Technology Woes

My work telephone has a permanent red light indicating a message in my inbox. I asked the administrative staff how to access it. No one knew. I asked teachers how to access messages. No one knew. They all had a similar problem: permanent red message lights. They had all tried, but the phone kept asking for a password and no one had been given a password. I tried all possible generic set-up passwords: 000, 0000, 999, 9999 etc. None worked.

I went online to look for a manual. I found one, but it did give an instructions about passwords.

When I heard that the phone system would be down for 10 minutes, because the phone company technician was on sight to make upgrades, I dropped everything I was doing and sought him out. He immediately reset my password and I cleared 79 messages going back 2 years. That is no exaggeration.

I have set up my mailbox and am now receiving messages. I have invited any member of staff to email me if he wishes to have his password reset and have arranged with the phone technician to forward the info on to him. I have also invited teachers to attend a workshop on how to navigate their phones.

Never did I think that I would be working at this level when I decided to take on the job of media specialist.

Experiences with Social Media

My multiple intellience inventory pegs me as a intrapersonal- it is number one on the list -and not interpersonal so I am not a very good candidate Social Media. As I indicated in my introduction, I do not make much use of the media. I am also not a letter writer and email has not motivated me to communicate more frequently with family or friends. With that said, I feel like an onlooker more than a participant in most of the platforms that we have been introduced to throughout the course. I have had to go outside of my comfort zone in sharing information with class members.


If anyone noticed, I started my Blogger account in 2006 but never made any entries. I had no intention of developing it at that point; I was simply exploring the medium. That is also true of my Delicious account: I subscribed to it in 2004, used it aggressively at first and then only sporadically. Some colleagues with whom I have shared the site since 2004 rely heavily on it. My sole purpose for taking the course is to be able to provide instruction to others who wish to use the media and to develop ways to incorpoorate them into a middle school curriculum.


The course has provided a wealth of resources that I am sure I will be continuing to explore long after the course is over. For example, my most recent search in Technorati using "middle school libraries" uncovered a site entitled Free Rice that is a vocabulary builder. For every correct word, the site donates rice to the U. N. World Food Program. The site has been a hit with my students and staff.

I have a new perspective about the media - their inter-connectivity. Previously I viewed Blogger, Delicious, Flickr et alia as self-contained and independent, but the course has shown how to draw all of the applications together and to meld them into a framework that is uniquely one's own.

Accelerated Reader

I started working at a middle school as the teacher-librarian (TL) in September. The TL is responsible for administering the online reading program, namely Accelerated Reader (AR). This presented me with somewhat of a challenge because I’d never worked with AR and there was no training. I had to resort to online manuals and on demand webinars. Additionally the school had moved to an up-graded program that was hosted by the vendor and not by the school. This required a number of technical changes that to date have not yet been sorted out. My biggest technical challenge is creating a short cut on the desktop that is NOT a favorite. I am trying to cut down on the number of steps students must take to access the program. At the moment they must logon with their district username and password; open Internet Explorer; type in the AR address; respond to security dialogue boxes; logon to AR using their AR username and password; and finally search for their quizzes. This is problematic for the majority of students: 50% tested below grade 5. I simply want them to click on a desktop icon and have access to the program.

Selling AR to Teachers

AR, originally published by Advantage Learning Systems (now the School Renaissance Institute), is not the only "computerized reading tool" on the market; however, it is the most widely advertised and used software available. The program begins with the Standardized Test for Assessment of Reading (STAR). Renaissance Place describes STAR as follows:

1. Student takes the test. Questions continually adjust to the student’s responses.You get results.
2. Detailed reports help you place new students, measure progress, and identify those who need individual help.

You make data-driven decisions. Match appropriate books and curricular materials to each student.

(There has been some criticism of the validity of the test which I will discuss at a later point.)

From what I can gather the program has never been fully implemented. Homeroom teachers, who are the designated lead teachers in the program, have little involvement. Some have never seen it in operation and none have accounts to access the program and monitor student progress. The librarian is the only one with this access, and even though there are only 215 students, it would be impossible for one person to monitor all students that closely. Teachers simply supervise the sustained silent reading period each morning. They are given the initial STAR report for each student and disseminate the student reading levels. Students then visit the library, choose books and complete the quiz when they have finished reading the book. There are no incentives in place although AR has several built into it: there are graduated reading levels and students receive a certificate when they achieve the next level. AR also recommends extrinsic rewards and in the program’s first year, there were footballs and movie tickets to name a few, but that no longer exists. Consequently, only those students who are self-motivated are participating.
At the moment my mandate is to get the program up and running. Lead teachers are expected to set goals for individual students; read to or with students who are challenged; review individual quiz results; initiate interventions by reporting lack of student progress to the appropriate staff members; and liaise with parents.
Teachers have a mixed reaction to the program. Some embrace it; others see it as another responsibility that they have little time for. My biggest challenge is to get teachers to buy in to the program and become more involved with it. To this end I have given presentations to small groups of teachers and worked individually with teachers who are uncertain about the program.

Final Project

I am trying to position myself as tech coordinator/librarian in the school to which I have recently transferred; hence the Master’s in Computing and Education at TC. My final project is to develop a technology plan for the school at which I currently teach, and I will document my progress through this site. I have been rather delinquent in developing this blog as I have been expending much time and energy in transitioning from one school to another, but the issues I have faced thus far will provide a focus for this assignment.