"National Ed Tech Plan Puts Technology at the Heart of Education Reform"

National Ed Tech Plan Put Technology at the Heart of Educational Reform. Written by David Nagel

Response to the article:

Nagel first states to us that the initial version of Obama's Administration on the National Educational Technology Plan (NETP). This first draft of the NETP stated that school days and years will be longer, internet access will be incorporated more into the curriculum, yet there will be flexibility in "seat time," and of course a greater emphasis on assessment. In my honest opinion this just sounds like the same thing that has been happening in schools already. Yes new technologies are being introduced and used in schools, yes assessments and standardized tests are being weighed more greatly, so I do not really see much positive change in this new plan. To me they are not making a very good effort in trying to truly fix and strengthen education in America. This new plan to me sounds and looks just like the No Child Left Behind Act with technology thrown into it to make it seems new, fancy and wonderful. 

Now I do believe that technology can be used to teach students more efficiently, in more interesting ways, and improve their technological skills yet by sticking a "classroom clicker" in every students hand does not mean they are being assessed properly and does not mean they learning, the students could just be guessing and hitting buttons at random. Short answers, projects, discussions, etc these are ways to assess that tell us more about the knowledge our students have about the lesson I just taught. Just like in my first blog about the school Kyrene which spent millions and millions of dollars on technology yet the students test scores were lower and classroom sizes were higher. I believe that I can teach my students more if i have less of them with little or no technology than if i had double the amount and they all had clickers and iPads. 

Under category 3 (learning) of the plan it states "The emphasis in the category of learning is a shift toward student engagement and empowerment in their learning activities "in and out of school that prepare them to be active, creative, knowledgeable, and ethical participants in our globally networked society." This is the only part of the plan I have read that I agreed with. Yet does engaging and empowering our students mean we can only do so by giving them a smart phone? Teachers should be empowering their students by the manner in which they teach their students to learn. Teachers are caregivers, nurturers, authoritarians, knowledge builders, empowerment builders and much much more!  

"NETP is calling on schools to adopt models from the business world to increase productivity" when schools are being called businesses and students are thought of as workers or managers like in Shame of the Nation by Jonathan Kozol, that is when you know that the people making these plans do not know what needs to be done and should not be dealing and medalling with education.