Effective School Technology Leadership

I read Chris Lehmann's blog post "A Whole New School". Chris, who blogs at Practical Theory: A View from the Classroom and is the principal of The Science Leadership Academy in Philadelphia, PA.  Chris asks this question. What is Good Technology Education Leadership? Here is his answer.

The simple answer is that good technology educational leadership is no different than good educational leadership; that the choices we make with technology education should be deliberate, thoughtful and in line with the overall educational goals of our organization.

I hope that we are seeing better leadership and our schools with respect to technology, at least I am seeing this at my high school and school district which has a very strong commitment to integration of technology for teachers and students as well.  This is evident by our school district issuing Macbook laptops to each teacher this year and our technology department spending a lot of time this summer teaching the teachers how to use them.

So how do we expose and integrate technology in our classrooms and involve students?

First, we have to recognize that to use these tools only for two periods a week is not transformative, and it perpetuates the problem of access.

I do believe that we as teachers who teach subjects other than Computer Technology Classes we must look for innovative ways to integrate technology and Web 2.0 tools in our classrooms to engage our students more in what we are trying to teach them.

Even though most of us are not 1 to 1 schools where every student has a laptop issued to them, I do believe that as teachers, we should seek out opportunities to allow our students the access to computers and computer labs and show them how to use these emerging technologies wherever possible.

When I see computers and computer labs vacant for many hours of the school day I begin to wonder why are we not using our resources better.  I think a big part of the answer should be to get teachers more excited about their own knowledge and abilities and seek out professional development opportunities to learn how to use these technologies in their classrooms.

In addressing the tools and technologies available to us as educators, he gives us a guideline to use in using these tools.

Secondly, these tools allow all of us — students and teachers — to do five things better than we’ve ever been able to do them in our classes before: Research, Collaborate, Create, Present and Network.

In summary he asks what is the role of teachers with all of these Web 2.0 tools available to us.

Finally, what is the role of the teacher with all these new tools? It is my belief that while our role has shifted, teachers have never been more important. We are no longer the only source of information in our classrooms as kids can access information more quickly and more powerfully than ever before, but as the world becomes more fast-paced, more bewildering, more and more of a Tower of Babel, we have one role left to us, and I believe that it has always been our most important role. More than the skills we still teach, more than the content we still teach….

We teach wisdom.

I really enjoyed reading this post.  I agree with much of what Chris says in this post and enjoy reading what he has written.  I had the opportunity to meet Chris at NECC 2008 in San Antonio, TX this summer and listen to him present at the Bloggers' Cafe.  As I told him at NECC he would be a fun principal to work for because he would challenge teachers to expand their own horizons and use of technologies in their classrooms.