Digital Learning Inventory

As part of our online course, we were asked to assess our school's access to technology and digital tools that can support students in developing global competencies.

1. What tools, software, operating systems, and equipment are available in your school and classroom? (including but not limited to: videoconferencing, streaming, photos sharing sites, video sharing sites, document sharing sites, podcasts, blogs, wikis, social networking sites, etc.)

Laptop (teacher)
Laptops/Netbooks (24)
Smart Board
- An interactive white board used with a laptop and projector where texts can be edited or annotated in real time in front of the class by students and teachers.
Projector
Desktop Computers (6)
Jupiter Grades (online grading system):
- www.jupitered.com
School Website (google sites):
- humanitiesprep.org
  - This site is managed by one of our dedicated math teachers
Youtube.com
- Used primarily to share videos sources with students.
Google docs
- Used for student written work. The editing and sharing functions allow students and teachers to edit and comment on each others' work during the drafting process. It also allows for paperless sumbission of work to teachers.
Skype:
- An online video calling tool that can be used to have students conference with people around the world. In my case, I even used this to observe my class doing seminar discussions while I was out sick.

2. How does your school make use of school and/or teacher websites?

We use Jupiter Grades to communicate with students, parents, Advisors and administrators about students’ progress in each class
Staff email list is a common place for staff to communicate about events in school and issues that arise with particular students
Our school website has important links, school-wide rubrics and norms, and press about the school
There is space for each teacher on the school website, but we don’t use them

3. How are you currently utilizing technology for learning?

I use the Smart Board each day, mainly projecting documents the class reads together in order to model annotating as we discuss what’s being read, or to document class discussions on the board
I also project instructions and film resources on the Smart Board daily
I update Jupiter Grades with daily homework checks and attendance, and weekly with grades on larger assignments
Which websites are blocked by your school's firewall?
Facebook, Assata Shakur’s website, LGBT.com, any social networking sites, gchat function in gmail
What websites and tools are colleagues in your building using?
kidblog.org
webquest.org
codeacademy.com
usda.gov
pbs.org
Is there a system for evaluating student technology literacy in your school? If so, how effective or helpful have you found the assessment?
Not that I know of
Gather suggestions from students on their ideas for integrating technology into their learning.
The biggest suggestion my students had was to get working class sets of laptops in each classroom. The computers we have are often not working or very slow, which frustrates them, and they say they’d rather work at home. For teachers, it’s also frustrating that we have classes larger than the number of laptops, so planning a lesson around use of the laptops does not make much sense.

4. What tools that are not presently available, would help to achieve district objectives?

Working laptops in each classroom, and enough for each student (we have often have 30 students but about 24 computers and many that are not working)
Does your school promote BYOD (bring your own device) policies for students?
No, we have a strict no electronics policy during the school day. Other devices such as laptops, kindles or ipads are welcome, but in a school with mostly low-income students, it feels inappropriate to promote BYOD because these devices are not options for so many students.

B. Using your Digital Learning Environment Inventory, develop a solution or suggest an improvement customized to your school/classroom circumstances. Include a paragraph describing:

1. The solution/suggestion

Research funding opportunities to purchase new laptops for our classroom. Last fall, when I arrived at the school and was having a lot of trouble with the laptop in the room used for the SmartBoard, I wrote a donor’s choose grant and was able to purchase a MacbookAir for my own use at school. This has changed my ability to plan a curriculum around daily use of the SmartBoard for reading complex texts and annotating together, or for showing films in class as research material. It has also allowed me to communicate with parents and students more readily through our online grading platform. In order to try to purchase laptops for my entire class so that writing workshops could include students working on computers instead of by hand, I would need to earn many points through donor’s choose in order to be able to write a grant so large, but colleagues at my old school were able to do this.

2. Reflect on what you learned from this process

There’s a clear tension between the progress and growth in technological advances throughout the world, and the lack of funding within the public school system in NYC to be able to keep up. We can learn about technology that is available, but we can’t plan around it until it is reliable and accessible for all students in and out of school. There have been improvements, for example, DOE wireless used to be so unreliable that I would never plan a lesson around using an online video clip, but in recent years, that has become less of an issue, and while I prefer to purchase dvds of resources I plan on using more than once for security, I am much less hesitant to rely on internet working in the classroom.
Of course, there’s also a larger discussion to be had about economic wealth distribution and its impact on access to technology. If we posit the idea that technology makes connecting with those around the world easier and faster, we must also include in this conversation questions about global equity of access to technological advances, which of course, usually comes down to economic equity.