This year has been a huge struggle when it comes to
technology in my new school. I consider
myself to be very technology savvy and I love teaching people how to use
technology. Unfortunately, a large part
of teaching teachers how to use technology is their own will to learn the new
things. I was a first grade teacher for
the past two years and I worked with a younger girl and two older women. The older ladies loved us, the younger girls,
because we were able to teach them about technology and all the benefits of
using it. They truly wanted to learn how
to use it, but they never had someone sit down and take the time to show them
how to use it! I loved teaching them how to use it because not only did they
benefit from learning the new technology, but their students benefited from
being part of a 21st century classroom!
This year I moved to a new school and I am the media
specialist there. I felt a huge weight
on my shoulders for this school to be very technologically savvy, this way the
district would see us as an updated and very current school. I was in for a surprise when I talked with
our computer lab teacher who was the technology guru for the past few years,
and she told me that it wasn’t until last year that every teacher at our school
learned how to check their emails. This
information was disheartening and bizarre to me at the same time. I quickly realized that I was no longer in a
place where the will to learn the new technology was prevalent.
As the media specialist there are several other mini jobs
that are handed to you. I quickly realized
that I had to teach the teachers how to use the computer programs for
evaluation, testing, grading and they were all online! The thought of teaching these teachers who
truly cared nothing about learning new technology how to efficiently use the
new technology was seriously my worst nightmare.
I began slow, I offered grade level training, but they didn’t
want to stay after school. Finally, I realized
the only way I was going to get the teachers to sit down and listen to me was
to be part of the faculty meeting agenda.
I wanted to be effective so I planned my strategy for weeks. I began by creating both print and online
directions for everyone. I gave everyone
a printed copy of what we were going to do, and then I showed them how in the
training and I had them bring their computers to walk through it step by step
with me, and then I sent them the online materials via email after the training.
I have found this is the most beneficial and effective way for me to train my
teachers, it is not perfect, it is not easy, but so far it is the only thing
that has worked.
Teaching teachers has been one of the most frustrating parts
of this profession thus far. They simply
are too busy to give you the time that you need to effectively teach them, and I
honestly cannot blame them. I was once
told that if you want a training to be effective you must show the teachers
that it is important by planning it during the school day, paying them to be
there (by having it during the school day), and thanking them for taking the
time to make it happen. The problem I find
is that we are only given the time to train after school because teachers
cannot be taken away from their students. But after school the teachers are
done, and they don’t feel that a training is important if it takes place after
school because there are 100 other thing they could be doing during that time
other than listening to someone talk to them about new things they have to do.
While I understand their frustrations, I also become very
frustrated because I want our school to be technologically advanced, but we can’t
get to that point if our teachers are uninterested in learning the new
skills. Do you have any suggestions for
motivating teachers to try new things?
