What do you want from me?(Teacher frustration and the administrative decree)

I was at the BER conference "Using Innovative Technology Projects to Strengthen Content Area Learning" and our first job was to talk to a stranger around us about their use of technology in the classroom. In our one-on-one chat, a K-8 teacher from the area told me, "I don't know what they want. They want us to use technology, but I don't know what they want us to do with it." And I think she hit the mark with that comment. When administrators encourage teachers to incorporate technology in the classroom, what do they mean? Do the administrators themselves even know? Are they expressing it clearly to the teachers?

There are obviously a million things that students and teachers can do with computers, most of them even legal. So when administrators aren't clear in their specifications for what constitutes a successful "technology integration", teachers can't easily design practices and lessons that ensure this is being done. Administrators who wish to effectively encourage these teachers to use more technology in the classroom must be clear about which of the following goals they are expecting to see met:

1. Engagement – Students are motivated and excited by the assignments they are given because the activities are hands-on, reactive, and immediate.
   
2. Just-in-Time instruction – in the quest to produce formative learning environments, technology allows teachers to intelligently collect data on student performance and to give those students challenges that meet their exact level of readiness at that moment.
   
3. Exploration – The internet and distance learning programs allow students to choose what to learn and provides nearly unlimited resources from around the world from which students can learn.
   
4. Communication – Technology can improve parent-student, parent-teacher, and student-student communication. Also, students' now have expanded outlets for communication with and publication to communities worldwide.
   
5. Management – Teachers can use technology to monitor and control student use of technology resources. Furthermore, detailed assessment reporting allows for more intelligent grouping of students in the class from one learning objective to the next.
   
6. Creative Expression – Students can express their understanding and interpretation of the key elements of a unit using a multitude of applications resulting in dynamic multi-media presentations.
   
7. Technology Literacy – Rather than using technology to teach or learn course content, technology can also be the objective. Students need to understand the terms, applications, browser functions, e-mail capabilities, HotKeys, etc. that make daily use of technology in the school and workplace efficient.
   

Inevitably, there are other goals as well. The fact that I missed a goal only emphasizes my point – evaluators have certain objectives in mind when they look at teachers' use of technology. When those objectives are not expressed clearly, then teachers are left on their own to establish learning objectives about technology use. They are stuck guessing what administrators want, and are often left frustrated when told they're "not doing enough".