Guest Author: Marti Sides, Curriculum Technologist, Willow Bend Elementary

I heart edtech. In August 1999, I began working for my current school district as a fourth grade teacher. It is a district that values technology in the classroom, and works to make sure that teachers have the tools that they need to teach effectively. At the time, I really didn't have much technology in my classroom - 2 Mac computers and a teacher PC. I brought my students to the computer lab twice a week to teach them pre-written technology lessons. It was within those lessons that I discovered my passion…educational technology.

During the summer of 2000, I decided on my very first summer project. I decided to bring home all of my teacher's manuals for the reading textbook and create one lesson for each story in that book involving technology. Most of these lessons were just worksheets that involved clicking, dragging, and typing rather than writing with a pencil. But it was something different. It was new and novel to both myself and my students, and I had to start somewhere.

Today, I am the curriculum technologist for a different campus within the same district. I am responsible for helping the teachers on my campus create their own technology lessons to integrate into their curriculum. In addition, I train them on the technology hardware and software that our district purchases. While my passion is educational technology, I have discovered that, as a teacher, I am the exception, not the rule.

This does not mean that there are not thousands, if not millions, of educators in the world who heart edtech. Ning sites, wikis, and blogs are abundant in the world of educational technology. Educators abound on twitter, and even have their own special discussion every Tuesday called edchat where educators vote on and then discuss a topic related to education each and every week. Again, these educators are usually the exception, not the rule.

Does this mean that educators are not excited about and do not want to incorporate technology into their classrooms? No. Many are. The oohhs and aahhs that I receive from my teachers when I show them a new piece of technology typically rivals those heard on the 4th of July. They are excited and truly want to use technology in their lessons and with their students. However, there are many barriers that prohibit the use of the technology.

First of all, there is often a lack of training, or perhaps I should say a lack of training time. With the inception of the No Child Left Behind Act and RTI (Response to Intervention), schools are constantly under pressure to make sure that each and every child receives the instruction that they need to stay on grade level. Conference times, planning periods, after school meetings, and professional development days center around differentiated instruction and how to meet the needs of all children. So how much time is left for technology training? At my campus, I am limited to one hour per month.

So what would it take to help teachers incorporate technology? First and foremost, the equipment should be user friendly. Children get it. They aren't afraid to click until they figure things out. This isn't the case for teachers. Many were not raised with a computer in the home (I'm in my mid 30's and we purchased our first computer when I was a junior in high school!). Therefore, technology does not come naturally. With that in mind, I often look for products that are not only easy for students, but also for teachers. Some of the items that I look for in a product include the following:

• Plug and play - Teachers are afraid to install items on their own for fear of ruining the computer. If a teacher can just plug the equipment into their computer and start using it, they often will.

• User friendly - Icons and navigation within the software must be so intuitive that there isn't a learning curve. Teachers can begin using it immediately.

• Reports, reports, reports - This all leads back to No Child Left Behind and RTI. Data often drives our instruction, so reports are imperative.

• Differentiated Instruction - Will this product meet the needs of a wide variety of students in the class with minimal tweaking by teachers?

The second barrier that prohibits the use of technology in the classroom is the use of internet filtering by districts. First off, let me say that filtering is not always a bad thing. We certainly do not want our students to be able to access inappropriate and questionalble materials while online. On the other hand, there are times when internet filtering causes problems for the classroom teacher. Let me give you a few examples.

• Example #1 - Yesterday a teacher emailed me to say that the Deal or No Deal game on the CBS website that she uses to review her students for the Texas TAKS test was blocked. She had used the site the year before and had planned to use it again to review with her students one last time. Instead of being able to play a fun, internet based game, the students were forced to review using paper and pencil instead.

• Example #2 - The iTunes store is blocked in our district. This wouldn't be a huge problem except for the fact that our district also purchased a number of iPod Touches for our special education students. We would love to be able to use the educational apps that you can find in the App Store on these devices, but can't due to the restriction. I have found that we can download the app at home and transfer it to school and authorize the computer at school for the app, but that is not a very convenient solution.

• Example #3 - YouTube is also blocked in our district. Again, I certainly don't want the inappropriate material that can be found on YouTube to be found by my elementary students, or the high school students for that matter, but I do want to be able to access the educationally valuable materials for my teachers.

The third and final barrier that prohibits the use of technology in the classroom is technical support. Most districts have an IT department that will come to the classroom and fix equipment for teachers. However, the reliability of those departments can be anywhere from outstanding to horrible. I'm lucky to have an outstanding IT department that will arrive on my campus within 24-48 hours of a complaint. I've heard that others aren't so lucky.

Technical support also carries over to the companies that actually provide these products. What happens when the IT department in a district can't fix the problem and has to call the company's technical support hotline? Or worse yet, what happens if there is no IT department and the teacher has to call the hotline herself? To all of those in the technical support business, please remember that we rely on your products to sustain our classrooms at times. When your product breaks, we feel as if we are left in the dark ages. We have to completely change our lesson plans at the spur of the moment, and that is not always easy to do. So when we call and ask for help, please remember that we might just have a classroom of 22 students staring back at us trying to stay as quiet as possible while we are on the phone with you.

Despite the barriers listed above, I still heart edtech. There are so many wonderful things that technology can do, and the benefits for our students are enormormous. The pros far outweigh the cons. For those educators who are too timid to try educational technology in their classrooms for fear of the barriers, I would say just give it try. Who knows…you might discover that you heart edtech too!