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posted by:
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Joni Falk
on November 30, 2001
at 3:09PM
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subject:
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Can an LSC-Net type tool help communication in your LSC?
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Thanks to all of you who have posted recently. You identified both challenges and strategies to addressing the communication problem. I would like to use this message to some up some of what I heard and to redirect the conversation to a consideration of how different forms of electronic communication might help within your project.
To start: Challenges that you identified included:
1. Different junctures where communication often breaks down. One project mentioned that lead teachers often gather information from fellow teachers but then the information is not transmitted. Another mentioned that there can be a breakdown between the level of the project, district personnel, and site administrators. There was mention that it can be difficult to get principals to give out information.
2. Sending notices does not seem to assure that they will be read: Gail Paulin writes that they sent e-mail, flyers and print material, and still there was a poor response. Gail suggests that perhaps there is too much information or too much "noise" to allow people to focus on what they are receiving. Another post refers to a list serv which is often not read in a timely manner.
3. Time: Programs that open up new channels of communication (e.g. Power School information system - which is being used to connect teachers and parents) also creates a greater demand on teachers time to communicate.
This time has not been built into teachers schedules. I notice I did not hear anything about teacher to teacher interaction, yet when implementing a new curriculum, it is probably pivotal that teachers exchange information and ideas.
Some Suggestions:
Jerry Valdez offers some concrete suggestions in his post including building in time for communication for coaches and mentors. He compares this to "building a caseload." He also speaks of the importance of concretely identifying roles and expectations for lead teachers through a memo of understanding. Last he speaks about going "paperless" and that all teachers are required to go to the web to get information on workshops, institutes, and coursework.
Gail Paulin asks if I would talk about LSC-Net and wonders about the Whats New format for announcing postings. I would like to spend a few minutes addressing some lessons learned from LSC-Net and would love it if in the last week of this discussion if folks would entertain how a system such as LSC-Net could impact on communication. We are exploring the idea of developing an LSC-Net like system for schools and are interesting in your feedback.
One possible feature that may be very useful for school is the functionality that we have built into the "Whos There" section. In this area you can search for a particular class of people (so in your school district it might be all 4th and 5th grade teachers). You can then compose one e-mail and it will get sent to each one of their e-mail addresses. Would this be valuable?
Another "feature" is that putting something on the Web is not enough. It seems that you need to send periodic "whats new " reminders to peoples e-mail in order to remind them of the webs existence and that there is new information. So building a web-site with notification systems to peoples e-mail seems helpful.
I wonder if a vehicle for teachers posting queries and replies would be useful? Do you think they would use it?
I think Jerry is on to something when he mentions that teachers now know that they have to come to the Web for info on schedule, workshops etc. If teachers know that they will get a lot of the information through multiple modalities, they are less likely to change their habits. Well another lesson learned THAT I DID NOT HEED is to keep your messages short.
I apologize for going on, but I would be very interested if you would examine the functionalitys available on LSC-Net http://lsc-net.terc.edu and help us think which of these, if any, would be helpful in tackling communication problems in schools. I also posted a paper on the site that might be useful in thinking about this. You can see it going to http://lsc-net.terc.edu/do/8364. I look forward to hearing your replies.
-----Joni
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