4.1 Digital Equity
Candidates model and promote strategies for achieving equitable access to digital tools and resources and technology-related best practices for all students and teachers. (PSC 4.1/ISTE 5a)
Candidates model and promote strategies for achieving equitable access to digital tools and resources and technology-related best practices for all students and teachers. (PSC 4.1/ISTE 5a)
This artifact, the Current Reality/SWOT Analysis Video on Digital Equity from ITEC 7410, represents my initial thinking about digital equity at my school. As one of ISTE’s Fourteen Essential Conditions, I had a few conversations about digital equity with teach leaders at my school in order to determine my school’s level of digital equity. Then, I read more about digital equity as it relates to device access, high-speed broadband, digital literacy, on-going support, gender and a culture that values internet access. This video is a synthesis of what I learned about digital equity as well as what I believe about digital equity in education. While I collaborated with peers and school leadership to understand digital equity at my school, I am the sole creator of this video.
This artifact represents my mastery of Standard 4.1: Digital Equity. As part of the project, I worked with the technology leadership team to discuss ways to make the lab scheduler my equitable, since one of the problems we identified is that some teachers reserve lab days when they first become available, while others wait until all available days have been scheduled. This results in an uneven distribution of technology since a minority of teachers have access to computer labs the majority of the time. The solutions we decided on were to give frequent schedulers their own set of Chromebooks to free-up space of more novel lab-users, and to limit the amount of times teachers try to book labs in a row. As I mention in the video, I am a big advocate for mobile learners. After witnessing students struggle to use their phones to learn as well as students struggle to use school devices to learn, I made efforts to use phone-friendly Web 2.0 tools for lessons, I teach digital literacy on schools devices, and I include tech tutorials in lessons so that students have support as they use new technology. Additionally, I have promoted these strategies for equitable access to classroom tools by publishing them on my candidate blog, and engaging in conversations with teachers in different districts about what they do to promote equitable access at their schools. Furthermore, I have promoted digital equity within school by sharing what I know about digital equity with teachers and students.
From completing this artifact, I learned that digital equity is more than just lack of access to a device, which is a misconception I had initially. Instead, digital equity should consider the inequities of many different social and economic factors, ranging from reliable internet to gender. This class has helpful me understand digital equity and how it relates to the student population I serve in a meaningful way. To improve the quality of this artifact, I would edit the video, or write out a script ahead of time—I hate how many times I say “um.”
The work that went into creating the artifact has helped my students learn digital literacy on schools devices as well as their phones. Additionally, last spring I led a professional development on Flipgrid s phone-friendly app that students can use in the classroom as well as how to support student use on PC and phone. One of my focuses was to teach teachers how to incorporate tech literacy into their lesson planning. The impact can be accessed by following up with teachers to see how they integrate digital literacy and tech support into the lessons.
This artifact represents my mastery of Standard 4.1: Digital Equity. As part of the project, I worked with the technology leadership team to discuss ways to make the lab scheduler my equitable, since one of the problems we identified is that some teachers reserve lab days when they first become available, while others wait until all available days have been scheduled. This results in an uneven distribution of technology since a minority of teachers have access to computer labs the majority of the time. The solutions we decided on were to give frequent schedulers their own set of Chromebooks to free-up space of more novel lab-users, and to limit the amount of times teachers try to book labs in a row. As I mention in the video, I am a big advocate for mobile learners. After witnessing students struggle to use their phones to learn as well as students struggle to use school devices to learn, I made efforts to use phone-friendly Web 2.0 tools for lessons, I teach digital literacy on schools devices, and I include tech tutorials in lessons so that students have support as they use new technology. Additionally, I have promoted these strategies for equitable access to classroom tools by publishing them on my candidate blog, and engaging in conversations with teachers in different districts about what they do to promote equitable access at their schools. Furthermore, I have promoted digital equity within school by sharing what I know about digital equity with teachers and students.
From completing this artifact, I learned that digital equity is more than just lack of access to a device, which is a misconception I had initially. Instead, digital equity should consider the inequities of many different social and economic factors, ranging from reliable internet to gender. This class has helpful me understand digital equity and how it relates to the student population I serve in a meaningful way. To improve the quality of this artifact, I would edit the video, or write out a script ahead of time—I hate how many times I say “um.”
The work that went into creating the artifact has helped my students learn digital literacy on schools devices as well as their phones. Additionally, last spring I led a professional development on Flipgrid s phone-friendly app that students can use in the classroom as well as how to support student use on PC and phone. One of my focuses was to teach teachers how to incorporate tech literacy into their lesson planning. The impact can be accessed by following up with teachers to see how they integrate digital literacy and tech support into the lessons.