Tech Tools as More Than a Substitution

Much of the United States is back to school, in one format or another, with the remainder of those schools that are still in summer mode soon to follow suit. In my backyard, my kids' district is starting the 2020-21 year with 100% remote learning, while several other area schools scrapped plans to return to in-person learning in the last 48-hours. These local districts range in size and socioeconomic makeup. In the largest districts in the US, there is a mix of return plans, as well. NYC, the country's largest district, is offering a blended learning approach when students return next month. LAUSD, the second-largest school district in the country, returned from summer break as a 100% online learning model this week. Currently, we at Project ARC are working with several schools in LAUSD in our new online APLEs course as they prepare to teach online with an authentic project learning experience approach to their pedagogical practice.

As much as many teachers yearn to return to "normal" classrooms, we know our remote, blended, and even socially distanced classes must look much different than school as we knew it did six months ago. And, I'm not so sure that is a bad thing - at least not in the long run. However, the question remains whether or not our districts are returning to school with an effective pedagogical approach. I fear that many of these districts will merely return to a model of this past spring that the Wall Street Journal noted was a "massive failure."

Part of the spring's massive failure was a result of the need to shift to online learning overnight without any preparation by our districts. However, we have now had months of summer vacation to get ready to go back to a school environment impacted by COVID-19. And, I know that teachers have been working all summer to try and prepare for the inevitable changes to their classrooms that must include technology as a driver of learning. Now is the time to reevaluate how we will implement technology tools as we build online, blended, and even face-to-face learning communities that are a result of our continued health concerns. As we settle into logistical routines this school, let's move beyond YouTube videos and online worksheets to educate the future of our world. And, while online routines may be important, consider the depth of the tools you are using.

For those of you who know me well and have read my books on PBL, you know that I advocate for high-level Bloom's, authentic project learning experiences. To get a sense of how to implement these types of projects, I wrote about an infrastructure challenge as it related to the shutdown of much of the world a few months ago. However, developing authentic project learning experiences can only get you so far unless you know how to utilize the technology to support the co-design, implementation, and assessment of the project process.

For help in considering what tools to use and how, we, at Project ARC, spent time this spring developing an infographic to show how learner agency and teacher practice is supported with technology tools via the SAMR framework. Instead of acquiring the skills to use one tool, we now focus on how these tools provide us with ways to level-up how we create collaborative ecosystems of learning. The tools shared cover writing, discussion, presentation, and curation on the learner agency side. For teacher practice, we included lessons, management, data, and assessment. Each example provided aligns with one of the SAMR levels. The way in which the tool is used, however, ultimately determines its placement in the framework, as there is a possible overlap.

Let's take a look at how we move through one of the levels in learner agency to get a sense of how the infographic is constructed. Since we have spent so much time on Zoom over the last several months, I will focus on the discussion section of the infographic. Zoom, the way most are using it, directly substitutes for an in-person, direct instruction experience with a talking head (either the teacher or a student) or a small group chat in breakout rooms that are similar to a group discussion in a face-to-face class. If we move into the augmentation portion of the infographic, we see that the use of Padlet ups the level of usage. Here, students can post their thoughts on the virtual wall and include links to sites, videos, or pictures to support their ideas. More importantly, learners can link to others' posts and describe the connection between the ideas. Now, we have functional improvement possibilities related to online discussions. Next, immersing our learners in a Backchannel Chat creates the opportunity for them to watch a video together and comment, in real-time, their thoughts and ideas. This is in lieu of writing down ten facts to submit to the teachers. Finally, we see the use of Etherpad, as a real-time collaborative writing tool, creates the space for a written discussion. The discussion has a replay feature for the teacher to follow along to see how the chat unfolds.

Teacher practice follows a similar path as learner agency. Using the assessment portion of the infographic, we can see that immediate results from quiz applications such as Kahoot have a place in our online teaching, similar to the process that we might use in the brick and mortar classroom. The use of EdPuzzle gives us the opportunity to embed quizzes within a video. While this levels up our practice slightly, we have to use this formative assessment opportunity to inform our instruction. Otherwise, we end up with a situation like this: a geometry student watches a video on how to complete a series of problems. For each portion of the instructional video, a corresponding question pops up. The student is required to pass the quiz before moving onto the next lesson. If the student doesn't pass the quiz, they must re-watch the video and take the quiz again. The failure in this method is that the formative assessment conducted isn't used to adjust instruction to meet the needs of the learner! Thus, rewatching the video isn't going to do much good a second time around and certainly not a third or fourth time. By now, the learner shuts down. Instead, we can again level-up our practice to include the use of Google Forms to analyze each survey question completed by a student and by the whole class. This information provides the data we need to plan for individual, small group, or whole group activities. And, if we really want to improve our assessment practice according to SAMR, the use of Flipgrid gives our learners the forum to provide videos as an assessment collection tool. Moreover, video responses to the original submissions are possible for feedback from peers, as well as the teacher.

If you like the screenshots above and are interested in receiving our Project ARC SAMR Framework Infographic, drop a line to [email protected]. Over the last few weeks, we have done several online presentations regarding the infographic and the relationship to our infrastructure project for folks in the US, UK, Kenya, Kazakhstan, and Australia. Our online APLE course also uses this infographic as the framework for the modeling that we do for best practices in online teaching and learning. We, at Project ARC, hope that you find value in thinking about your choice of technology tools as you integrate them into your authentic project learning experiences and beyond.