Week 1 Assignment, Part 2

In completing the Technology Applications Inventory and the SETDA survey, I am stunned by how much I don't know about technology. I have always considered myself to be technologically astute, however, seeing how poorly I scored in the Solving Problems domain of the Technology Applications Inventory has made me reconsider my assessment of my skills. Additionally, I realized that because my campus does not track the correlation of technology and student achievement, we may be missing an important source of data.

I understand from my campus technology coordinator that technology data as it impacts student achievement is not collected at the elementary level in our district.I think we should be collecting this data at the elementary school level because technology skills that must be mastered by Grade 8 must be formed in elementary school. If we track this data in elementary school, we can better predict how our eigth graders will do on their assessment in Foundations, Information Acquisition, Problem Solving, and Communication. Further, we can use the data to formatively assess our students' performance and address skills that need more instruction to assure mastery.

The Technology Applications Inventory indicates that Foundations and Information Acquisition are my areas of greatest expertise. I agree with the results of my survey especially since Foundations assesses the most basic computer applications and Information Acquisition is a skill that has evolved as I have kept up to date with current technology. As a technology leader on my campus, I will need to strengthen my Solving Problem skills such as learning spreadsheet and desktop publishing programs.