District Administration - July 2008 - (Page 23)

But professional development is needed to help teachers mobilize their existing curricula. This means transforming teachers’ existing pencil-and-paper-based curricula into lessons that take advantage of the mobile learning environment—and in so doing making the lessons even more eﬀective. For example, in a lesson on the water cycle, a student would have multiple sheets of paper that correspond to diﬀerent learning activities, such as deﬁning In contrast, in a mobile learning environment, the teacher creates a coherent lesson with multiple learning activities in which the relationships among the activities—and resulting documents—are explicit. The lesson is represented in one window on the device, and the student moves back and forth between the lesson deﬁnition and various learning activities. “I don’t have to hunt for pieces of paper anymore,” says one fourth-grader from “If Alvin was going to prepare its children for the 21st century, I had to ﬁnd a way to provide each child with a computer.” —Beverly Walker, deputy superintendent for curriculum and instruction, Alvin (Texas) Intermediate School District to 1998 were given access to new technologies and support—and it took three to ﬁve years for them to become eﬀective in using immobile computers. Based on working with hundreds of teachers worldwide as they use mobile devices, we’ve found that it takes half that amount of time to become eﬀective at using mobile computing devices. Mobile devices are simpler and less intimidating to use. They are appropriate to the learning tasks in K12 classrooms. And mobile devices are not saddled with the excess functionality that comes standard on high-powered computers and productivity software suites. Success Stories While mobile computing technologies are still in their early days, some districts and schools have successfully explored their use. In 2004, the Alvin (Texas) Intermediate School District passed a multimillion- dollar bond that called for the key terms of the water cycle, drawing a concept map that represents the process, and collecting rainwater data in a spreadsheet. Seeing the relationshipsin the multiple sheets of paper and keeping track of the paper in a binder is diﬃcult. Kealakehe Elementary School, in Kailua Kona, Hawaii, who learned with mobile devices this past school year. “Everything is in one place.” Teacher participants in Apple’s Classroom of Tomorrow network from 1985 BY DANIEL J. GULCHAK tion and performance, among other beneﬁ ts. One study I conducted was with a thirdgrader with emotional and behavior disorders in Mesa, Ariz., who used a handheld to monitor when he was on-task during a reading period. The alarm in the calendar program on the handheld was set to chime for an appointment at 10-minute intervals during his reading. In this case, we set up appointments at 9 a.m. and then at 9:10, a.m. and continued until 10 a.m. The alarm reminded the student to selfmonitor his attention during the preceding 10 minutes by asking, “Was I on-task?” according to a deﬁnition that the teacher created. The results showed a 34 percent mean increase in on-task behavior as determined by independent observers during the ﬁve-week study. The teacher reported an increase in reading productivity and assignment completion. Improved Performance I conducted another study in Phoenix to teach six middle school students with behavior and learning problems to self-monitor their math performance and record their productivity and accuracy on a handheld computer. Using the same HanDBase program but with different forms, students corrected their work at the end of the math period using an answer key and then recorded accuracy and productivity data into their handheld. Although all students scored average or above average on a standardized math achievement test, all showed growth by selfmonitoring their performance. One student increased his productivity from a mean of 41 percent to 80 percent. Another student saw improvement in accuracy from a mean of 60 percent to over 90 percent. This study demonstrated that students could independently assess their math performance and improve their math achievement using the handheld self-monitoring program. Beneﬁ ts for the teacher included a decrease in workload, since students were correcting their own work, and a decrease in classroom management problems. Selfmonitoring attention or performance with pen and paper is an evidence-based practice with over three decades of research documenting its effectiveness with special education students. Valuable Skills for a Flat World Using handheld computers for self-monitoring is just one example of the power that mobile learning offers today’s students. The power to collect data, analyze it with spreadsheets or graphs, and then send a copy across the room to the teacher by Bluetooth is one example of the skills needed in today’s ﬂat world. For today’s digital learners, this represents efﬁciency and is becoming as routine as the old habit of banging chalk brushes together to clean them at the end of a day. Laptops are also good digital tools, but since they are weighed in pounds as compared to ounces, the advantage goes to handhelds. Additional beneﬁ ts of handhelds for students with exceptionalities include setting the alarm to notify them to go to special classes or to take their meds, recording homework assignments and due dates, using a word processor to take notes or complete assignments, and using applications for remembering multiplication tables, periodic tables and various math formulas. Most of these features are built into all handhelds, but speciﬁc applications such as formulas and tables can be downloaded easily at numerous Web sites, usually for free. The possibilities are only limited by the imagination and motivation of the user and the innovative teachers and administrators that support them. Daniel Gulchak is a special education teacher and the Webmaster of the Council for Children with Behavioral Disorders. www.DistrictAdministration.com July 2008 23 http://www.DistrictAdministration.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of District Administration - July 2008

District Administration - July 2008
Contents
Editor’s Letter
Letters
News Update
Curriculum Update
Administrator Profile
Conversations
Getting Mobile
School Supplies on a Budget
The Silent Issue
How Well Does This Web Site Work?
New Products
Management Books
Speaking Out
Calendar of Events
Research Center

District Administration - July 2008