Another school, another project

Originally, I planned on doing both my class projects at the school where I used to work. It was familiar; I knew the players. But the more I looked into it, the more I realized that there was a huge need for help in the area of updating the collection in the media center (great for Dr. Nita's class) but not so much in the area of technology.

Meanwhile, I found, quite by accident, a need for help in the area of technology at the elementary school where my children attend. So, after much deliberation and after getting feedback from my learning set group via emails, I have decided to jump in with both feet at two schools. Where I will find the time, I am not sure, but that is why it is called a leap of faith. I know this is what I should do, so now I feel like I am so behind in working on my project for Dr. Rob. While everyone else has been formulating their project in their heads and getting started, I have been spinning my wheels. Today, the wheels stop spinning, getting me nowhere and now I am finally moving forward.

Last week, I spoke with the principal at the elementary school to get the go ahead to proceed. So I emailed the media coordinator and arranged to meet. The meeting was today and I came away from the brief meeting energized and ready to dig in. This school held a fund raising campaign this year to purchase smart boards for every classroom. They raised the money, and smart boards have been installed in most classrooms. Now the challenge is to provide more training and support for the classroom teachers so that the smart boards will be used to their potential as interactive tools.

The Media Coordinator had said that the school music teacher had approached her for help with using the new Smart Board to teach about the orchestra. So the media coordinator helped compile resources for the lesson and then helped to deliver the lesson by modeling and then letting the music teacher gradually assume the class. I was glad to see that this media coordinator's skills were being utilized by coordinating and delivering resource material and that her skills as a teacher were also being used.

She is planning to contact the teachers at the school to see if there are teachers who may have similar requests for help using the smart board to teach particular topics. The plan is to see what kind of need and interest are out there, then plan a unit of material to help the teachers get an idea of as many different ways the smart board may be used within a particular topic of study.

I am not sure exactly where this may lead in terms of format, but I can see some exciting possibilities. I want my project to be practical and I would like to help teachers find and see the different possibilities that are available with the technology. I know precious little about Smart Boards, so my work is cut out for me. The teachers already know more than I do about the technology, so I have some catching up to do and I have some research and planning to do. But first, I need to wait to hear about who needs help with what areas so I will have a starting point. I can hardly wait.