MY HERO Provides Opportunities for Addressing NET
by Sara Armstrong, Ph.D.
While our goal in classrooms is to integrate technology in teaching and learning, not teach technology as a subject separate from content, there are a number of things we want students, teachers, and administrators to know and be able to do with technology. The International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) has created NETS (National Educational Technology Standards) for students, teachers, and administrators.
Student Standards
As students contribute artwork, short films, or stories to The MY HERO Project, they address a number of ISTE’s NETS for students:
NETS for Students
1. Basic operations and concepts. By using the Internet and other materials for researching their heroes, creating their contributions, and uploading them to the MY HERO website, students employ a number of basic technology operations and concepts.
2. Social, ethical, and human issues. As students decide on a hero to explore, they consider a number of social, ethical, and human issues. As these ideas relate to technology, students make decisions about what they will share in their work, knowing the global community will view it.
3. Technology productivity tools. Students employ a range of software and hardware as they develop their MY HERO artwork, short film, or story.
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4. Technology communication tools. Since MY HERO includes participants and an audience from around the world, students embark on the path of creating clear and compelling content when they create their work for publication. Teachers have commented on student awareness of the impact of their work and the widespread reactions they receive.
5. Technology research tools. MY HERO stories include information students have found and evaluated from a variety of online and offline sources.
6. Technology problem-solving and decision-making tools. It may be the case that students employ online and offline problem-solving and decision-making tools as they evaluate their research and decide on a hero to feature in their stories, artwork, or short film.
By evaluating the level of understanding and competency students already have with regard to the use of technology tools, teachers can provide them with next steps and deeper challenges to encourage their mastery of NETS through MY HERO projects.
Teacher Standards
Teachers also need encouragement and opportunities to improve their technology skills. MY HERO projects support this endeavor.
NETS for Teachers
I. Technology operations and concepts. As teachers develop their lessons for students to develop stories, artwork, or short films for The MY HERO Project, they practice what they will be asking their students to do, thus demonstrating and improving their own technology expertise.
II. Planning and designing learning environments and experiences. For over ten years, The MY HERO Project has collected student and adult stories focused on heroes in a variety of categories. Through an online tool, eCreate, teachers can build a page of hero stories on a particular curricular theme or interdisciplinary topics, or a page of their own students’ work and make them available to students. The opportunities for creating rich learning situations for students abound.
III. Teaching, learning, and the curriculum. Including MY HERO content in lessons and challenging students to research and write hero stories for inclusion on the site constitute fine examples of using technology in a meaningful way to maximize student learning.
IV. Assessment and evaluation. To evaluate student work, teachers may require students to word process their stories, email them to the teacher, edit their work electronically, and upload their stories to the MY HERO site. Teachers can assess through observation, note taking on a laptop, or applying a rubric to online submissions.
V. Productivity and professional practice. As teachers share their MY HERO assignments with their colleagues via email, listservs, or forums, they can refine and improve the assignments they give their students.
VI. Social, ethical, legal, and human issues. By allowing all students to explore The MY HERO Project website and contribute stories, teachers address issues of equitable access, and support the idea of the power of diverse talents and experiences as students read a range of inspiring hero stories.
Administrator Standards
While administrators may not be directly involved with students and teachers as they engage in developing content for the classroom and the MY HERO website, administrators can make a powerful statement by encouraging teachers to develop curriculum that includes using and contributing to The MY HERO Project.
I. Leadership and vision. Administrators, through their example, inspire good work. By becoming familiar with the many features of The MY HERO Project, and allowing time for teachers to do the same, administrators provide a strong model for teachers who are working hard to integrate technology in a meaningful way in their classrooms.
II. Learning and teaching. Through inspiring stories of real people, students find their place in the world, and begin to see the potential each of us has to contribute to our world. The MY HERO Project focuses attention on good work and positive contributions, while making it easy for students and teachers to use technology tools to add more curricular-based stories to the MY HERO global database.
III. Productivity and professional use. The MY HERO Project includes a number of tools for teachers, such as eCreate, that are easy to use and allow teachers to develop personalized hero Web pages for classroom use. Administrators can facilitate teacher and student improvement in employing technology by encouraging the use of projects such as MY HERO that utilize technology tools and resources embedded in curriculum. Administrators can be asked to contribute a hero story to a class project!
IV. Support, management, and operations. A carefully monitored project such as MY HERO meets the guidelines set by most schools that direct online technology use. Because of the ease with which teachers from a variety of disciplines can develop a MY HERO project that meets their curricular goals, administrators can support this model for technology integration into curriculum.
V. Assessment and evaluation. Administrators can assess some levels of student and teacher fluency with technology by viewing her/his school’s contributions to The MY HERO Project.
VI. Social, legal, and ethical issues. By promoting online projects that pay attention to the good works of the world’s citizens, require research and citing sources, and provide an environment for a global exchange of ideas among students and teachers such as The MY HERO Project, administrators model support for the best uses of technology in education.
The MY HERO Project offers many opportunities for students, teachers, and administrators to practice and perfect technology standards identified by ISTE’s NETS project. At the same time, solid curricular goals and interesting content mark MY HERO stories, artwork, and short films. All this in a global context makes The MY HERO Project a powerful addition to any school’s teaching and learning practices.
