Researchers have documented that during preschool years, children living in poverty are often exposed to lower quality and lower quantity language learning environments¹. According to literacy nonprofit Reading Is Fundamental, 34 percent of kids entering kindergarten lack the basic language skills needed to read. In the most recent Nation’s Report Card only 35 percent of fourth graders were proficient in 2019, down from 37 percent in 2017. Students who are not proficient readers in the third or fourth grade are at high risk of dropping out of school. Poor reading ability has detrimental effects for future income, employment opportunities, and participation in society.

“We are passionate about providing equity of access to learning for all students through teaching with technology,” says Jeremy Cowdrey, president of Imagine Learning, a Pre K-8 digital curriculum company. “We believe every student has the right to fulfill their unique potential. Our goal is to meet students where they are and provide educators with data-driven insights that inspire teaching and learning breakthroughs.”

The company started 15 years ago with the concept that language should be an asset to help kids reach their full potential. First, they offered a program to help kids learn the English language in context with developing both language and literacy skills.

Now, more than 3 million students across the country benefit from Imagine Learning programs daily. The adaptive suite of Literacy, Math, and Assessment solutions  are powered by the Imagine Learning Language Advantage^TM—a theory of action that promotes rigorous and equitable development of language that enables students to have deeper comprehension, engagement, and enjoyment of learning.

Results

Imagine Literacy students are 1.8 times more likely to outperform their peers on state tests and Imagine Math students are 3 times more likely to be proficient on state tests. And while performance on state assessments is one benchmark of success, the Imagine Learning team is more proud to help teachers amplify confidence and inspire learning breakthroughs for their students.

Ten years ago, Meriden Public Schools in Meriden, Connecticut started using Imagine Language & Literacy for its bilingual programs. Since 2015, the program has been implemented in all of the district’s elementary schools.

“Imagine Learning programs are embedded into our core content,” says Mark D. Benigni, Ed.D., superintendent of Meriden Public Schools. “It’s part of what we do now.”

Since then, their Smarter Balanced Assessment third-grade reading proficiency is up 20 percent; student performance in the Smarter Balance Assessment is up 25.6 percent; and there’s a 35 percent increase in students scoring Level 4, the highest standard, on the assessment.

Personalized approach

The technology is a supplement, not a replacement for the teacher. And it can both support and improve the ways teachers help students learn.

For example, “Our programs recognize when a student is having trouble in a certain area, it flags that issue for the teacher and informs individualized instruction. The teacher can then provide one-on-one support to help that student understand the topic and advance,” says Cowdrey.

The programs also offer unique access to live teaching support both in and out of school from certified, bilingual teachers. This provides equitable educational opportunities to all students and aligns with national initiatives for us ed tech equity.

Urgency

The educational technology gamifies content, which is appealing and interactive for kids. Dr. Benigni says it’s a positive use of screen time.

“It’s a learning tool,” he says. “The careers of tomorrow are going to require our students to be digital learners. We would be remiss if we weren’t preparing them to live in a world where technology plays a key role.”

“There’s room for traditional learning and tech in the classroom. Both have to work in tandem to accelerate the learning for students,” says Emma Sanchez, retired principal and executive director of language acquisition and development for the Chula Vista Elementary School District, the largest elementary school district in California.

Sanchez believes there’s a sense of urgency too. “This is the responsibility of the entire educational community,” she says. “We all share this responsibility to ensure every learner’s academic success.”

¹Chiang, Walsh, Shanahan, et al., 2017

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Over 500 undergraduate students enrolled in Purdue University’s Engineering Projects in Community Service program (EPICS), are teaming up to design, build and solve engineering-based problems to benefit local communities and education organizations.

“Everyday we get up and we’re looking at how we can make the world a better place,” says William Oakes, professor of engineering education at Purdue University and director of EPICS.

Now in its 20th year, EPICS has become a model for other engineering and community service programs at 24 universities.

“The results of our projects improve the quality of life in our community, both locally and globally,” says Oakes, noting some of the ways EPICS has helped. They’ve created software and educational apps for kids, as well as custom prosthetics. They’ve also helped Habitat for Humanity improve construction and energy efficiency locally and internationally.

In this transformative education, students learn problem solving skills; leadership; how to work together; and they develop a sense of accomplishment.

Finding meaning

“Generation Y really wants to have meaningful work,” says Daniel Nichols, president of Stem Jobs, a company and magazine whose goal “is to connect classrooms to careers.”

Nichols encourages students to “Do what you love,” while learning STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) skills.

He says by 2018, 74 percent of jobs will require STEM capability, which is having taken and passed certain STEM subjects; while 68 percent of jobs will require STEM proficiency, passing STEM coursework and having a STEM degree or certification.

“Get more students engaged in these subjects that drive the economy and will drive their careers in the future,” says Nichols, explaining students with STEM backgrounds typically earn more money than their peers without STEM skills.

A growing field

Combining STEM and community is appealing to women and minorities, two groups who typically haven’t studied STEM.

Still there aren’t enough educators to teach the tech.

“We’re seeing STEM as being key into solving problems of the 21st century,” says Talia Milgrom-Elcott, co-founder and executive director of 100Kin10, a group of over 200 partners working to support STEM educators and to train 100,000 STEM teachers by 2021.

Milgrom-Elcott envisions STEM students working on problems like drought, hunger and artificial intelligence: “We can’t solve them without STEM tech.”

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An endless journey

Given this reality, we now need to imagine the future of education as a learning continuum of experiences in which children engage throughout their lives. It starts with the recognition that in order for children to be prepared for the “world that no one knows yet” (in the words of famed anthropologist Margaret Mead), 21st century learning begins long before formal education, reaches beyond both the school day and year, and spans the child’s full educational journey into post-secondary education, career and citizenship.

This broader, deeper approach to learning enables communities to unite around a common learning vision and develop an ecosystem for student support and growth. It ensures that children engage in a myriad of diverse, real world learning opportunities, develop capacities for the transfer and application of knowledge, and build the skills, dispositions and abilities to succeed in whatever they dream to do next.

Enriching the experience

Leading districts and learning communities use this approach already. They incorporate inquiry based, hands-on learning and partner with community organizations to reinforce and enhance student growth and development. They use technology and social media to their best advantage, establishing close home and school links, and making anytime-anywhere learning a reality. They also support their educators as the 21st century learning professionals they are, and make sure that they too get the chance to create, communicate, collaborate and think critically about their work.

Our children will solve unforeseen challenges, communicate in undreamed-of ways, innovate and work globally. To succeed, students and educators both in and beyond school must approach learning as an ongoing experience, not a place or an end goal. It is our job to help them do just that.

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Dr. Jan K. Wachter

Safety Sciences Professor and Ph.D. Program Coordinator, Indiana University of Pennsylvania

What are a few of the advantages of a career in worker health and safety?

There is flexibility to choose specific safety and health careers aligned with one’s own interests and talents; for instance, a career as a construction safety manager versus a process chemical safety expert. Job options are limitless since most organizations need to have safety and health expertise due to regulations or their desire to protect their workers. Excellent career advancement exists.  Most safety and health careers are financially rewarding, intellectually stimulating and personally satisfying.

What are the challenges that a business faces in this area?

Safety and health requirements are numerous and often complicated, especially for diversified companies in global, shifting markets, requiring them to have resilient technical expertise.  Due to resource constraints, smaller organizations could have difficulties managing these requirements. Businesses in very competitive markets are sometimes challenged to overcome barriers to safety and health excellence, such as tolerating unrealistic production goals or allowing organizational changes to occur without first analyzing their safety and health implications.

What do you see for the future of careers in worker health and safety?

With the recent issuance of a safety and health international standard, careers will evolve toward supporting “management systems,” becoming more proactive, rather than reactive. Safety and health managers will become technical experts who plan and control work through efforts such as prevention through design. They will continually improve work systems from multiple perspectives, such as safety and health, quality and efficiency. This evolution will most likely require advanced education and training in scientific, engineering and business disciplines.

What advice would you give someone looking to start a career in this area?

Worker safety and health careers provide amazing opportunities for those desiring applied science vocations where job satisfaction is achieved by daily diversity of interactions and tasks. For additional insight, contact universities offering safety and health degrees and professional societies, such as the American Society of Safety Professionals. Also, read newspapers or listen to the news to see how far-reaching safety and health issues affect our lives – these examples provide clues to remarkable career possibilities

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Educational goals

The International Technology and Engineering Educators Association strives to attain the goal of STEM literacy in all students. We support moving to a more aggressive approach that takes teaching engineering design as a foundational skillset of STEM, and moves it into the realm of integrative STEM education (I-STEM). The end goal is to operationalize I-STEM education practices to empower educators to implement engaging and dynamic instructional practices in K-12 schooling to benefit all students.

I-STEM education is the application of technological and engineering design-based pedagogical approaches to intentionally teach the content and practices of science and mathematics education. I-STEM Education is equally applicable at the natural intersections of learning within the continuum of content areas, educational environments and academic levels.

Practical applications

Engaging all children in I-STEM education necessitates teaching technology and engineering through a real-world context, while introducing and reinforcing the appropriate math and science instruction to connect STEM learning throughout the lesson. This approach allows educators to fully integrate engineering mindsets such as systems thinking, creativity, optimism, collaboration, communication and ethical considerations. Exposure through I-STEM education builds confidence and competence in all children to not only understand STEM disciplines, but also to master critical thinking and problem solving. They learn to use their surroundings to create the necessary solutions to improve the world around them.

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Innovative districts are leveraging the power of educational technology to transform schools into places that inspire the skills and dispositions essential for future success. The traditional model of school was designed for another time based on what society knew about learning, the type of knowledge and skills society thought it needed and the type of educational experience they could actually provide to students. Today, changes in what we know about student engagement, what present-day society needs from future graduates and advances in educational technology have made the traditional model outdated.  

Teaching in the modern era

We now know students are more engaged when they are allowed to give input on decisions about what they learn, how they learn it and the ways in which they demonstrate learning. Increases in student voice, choice and ownership spike engagement levels and accelerate learning.

As students progress through the educational system, the positive impact of increased autonomy over their learning has a cumulative effect and a positive social-emotional impact. The skillful use of educational technology can provide students the ability to increase ownership of learning, elevate their connection to learning goals and provide access to more authentic learning resources and audiences. 

Our society now needs graduates who have mastered content and developed skills beyond those traditionally measured by our standardized tests. Those graduates armed with the ability to apply content expertise creatively, solve problems, communicate in a variety of forms, and contribute to a larger team will be valued most. To fully equip our students for success in this technology-enriched world, we must aim higher and inspire the development of the skills essential for applying content knowledge in new and innovative ways.  

Using new tools

Additionally, through the use of digital tools we have the ability to engage students in a significant amount of course content independently and in more personally relevant ways. While students engage independently through technology, educators have increased opportunities to interact with students, strengthen relationships, make connections to student aspirations and co-design next steps along their learning path. When used well, educational technology can help expand the reach of our students and educators to bring in outside experts and access learning goals in ways that produce deeper learning and empower authentic application of skills.  

Creating the educational system our students need is not easy work. The inertia of a system that is both easy to measure and is viewed as sufficient from the perspective of most parents and adults makes it difficult to redirect. Only when transformation efforts are grounded in what we know about learning, aimed at the knowledge, skills, and dispositions that society needs, and led by empathetic educators leveraging the power of technology will we have school systems capable of producing exceptional graduates. 

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“We looked at five presentation solutions,” said Balch. “Some were specific to one operating system, or they didn’t work with our enterprise environment. They either couldn’t set up proxies or they wouldn’t work with our other layered security.”

Increasing student engagement

The best presentation solutions are designed to allow people to simultaneously share content no matter what devices they are using and no matter whether they are broadcasting to a projector or a television screen. The goal of this technology is to allow teachers to put the focus on helping their students learn.

“Students are more engaged during presentations, which increases classroom conversation and ultimately improves learning,” says Balch. “It gives teachers more flexibility and students more opportunity for engagement.”

This flexibility is evident in the array of classroom subjects that presentation technology has been used for. In addition to career and technical education classes, the school district has used presentation technology to help teach about everything from billing to basic medical procedures like taking blood pressure.

The success is all too clear, and Balch is looking to introduce it to classrooms in all 54 campuses of the school district.

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Here are four levels of adaptivity utilized by the top K-12 ed-tech solutions that produce real results and user satisfaction:

1. Scope

It’s not uncommon to see students perform at the same or only slightly higher level after using a new solution. Oftentimes this is caused by a lack of complete alignment to specific state standards and scope of content. The top solutions that produce the best results year after year are those that are not only thoroughly aligned to standards and assessment limits, but also reflect the proper breadth and depth of content — both instructional and assessment content. Ed-tech programs that increase student outcomes match the scope of state standards and official assessments in order to deliver efficacy.

2. Type

Although many tests in K-12 education are predominantly multiple choice, student engagement and mastery improve dramatically by using a variety of content types in instructional and practice content. Research shows that differentiated instruction is enhanced by providing multiple types of content based on students’ learning styles, resulting in significant increases in each student’s ability to learn, retain and recall information. The same concept applies in top ed-tech solutions, in which different types of mediums such as video instruction, interactive questions and gamification help drive student success.

3. Sequence

You wouldn’t teach a class by giving students the final exam first and teaching them second, so why opt for a solution that does things backwards? Proper sequencing of content can make or break a student’s success. Providing instructional material before “skill and drill” practice benefits students, as does ensuring the order and grouping of content promotes understanding and future recall.

4. Rigor

Many solutions on the market today offer predominantly one level of difficulty of content. Other solutions offer differentiated content at a macro level, meaning the entire experience may be at a beginner or advanced level. In both cases, students often find themselves inadequately prepared for state-wide and college- and career-readiness exams because these tests utilize varying question difficulty. Look for a solution that offers differentiated instruction per lesson area by difficulty to students to ensure they are fully prepared for official tests.

When utilized together, these four dimensions of adaptivity drive real results. The next time you’re looking for an ed-tech solution for your school, keep these in mind to guarantee significantly improved student outcomes and teacher satisfaction.

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At the time, few educators could have imagined the degree to which technology would affect our lives and the education community in such a short amount of time. Though technology use has grown rapidly, many of the original recommendations from the 1996 report are still relevant for today’s educators, particularly the first goal to ensure that “all teachers in the nation will have the training and support necessary to help students learn to use computers and the information superhighway.”

Resources for educators

Today educators can easily replace computers and theinformation superhighway” with a number of ever-changing devices and digital information access points, but what doesn’t change is the need to effectively train and support teachers who use and teach with technology in the classroom. We’ve heard the oft-repeated myth that educators aren’t tech savvy or are too obstinate to learn and adapt. But after more than two decades in education, my experience is that teachers are eager and willing to learn; they just need the time and space to plan and coordinate. 

Proven methods

As supporters of strong education, we also need to support education leaders as they implement tried-and-true pedagogical constructs when it comes to their own learning. We have instructional frameworks that help students move toward independence, guiding them to master skills and grow in their understanding. Educators are no different. Like students, they need to see someone model a new practice or technology, then they need to practice with support and eventually work toward doing it on their own. Renowned educators Douglas Fisher and Nancy Frey break this down into four components that are easily remembered as “I do it,” “we do it,” “you do it together,” and, finally, “you do it alone.”

What we know about adult learning is that the fundamentals are the same as the learning that happens in our classrooms. Education leaders can no longer afford to delay investing in training and support systems that will set educators and students up for success.

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Knowing how to use technology is now critical for students to develop the skills they need to be competitive and thrive, but it has also made parenting more complex. New opportunities bring new concerns. As parents, we want our children to learn, connect and have fun through technology, and at the same time, act safely, responsibly and thoughtfully online.

Here are four ways to help your children stay safe online:

1. Have a conversation

Have proactive, open and ongoing conversations with your children about digital safety and the use of social media and technology. Devices, sites, games and apps will change as our children grow, and so will rules and guidelines. It is important to revisit the conversation regularly.

2. Show common courtesy

Teach your children that the rules of life also apply online. Just as we tell them to say “please” and “thank you” in daily conversations, we should also make sure our family values are reflected in the way our children behave online.

3. Teach proactive self-protection

Help your children build good digital habits and ensure they have the skills they need to be responsible. Just as we teach them to look both ways before crossing the street, we should also be teaching our children that “123456” is not a safe online password and should never be used.

4. Model good digital habits

Monitor your own device use, like not bringing your phone to the dinner table, never driving and texting or turning off all devices and storing them in a common area well before bedtime. Kids follow what adults do, and they benefit greatly when expectations and good digital habits are modeled for them.

We owe it to our children to give them the tools to thrive in an increasingly digital world. We must show them how to be mindful of their online presence and footprint, and how to meaningfully interact with social networks, games and apps. We must model the ways they can protect themselves and their identity and help them learn to balance their time online within their daily life. Together, we can succeed in ensuring our children become extraordinary citizens — in the digital world and the real world.

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