Chapter 9 - Technology

When St. John's started to offer to host a cohort of graduate students who will major in Instructional Technology, I thought that there couldn't be a better fit for me. So I and several of my colleagues said yes --- and here we are today.

I am happy that the chapter on technology made me realize that we are not doing so bad in terms of technology in our school. For the most part, our teachers from PreK - 12 are all technology advocates. Handheld computers are being used from lower school (to practice math skills, music skills) to middle school (for essay writing, outlining). Our high school teachers use Moodle to check students' works. Colleagues talk to each other using quick e-notes (popups). Parents are able to check their child's progress by logging on to an online grading system. One can see how important connectivity is at our school. The moment our connection is down, our computer person is all over the place, checking to make sure that what is up should be up.

This year I did a virtual form of the science fair patterned after a presentation I attended last year at EARCOS (East Asia Regional Council of Overseas Schools) of which St. John's is a member. This virtual science fair paired each student of mine with a science expert (some were science undergrads from UOG, some were science teachers from the Philippines, some were colleagues, etc) who advised them (online) regarding their project. The students had the benefit of their advisor's expertise and I as their teacher are not bogged down advising 100+ students. For me, this was a win-win situation. There were a lot of kinks that needed to be ironed out in the beginning but for the most part, it was good to see the kids doing science online.