#21sted

[lifelongkindergarten]

[lifelongkindergarten]

[powwhamteaching]

Kind of Bummed About Technology Policies, Guys

So Missouri passed a law a few years ago saying all school districts need policies for student/teacher communication online.

Most districts restrict online communication pretty heavily. So let's set aside that implicitly, these policies assume teachers want to communicate with students for untoward purposes, which is deeply upsetting and offensive.

Our district's policy states that teachers cannot communicate with students online or through text messages, except through district approved sites such as My Big Campus.

Okay. Fine. But I asked if I could have my kids get Google Drive accounts, so they could collaborate on documents, we could share them, and we wouldn't have to fight with jump drives/saving to the server. The response I got disappointed me, but I'm willing to role with it. I was told to try My Big Campus because it can do most of the things Drive can do.

Which, yes, MBC does do the things we need for class. But I know the kids get Google accounts in one of their computer classes. It would be great if they could use those in other classes too. Also, I think Google Drive will be more useful for kids outside of school. You're not really preparing kids to use technology if the programs/apps they use only exist in high school settings.

Our administrators were talking up using Twitter yesterday, so I asked what I would need to do to get a class Twitter account. Apparently, to do what I want to do, I would have to get signed permission from every student using Twitter. What I want is to be able to pose a question to the class which the students can answer by tweeting under a hashtag. It's a nice, simple way to do a formative assessment or generate class discussion questions. And the sense I got is that, again, I can use My Big Campus for this. Which, yes, I can use My Big Campus for this, but Twitter is cool and the point of asking to use it is because kids will think it's neat, and our district is already on board for Twitter, but collecting 200 permission slips is just enough of a hurdle to make this not-so-worth it since it's not integral to my class.

Everyone I talked to about this was nice, and I understand that they are not responsible for our district's policies. But it's pretty demoralizing to sit in meetings for two days where our district's mission of "preparing 21st century learners" and that we should engage students using technology is pounded into our heads, but I have to fight to get to use Google Drive. 

It is contradictory and frustrating.