- Get a group of educators together who are interested in this project . Ideally this group should include an administrator, library media specialist and several key teachers. It is important to involve school personnel who are in leadership positions who believe that this is a worthy undertaking that will help promote the school’s instructional goals.
- Develop a plan of action with an accompanying timeline. Break the action plan down into incremental steps that can be accomplished one at a time, and identify what support the library media specialist, teachers and students might need at each step.
- Plan to involve your library media specialist in the equipment ordering, training, and troubleshooting. Centralize the training to encourage a team effort -- then decentralize and encourage those with the highest comfort level in each department to help others. It is highlly recomended that you provide continuing support for those ready to venture out on their own, along with more individualized training for teachers in need of review.
- In order to get teachers to use technology, make it readily available and easy to use.
- Similarly, centralize your equipment at first. Create a focus on sharing equipment and strategies in a central location -- later, distribute the tools to those who have demonstrated an ability to use them effectively.
- Our district has been successful in utilizing the turn-key approach in many areas. The teachers who are “early adopters” have a responsibility to help others and also to discover and model best practice. Those who begin to use the “Smart Classrooms” will become a resource for their colleagues.
- Allow teachers to let you know when they’re ready for the next step, especially as they observe their peers experimenting with the new technology. Use other teachers as catalysts for the initiative and retain the right of the administration to make the decision on who gets what items in their classroom based on effective use and demonstrated improvement.
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