ISTE Coaching Standards
5b : Professional Learning Facilitator - Build the capacity of educators, leaders, and instructional teams to put the ISTE Standards into practice by facilitating active learning and providing meaningful feedback.
The ISTE Standards provide competencies for learning, teaching, and leading in the digital age, providing a comprehensive roadmap for the effective use of technology in schools worldwide. Translating standards into ideas to which teachers can build professional learning and identify how those standards can be aligned with their everyday practices in their classroom and schools have been significantly important in the digital age.
How to support educators to tie digital tools used in teaching and their professional learning to the ISTE Standards? I will be examining Schoology, a learning platform used in my school district and some other digital learning tools in this post and understanding how these tools supports educators in their professional development and extending to their teaching practices.
Schoology has earned a Seal of Alignment (2018), which means ISTE verifies that this product:
• Promotes critical technology skills
• Supports the use of technology in appropriate ways
• Contributes to the pedagogically robust use of technology for teaching and learning
• Aligns to the ISTE Standards in specific ways as described in the review finding report
Schoology offers a professional development program on blended learning using the Schoology platform and tools for educators. According to the Schoology Blended Learning Professional Development (2018), the Schoology Blended Learning Professional Development is grounded in research-based strategies and collaboration to enable educators to master and apply new learning in their own educational context. International Society in Technology in Education (2018) conducted a study to review alignment against the ISTE Standards for Educators. This study offered a professional development program on blended learning using the Schoology platform and tools to 15 educators participate to transform their educational environment with a shared vision for learning.
The Blended Learning program consists of nine sessions of approximately 24 contact hours, delivered over a school year. Educators were working with Schoology coaches and educational experts to help their schools transform their classrooms while maximizing the use of Schoology platform tools.
The Schoology Blended Learning resource aligns to the following indicators of the ISTE Standards for Educators:
According to the result, educators who completed this program have a comprehensive understanding of blended learning, utilizing all the tools available in Schoology and external apps and tools that complement and enhance the experience where appropriate. Educators who completed this program have a very complete understanding of the ISTE Standards and have gained the knowledge and skills to create engaging learning experiences for students.
Besides learning platforms like Schoology, there are many digital tools tied to ISTE standards. Crawford (2016) shares how teachers can use the following five technology tools tied to the ISTE Standards in their teaching.
- Diigo, a social bookmarking website that allows students to engage deeply with websites and PDFs. After students sign up for a free account, they can highlight, annotate, and tag content found online. By recording and analyzing their thoughts, students become more than passive observers. It connects to the ISTE Standards for Teachers to facilitate and inspire student learning and creativity.
- Touchcast, allows students a way to address the Knowledge Constructor and Creative Communicator standards within the ISTE Standards for Students, which expect students to curate resources and express themselves creatively for the purpose of informing their peers.
- Google Classroom, a hallmark of the ISTE Standards for Educators, to model digital age work and learning.
- Screencastify, providing feedback for students via technology and asking them to determine their own improvement goals, which creates empowered learners from ISTE Student Standard.
- Goobric, allows teachers to use rubrics to automatically score student work.
The Seal of Alignment program from ISTE recognizes many edtech products for their alignment to the ISTE Standards. It is a helpful resource or tool for educators and coaches to find products that provide a high-quality, standards-aligned learning experience that enhances educators and students’ digital age skills.
Reference
International Society in Technology in Education (2018), Schoology Blended Learning Professional Development. https://cdn.iste.org/www-root/PDF/FindingsReportISTE-Schoology_FINAL.pdf?_ga=2.238522051.2144943631.1646605901-368861522.1640196503
Crawford, B.,(2016), 5 tech tools that complement ISTE Standards. International Society in Technology in Education. https://www.iste.org/explore/ISTE-Standards-in-Action/5-tech-tools-that-complement-ISTE-Standards
Totally agree that your sharing is very useful and informative, it is true that in schools or in many different work environments there are many different difficulties when implementing the use of new digital tools and technologies. 2. Your sharing points out the difficulties teachers encounter and the help they need in choosing and learning digital tools, and how to connect technology and teaching through the professional building as a bridge. Personal love to know more materials and then provide techniques and skills and teachers. How professional improvement can change or enhance teachers’ thinking and values in accepting technology and some new teaching models. Nice post, enjoy read a lot!