I watched the Edutopia video Tech-Fueled Differentiated Instruction Engages Elementary School Students and was really impressed by their use of technology. I would say that the issue shaping the use of the technology at Forest Lake is NCLB. They mentioned twice that they were pushing for higher achievement and also mentioned in the commentary that they had watched "achievement soar" since they began using this system.
What impressed me was the fact that they maximized the technology they had available, but they didn't seem to be using the technology just for the sake of using technology. The technology was used appropriately for the activity and for the student. Students were able to set goals and work at the pace which worked best for them. Students were using interactive white boards for learning activities and also for interacting with other school children and their NASA mentors. Computer aided keyboards were used in music and handheld devices were used by the teachers for testing.
I noticed right away that there was a lot of activity in the school rooms. Students were not all working on the same activity at the same time. Some students were doing independent work, some working in groups and some one on one with the teacher. I really liked the feel I got from that classroom environment. It felt very productive. A little like a beehive, with every worker knowing his or her job and working toward a goal.
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