Key Words: technology planning, needs assessment, staff development, evaluation, motivation

 

Strap on Your Spurs: Technology & Change Cowboy Style - Ready to Ship

Annette Lamb & Larry Johnson (1994, Revised Edition 1997)

ISBN 0-9641581-0-8

199 pages

$23.95

 

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Overview

 

Many schools are revising their school technology plan. This guide for educational technologists, library/media specialists, teachers, and administrators contains strategies for designing, developing, implementing, and evaluating technology programs in schools. Through funny cowboy quotes and real-world technology planning examples, learn to develop a plan that will help your school lead the way with technology.

 

Larry Anderson, of the National Center for Technology Planning, how praised the books and presentations by Lamb and Johnson as a "fun and motivating approach" to technology planning.

 

Cowboy Quotes   You can't always tell a gunslinger by the way he walks. You never know what might excite a teacher. You can't tell who might be turned on by a particular software package or instructional approach.   After weeks of beans and taters, even a change to taters and beans is good! Sometimes it takes repackaging to sell technology. Move things around.

 

 

Table of Contents

 

Introduction - The Cattle, Brands, and Branding: Educators, Technology, and Change

 

Chapter 1 - Round Up the Herd: Forming Effective Technology Committees

 

Chapter 2 - Know Your Herd: Conducting a Needs Assessment

 

Chapter 3 - Plan the Cattle Drive: Developing a Technology Plan

 

Chapter 4 - Buy a Good Horse: Implementing a Technology Plan

 

Chapter 5 - Practice Ropin': Coordinating a Staff Development Program

 

Chapter 6 - Lead the Way: Managing Change

 

Chapter 7 - Weighin' the Beef: Evaluating Technology and Change

 

Chapter 8 - Ropin' 'em In: Making it Work

 

References & Resources

 

Index

 

Introduction

 

This book is based on a number of conference sessions and workshops we've conducted together over the past few years. Although we've tried to keep this text as practical as possible, we've cited some well-known books and articles for those who want some theory to go along with their practice.

The book is not intended to be a strict set of rules, instead we hope you'll use it as a guide. Rather than follow a particular project from start to finish, we've tried to provide a wide range of examples across sizes and types of schools and programs. In this way, we're hoping that everyone will find tips they can apply to their particular situation. Reminders and helpful hints called "Cowboy Quotes" are found in the outer column of many pages.

Throughout the book, you'll find "hands-on" activities. We encourage you to share this book with your planning committee and work through the examples in small groups. The "Sharpen Your Spurs" activities are short exercises that will help you reflect on your views and individual situation. The "Polish Your Saddle" activities are intended as larger projects that may relate directly to formulating your plan.

Rather than include a huge appendix of sample technology plans, we encourage you to use existing resources. If you have access to Internet there are many plans available on-line through The National Center for Technology Planning (NCTP). You may also wish to contact your IBM or Apple Representative. Both organizations provide planning services and resources.

We hope you find this book useful and we wish you luck with your technology planning. If you have comments or ideas you'd like to share, we'd love to hear from you!

 

 

Sample Selection

 

From Strap On Your Spurs - Chapter 6: Managing Change, Pages 141-149

 

Strategies to Gaining Support and Involvement: Getting them to join the herd

 

Sometimes you need to go beyond the traditional approaches to inservice to get teachers going with technology. You may need to try some sneaky and not-so-sneaky ways to wake up your faculty and staff.

Even cowboys had trouble with their herd sometimes. They thought of innovative ways to keep them happy and pointed in the right direction. For example, some people say that "singing cowboys" originated from cowboys singing to their cattle at night to keep them calm.

 

Traditional Approaches

From coffee and donuts to giveaways there are lots of gimmicks to get teachers involved with technology. You may have tried beginning-of-the-year orientations or afterschool workshops. Posters in the halls can announce upcoming opportunities to see demonstrations or try new products. You may have even created areas to showcase students and teacher work on bulletin boards. These traditional approaches can be very effective; however, there are usually "hold outs" who don't participate.

 

Keeping Up with the Jones'

One effective approach for getting teachers to use technology involves generating jealousy. It's called "Keeping Up With The Jones'". Work with a teacher at a particular grade level or content area to create a high visibility technology project. For example, put the laserdisc player in the high school science area and give them a science series such as the Optical Data curriculum. Once teachers realize that a single teacher has a laserdisc player in his or her classroom and his or her students are having a great time, they'll want the technology too. To make this approach work, publicity is essential. Everyone in the building must know how well the project is working or jealousy won't set in. The downside of this approach is that you need to be ready to provide additional equipment to meet the increased demands caused by your manipulation.

 

Generate Jealousy

Paula Wilson was disappointed that more teachers weren't using the laserdisc player and laserdiscs she had purchased the previous year. She decided to place the player permanently in a third grade classroom with a teacher who had expressed interest in developing a multimedia whales unit. Ms. Wilson helped with the development of the unit including collecting resource materials, developing activities, and creating bar codes for the Whales laserdisc. The unit was so successful that Ms. Wilson took a photograph of the children demonstrating their projects and sent it to the newspaper. All the publicity sparked the enthusiasm of other teachers who became interested in developing similar multimedia thematic units. Before long the lone laserdisc player became so popular that two additional players were purchased.

 

Sneaking Up on Your Enemy

Befriending an enemy can be an effective way to make new allies as well as promote technology in your building. For example, let's say the swimming coach has been bad-mouthing technology. Show him how to create a spreadsheet to calculate swimming statistics.

 

When posed with a "problem" teacher or administrator, begin by identifying his or her interests or weaknesses. Identifying their interest in sports, picture books, or even the Civil War can be the information you need to develop their love of technology. If they love sports, show them the sports almanac on CD-ROM. Picture book lovers will enjoy Grandma and Me on CD-ROM. By showing them all the technology-based resources available on the Civil War, you will gain their attention. You may even be able to get your enemy to become you advocate.

 

Befriending

Dale Callaway had been trying to persuade the Dean of Academic Affairs that distance learning could be of great benefit to their small college. Unconvinced, the Dean had denied many of his requests for upgrading satellite technology on campus. After some investigating Mr. Callaway discovered the Dean's love of international soccer matches. A key to the satellite room and a short lesson in using the controls allowed the Dean to watch international games on weekends. Before long, the Dean discovered all kinds of programming including college coursework. Suddenly the Dean became a big advocate of not only upgrading the equipment, but also promoting a distance education program.

 

Using the Element of Surprise

Trying something new and different can sometimes stimulate use of new resources or technologies that are underutilized. Rearrange the technology laboratory. Paint the walls and put up posters. Pull together three or four computers into "multimedia clusters". Separate a large lab of computers and put a computer on every teacher's desk.

 

Consider working with groups you may have avoided or forgotten. For example, work with the special education teacher or the school counselor. Consider the technology needs and interests of the school nurse.

Get involved with events such as developing a desktop presentation for a school board presentation or develop a hypermedia environment introducing each teacher. This would be fun for a beginning of the year orientation. Making technology highly visible is important in its promotion. Make a big deal out of the changes. For example, write "birth announcements" to go with classroom computers.

 

Demos

Ms. Randall's goal for the year was to get resources out of the library/media center and computer labs and into classrooms. She set up a technology area prior to every faculty meeting and provided quick demonstrations of software. When possible she brought multiple copies and checked them out to interested teachers on the spot.

 

Shuffle the Scanner

Mr. Chu convinced the principal, Ms. Dexter, to move the flatbed scanner from the secretary's area in the office to the teacher's lounge. Most teacher's didn't even realize that the scanner was in the building. Mr. Chu and Ms. Dexter wrapped a big pink bow on the scanner and announced that the scanner was the latest "addition" to the lounge technology family that already consisted of a Macintosh and laserprinter. Now teachers have open access to the scanner without feeling like they're intruding into the secretarial area. In addition, a scanner that was rarely used is now running continuously. The bow was met with so many smiles that Mr. Dexter is considering adding more members to the "tech family" just to see the reactions of the teachers.

 

Attack the Lounge Lizards

You probably know the lounge lizards. These are the secretaries and teachers who tend to hang out in the lounge. Regardless of the time of day, you can always find them in the lounge. Consider ways to move the lounge lizards into areas where they can use technology. Start by placing new materials in the lounge. Then after the lizards get "addicted," take the technology back to the media center or technology lab. The lounge is also a nice place to post "we need" and "we've got" lists. In other words, when teachers think of software or other resources they want, you can jot down the possibilities.

 

The Trail

Rather than putting the new CD-ROM system directly into the library/media center, Ms. Eagan put the technology in the teacher's lounge for two weeks. She loaded the Sports Almanac. A simple sheet of step-by-step instructions sat next to the CD-ROM setup. Before long, everyone was getting involved. A group of teachers started playing a kind of "sports" trivial pursuit. By the second week, a teacher had checked out two other CDs and placed them on the computer in the lounge. The teachers were disappointed when the CD-ROM system was moved to the library, so they all began eating lunch in the library and gradually began discovering other CDs available there.

 

Go For the Throat

Sometimes it seems that nothing you do motivates teachers. You may need to work directly with departments. This can eliminate the common comment that the session or technology "doesn't apply to my area." This may involve targeting specific areas for inservices. For example, use computer graphics and scanning technology to excite art teachers. Laserdiscs might be what turns on science teachers and telecommunications may be the topic to reel in social studies teachers.

 

Attack!

Mr. Summer was excited about the new network established in the school district. Every teacher would have access to the Internet and could communicate with students and teachers around the world. After a short introduction to the Internet for all the faculty, Mr. Summer was surprised at the lack of interest. After a little investigating he realized that the teachers couldn't see how it was useful to their particular curriculum areas. As a result, he developed a plan of attacking each department. He found scientific databases available on acid rain that would be of interest to the science teachers and he discovered a national peer writing project that would fit with the middle school writing curriculum. Specific demonstrations at each department meeting generated the interest he was seeking.

 

Recycling Old Ideas

Have you ever distributed a new book or software list only to wonder if anyone actually read it? Recycle the list and add activity ideas. Try linking books, videos, CDs, and other resources into multimedia resources lists. Create a bulletin board above the CD area to advertise all the CD's available. After the initial excitement over a new software package, it's easy to forget about it. A bulletin board can keep the resources in front of users.

 

Recycles

Ms. Huntington purchased a series of early reading CD-ROM electronic books based on the requests of the primary teachers. She was frustrated that the resources were used once and forgotten. The teachers explained that they kept forgetting they were available. Ms. Huntington created a large bulletin board featuring popular characters from the CDs. Whenever students came into the center they were reminded about the availability of the resource.

 

Give It a Name and Logo

The more professional something looks, the more likely people are to buy into its use. If people think your library/media center is full of "books." Rename it the "Information Center" or the "Technology Resource Center". Create themes or topics for special weeks and highlight software that's available. Sponsor a contest to name the new network. Or, consider a contest to name each laserprinter in the building. The activity can be fun and an interesting way to promote information about new technologies. Involve yourself on committees and share your resources.

 

Twinkies to Pizza

As Ms. Vance loaded software onto the new computers in the laboratory, she considered what to name the hard drives. Drive1, Drive2, Drive3 crossed her mind, but they seemed so boring for an elementary school lab. Instead, she thought about the fact that no food or drink was allowed in the lab. Maybe it would be fun to name each computer after a different food. Ms. Vance held a contest to select the top twenty favorite foods. The winners included Twinkies, macaroni, and pizza. The students had a good time with the contest and were also reminded that the names on the computers were the closest they would get to food in the lab. She later used the same theme to promote a project called "Addicted to Technology." Although she got some flack for naming the lab after favorite foods rather than nutritious foods, it brought a lot of attention to the new lab.

 

Update Your Mission

Many educators with technology responsibilities were originally hired as librarians, audiovisual directors, and computer teachers. It may be time to rename your position to reflect you new and changing responsibilities. Pick a new title:

 

Information Skills Curriculum Chairperson

Technology Coordinator

Learning Resources Specialist

Coordinator of Whole Language Resources

Director of Networking and Communications

Information Director

 

These are just a few of the new titles that are emerging. These new titles can reflect your expanded responsibilities. They can also draw attention to your need for new facilities and funding. It's possible you could even justify new budget line items.

 

Shrinking Budgets/Expanding Costs

Ms. Waters was frustrated by the fact that her library budget was shrinking, while the demands for new technologies such as networked software and CD-ROM were rapidly increasing. When she confronted the principal, he indicated that her budget was always intended to support the needs for items such as books and magazines. He doubted that the school board would expand these traditional budget items. Ms. Waters developed a proposal that showed the increasing demands on her budget. She indicated that her traditional position had evolved to the extent that a new classification should be made such as Director of Information and Communications. The position would need budget lines items for network hardware and software, CD-ROM, electronic subscriptions, electronic references, and other technology related information resources. In addition, she suggested some decreases in traditional library areas such as book reference, book repair, and print subscriptions. Although not all of her requests were met immediately, her budget was expanded. In addition, Ms. Waters was put in charge of a task force to examine the reorganization of all information and communications resources in the district.

 

Sample Activity

 

Explore a Sample Activity.