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Technology team will help infuse schools with latest aids by Josh Verges, Argus Leader A newly formed "innovation group" of teachers, administrators and others aims to help the Sioux Falls School District make smarter decisions about technology purchases. Teachers will apply for money to test out new devices and software. At the end of the school year, the oversight group will evaluate the results and decide whether the methods should be scaled up. "If it is successful, it could move into other classrooms or districtwide," Bob Jensen, the district's information services director, told the school board last week during a report on the updated technology plan. Deb Wolf, a chemistry teacher working as an instructional coach for high school teachers, will be on the team that evaluates new strategies involving technology. She said iPads, for example, are new and appealing to educators, but it remains to be seen how useful they can be in a classroom. "We want to be able to really say, yes, it is an effective tool for teaching high school math, or here's something else that works better," Wolf said. "We don't want to just say: 'Here's some money, and go try whatever you want to.' " The group represents a significant shift in the way the district decides who gets technology and when. Typically, new hardware and software has been purchased by subject area at the same time as that subject's curriculum reviews, which are on a seven-year rotation. So, if an algebra teacher found a new software program for class, he'd have to wait as many as seven years to make it part of the math curriculum. "The goal here is to speed up the process of experimenting with new technology," Jensen said. Using iPods, iPads to help students |
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