Two years from now, we're expecting every high school student to have a laptop at their disposal during class. I decided to adopt that mentality as I attend JOSTI. At every workshop or session, I will be taking notes on this blog, so I can turn them into useable posts in the future. As I pulled out my laptop to replicate a student's actions, I thought the theme of the keynote session was just too apropos: letting students take the lead in technology.
Evan Glazer, principal of Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, explained why his administration and staff adopted this policy: If students are already good test-takers, how do you challenge them? At TJHSST, the answer was giving them opportunities to be creative, especially with technology. And so, eighth period is designated for one of 150 activities, many of which are determined by students themselves; for example, one group of students collaborated with a local business to create a satellite. This activity period gives students the opportunity to show what they can do with technological resources, with the guidance of mentors. One of the most ambitious projects was explained by Richard Washer, information technology coordinator for TJHSST and techie strand coordinator for the conference: In 2002, students got source code from Blackboard to create courses for students evacuated from the American International School in Islamabad. In the seven years since the establishment of this virtual school, 27 more organizations and shcools have joined. Students clearly are excited about such empowerment in their education. In fact, four alumni are coming back to the school to teach. And six others shared what they came up with when they were given freedom with technological resources:
1. Recent graduate William Yang is student technical administrator and co-founder of a free alternative to mass-market review books for AP tests. All the material was created by and for students. Right now, the wiki is not available to users outside of the school (for security purposes), but William hopes to do so soon. After all, this might be not just a school project, but a small business someday. Why not get our students on board with this venture, if we can?
2. Recent graduate Josiah Boning is student head administrator of TJHSST's intranet. Basically, it is an in-school Facebook. Students join on their own, creating their own log-ins and profiles. After moderator-approved, students can search the directory for information. Registration and attendance for eighth-period activities is done virtually. Announcements are e-mailed to trained moderators to be posted. Class elections are held through online polls. Josiah said he will reveal the PHP language source code if some WBAIS students want to take on a similar project.
3. Jennifer Lee, a student of Japanese, and Nihaar Sinha and JeanMarie Stewart, students of German, contributed to the school's foreign-language podcast page. After teachers secured a grant to purchase MacBooks and iPods, students brainstormed ideas for podcasts. In German class, students wrote scripts about pictures introducing the sections of the textbook. Then they used GarageBand to record and mix photo and audio, and some students used their eighth period to create a WordPress blog where students could post their podcasts. Some creations were even uploaded to and now available on iTunes. And Nihaar even dispelled every teacher's greatest fear: No classtime was spent on instructing podcasting (students were able to figure this out themselves); to encourage risk-taking, grading rubrics were for linguistic goals only.
4. Sappho Gilbert, a recent graduate and proud member of Generation Y, interned at the National Institutes of Health for her senior research project, similar to the one at WBAIS. The tumor biology lab where she worked was revolutionized with a simple suggestion from this tech-savvy generation: Use print screen (PrtSc) to capture microscope images for cell counting. This process, which is still used in the lab today, "made work more manageable" and more accurate, Sappho said. Whose to say a WBAIS student couldn't tell any of us what would make our classes "more manageable"?
Which brings us back to the topic at hand: Trust your students to tell you what you should be doing with technology. They know, and they are just waiting for the opportunity to show you what they know.
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