The CEO School Technology and Readiness (STaR) Chart

Overview

The CEO School Technology and Readiness (STaR) Chart provides a fairly effective measuring system for a school's effectiveness in ICT integration. However, it is not an absolute measure since the different categories presented may see a school having high ratings in one category and low ratings in another, resulting in difficulty determining a definite indicator level for the school. Even with this draw back, the chart can give administrators a good idea as to a school's level in the various categories and enable them better plan their developmental programs for ICT integration, inclusive of staff development and resource acquisition. Importantly, in planning, administrators have a very good idea of what areas and resources need to be focused on to get the school to each stage of development.

In examining the chart in relation to the Intermediate High School, I have looked at the following categories:

Hardware and Connectivity

Digital Content

Student Achievement and Assessment

Hardware and Connectivity

The school is in the Early Tech stage of this category. There is an IT lab which has the capacity to house an average class comfortably, with one computer per student. However, due to scheduling challenges for subjects other than IT, most classes would be unable to have such a ratio of computers to students. While some students own netbooks as part of 'one-laptop-per-child' initiative, many of the netbooks have been damaged. Therefore, in the regular classroom, there is a very high ratio of students to computers.

Internet connectivity is excellent as all classrooms and offices have adequate access to a stable internet connection. However, there are no computers installed in regular classrooms to allow independent classroom use. A multimedia projector is also available for use to teachers. There is little use of other forms of hardware technology.

Digital Content

The school falls into the Early Tech stage in this category. Learning is teacher centered and limited use is made of digital content to supplement instruction and reinforce basic academical skills. Better hardware support in the classroom or a secondary laboratory that can result in a computer-student ratio of even five students to a computer may encourage further use of digital content.

Student Achievement and Assessment

Since there is little overall integration of ICT in the classroom, measuring student achievement from an ICT perspective is almost non-applicable. An assessment of student skill improvement can not be done since little digital content is used to develop those skills and measure their developmental process. The digital process is not integrated into the assessment of subject matter though this is an avenue that can be systematically introduced without great difficulty.

The school does not have a web site and therefore not portal to communicate with parents via the web.

The rating here is also at the Early Tech stage.

Conclusion

All in all, the Intermediate High School is at the Early Tech level and requires a significant amount of planning and strategizing to move to the next level.

Teaching Spaces & Curriculum Delivery

Teaching Spaces

Comfortable and conducive learning spaces are critical to students' growth.  The traditional classroom setup is to have rows of students all facing a chalkboard to be receptive to the 'all-knowing teacher' at the front of the class.  However, that suits one type of learning and delivery and does not work for all styles of teaching/learning, especially those including ICT.

A classroom which provides access to online resources and multimedia is critical to ICT integration.  The layout of such a classroom can be quite varied depending on needs and teaching approach.  Perhaps the most suitable layout is one which is very flexible - furniture is easily movable:  this includes student's desks and chairs, as well as the resource centers/desks (classroom computer desk - printer, scanner, computer and other peripherals station).  This allows for teachers to best shape the classroom layout to what is necessary for a given lesson.

Curriculum Delivery

All teachers must routinely examine their teaching methods and success in order to ensure they are delivering the best content to students in the most effective way and achieving satisfactory results.  For centuries this has been part of the arsenal for good self-analysis puts the teacher in a better tactical position.  From a historical context there is clearly no reason to wait for ICT before examining one's teaching methods - these types of technology are very new in the history of the teaching profession - teachers have been and will continue to evaluate their teaching methods with or without ICT.  To do otherwise will be disastrous. 

ICT can assist teachers in their personal assessment since certain tools can be used to gain statistics more readily than through manual means.  For instance, if electronic testing is done, a teacher can quickly assess the topic questions that were poorly answered and those which were well assimilated, resulting clear statistics for re-teaching and knowing at what stage to move forward.  The fact that many statistics can be maintained in digital form also allows for long-term self-analysis and student trends, this in turn, leads to redefining programs to better reach students.

School Staff Development

Staff development is a critical aspect of ICT incorporation in education.  In some schools, there are established programs geared towards developing ICT skills among staff, in others, such programs are nonexistent. 

At one of the schools I teach, there is no staff development program for ICT.  This school has an IT lab and multimedia projectors and many students own netbooks.  However, most students use the netbooks for gaming and the school has inadequate resources for ICT integration.  Furthermore, teachers training in ICT is limited.

In preparing a staff development programme for ICT, the following principles are important considerations:

1. Identifying and acquiring adequate resources;
2. Resource sharing and management;
3. ICT integration vs teaching ICT;
4. Teaching/learning strategies for ICT integration;
5. The need for careful lesson planning;
6. Adequate support structures;
7. Security and;
8. Ongoing staff training and assessment.

Hopefully, an effective program for staff development in ICT will be put in place soon.

"The basis of all learning is wonder."

~L Darrien Ollivierre

Role of the Teacher in ICT Integration

In Steve Wheeler speech to the National Czech Teachers Conference, he outlined some of the benefits that ICT can bring to the classroom.  These included shared learning spaces, shared learning resources, the promotion of collaborative learning, and the move towards autonomous learning.

He indicated that in the UK the government spent large sums of money to encourage schools to embrace ICT; this involved spending on physical resources and equipment and importantly, on teacher training.  In the US investments were made in centralized systems that could broadcast information to a network of schools simultaneously.  This allowed for a lot of autonomous learning by students in which they prepared projects without significant teacher involvement apart from general guidance.  In Minneapolis, 90 students became aware of any-time-anywhere-learning after they were loaned laptops and encouraged to do a lot of personal, unscheduled work/studies.

These research findings raised concerns about the role teachers will play in the ICT integrated classroom; concerns about how much control teachers lose to both the technology and to the students.  In fact, the research even led some to question the very need for teachers in light of ICT and concepts like collaborative and autonomous learning among students.


I believe that a certain level of autonomous learning is good. It helps the students to focus on the things that most spark their imagination. However, core curriculum is still going to be critical. Therefore, a lot of guidance is still going to be needed in order to achieve certain goals. While some may be concerned about teachers becoming more of a moderator than a director, this may not be a well founded fear. Remember, autonomous learning does not prevent the instructor from participating. The teacher can facilitate a certain amount of learning this way by providing a framework of content that needs to be learnt and then give the students a certain level of independence in how they go about examining, learning and demonstrating understanding of the content. Throughout this process, the teacher is still questioning, challenging, explaining - teaching. The key is in deciding how to aptly structure such activities to ensure this all takes place and that enough supervision and guidance is achieved.

Integrated Approach

Computer literacy is about being versed on computers in some aspect; whether this means being versed at the inner workings of the computer (such as the computing aspects of the system, system design and operation, system logic, binary and hexadecimal structures etc.) or being able to effectively operate certain software for productivity, research, communication, entertainment and so on (such as database management, internet usage, email and social networking, gaming etc.). It is simply a matter of what aspects of computers a person is literate in and to what extent. A biologist may be very literate in marine biology while another may be very literate in insects or desert creatures; neither may be very literate in the other's field.

While the pundits have left computer literacy with no absolute definition, the integrated approach is an APPROACH to computer literacy in which various ICT skills/knowledge are acquired. This means that it is part of the computer literacy process but it is NOT computer literacy in of itself. For example, rather than coming into a class to learn how to send an email, the integrated approach in a Geography class would perhaps have students learn how to send an email as part of a wider lesson in which the objective is to share collected weather data with the local Met Office. In this scenario, the objective is to share data with the Met Office, NOT to learn how to send emails (which is something that would more likely be a IT lesson objective).

In the integrated approach, ICT skills are essentially developed in a manner secondary to the main subject content.  In a way, the students learn these skills without even thinking of acquiring the skills, their primary focus is the main subject area and the ICT skills is merely a 'cool' byproduct of what they are studying.  To some extent, this method of learning ICT skills is very favourable to the students because they are not 'worried' about passing ICT - they do not feel any anxiety with those skills being assessed for a grade.

Challenges

The integrated approach to ICT had a number of challenges however.  These include:

1) Identifying and applying context for integration:  It can be very time consuming for teachers to examine and identify aspects of their curriculum in which they can integrate ICT effectively.  The use of ICT in a lesson must be well planned.

2) The ability to craft the curriculum in such a way as to allow for integration:  Teachers must be skilled/knowledgeable in the ICT options available so as to reshape the curriculum to effectively factor in ICT.

3) Inadequate equipment and facilities to allow for use in classrooms other than the IT labs:  It is necessary to have appropriate equipment to use ICT.  Furthermore, the classroom environment or work area must be conducive to the use of ICT (and must be secure).  In light of the cost to put these things in place, the provisions at many institutions are inadequate.

4) Long planning times initially:  The three items above can be very time consuming to put in place.

5) Large class sizes:  In classes with many students, managing both the students and equipment can be very challenging.  In addition, much more group activities may need to be designed in order to 'stretch' the ICT resources that are available.

Responsibility

From a general standpoint, it is the responsibility of all teachers to assist students in the process of becoming computer literate. When we talk about processes like the integrated approach, it may not be most accurate to say we are 'teaching' computer literacy. In this approach we are teaching other concepts of our curricula while accessing ICT skills. With such approaches however, all teachers have some responsibility to guide students to the awareness and development of certain ICT skills. The students also have a responsibility to hone these skills and share them with their colleagues.

It is also the responsibility of the IT instructor to educate students through the IT curriculum to cover things like the inner workings of the computer, software packages and so on.

Since there are different schools of thought on what being 'computer literate' means.  Responsibility may vary at different institutions.  Some guiding philosophies may result in the IT teacher being the person who handles all things ICT, even the process of integrating into different classes - this may be evident in this person being required to provide all technical support to other teachers when they integrate ICT.

The integrated approach opens up many avenues to teachers to supplement their lessons while helping students to become more aware of and competent in the use of computers in today's ever more technology driven world.

Minimally Invasive Education

Dr. Mitra's work suggests that children's learning about computers as a tool reflects the most basic way of learning - which existed before schools. In the experiments where children were left on their own to use ICT without the guidance of a teacher, they did exactly what early man, or a baby would naturally do - they tinkered with the device. By fiddling around they learnt about various features and discovered how the devices could be used to add to their existence. 

Mitra's work reflects some of Vygotsky's perceptions. Spontaneous learning bears a close resemblance to what the Indian experiments showed. In spontaneous learning, children learn based on observation and interacting with the world around them in an informal way; this was exactly what was seen in the Indian experiments where children used the computers set up at kiosks or in walls in public spaces. Without guidance, the children were able to discover and learn. Furthermore, the elements learning through collaboration was also evident where one child would help to guide another through various procedures. Again, this all comes down to the very basis of learning - learning for the sake of knowing and utilizing information rather than through a 'schooled' system that streamlines concepts (necessary for measurement of information passed on and knowledge standards) and have a heavy focus on grades.

When it comes to ICT in school, Mitra's work clearly has shortcomings.  Schools are primarily based on structure. There are curricula to follow with specific goals and thresholds to achieve. It therefore means that leaving students to learn in the manner of Mitra's experiments may not allow for the development of a particular skill set as fast as is necessary for the purpose needed. For instance, if the Geography curriculum requires that a student must send an email with photo attachments of certain land features to a student at a collaborating school in their second week of the course, that student has two weeks in which to develop that ICT skill. On his/her own it may take a month to find that feature, while some students may already know how to do it, or may figure it out in a day. So in the school setting, more structured learning will be necessary to effectively utilize the skills for specific purposes. Of course this doesnt mean that the students cant learning in a manner that mirrors Mitra's methods. As I opined in an earlier post about Spontaneous Learning, the teacher can create a framework that, while structured, creates a space for students to be spontaneous in their learning - a marriage of the two concepts.