Teaching, like many disciplines, relies on many of the same techniques that have been employed since the beginning of time. The variable that is changing is how teachers are using 21st century technology to aid their students in their daily lives.
La Ballona Elementary School will soon become the first school within the Culver City Unified School District to have interactive computers and whiteboards in all of its classrooms, ushering in a new era of contemporary teaching and learning.
While other Culver City schools have similar computer-related technology, none have it throughout the entire school.
Teachers at La Ballona are currently using computers that project lessons from an overheard projector onto screens called whiteboards that allow students, using a device similar to a stylis, to perform a variety of academic tasks.
They use laptops or desktop computers to keep track of how each student performs. Children are assigned a number, so the classroom instructor can monitor their progress at any time during a lesson.
For educators like Deb Arancibia, the laptop that came with her Promethean system allows her great flexibility as she can move all over the classroom while calling out instructions to a student standing at the whiteboard, which have taken the place of old-fashioned chalkboards.
The subjects that Arancibia’s students study everyday are online. “ What I have on the board is the exact same thing that the children have on their desks,” she said. “I have the exact same picture of the worksheet that they’re using for math on the board, and we can work through it and discuss it.”
During a Friday morning earlier this month, Arancibia’s students used the new technology to check weather reports and study lessons in counting money by moving different coin denominations around the whiteboard while their teacher monitored them from her laptop.
La Ballona educators have been trained on the new computers so those who do not have them will be ready by the end of the year when every classroom with be equipped with them.
“This is 21st century learning,” said CCUSD board member Laura Chardiet, a former Parent-Teacher Association president at La Ballona.
Kindergarten teacher Sandra Haro believes her students are more attentive to the interactive Smart Board system. “I think the kids so much more engaged because they’re used to seeing (computer) screens at home and technology everywhere,” she noted. “They can come up and touch things and move things because it’s so interactive.”
Funds to purchase the computers and projectors were raised by the school’s booster club, as well as the Culver City Education Foundation. Last year, during a conversation with principal Chris Collins about what many of the teachers would like to have in their classrooms, the topic of interactive whiteboards was raised.
Heather Moses, the co-president of the school’s booster club, is a believer in the kind of technology that is being used at La Ballona.
Moses’ daughter is in kindergarten and it took a while for her to see how the new technology could enhance a student’s academic life. “I thought, ‘Why would she need a Smart Board in her room because it’s so hands on?’ I didn’t see the value in it, quite honestly, and I’m very tech-savvy,” Moses admitted.
“But after watching it in action and seeing how the teacher uses it, I was totally turned around.”
Collins has seen how the children respond to the new method of teaching.
“In the limited amount of time that we’ve had with the interactive boards, we’ve seen how effective they are with students,” she said. “So when our booster club made it their goal to outfit every class with this technology, we were thrilled.”
The Epson Britelink system in kindergarten teacher Joanne Orozco’s dual language Spanish/English class, which will be in most of the classrooms, is the most cost-effective. It cost approximately $3, 000, according to Collins, and the Smart boards approximately half that amount.
Chardiet thinks learning is the same as it has been to students of past generations, but the difference in today’s schools is information can be accessed more quickly.
“Before we used to have to memorize dates and facts, and now we’re evolving into a society that is knows how to research dates and facts,” she noted. “So if you want your students to develop this skill, this would be a way to accelerate that skill development.”
Moses likes the visual aspect of the technology. “When you’re talking about the space program, for example, instead of just being able to show the students a picture, you can show them a video of a rocket launching,” she said.
Chardiet thinks the new equipment holds benefits for classroom instructors as well.
“It allows the teacher to differentiate instruction,” she said. “Having available technology in the classroom allows them to go faster or another group to go slower.
“If our objective ultimately is for students each to have their own iPad so that they can work independently without buying texts books, that’s going to allow the teacher to differentiate the instruction depending on where that student is.”
As a Title I school, La Ballona has several students who do not have access to computers at home, and the booster club as sees this as one way to bridge that existing gap.
Title I schools receive federal funding for at risk or low-income students.
“The teachers know that there is definitely a digital divide,” Moses said. “Kids who don’t have access to the Internet are at a definite disadvantage.”
“We know that this helps all students, but we know that it also helps students who might not always have access to a computer,” Collins added.
La Ballona is also a California Distinguished School, an honored bestowed upon the state’s most exemplary and inspiring public schools, according to the California Department of Education’s website.
Chardiet, who in a campaign interview with the News while running for the school board last year spoke frequently about the need for updated classroom technology, said having the classroom new computer system has the potential to lessen the achievement gap among students at Title I schools.
“It makes me so happy that the parent groups are getting stronger in their ability to raise funds and support the instructional programs there,” she said. “I think because of the socio-economic background of the students, it’s especially critical that they have access to technology so that when they get to the middle school they will be able to matriculate with easy without any technology obstacles.”
As a former English as a second language teacher, Chardiet said the parents of the elementary school’s students mirror the demographics that she taught. “I feel an incredible sense of obligation to provide their children with this technology,” the school board member said.
The school board member touched on a controversy that ignited earlier this year concerning a group of El Marino Language School parents who have engaged in a contentious back and forth with one of the school district’s unions regarding parent-funded position with money raised by El Marino’s booster club.
“(The funds that paid for La Ballona’s interactive technology) is money that has been raised by the boosters, so instead of perhaps having parent funded positions in the classroom, they could perhaps focus their efforts on providing the latest technology in the classroom,” Chardiet suggested.
Collins said she and the teachers will be ready for what Chardiet calls 21st century technology in September.
“The train has left the station, and La Ballona is on the train,” she said.
