Kathleen Wong
“Our goal is to connect our students with the world by experiencing it and we believe that technology is one of the most powerful tools that we can use to achieve that goal.”
– Kathleen Wong
As an international school, our mission is to promote students connecting with the world through experiential learning and language acquisition. Arguably, we can do this via the printed medium. However, a more powerful, experiential approach is to blend technology into learning.
With a full set of laptops, the number of teachers and classrooms using technology will double. Specifically, we are working on:
Audio dictation – Because oral production is a focus in elementary language acquisition, we will do video stories, podcasts, radio stories, etc. Also, they can dictate their stories – potential 1:1 laptop ratio for projects vs 1:2 with limited laptops.
Watch educational programs, play language games (Duolingo, Kahoot) in the target language. Access books in Spanish, Japanese, English with interactive work materials, including various on-line programs – classroom access will double.
We will be able to expand the innovative use of current programs to other grades and classrooms.
Literacy & math centers – students can read/write and publish in Spanish, Japanese, or English, access math programs in Spanish – few classrooms use a tech center due to lack of tech, we can potentially expand it to all 2nd-5th grade.
Access adaptive learning and assessment tools available online that allow for independent / differentiated instruction while also allowing the teacher to maintain a lower student to teacher ratio via small groups.
With the Innovative Educator Prize grant, we’re able to try new ideas that weren’t possible or scalable due to limited resources.
Communication across countries to speak in Spanish, Japanese, and/or English with others via video conferencing. Communicating with “pen pals” in countries like Pakistan, Chile, etc. – Skype Pals? Chat centers with other countries?
Create, film, edit, and publish movies, videos, presentations in English, Spanish, or Japanese – not enough resources now but will do with add’l laptops.
Collaborate online for presentations (e.g. group research), discussions (e.g. respond and add to each other’s reflections), or projects (e.g. wiki) – will be able to do if we have longer checkout times for tech.