, although fluent with the technology, do not have the best use ethics and
standards.
Curriculum and programs need to be designed and implemented within daily classrooms.
Teachers need to be educated on proper digital citizenship expectations and then in turn need to
use innovative and inspiring ways to make their students outstanding digital citizenships (Levy,
2011) (Papa, 2011).
Site recommendations for improving technology program
Both strengths and weaknesses have been addressed in relationship to Northridges site
technology program. As in most cases things can constantly be improved, especially when it
comes to teaching the digital natives. The improvements have been separated into short-term,
fiscal year, and long-term, approximately five year, plans.
Mission and vision statement: The first thing Northridge needs to do to head their
school in the right direction is to create a mission and vision statement. According to Euting
and Stephenson, a critical aspect of a successful technology program is held in the peril of a

Technology Plan of Improvement: Northridge Elementary

mission and vision. The faculty, staff, and students must know what the goal of the technology
use in the building is. Northridge already has a committee that meets; the first task of the
committee will be to decide the direction of technology use in the school. Using the outline for a
mission and vision statement that is given in Going One to One, the committee needs to write
and then share with everyone (Euting & Stephenson, 2013). As the committee is formulating the
statements, it is important to address these questions: 1. How will it serve learning? 2. How will
you integrate the technology into everyday instruction (Euting & Stephenson, 2013)?
As the mission and vision statements become the foundation for all technology
integration at Northridge, the school will begin to expand on the technology being used. The
second step to improving the technology plan is to help each teacher in the building implement
more technology than they use currently. Papa describes a mentor program in her book
Technology Leadership for School Improvement. The mentor has the task of connecting with
the mentee and building a relationship. After the relationship is established, the mentor engages
in a process of inquiry, reflection and decision making with the protg rather than transmit
knowledge and then evaluate the protgs conformity to it. When teachers are required to do
some thing, many times the attitude lacks. Within the mentor program, the inexperienced
teachers (in the realm of technology usage) are pushed to explore technology integration, but
allowed the freedom to do so in his or her way. The mentors are available and provide support to
the teachers learning (Papa, 2011).
Administrators model for school: One of the biggest weaknesses with Northridges
technology plan includes the large amount of technology available but the lack of professional
development. In this first year of technology improvement, Northridge administrators will begin
to integrate technology and model acceptable integrations. A support administrative team in the

Technology Plan of Improvement: Northridge Elementary

realm of technology integration is suggested to improve tech integration (Karaca, Can, &
Yildririm, 2013). During faculty meetings administrators will begin using interactive websites
and activities that actively engage. Nearpod can be used along with slide shows as information
is being presented (Nearpod, 2014). A tool used by a few teachers in the building is Google
drive. If the teachers used this in faculty meetings and PLCs, collaboration and sharing would
be taken to the next level, which is wanted in the classrooms based on the SAMR model (Lepi,
2014). If teachers are shown the interactive ways to use technology and trained on it, they will
begin to feel more comfortable and use technology on their own (Karaca, Can, & Yildririm,
2013).
Onsite professional development: In Etmers study of teachers beliefs, the lack of
professional development is cited for one of the biggest reasons for not integrating technology.
With this being the case, professional development must be available and required for teachers
(Ertmer, Ottenbreit-Leftwwich, Sadik, Sendurur, & Sendurur, 2012). Although the district
provides numerous technology professional development trainings, it is not convenient for the
teachers to attend. For Northridge to provide mini PDs throughout the year and onsite, the
teachers would be able to afford the time spent. According to Papa, professional development
needs to fit the needs of the teachers and reach and attack problems the teachers are currently
facing. With the professional development being done by site teachers and on site, the PD can
be tailored to fit the staff at Northridge (Papa, 2011). Knowing that a few of the teachers use
Skype to talk to long distance relatives, the first professional development day will be a 15-30
minute lesson on using Skype in the classroom. The PD presenter needs to find where the
teachers are currently and move forward from there. Another concern at the school is digital

Technology Plan of Improvement: Northridge Elementary

citizenship and another mini professional development should pertain to teacher copyright laws
and student safety online.
Digital citizenship curriculum: To address the issues of digital citizenship, the school
is creating a technology classroom that will be in the specials rotation. A large focus in the class
is digital citizenship. Through curriculum found online and created (based on ISTE standards),
the students will engage in proper technology handling, Internet safety, and Cyberbullying. The
first year of the technology plan will focus on the students in the classroom. According to Peter
Levy, in his article Confronting Cyberbullying, it is important to spend class time teaching
proper online behavior and consequences of Cyberbullying (Levy, 2011). With the curriculum
pressure in regular education classes, the technology class will ensure students learn netiquette.
Papa lists resources in his book. One of the many websites in the section of digital safety and
security is www.cybersmart.org/hom. Cybersmart is connected with CommonSensemedia.org
and has created curriculum for digital citizenship. The curriculum on the website will be the
majority of curriculum used in the Northridges computer lab class (Digital Literacy and
Citizenship Classroom Curriculum, 2014).
Long-term improvement plan (5 year)
An important factor in technology integration is long-term plans. According to Papa,
schools address pieces of whole problems in hopes of fixing the problem. Technology
integration cannot be addressed one year and then expected to thrive. Much of the plan in year
one, is just the beginning of technology integration at Northridge. Some of the programs will be
expanded on in the following years and new ones will be implemented. Technology integration
is a process, one in which everyone will be involved with after a couple of years. In Technology
Leadership for School Improvement, Papa discusses that change only happens when teachers are

Technology Plan of Improvement: Northridge Elementary

involved in the process. The focus of the long-term goals will be to build a community in which
teachers mentor one another in technology integration (Papa, 2011).
Vision and mission statement: In the first year, the vision and mission statement was
written following Eutings guidelines. Over the following years, the statements will be revisited
and tweaked to improve as the goals develop (Euting & Stephenson, 2013). The technology
committee will need to continue to meet and help the teachers to form goals for innovate
technology that focuses on learning (Papa, 2011). Once the committee has a firm direction and
statements at hand, they will begin to move forward with finding and evaluating technology to
share with the teachers in the professional development piece of the improvement plan.
Applications and Web 2.0 resources that will be modeled by administrators needs to be aligned
with the vision and mission statements created and promoted by the technology committee.
Administrators model for school: As a part of involving teachers in the community,
teachers will need to see benefits of using the technology at different levels. After mastering and
allowing teachers to become comfortable with two different technology integration pieces in year
one, the principals will begin implementing more technology into faculty meetings. At
Northridge, some of the faculty meetings are and will be used to discuss and learn the new
teacher evaluation system. As part of this, the principal and TLE teacher leader do a great job of
using classroom strategies to help the teachers learn the material (K. McLaughlin, personal
communication, 2014). Instead of doing paper pencil learning strategies, technology-learning
strategies need to be incorporated. Using the iPad application BiaBoard, teachers join together
on the same board and share ideas. Teachers must become aware of the possibilities and become
comfortable with using them. There is no better way than having teachers use the technology
together. This also ties to Papas idea of building a community and having teachers partner with

Technology Plan of Improvement: Northridge Elementary

the administration (Papa, 2011). Through the technology committee, the principal will learn new
technology and share with the rest of the staff by modeling its function.
On-going professional development: Continuing from year one, the school needs to
provide professional development for teachers. The professional development on site needs to
be small scale but continual. To start year two off, the professional development will be on how
to help kids research. According to B. Miller, the library media specialist, faculty and students at
Northridge struggle to do quality research (Personal communication, June 2014). Because
information is readily available to students, it is pertinent that students know how to access
information appropriately. Teachers will have 30-minute professional trainings that allow for
times of sharing and then exploring further options. A part of the community building discussed
by Papa, the teachers need to tackle specific problems that are being faced at the time; it is also
important to focus on the curriculum they have already been given (Papa, 2011). Through both
the problems faced at Northridge and the pre-determined curriculum, different teachers on the
technology committee will lead professional development. Research skills are only one of the
many professional development series that will be presented at Northridge.
Digital citizenship training for teachers, students, & parents: After the first year of
beginning the process of teaching students about digital citizenship and Internet safety, it will
continue in the next several years. The goal will be to focus on different aspects of digital
citizenship as a part of each grade levels computer curriculum. Because the goal is to increase
technology integration within the building, it will also be important that teachers know and help
reinforce digital citizenship within the classroom. Using Common Sense Media teacher
professional development curriculum for digital citizenship, teachers will be provided with more

Technology Plan of Improvement: Northridge Elementary

in depth training over the second and third year (Digital Literacy and Citizenship Classroom
Curriculum, 2014).
A program under the teacher includes parental digital citizenship classes. According to
Levy, parents play an important role in digital citizenship. Many parents are not aware of some
applications and websites students are using. Parents need to know ethical use of technology so
they can model and practice at home (Levy, 2011). Quarterly classes will be offered in
conjunction with parent teacher conferences that teaches parents how to practice digital
citizenship as well as monitor their childs behaviors at home.
Conclusion
In our ever-increasing technology society, technology has come to play an important role
in education. Although national, state, and district mandates are requiring and encouraging
schools to integrate more and more technology into the schools, Northridge Elementary is far
behind where it needs to be. While a few teachers are inspiring student learning, many are
holding onto traditional approaches.
Northridge needs a new vision and mission statement for technology integration along
with goals for the future. Relying on the already created technology committee, the school will
begin to build technology integration modeling programs and on site professional development
based on the mission and vision statement. The technology committee this first year will build
the foundation for the later improvements.
As the Technology committee begins to develop goals, mission, and vision statements,
they will then share the vision with the rest of the school through mini professional
developments as well as a mentoring program for the other teachers. The technology committee
will form relationships with other teachers and help to increase their technology integration

Technology Plan of Improvement: Northridge Elementary

beginning with areas the teachers are most comfortable. Administrators at Northridge will also
rely on the evaluation of technology tools to begin modeling technology at faculty meetings.
The improvement of technology integration will be a collaborative and community
building process that involves all the staff over time. Although short-term plans for the following
fiscal year are set and in place, to ensure a lasting change, a five year plan has been developed to
sustain the direction of the technology committee. Differentiated technology instruction for
teachers will derive from the technology committees plan and mentoring of fellow teachers in
the building. The staff will be stretched and engaged through a series of professional
development that address specific needs in the school.

Technology Plan of Improvement: Northridge Elementary

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Technology Plan of Improvement: Northridge Elementary