In my role as Academic Technology Coordinator, I have the pleasure of witnessing technology integration, including that of emerging technology, all across our campus. "Emerging technology" refers to new and innovative technology not yet widely adopted due to cost or availability. When we typically think of emerging technologies, we often think of those areas traditionally related to science and math. Because of our positive and motivated teaching community, however, we see emerging technology in unexpected places. The first quarter of our school year offers many examples of early adopters in areas traditionally not associated with technology, such as religion, foreign language, and our Pre-K program.
In 8th grade religion, Fr. Skully Knight had a thought while planning a lesson on Incarnation: “One of the ideas that we discuss is Incarnation, the Word becoming flesh and living among us as John the Evangelist writes in his Prologue. We use the movie 'The Odd Life of Timothy Green' as an illustration of this theological concept. It is the story of a young couple who cannot have a child and they write down on paper all of the traits they believe their child would have, and when a boy mysteriously enters their life, they realize that he is all of the things they hoped for in a child. He is the incarnation of their words.” Fr. Skully enlisted the Academic Technology group and the newly created Tech Scholars, a small group of upper school students who focus on technology, to assist students create a single word that describes Timothy, while keeping in mind the concept of Incarnation in scripture. Ryan Field (‘20), guided the students through designing their words in a 3D modeling program. For printing, he enlisted the help of another Tech Scholar, Ellen Rea (‘20), to print the words using the available 3D printers on campus. The increased accessibility and training for the 3D printers across our campus is in part thanks to Betsy Minton, one of our Instigators, and her relationship with Dremel. Through her guidance, the Tech Scholars were able to print all the words in a few short days. Fr. Skully sums it up nicely: “It was an interesting way to use technology to talk about theology”.
Dr. Victoria Alvarez was the inaugural user of our Virtual Reality Lab on campus. During the first quarter, the Tech Scholars, which include Stephen Barker (‘20), Zach Holloway (‘18), Daniel Johnson (‘17), Ellen Rea (‘20), Ryan Field (‘20), and Celia Keisel (‘20), spent a good amount of time setting up our two VR Labs and going through setup training so they could assist the teachers in using the VR Labs. Dr. Alvarez went through similar training including managing health concerns and procedures before implementing in her class. Two Tech Scholars were assigned to assist Dr. Alvarez, Stephen Barker and Daniel Johnson. According to Dr. Alvarez, “Using the VR Lab in my AP Spanish Language and Culture class was very interesting. At that time, my students were studying the environment vocabulary, and had just finished a presentation-based project where they talked about about the natural world and resources of several Hispanic countries. With the VR Lab, we were able to travel to the Galapagos Islands in Ecuador, and role played a group conversation imagining that we were scientists working at Darwin's Research station. For a few minutes they were immersed in a different context -an authentic one- and using the target language to communicate.”
Lastly, we are seeing an increased use of digital portfolio tools on our campus. While the use of this technology isn’t officially emerging, it is emerging in places you might not expect: our Pre-K4 program. Last year, our 6th grade science teacher, Stacy Hill, introduced Seesaw, a digital portfolio tool to me, and we began to investigate its usefulness to our 6th grade students to curate digital artifacts. During that investigation, it became apparent the ease and usefulness of this tool could work for our Lower School. After introducing Seesaw to the Lower School teachers, Lindsay Smith, Julie Pace, and Sarah Reno from PreK-4 met with the Academic Technology Group to assist with setup and training. According to Ms. Lindsay Smith, “Assessment in PreK-4 does not look like the traditional methods used in upper grades. We rely heavily on the portfolio approach to document students learning, and achievements in meeting their milestones. In years past, we have used a paper portfolio that displayed students' work, alongside anecdotal records, photographs, and other detailed narratives. This portfolio allowed parents to watch their child’s growth and development throughout the year. The paper portfolio, while meaningful, was very time consuming, and not always eco friendly. This year, James McCrary introduced us to Seesaw, an online digital portfolio. Teachers are able to upload students' work with a single click, and give parents instant access to their child’s day to day activities. The hours we have saved moving to this new system gives us more time to spend differentiating instruction, and planning and implementing activities for our students.”
These are but a few examples of innovation happening on our campus. As someone who loves to integrate technology in academics, these types of stories make me very proud of our community, especially the teachers for being open to innovative ideas to enhance the learning experience for the whole child: spiritually, intellectually, morally, physically and artistically. I look forward to the rest of the year and being witness to more of these stories.