Technology Standards

Before I paste my standard and start talking, I should insert a disclaimer. Since I don't work in the K-12 classroom, my lessons are not K-12 lessons. But, since I want to get as much as possible out of the class, I'm still going to try to relate it to my experiences. So rather than talk about how I can implement these standards into my teaching, I'll talk about how this standard would impact my role.

From the standards for Grades 9-12, "Technology Communications Tools" Section.

By the end of Grade 12 each student will:

...

2. use available technologies (e.g., desktop conferencing, e-mail, groupware, instant messaging) to communicate with others on a class assignment or project

In a way, I teach this standard in the professional environment more than any other. Businesses in general want collaboration to be more efficient. My employer is the largest in West Michigan with over sixteen-thousand employees spread out on more than seven campuses. "Face to Face" meetings are not always convenient (and if one person is in Reed City and the other in Kentwood, you could make the case that they're barely possible), and while telephone conversations and e-mail can facilitate communication, I wouldn't call it collaboration.

There are two tools that are our primary means of addressing this issue--Microsoft Live Meeting and SharePoint.

LiveMeeting allows remote individuals to participate in a "Face-to-Face" meeting. One person (or more) "hosts" and can share things on their computer display. You can choose to share a single application or your entire screen. Educating people on this tool is trickier than it seems, mainly because outside of the technology realm try to connect what they're learning with the technology knowledge they already have. They have heard of--and generally understand--the concept of "Video Conferencing," so they assume that this technology involves a camera. Additionally, they understand the concept of e-mailing attachments (and LiveMeeting involves sending an e-mail invitation) so they might think of it as sending a succession of screen shots back and forth.

The best way that I have found to get people to understand it is to do a Live Meeting in the classroom. Some people sit facing the screen, and others turn away (with their monitors) and become our "Remote" participants, then people alternate "hosting" the meeting.

SharePoint is more of a web-based collaboration space. Whoever "Administers" the site can control access to all or part of it, and then create different collaborative tools therein. These include Discussion Boards, Problem Tracking Systems, Document Libraries, and Shared Calendars. The tool is extremely flexible, and especially useful since it requires minimal involvement by technical support and provisioning personnel to keep it running.

And honestly? The trick to teaching it to people is getting them to understand how easy it is.

I've been doing technology education and training for more than a decade, and I am confident when I say that people typically underestimate their own technical ability by 2-3 rungs down the ladder of proficiency. People who come to a class and say they are "Completely computer illiterate," probably know almost enough to get by. People who are truly computer illiterate (in my experience) hate computers and don't try to learn more about them.

But since SharePoint is so powerful & flexible, and people underestimate their own capabilities, they assume it must involve "computer programming" to make it work. The class on SharePoint Administration is an eight hour class. I spend the first part of the class showing them some of the "cooler" features, at which point when we're ready to take a break a lot of them have decided they're never going to understand how to do it. Then all you can do is take "baby steps" to building something complicated and powerful to prove to them that they can do it. A lack of confidence is a lot harder to overcome than mere ignorance.

So we start small, and have them build basic file libraries, then show them how they can add "Columns" to those file libraries that allow them to ask people who submit files different questions about those files and compel them to answer. I can usually tell who has their Eureka moment when we cover that, because they get the same look on their face that I got back when I learned to program in Basic and I figured out how to make the computer ask people questions.

Tying this back into the standards, I'm better off as high schools (and colleges) build this proficiency in people. I do not see myself teaching K-12 in the future, but if I stay in the professional development sphere then those levels of education will "trickle up" to where I am, and additional proficiency like the kind suggested by these standards will only make my job easier.