overall instructional leadership
Master of Education in Educational Technology Leadership
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My greatest growth as an educator has come the last few years I've spent in Instructional Technology. Last school year I began to feel inadequate with my knowledge around the theories behind why any of this was valuable to education and thought, "Who am I to try and be a leader in this area?" So, last summer began my journey of pursuing a Master's degree in Educational Technology Leadership. My passion, aptitude, and desire for this field drove me to complete this degree in one year's time, walking the stage
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this May. I've been empowered to become a leader in my field, and I've reached the point where I'm comfortable taking risks for the greater good of education. I believe this establishes a strong commitment to my profession and demonstrates my impact on those I support. Here's my full master's story.
strategic plan
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Before this school year started, I wanted to make sure I created a plan that could help keep me focused on the work that needed to be done on my campus. My campus principal and I spent time diving into her vision of the campus. Together, we created a complimentary vision on what instructional technology would look like on the campus. As a result, I developed this technology strategic plan that includes our mission and vision for technology integration, priority goals/objectives, strategic actions to accomplish those goals, and measures of performance.
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professional development
micro-credentials
In an effort to provide differentiated professional learning for my faculty/staff members, I developed a micro-credential system that develops teachers' skills and builds capacity on campus by making them a leader in that area. Please visit our website to learn more information.
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Listen to Lauren Jones's personal story about how she earned her STEM & Coding micro-credential. She'll explain the goal setting process and how my coaching led to her professional growth in this area. As a result of her learning, she received a grant and was even awarded Teacher of the Month by Ozobots. Lauren now serves as a leader for others who are pursuing the STEM & Coding micro-credential.
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professional learning courses
I also offer district-wide professional learning courses year round including sessions on:
- Google Certified Educator Level 1 and 2 Bootcamps
- Prove You're a Rockstar for Building Teacher T-TESS Portfolios
- Inquiry, Problem and Project Based Learning Methods
- Build Your Own Virtual Reality
student benefits from involvement
Student Growth flipgrid
With our campus culture of innovation, we're being intentional about teaching and growing student agency, collaboration, curiosity, and risk-taking. My plan to document growth in these areas is to gather data using Flipgrid.
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Our students have begun posting what their current understanding of these innovation pillars are. Every 4-6 weeks students will revisit their original posts and continue the narrative, sharing their personal story of how they are growing in these areas. Then, students add classwork to portfolios where they reflect on how their creations align with each of the 4 areas.
For example, listen to Preston talk about his understanding of collaboration. Here's his portfolio where he will soon begin to add evidence to support his knowledge and skills in all areas.
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house system app
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Agnew Middle School is using the house system to build community by empowering students to earn points for their houses through good behavior, special accomplishments, and more. So to support their vision, I use my abilities to create all the graphics and even developed an app to be the brains of the whole operation.
Listen to James Colbath, Student Success Coordinator, explain how my app is impacting student culture on campus. |
wonder day
What if students were given more choice where they are allowed to explore and learn content within the context of their passions? In this type of environment, students would be given the autonomy to master objectives and standards
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through passion-based learning. Centered on using technology with design thinking, these types of learning experiences afford students life ready skills that will prepare them for success in the future. Here is the first site where our students documented their learning and shared their Wonder Day projects. Because of its success, we now host two Wonder Days each year for our students. This served as our entry point for what you'll read about next, my role as Passion-based Learning Teams Coach.
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visionary
passion-based learning teams coach
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My efforts in my field are futile if I don't have the vision, support, and empowerment from campus leadership. Listen to Principal Kelly Long describe her vision of what learning should look like, a risky move in today's education system. Classrooms that utilize a student-centered approach where learners show mastery of objectives by learning the content through a lens of passions and aptitudes empower students to take ownership of their growth and connect their learning to relevant, real-world experiences.
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project culture shift Expert & influencer
Google for Education's Project Culture Shift is a guided process that helps schools create rituals and routines that foster a culture of innovation among teachers, staff, and leaders, who can then work to create that culture for students.
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At Agnew Middle School, I facilitated workshops to help teachers:
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digital citizenship
district-wide monthly lessons
My Instructional Technology department supports district digital citizenship by creating monthly lessons for our 40,000 students. Each campus has a designated representative who develops a plan to enact these lesson. My efforts working with my campus rep this fall have led to me earning the Pear Deck Digital Citizen badge.
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microbyte video series
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As a leader of my department's social media team, I storyboard, produce, and film a video series we call MicroBytes. This helps us to stay relevant and on top of this topic in between monthly lessons. It's our goal to teach and inspire others that digital citizenship cannot be taught in isolation. It must be interwoven into all of our conversations with students, so we are charged with setting that standard.
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