Integration of Technology and SAMR @Fairfield High

Integration of educational technology has been a focus of ours at Fairfield High since the 2014-2015 school year. Year one we sent several teachers to the GAFE Summit in November 2014 and about 20 to the GAFE Summit over the summer. Then, this year with the deployment of the 1:1 Chromebooks for our 9th graders, we ensured that every 9th grade teacher attended the GAFE Summit in November 2015. However, knowing and understanding the Google Apps for Education is just one step in the puzzle. Understanding how to integrate and where a lesson stands as far as SAMR is another critical component. We want our teachers to fundamentally understand that merely substituting technology for paper is very similar to a DOK level 1. We want to see our teachers at the levels of modification and redefinition.

Our Ed Tech Specialist, Josh Harris, has been a key player in assisting teachers to understand SAMR and what it looks like in their classrooms. Josh has assisted teachers in many ways and his 1:1 coaching in their classroom has been invaluable. Josh is also now going to be part of our continued Plan/Observe/Debrief planning sessions. We are going to work on showing teachers how they can have overlap with educational technology and instructional strategies such as academic conversations.

Our teachers have engaged in two colleague to colleague teaching sessions so far this school year. In November we had our #TechJamSession and in February we had our #InnerCircleOuterCircle. At both sessions teachers shared with each other different ideas for tech integration and ways to move their classrooms from DOK 1/2 up to DOK 3 and 4.