Instructional Technology
Daniel Vigeant, Director of Technology Services
508-580-7568
The Brockton Public Schools' Instructional Technology Program, K-12, must help prepare students for their futures rather than reinforce the past. Technology has changed the very fabric of today's society. It has been the driver of change in such areas as global communications, economics, the arts, politics and environmental issues. Technology is key to learners' achievement of world class educational standards. Thus, instructional technology must be infused into learning in every subject area. When technology is effectively integrated into classroom instruction at all levels, it can raise both the quality of teaching and the level of student achievement. As technology itself changes, the instructional technology program will adapt and change to meet the needs of our students.
The Brockton Public Schools seeks to prepare a learning community of technologically literate lifelong learners. These learners will be able to interact successfully in a technological environment to achieve their personal, educational, and workplace goals. In order to ensure individual student achievement, technology should be utilized to support pedagogical models that address student needs (for example, assistive and adaptive technologies) and maximize learning for all students.
Students must be able to access information, manipulate data, synthesize concepts and creatively express ideas to others using video, text and audio media. It is the expectation of the Brockton Public Schools that each student will be able to retrieve information and use it to make decisions and solve problems. These learners will skillfully use technology to access, retrieve and use information school-wide, community-wide, nationally and internationally. Technology opens the world to students, providing a depth and richness of instructional approaches to reach children of all learning modalities.
Guiding PrinciplesTechnology should be used by students and teachers to facilitate learning. The content areas provide a curricular context for the use of technology. Classroom practice should reflect not only the National Education Technology Standards and profiles, but also the standards of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, the International Reading Association and the National Council for the Social Studies. Technology is not to be promoted in isolation, but rather should be an integral tool for learning and communication within the context of academic subject areas.
Through the increased use of technology, learning environments in the schools, K-12, will exemplify the shifting paradigms of exemplary practice.
Traditional Learning EnvironmentsTeacher-centered instruction
Single sense stimulation
Single path progression
Single media
Isolated work
Information delivery
Passive learning
Reactive respnse
Isolated artificial context
New Learning Environments
Student-centered instruction
Multi-sensory stimulation
Multi-path progression
Multi-media
Collaborative work
Information exchange
Active inquiry-based learning
Proactive, planned action
Authentic real world context