Running Head: INDIVIDUAL TEACHER TECHNOLOGY ASSESSMENT 1

Individual Teacher Technology Assessment

Janelle Couch

PL & Tech Innovation – ITEC 7460

Spring 2017

Mr. Michael Rotjan

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Individual Teacher Technology Assessment

Ms. Bolton, a high school science teacher in Cobb County School District,

responded to two surveys derived to determine teacher’s comfort, ability, and change in

respect to technology use in the classroom. The purpose of the surveys was to determine

how well she is able to adapt to new technology or classroom practices along with

determining her level of comfort and technology use in her current classroom. Ms. Bolton

has been teaching for over ten years and recently made the transition from a title one

middle school to her current high school. Her students have access to computer laps in

the school, along with most students having their own devices or cell phones. While her

school and classroom aren’t considered 1:1, nearly all of the students have their own

personal device. Additionally, Ms. Bolton has a teacher computer, two desktops in her

classroom that are devoted to student use, along with an interactive board, document

camera, and personal iPad that she uses in the classroom.

Levels of Technology Use and Change

On the Levels of Technology Integration survey Ms. Bolton describes her use of

technology as daily, where she is using the computer for grades and attendance and then

uses Smart Notebook software where most of her lessons are created and used on the

Smartboard. The students in her class usually use technology about once a week unless

they are completing a specific project. Ms. Bolton wants to go more paperless in her

classroom. After interviewing her and hearing her concerns, she knows she will not be

able to go completely paperless since all of her students don’t always have devices on a

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daily basis, but would like to start making effort into getting parts of her classroom or

specific lessons paperless. She wants to start by getting herself organized and getting rid

of the binders and folders. Then she wants to bring the technology to her students and

start to get them to turn in materials online (M. Bolton, personal communication,

February 2017). Ms. Bolton believes she is able to create lessons with technology but can

always use ideas and improve to be able to create more engaging lessons for her high

school students. Having this positive attitude about wanting to learn from others makes

her a great candidate for coaching. She is willing and open to learn.

When asked if she has the necessary digital resources she stated that to effectively

move to paperless classroom, she would have to secure computers or devices for all of

her students in the classroom. Having a class set of computers would do, but because that

is not an option, she will have to adapt to what she has. While technology is not used in

every lesson, she stated that she is making more of an effort to learn and utilize the

technology resources that she is seeing other teachers use including Edmodo, Office 365

and Smart Notebook. She stated that having her students all on Edmodo, she believes that

she will be able to have them start turning in their work online. Ms. Bolton believes that

there are definitely obstacles in her way to using more technology in the classroom,

mainly the accessibility to devices, but also getting her more comfortable and well versed

in the websites and online tools. The Level of Technology Integration that best describes

Ms. Bolton is Level 1 Awareness where the instructional focus is directly from the

teacher. While her level of technology use with the students is low she is beginning to

move towards Level 2 Exploration where students use of the technology is at a recall and

reproduction level as in review games or drill and skill (LoTi, 2015).

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The second survey that Ms. Bolton was asked to complete asked varied questions

about her comfort and willingness to adopt new technologies and innovations. While she

stated that she often waits for others to try something new before she does, she sometimes

seeks out new technologies on her own. During change Ms. Bolton often leans on others

to get through it. In the interview with Ms. Bolton she stated “while I am not the most

comfortable with change I like to lean on others and feel comfort when they have use the

new thing first” (M. Bolton, 2017). She also prefers to stick with what she knows and use

the tools that she is comfortable with. Ms. Bolton wouldn’t consider herself to be the

outspoken leader in the school or her grade level, but she also isn’t the last one to try

something new. She feels very comfortable being in the middle of the pack. Having

access to a technology trainer from the county will give Ms. Bolton, and others at her

school, access to new technology ideas and the time and effort needed to gain confidence

to use them in their classrooms. As a result of the survey and interview, Ms. Bolton

would be considered a late-majority adopter. Like a domino effect, once the first groups

of teachers start something new, the later adopters will come in once the majority has

already tried the technology or innovation in their classrooms (Orr, 2013).

Technology Perspective, Needs and Coaching

Due to the lack of resources in the school and her students not consistently having

technology in classroom, Ms. Bolton feels like she will have to be creative to try to go

paperless in her classroom. With coaching strategies and lesson ideas, I feel that Ms.

Bolton will be able to accomplish her goals and begin to go paperless. Along with lack of

devices, there needs to be more time and training to get her comfortable with the tools

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and technology in the classroom. After meeting with Ms. Bolton it is clear that she would

like to begin a coaching relationship to gain knowledge to implement technology in her

classroom and better her students experience with science. Having a teacher like Ms.

Bolton that is open to new ideas and working with someone to better herself in the

classroom makes her a great candidate to be coached.

A peer coaching approach will be utilized in this situation. Being able to work

with her and model how to use different technology tools with her and her students will

be very beneficial for her and other teachers that she is able to then share the knowledge

with. To start to become paperless in the classroom Ms. Bolton wants to utilize Office

365 and OneNote. We will begin by organizing her classroom and lesson materials into a

OneNote Notebook. This will allow her to keep all of her papers, files, and resources in

one place. Once lessons are built in OneNote she will be able to utilize this in the

classroom with her students. We will build a lesson that will be delivered to the students

using the OneNote. I will be able to model in the classroom the lesson with the use of the

OneNote notebook. Following the lesson, we will have a reflection meeting to discuss

what she saw and strategies to use in the future. Ms. Bolton will then take the next lesson

using the OneNote notebook and teach from it while I am there for support. Again, we

will have a reflection meeting. This is the time where we will determine if she needs

additional support or feels the confidence to continue on her own.

The students will be trained on OneNote also, as Ms. Bolton wants to shift her

class to a paperless setting, where OneNote can be used. Depending on the response in

the classroom, Ms. Bolton can also use Edmodo to help her become paperless. Once Ms.

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Bolton has been teaching with the OneNote notebook, I will visit her again to ensure that

she is still successful with the classroom lessons and to give her any additional tips to

engage students with the science standards. Knowing the teachers in the school, I foresee

the anticipated success of this in her classroom to spread to others teachers, which will

allow me to begin other coaching relationships or have Ms. Bolton take on a leadership

role and share her knowledge of the experience with others.

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References

Bolton. M. (2017). Personal Communication via Technology.

LoTi. (2015). Framework Resource. Level of Teaching Innovation Framework. Retrieved

from http://loticonnection.cachefly.net/global_documents/LoTi_Framework_

Sniff_Test.pdf

Orr. E. (2003). Diffusion of Innovations, by Everett Rogers 1995. Retrieved from

http://web.stanford.edu/class/symbsys205/Diffusion%20of%20Innovations.htm

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Appendix

LoTi Survey

1. How often do you use technology in the classroom?

2. Which of the following occurred in your classroom in the past week? (select all that

apply)

-teacher completed attendance and email on computer

-teacher gave a PowerPoint presentation during a lesson

-students completed games online (skill and drill)

-students completed educational tutorials

-students used tools like word, excel, PowerPoint

-students evaluated work online

-teacher attempted a technology lesson in class, but it may not have been

completely successful

-teacher designed and implemented technology lesson (ex. using padlet, socrative,

etc)

-students experienced real world connection during a lesson

-used Skype or collaborated with a class outside of the school

-technology lessons are used daily with students

-students have full access of computers, cameras, scanners, etc for education

3. Which statement best describes your classroom's digital infrastructure?

-no access to digital resources

-teacher workstation only

-classroom laptop/mobile device station

-access to laptop/mobile device cart

-one-to-one laptop/mobiles

-BYOD (bring your own device)

4. I have the necessary capabilities and skills to integrate digital resources successfully

into my classroom instruction.

-strongly agree

-agree

-no opinion

-disagree

-strongly disagree

5. How often are your students using digital resources during the instructional day?

-never

-at least once a year

-at least once a month

-at least once a week

-at least once a day

-multiple times a day

6. How often are you (the teacher) using digital resources during the instructional day?

-never

-at least once a year

-at least once a month

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-at least once a week

-at least once a day

-multiple times a day

7. I feel comfortable creating and implementing technology lessons in my classroom.

-strongly agree

-agree

-no opinion

-disagree

-strongly disagree

8. I am able to maximize student learning best when I complement my whole group

approach with learning stations/centers, cooperative grouping, and/or individualized

instruction.

-strongly agree

-agree

-no opinion

-disagree

-strongly disagree

9. I am treated as a respected educational professional on my campus.

-strongly agree

-agree

-no opinion

-disagree

-strongly disagree

10. My students often have a hard time following classroom rules and I experience

behavior issues when doing technology lessons.

-strongly agree

-agree

-no opinion

-disagree

-strongly disagree

Adopter/Change Survey

1. After hearing about a new technology do you…

-immediately research it and use it

-discuss it with a colleague and get them to use it

-wait for others to use it

-wait till someone asks you to use it

2. How well do you cope with change?

-it doesn’t affect me

-I deal with it well

-with help from others I make it work

-it bothers me

-Please don’t make me change anything

3. How often do you seek out new technology or teaching strategies?

-all of the time

-sometimes

-never

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4. How comfortable are you trying something new?

-very comfortable

-neutral

-not comfortable at all

5. Do you prefer to…

-seek out new technology

-stick with what you know

6. When asked to use a new Web 2.0 tool, how do you react?

-Refuse to use it

-Shy away and wait for most other teachers to try it first to see how it works

-Agree to try it after hearing about it at lunch that others are using it

-After thinking about it, decide to try it out

-Jump on the chance to try something new

7. How often do you take the lead in the school setting?

-all of the time

-often

-sometimes

-rarely

-never

8. Are you the last person to try something new?

-always

-sometimes

-never

9. When it comes technology, what best describes you?

-I am skeptical of new technologies and use them only when I have to

-I am usually one of the last people I know to use new technologies

-I usually use new technologies when most people I know do

-I like new technologies and use them before most people I know

-I love new technologies and am among the first to experiment with and use them

10. When it comes to using technology in your teaching, would you say you are keeping

up or being left behind?

-Keeping up

-Falling behind

-Don't know

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Individual Teacher Technology Assessment Teacher Responses LoTi Survey

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Adopter/Change Survey

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