Running head: CLASSROOM TECHNOLOGY PLAN 1

Classroom Technology Plan

Patrice Bacote
University of Maryland University College
EDTC 630

Classroom Description
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I teach reading and social studies to 44 bright, curious, and creative 6th graders

at Princeton Elementary School in Suitland, MD. Princeton Elementary School is a Title

I school in Prince George’s County.

Number of Students Demographic

2 Limited English Proficient (LEP)

4 Special Education (SPED)

2 Talented and Gifted (TAG)

12 Hispanic

32 African American

31 Free and Reduced Meals (FARMS)

My students use technology almost every day. Currently, in my classroom, I have

a visualizer, projector, three desktop computers and thirty ThinkPads. My students use

ThinkPads to research, complete assignments in Google Classroom, create and share

presentations, work collaboratively with peers, play learning games, type essays, take

quizzes and tests and so much more! We use many programs to support learning in the

classroom. The programs that we use the most are:

● Quizizz- for fun formative assessments

● CommonLit- to sharpen our reading and comprehension skills

● ClassKick- to work collaboratively with the teacher and/or peers

● Canva- for creating beautiful flyers and infographics

● Google Classroom- to complete assignments independently and collaboratively

using Google Docs and Slides

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I use the visualizer in my classroom along with my personal laptop to play whole-

group games, show educational videos, and go on virtual field trips when I can find one

that connects to what we are doing in class.

State and district testing is a necessary task. Based on the scores from the Map-

Growth test taken in the winter and last year’s PARCC data, 78% of the students in my

class are performing below grade level, 20% are performing on grade level, and 2% are

performing above grade level in the area of language arts. My students struggle with

grasping the standards I teach because I found that they are missing prerequisite skills.

For example, it’s hard to explain what strategies an author uses to persuade the reader

in an argumentative text when you don’t have a good foundation of author’s purpose.

We often approach each new concept with a period of re-teaching. My students do well

with basic concepts, concepts that don’t require them to think at a higher level; they

prefer and perform well on multiple choice test questions, but not constructed response

questions and they are master summarizers, but not analyzers. I am trying to work on

my students’ reading and writing stamina so we spend time doing both activities each

and every day. Possibly, one of the greatest challenges I face teaching reading and

social studies, in addition to trying to nurture a love of reading, is teaching my students

to be active, critical readers. My students need enrichment in the area of language arts,

specifically with actively reading and analyzing non-fiction text and writing grade level

appropriate constructed responses using text evidence as support.

Vision

I believe that technology should be used to enhance instruction and provide

students with memorable learning experiences that they can connect to and draw
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meaning from. In my dream classroom, students would use technology to learn about

the world outside of the classroom and local community, do project-based learning

activities that take learning to a new level, and create meaningful artifacts that

showcase their learning. In my dream classroom, I, the teacher, would use technology

to differentiate, accommodate and make interventions for all of the unique students in

my classroom.

Goals and Objectives

Goal Objectives Evaluation

Students will be able to

Students will use
technology in the
classroom at least three
times per week.
use digital, open
educational resources
once a week to reteach
weak standards to
improve their overall
performance in reading
I will use the progress
by at least 10%.
monitoring/data tracking
Using the educational tools available on each
website CommonLit once website, Google Forms
a week for 30 minutes, (tests created by the
students will be able to teacher), and benchmark
increase their testing data to monitor the
comprehension of success of this goal.
literature by at least 10%.

Students will be able to

use the educational
website NewsELA once
a week for 30 minutes to
increase their
comprehension of
informational text by at
least 10%.

I will use teacher-created

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Students will use rubrics to score writing

technology to create a
grade level appropriate
writing artifact at least once
per week.
Students will be able to
artifacts to monitor the
use digital tools to
success of this goal.
annotate text at least
once per week to
increase their
comprehension of the
text by at least 10%.

Students will be able to

use a rubric at least
once per week to
improve their digital
writing artifacts by at
least 10%.

Students will be able to

use online resources to
conduct peer reviews of
writing at least once per
week to improve their
writing skills by at least
10%.

Current Technology

The technology that I currently have in my room can be used to meet most of the

student objectives mentioned above. The ThinkPads that are available in my classroom

will enable students to:

● use digital, open educational resources once a week to reteach weak standards

to improve their overall performance in reading by at least 10% (objective 1). I

can upload or share open educational resources to my Google Classroom for

students to interact with during their centers/classroom rotations time block.

● use the educational website NewsELA once a week for 30 minutes to increase

their comprehension of informational text by at least 10% (objective 3). Students

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can use the NewsELA website to access assigned materials using their

ThinkPads during reading or social studies time.

● use online resources to conduct peer reviews of writing at least once per week to

improve their writing skills by at least 10% (objective 6). Student work can be

uploaded into a program (i.e. Google Doc) that allows collaboration (in this case,

feedback from peers) to take place.

Objective 5, students will be able to use a rubric at least once per week to

improve their digital writing artifacts by at least 10%, could be met by uploading student

work along with rubrics and expectations so that students have the opportunity to reflect

and improve their writing on their own. However, I think this assignment would be more

meaningful if it was done as a whole group, using real student work, with the teacher as

a guide. I would need to use the projector and visualizer in my classroom to accomplish

this. I could also use the app Google Cast to screen share (and have students screen

share their edits) so that the activity will be more interactive and engaging for students.

Additional Technology

It is possible for objectives 2 and 4 to be met using the technology that I currently

have available in my classroom, but if I were able to purchase headphones for all

students and at least 7 iPads, I would be able to enhance the students’ experience.

Objective 2, students will be able to increase their comprehension of literature by

at least 10% using the educational website CommonLit once a week for 30 minutes,

requires students to log into CommonLit and access stories that have been assigned to
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them. Part of the reason that I chose to use this website in my classroom is because it

gives students the option to listen to the story aloud and follow along as it is being read.

I encourage my students to listen to the stories, regardless of their reading level,

because I want them to have many opportunities to hear what fluent reading sounds

like. Although beneficial, having students listen to the stories aloud also causes minor

problems in the classroom because it increases the noises level; other students

sometimes have trouble focusing. If I had access to a class set of headphones, I believe

that the quality of this activity could be magnified.

Objective 4, students will be able to use digital tools to annotate text at least once

per week to increase their comprehension of the text by at least 10%, could very well be

met using the ThinkPads that I currently have in my classroom but there is a way to

make the activity more engaging and exciting for students, especially kinesthetic

learners (as the majority of the students are). Imagine the excitement students would

feel if they were able to interact with the text in a more hands-on way. This is possible

via iPads. Using iPads, students can use their fingers to enlarge, shrink, select, circle,

underline and highlight text. Using iPads, students can also swipe back and forth

between pages and windows without having to scroll and easily take screenshots. In

addition to all of the aforementioned benefits, the App Store (and the school district)

offer free e-books and programs that can be downloaded onto the iPads so that

students will never run out of text to read and annotate!

Professional Development
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In order to fully implement this plan into my classroom, I will need to participate in

professional development workshops to strengthen my skills/knowledge base of Apple

products as well as best practices for virtual teaching.

The Apple website offers free, self-paced, professional development for teachers.

All of the professional development takes place online and will help teachers to “build

skills on iPad and Mac that directly apply to [student] activities” (Apple Inc., 2018).

Teachers can work independently or collaboratively to complete each lesson than take

quizzes to earn digital badges. For a more structured experience, Apple Inc.

recommends that teachers seek out the professional learning offered by the

EdTechTeam. The EdTechTeam offers online training as well as workshop or

conference style training. For my own professional development needs, I will sign up for

the EdTechTeam online training. It’s a four week course and costs $150 but I am more

productive when there is a teacher facilitating a course and also when I can work when

it is convenient for me. The remote instructor for this course evaluates participants by

scoring their projects and offering feedback for improvement.

To sharpen and expand my virtual teaching skills, I will sign up for the

professional development course, Fundamentals of Virtual K-12 Teaching, offered by

PBS Teacherline. Although the course costs $580, it is also worth 3 graduate credits

and I can use those credits towards advancing my certification to an Advanced

Professional Certificate. The online course is facilitated by an instructor and content is

taught through project-based learning activities; all factors suitable for my learning style.

In terms of evaluation, this courses requires teachers to submit work and participate in

discussions. Teachers will receive graded feedback on all of their submissions.

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Budget

A budget for the additional technology (a class set of headphones and 7 iPads)

that I plan to add to my classroom and the professional development courses I’ve

chosen to help me increase my knowledge of Apple products and enhance my virtual

teaching capability is outlined below:

Item Reasoning Number Needed Total Cost

Egghead Stereo Headphones can 45- one for each $10.07 x 45 =

School Headphone be used to reduce student
with Leatherette distractions by
Ear Cushion, black eliminating noise
from computers.
(available on
Amazon) $453.15

Apple iPad mini, iPads will be used 7- Enough for a $274.80 x 7 =

black with space for reading and center
gray annotating text

(available on
Amazon) $1923.60

HDE Shock Proof The cases will be 7 $16.99 x 7 =

iPad case for kids, used to protect the
black iPads from falls and
scratches. $118.93

PD Course- Apple I need this course 1 Course $150.00

Professional to help me learn
Learning: World how to use the new
Class Training for iPads in my
iPad and Mac classroom because
(online) I am unfamiliar with
Apple software and
EdTechTeam available apps. $150.00

PD Course- I need this course 1 Course $580

Fundamentals of to help me improve
Virtual K-12 on my virtual
Teaching teaching skills.

PBS Teacherline
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Total Cost: $2764.61

Timeline for Implementation

Task Implementation Time Period

Collect pre-assessment data and Fall 2017 (completed)

historical trend information using past
assessment data of students. Create a
spreadsheet to organize the data.

Seek grant(s) for purchasing iPads and Spring (March-April) 2018

headphones for the classroom.

Implement objectives for students.* Spring (March-May) 2018

Participate in Professional Developments. Spring 2018

Assess students and evaluate progress Spring 2018

(formative assessments).

Analyze and organize new data Fall 2018 (or as soon as data is available)
(summative assessments).

Evaluate effectiveness of added Spring-Fall 2018 (ongoing)

technology. Continue or rethink
classroom technology plan as needed
based on new data and new classroom
demographics.

*Note- All objectives can be implemented regardless of whether or not I was able to find

a grant to purchase headphones and iPads.

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References

Apple Inc. (2018). Education: Apple teacher. Retrieved from

https://www.apple.com/education/apple-teacher/