Technology Advancing Education in Glendora Classrooms

For today's Glendora elementary school students, the chalk board is a history lesson in line with the dinosaurs.

Classrooms at the elementary school level include LCD projectors, which can project website links. Document cameras allow for student work to be projected before the class. The chalk board has been thrown out in favor of the internet-interactive SMART Board.

Advancements in technology allow teachers to readily access a world of information on the internet and, even, the thoughts of children onto a screen in front of the class. 

“If they’re a fifth grader right now, they’ll graduate in 2018 and be finished by college in 2022,” Sutherland Principal said. "We have to prepare them for 2022 and we don’t know what that looks like yet. If we are even a little behind in the technology, it creates a bigger gap for them when they get there.”

Technology has been infiltrating campuses for more than a decade, but the latest generation of technology allows for a more engaging and interactive classroom, said Michelle Hunter, director of special instruction and nine through 12 curriculum and instruction at . 

A math lesson at Glendora High will have students writing on an iPad, which is then instantaneously shown on a screen in front of the class. A class of students might use a student response system clicker to answer a question, their individual response instantly tabulated before their eyes.      

“Whenever you can find a method that engages students, and makes them excited about learning, that’s what its all about,” Hunter said.  “It’s about taking them to that next level.  I think technology allows them to do that.”

Even during budget stretched times, finding ways to incorporate technology into the classroom remains an important mission, Hunter said.

“It’s multi-dimensional, it’s real-time, it’s more engaging,” Hunter said.  “It’s what the kids know.”

In a show of how the classroom has changed from one generation to the next, assistant superintendent of educational services Jeanine Robertson said she recalls how when she was a teacher, a schoolwide blackout might not interfere with a day’s worth of learning. If that scenario were to happen tomorrow, classroom instruction would be significantly disrupted, she said. 

“The technology is so integrated now into the curriculum it would be a big change if the power ever went out,” Robertson said.  “So many things that are part of the school day could not be done.” 

Robertson said at Charter Oak she has seen a teacher use an iPod Touch to help teach a student about fluency. The student will talk into the Apple product and then the recording will be played back.

Schools are asked to draft a five-year technology plan detailing goals, Robertson said. Standards by the International Society of Educational Technology set expectations. Robertson said the recently revised standards emphasize what students should be able to do with the technology instead of what students should know about computers. 

Software programs are able to review scantron data and inform teachers where exactly students are struggling, she said. With this concise data, the teacher can more easily tailor instruction to the students.

At the high school level, the changing technology allows for a situation where everyone in the classroom is reached, Hunter said.

“If you have a student who is a visual learner, you are providing that visual tool to project information and support them in their learning,” Hunter said.  “Standing and lecturing the information, they might miss. You are really reaching the various learning styles in the classroom.”

Robertson said class instructions are following the lead of their technology savvy students.

“(My five-year-old granddaughter) has known how to use my iPhone for years,” Robertson said.  “She knows how to use the apps, open the apps, which one she likes and what she doesn’t.  She was doing that at three.”