Technology in Urban SchoolsCatalystIn edited excerpts from this new report by the Education Writers Association, Catalyst takes the pulse of four cities' efforts to equip their schools and classrooms with computers. In Chicago, local school control is proving to be both a blessing and a curse. In Milwaukee, an ambitious technology plan aims to connect all 156 buildings and put mini-networks, a printer, a television and a multimedia teacher workstation in every classroom—by 2002. In Cleveland, the primary grades and their teachers got a huge head start, thanks to a state program; every classroom has three multimedia... > Read More |
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No 'cookie-cutter' solutions but a lot more workSusan DeGraneWhen Rita Gardner conducted her first classroom observation as principal of Shields Elementary School, she was struck by how little teaching had changed since she was a teacher at Shields 14 years earlier.
"I was sitting next to a little boy who had a whole world going on in his desk with spacemen and stick figures and action heroes," Gardner recalls of that day in 1991. "It occurred to me the world had changed, and the students had changed with video games and Nintendo, but education just wasn't keeping up. Nor were we preparing students with skills for real life."
As a... > Read More |
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E-mail for teachers, technology 'help desk'Priscilla PardiniIt's 8:15 a.m. Monday at Hi-Mount Community Elementary School on Milwaukee's West Side—time for morning announcements. Fifth-graders are at the microphone with information about Columbus Day, parent-teacher conferences and a school rummage sale. They lead the Pledge of Allegiance and read the lunch menu, featuring Milwaukee bratwurst.
But at Hi-Mount, students and staff don't just listen to announcements over a public-address system. That's because the announcements here come in the form of the Hi-Mount Morning News. On television monitors in each classroom, students watch the live... > Read More |
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Primary teachers get laptops, trainingShari SweeneyLaura Holzheimer knows what it's like to stare at a computer keyboard and be stymied. A veteran elementary school teacher in the Cleveland Public Schools, Holzheimer still remembers being apprehensive about installing software on her laptop computer.
Today, though, as one of approximately 50 teacher trainers in the district, Holzheimer comfortably dispenses advice to a roomful of worried teachers, all with laptop computers and all first-time users.
"Remember, you learn the most by clicking, clicking, clicking," Holzheimer says. "Explore. Talk with a friend. It wasn't so... > Read More |
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Charters learn technology sellsAmber ArellanoThe debate over what makes the critical difference in improving Detroit's schools—money or management—has grown fierce and more public than it's been in decades. This year Michigan's Republican-controlled state Legislature is expected to authorize either a state or mayoral takeover of the district's 264 schools. And for the first time, the mayor of the predominantly African-American city, Dennis Archer, who typically opposes state decision making on Detroit, announced in December he would support such a measure.
Martin Luther King Academy in Mt. Clemens, Mich., is just 20 minutes... > Read More |
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Education technology resources on-lineBernice YeungTechnology Counts '98:
Putting School Technology to the Test
A special report from Education Week gauges the effectiveness of technological learning in schools. The site includes case studies, data, a test score study and state-by-state charts.
Teacher Zone
Teacher Zone helps elementary school teachers and principals assimilate technology into their lesson plans with suggested lesson plans, tips for technology planning and funding, classroom Internet resources and more. This award-winning site also provides links to more education technology sites... > Read More |
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Learning 'a second language'Susan DeGraneIt's nearly noon on a Monday at Daniel Carter Beard School, a small school for special education students ages 3 to 9 on Chicago's Northwest Side. Eighteen teachers, a principal and the school's technology coordinator are gathered in the library to attend a workshop on the basics of using a Macintosh.
Helen Hoffenberg, a teacher trainer from the district's Department of Learning Technologies, begins by polling teachers about their use of computers. Most say they use computers for word processing. A few write e-mail letters to sons and daughters away at college. But almost all... > Read More |
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Fenger, Chicago Ag, Shields out frontSusan DeGraneFor all the obstacles it faces, Chicago does have schools that are making exemplary use of technology. At Fenger Academy High School in Roseland, for example, students use computers with an innovative science curriculum that emphasizes the environment.
Four years ago, the school started teaching environmental science and was looking for a way to bring more technology into its classes, says biology teacher Karen Baker. To suit its own special needs, the school adapted an interactive science activities program known as CoVis, which had been developed by Northwestern University. ...> Read More |
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Distance learningPriscilla PardiniIt's second period at Milwaukee's Washington High School, and Dennis Rashka is teaching Advanced Placement calculus. The lesson is on derivatives, the slope of a curve at a particular point on that curve. "Are you with me?" Rashka asks the six students sitting in front of him in the classroom as well as the two additional students whose images appear on an oversized television screen set up at the back of the room.
The two girls are students at Marshall High School, located about 3.5 miles northwest of Washington. Because Marshall doesn't have enough students to warrant its own AP... > Read More |
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