Technology in the Classroom

By Rebecca Moses

Published in the Culpeper Star Exponent, Culpeper, VA Wednesday, November 16, 2005 Reproduced by permission

Eric Conti, assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction, loves education. But he really loves how technology is playing an important role in educating Culpeper students.
Conti, along with other curriculum and instruction staff and teachers, spent more than an hour showing the School Board how much of an impact computers and advanced technology are having on education.

‘Technology is changing the way we think,” he said. One example of this is through T Tech, a program that monitors each child’s writing ability from kindergarten through fifth grade.
Through CCPS’ Web site, teachers can see an example - written in a child’s handwriting - of what the school system considers a 1, 2, 3 or 4, with 4 being the highest mark. Parents and students can also see this same example. By labeling the writing with a number instead of a grade or percentage, teachers are presenting the child’s writing ability in a more professional way, Conti said.

In a standards-based world, he said, “Reporting like this is much more powerful than report cards.” Another example of how technology is shaping education is through a program called DIBELS, or Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills. DIBELS is a reading assessment that takes one minute to administer and tests students on the five “big ideas” of early reading, including phonic, vocabulary development and reading comprehension.

The entire program is loaded on a Palm Pilot, and the teacher administers the test to students using the hand-held computer. The program, which can break down oral answers into precise phonetics and syllables, then calculates the answers in a graphic. By using DIBELS, teachers are able to give needs-focused instruction - targeting the one skill that may be holding a child back.

Other examples include Moodle - a discussion board similar to Blackboard - and Google Earth. Once logged onto Google Earth, students can type in “The Pyramids” and through the help of a satellite see real images of the Pyramids in Egypt at that exact moment. Starting next semester, 11th- and 12th-graders will also have the opportunity to take an online class, and this semester, every fifth-grade student will receive a digital camera to use for part of an essay project.

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