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The following was originally published July 22, 2009 at http://futuretechintexas.blogspot.com/2009/07/technology-readiness-in-schools.html Today's students are driven by technology. They use cellphones, computers, iphones, they text, blog, twitter, and are used to 24/7/365 connectivity (Richardson,2007) in their lives. Mark Prensky coined the phrase "Digital Natives" for these students. He also mentioned everyone else is known as "Digital Immigrants". With this consideration, the education system must change. How do we know if our schools are changing to meet our students' needs? In Texas, schools must participate in an annual evaluation of their campus to determine where each campus rates in technology in four different areas. Teachers, as well as administrators, fill this evaluation out at the beginning of each school year. This evaluation will allow the TEA (Texas Education Agency) to see if the campus is aligned with the Texas Long-Range Plan for Technology. In this presentation, we will look at the evaluations from the past three years for Schindewolf Intermediate School in Klein ISD located in Spring, Texas. The campus showed an impressive amount of growth over the past three years in Key Area III (Leadership). They are considered to be "On Target" for the year 2008-2009. However, a decrease in Key Area I (Teaching and Learning)demonstrates the need for more intensive application and integration of technology usage on this campus. There was a slight increase in Key Area II (Educator Preparation & Development) but Key Area IV (Infrastructure) showed no increase from last year. According to the data, the two key areas that directly deal with student learning rate the lowest both for this campus and the statewide evaluation. Clearly, there is a need for a re-evaluation of the way technology is being integrated and to what extent it is being used. The importance of this imformation will allow us to become better learners. Both teacher and students must become better learners by assimilating information in the manner students relate to most, through technology. Just as being in a foreign country, it is not enough to speak a few words to communicate effectively. One must become fluent to teach the subject and this means using the "language" until it becomes more comfortable and one's level of confidence raises. Teachers need to understand it is ok to not be experts at using technology, but they also need to understand it is not acceptable for them to not try at all. Their success is our success. "Digital Immigrants" must learn to speak the "Digital Native" language to teach our 21st Century learners effectively. Our students must be able to compete in the 21st Century world, as Globalization is very real. The annual STaR Chart report enables the Texas Education Agency to determine whether the campus is following the SBEC Technolgy Standards and how they compare with the rest of the state. This information, in conjunction with the Texas Long-Range Plan, will help to focus, aid, and manage the weakest areas to create a techology-based learning environment. [|Texas STaR Chart]View more [|presentations] from [|dfsullivan06].