Mark Connolly and Josh Furst work closely with faculty to integrate technology effectively in classrooms across all disciplines. Josh and Mark are new to their roles as instructional technologists, but not to Milton. Mark joined the modern languages department to teach Spanish in 2002, and ultimately served as department chair. Since 2010, Josh has worn many hats, beginning as A/V media tech coordinator and most recently serving as K–8 technologist. Now he advises Class II students and teaches Values in the affective education curriculum.
“One of our first priorities is connecting with all faculty to gain perspective on what they hope their students will do in their individual classrooms,” says Josh. “We are also helping teachers to reimagine what evaluation and assessment looks like, feels like, and what role it has in their courses.”
A key task is providing support on the School’s two major platforms—Schoology and Google Apps for Education.
“Not only do we provide the support, but we also want to get everyone to look beyond the platforms,” says Mark. “What does it mean to use these tools equally well as a biology teacher, as a history teacher, or as a Spanish teacher? We are also shifting ‘I want’ requests to ‘I would like to be able to.” Instead of ‘I want a Smart Board,’ for example, the thinking should be ‘I would like my students to publish for an audience.’ Starting there helps us help the faculty use these tools to improve student experience.”
Mark and Josh are also working with faculty to incorporate more multi-media into course work when appropriate.
“Taking the standard five-paragraph essay and thinking of ways to introduce other elements is an example,” says Mark. “Maybe using an audio or video component is a great solution. We’d like to bring more creativity into the learning process and the traditional assessment—to offer alternative ways for students to show they understand the subject.”
Over the summer, one of the first teachers to approach Mark and Josh with her ideas was science faculty member Linde Eyster, who teaches biology.
“Mark has worked very hard to help her streamline the work flow in her class and maximize how she uses her resources,” says Josh. “I worked with her on reimagining collaborative opportunities for her students. The students are curating photographs for a biodiversity photo conference they were invited to attend, so we have been working on that together.”
“Linde also wanted to find ways for her students to demonstrate their understanding of biology beyond the written lab,” says Mark. “We created virtual message boards where students are asking questions and answering each other, but she has oversight of the conversations happening there.”
Josh and Mark’s office is located in Cox Library, visible to students and faculty, to encourage casual interaction beyond their open office hours. Josh says providing student support is also important, and during the first two weeks of school, he made himself available until 11 p.m. each night for email questions and support. The technologists’ library office space also offers opportunity for close collaboration with the library’s new director, Laura Peale, who has lots of great ideas on teacher-student resources.