National Educational Technology Plan: Transforming American Education: Learning Powered by Technology

The National Educational Technology Plan: Transforming American Education: Learning Powered by Technology draft includes very insightful information in regard to teaching and learning, as well as professional development and training.

In regard to learning, the draft plan states, “The model asks that we focus what and how we teach to match what people need to know, how they learn, where and when they will learn, and who needs to learn. It brings state-of-the art technology into learning to enable, motivate, and inspire all students, regardless of background, languages, or disabilities, to achieve.” In other words, what students learn in the classroom must be directly related to the skills the will need to apply to life beyond high school. In order to do this, individualized instruction is essential. Since the beginning of this course, I have realized that educators are doing a disservice to their students by not incorporating technology within the curriculum to the highest degree possible. This plan will help bridge the gap between traditional learning and modern learning to help our students achieve success to the best of their abilities.
In regard to teaching, the draft also states, “In such a teaching model, teams of connected educators replace solo practitioners and classrooms are fully connected to provide educators with 24/7 access to data and analytic tools as well as to resources that help them act on the insights the data provide.” In the past, teachers were only responsible for what happens within their own classroom. At the same time, if there was a problem in their classroom, they had to figure out how to resolve those problems on their own. Now, we are moving to a much more collaborative working environment in which teachers are encouraged to connect with each other and assist each other in areas of needed improvement. We are also in a data-based era, in which data MUST support our reasonsing.

The NETP calls for teachers to engage in online, collaborative professional learning and training experiences that are ongoing, and provide 27/7 support.I find this type of professional learning to be extremely beneficial and engaging to teachers who often leave in-person professional development workshops feeling as though they a) learned nothing new or b)left the workshop more confused than when they entered. The only concern I have with this type of professional learning is that I forsee a problem with older generations of teachers opening up online and becoming actively engaged in the experiences.

Another area of concern I see with the NETP is that state-mandated testing could be reduced and replaced by teaching and learning being mediated through technology. The plan states, “Data streams captured by an online learning system can provide the information needed to make judgments about students’ competencies. These data-based judgments about individual students could then be aggregated to generate judgments about classes, schools, districts, and states.” While this sounds like a great direction to take, the current levels of technology proficiency that I see from students in the classroom concerns me. For example, many of our students take a STAR Reading and Math assessment to measure their reading and math abilities. This is done online and we often find poor scores, not because the students are low in reading in math, but because they still struggle with working the computer. With that being said, I think that reducing state-mandated testing by gathering data streams by an online learning system will be a positive thing when students are showing higher proficiency levels in technology.

Overall, I believe the NETP draft is headed in a positive direction for our nation. I would like to see these changes come sooner rather than later, but change takes a great deal of time and energy.