Are EdTech PD’s always the Ugly PD?

As teachers, we strive to be the most up to date in our practices and to learn how we can better engage and teach our students (well I guess I should say, most teachers). PD’s are definitely a hot topic when it comes to education as some people see it as a waste of time or a box that needs to be checked and for some teachers, it is the best part of the year, where they are able to take practices and apply it to their classrooms. Since I was new to Goochland county, I was part of a lot of PD’s during new teacher week and there was one that stood out to be one of my worst, and it was of course, the ed tech one… Now, I shouldn’t put down all ed tech as they are technologies that have been created that make my job easier- especially the virtual lab technology. This particular PD was not that..

We were at the high school and we were with the technology coach for the county and the instructional technology coach for the elementary and middle school (problem number 1.. no high school coach as she was out). As we are doing the PD, whenever the high school teachers had an a question, it was met with hesitation and a “wait for your coach to instruct you”. So I spent 3 hours in a room going through the new technology but I wasn’t able to fully understand it because I was told to wait for my coach.

The next problem was when we adopted Smart Pass, which is our electronic hall pass system. We have started to use them during our school day and the intent was to make our school wide study hall easier, but it has been met with too many hiccups. The first being that with our spotty internet and wireless connection, passes will not load which then shows students with no pass in the hallway when they do and causes lots of debates with admin and referrals that do not need to occur. The second is that when teachers create passes, students are unable to see them so teachers are then flooded with paper passes, emails or phone calls about where their students are. While we were in the PD, all of these questions came up, but we were told that it wouldn’t happen and it tracks the students…

I have to say that when it comes to Ed Tech, I find myself disinterested and not wanting to participate in those PD’s, I think maybe it’s just that I do not use ed tech in my classroom as a lot of the things in ed tech that I have seen aren’t for my content as I want to be more hands-on. Maybe because of my age and growing up in technology, I just “know” technology and can figure it out quickly, so I feel like I don’t need it and it doesn’t apply to me.

When it comes to Ed Tech PD’s, it will always be my ugly (but maybe this class will change my mind!)