“The best kids are going to become the best. But the best thing about it is that you’re going to learn lessons in playing those sports about winning and losing and teamwork and teammates and arguments and everything else that are going to affect you positively for the rest of your life.”
-Carl Lewis

From time to time people ask “why did you go 1:1?”, or “what are the students getting out of all of this technology?”, or “what is our return on investment (ROI)?”. For me and educational leaders all over the world there are many reasons. I have been a champion of and for individualized expression and differentiated learning since I set foot in my first 8th grade social studies classroom in 1993. With the U.S. History Workshop instructional model students had guided practice, options in assessment, consistent expectations – high expectations for all – and we brought history alive so to speak. An amplifier for student learning was is and continues to be technology tools. Do you remember Netscape? I do – Do you remember HyperStudio>? – I do – Do you remember music/video clips to aid instruction (we still do with Discovery Education for example).

I’m proud to lead the 1:1 transformative learning movement in Deerfield with the outstanding leaders and teachers with whom I work every day because our students – like all students – deserve a world class education and learning environment.

Though I’m somewhat conservative in many ways, as a leader my record shows that more often than not I challenge the norm. I read a lot as most educational leaders do, and I aim to engage, inspire, and empower each and every person with whom I work and interact. Thankfully the Board of Education at DPS109 “gets it” and supports that our change and transformation is part of the new normal that we are creating and more importantly we are allowing our students to create.

At a conference recently I was reminded of some deeply relevant and comprehensive studies conducted by Apple including their 1985-1997 longitudinal study of the “why” in terms of using technology tools to amplify and expand student learning opportunities and teacher pedagogical opportunities. In brief, as the speaker shared, the study found that engaged learners supported by great teachers learn more than disengaged learners with not so great teachers. A great deal of engagement is shown to take place when technology and personalization are infused in the learning environment. That is the environment I want in every classroom every day – ENGAGE, Inspire and Empower is our mission/vision/tag line. Engagement is key – excellence is key as well.

The speaker went on to share the key findings from their follow up study from Apple’s Classroom of Tomorrow Today – 2008-2010. Not surprisingly, findings included that student growth and learning is most impacted when the learning environment is: creative, relevant, collaborative, and challenging. High expectations and challenging learning exercises support learning and growth.

Especially in our new leadership experience in DPS109 we review, consider, analyze and refresh the dialogue about our Vision -Why does our institution exist?

Our institution (Public school district) exists so that teachers may teach and students may learn. In addition we exist to allow teachers to provide excellent personalized learning with the best and most effective and impactful methods, resources, plans, and partners. I want our teachers and students to stretch their abilities and growth beyond where they are – technology amplifies – technology tools transform – technology tools open doors that exist all around us and infuse our lives. The partnership of teachers, students, community in support of relevant, challenging and modern learning environments – these are cornerstones of our educational mission, vision, values and goals.

A hot topic is how to meet the needs of different learners in the same classroom. There are volumes of literature and research about this topic, for the purpose of the blog and for this post in particular, I share a term I learned at the leadership institute:

Targeted Pedagogy – (instead of personalized learning or differentiated instruction)

We contemplated a very realistic Personalized Learning Challenge – We consider a typical 5th grade classroom in “anytown” USA (or Canada, Australia, the UK, etc.). This is a classroom where one child is reading at 1st gr and one at 8th grade level, one is reading at the 12+ grade level. With 23 learners, in my opinion, teachers need technology tools to transform the learning experience so the “normal” class can target pedagogy to challenge and meet the needs to close gaps for all children regardless of their individual reading level and remediate 1st grade level. I’ve written about the vast resources our Board provides for our teachers in that we are starting to learn how to leverage individual learning paths based upon valid and reliable metrics so that students are reinforced and challenged for growth and new learning each and every day.

A challenge shared with us at the conference was to ask teachers to shed their rooms of their file cabinets … reach out into the future – not the past – to curate, create, collaborate, and construct learning environments where each and every child is taken from their point to points far beyond any limits.

Engage, Inspire, Empower