My colleague, Silvana Meneghini, and I have been working on developing a Professional Development framework for embedding technology use and modern learning litercies based on Ruben Puentedura‘s SAMR model.
The template consists of 4 Focus Areas. Each stage of the SAMR model consists of 4 focus areas in the template, that support vision, planning, and evaluation in activity and task design as well as a professional development framework.
Goal Rationale:
Start with your goal in mind. What are your objectives? What do you want to accomplish? What learning do you envision? What literacies are being addressed?
Process Rationale:
Knowing all the answers is not important anymore. Learning how to ask questions and be open to reflect and receive feedback. are the skills to develop. How do we make the process of learning visible? How do we create a “learnflow” within and between tasks and activities? The process will inform your actions.
Technology Rationale:
Content knowledge becomes less important. Technology pushes pedagogy into center stage. As technology becomes further ubiquitous in our lives, a degree of fluency will be necessary to allow pedagogy to fully absorb technology. The tool will no longer be the objective.
Communication Rationale:
Traditionally, communication happened synchronously and face to face or asynchronously in written text form. Due to technology, the concept of communication and the types of media that help us communicate with an audience larger than 1 has changed and grown exponentially.
Communication no longer assumes the position of a finite, one way communication, but is transformed in the possibility of a two-way, crowdsourced or feedback process.
Each one of the four focus areas possesses several subcategories.
In a SAMR exercise, technology (learning) coaches support educators in identifying the placement of their lesson or project within the framework. The exercise can tag accomplishments, potential gaps and facilitate pinpointing next steps.
- The initial ideas is to take a look at a lesson and identify the ENTRY POINT of the SAMR stage (substitution, augmentation, modeification, redefinition).
- Concentrate on identifying the 4 FOCUS AREAS (goal, process, technology and communication).
- By using the subcategories, the coach/teacher work through areas addressed and possible gaps and potential areas of upward MOVEMENT movement towards redefinition.
Example:
Name of Activity: Middle School- Official Scribe
Activity Description: Students take individual classroom notes with paper/pen to study from for upcoming quiz, test or exam.
Students use computer to type up notes.
| Goals | Process | Technology | Communication |
|---|---|---|---|
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| Basic Literacy | Consume>Produce | Note Taking | 1: 1 |
Students use formatting options to organize, highlight, edit, rearrange their notes.
Students are printing out or emailing their notes to share with their classmates.
| Goals | Process | Technology | Communication |
|---|---|---|---|
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| Basic Literacy | Consume>Produce | Note Taking | 1: Group |
Students are creating their own blog post, using a variety of technology tools and methods to create annotated screenshots, videos, images to bring in different perspectives and address various learning styles.
Students are creating collaborative notes via a Google Document, which is shared with the entire class. Everyone can contribute, add information, edit incorrect information,etc.
Note taking is not confined to remembering and regurgitating information heard in class, but (hyper)linked to further reading of text, images, audio and video. Students are labeling/categorizing their blog post and information to
make organization and information search easier. Students are solving problems of how to handle information overload and filter relevant information.
| Goals | Process | Technology | Communication |
|---|---|---|---|
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| Basic Literacy | Consume>Produce> Feedback | Note Taking | 1: Group |
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| Network Literacy | |||
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| Information Literacy |
Students are contributors to a collaborative blog site, alternating being the Official Scribe of day. Collaboratively they “write”their own online textbook. Students express their understanding through a variety of media. Students use the blog as a learning hub to communicate and connect beyond their classroom walls, connecting with peers and experts from around the world.
| Goals | Process | Technology | Communication |
|---|---|---|---|
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| Basic Literacy | Consume>Produce>
Feedback |
Note Taking | Global Communication |
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| Network Literacy | Blogging | ||
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| Information Literacy |
Silvana and I will be presenting our framework and the SAMR exercise at the ASB Unplugged conference at the end of next month in Mumbai, India.
Presentation Description:
Let’s take a closer look at Ruben Puentedura’s technology integration SAMR model and how it can be applied as a Professional Development framework in education. How can educators use the model to inspire upward movement from using technology to substitute traditionally taught lessons towards transforming teaching and our own professional learning. Bringing together the SAMR framework with TPACK (Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge) allows teachers and technology coaches to visualize the interconnectedness of the models, making gaps more evident and point to “support opportunities” to move toward transformation.
Presenters will share scenarios and examples from different levels and subject areas. Participants will go through the exercise and will collaboratively brainstorm further scenarios to “practice” SAMR upward movement towards transformative teaching and learning.
Interested in this type of SAMR template and framework? Shortly, we will be looking for participants in crowdsourcing more examples from the classroom. Stay tuned…
Download the SAMR Template as a pdf
Thanks for this outstanding post Silvia. Anything to provide a focus or direction to professional learning is a positive thing! Best of luck with your upcoming ASB conference.
I think you are on the right track here. This gives those of us using the SAMR more examples and details for the levels of implementation on the SAMR. My only recommendation would be to do away with the clickable widgets on this site that, when clicked, only take you to the image of the widget rather than to additional information. Just too clunky.
Great infographic! I just wrote an article with Dr. Heather Moorefield-Lang published in Teacher Librarian on SAMR and AASL Best Websites and Best Apps for Teaching and Learning.
Redefining Technology in Libraries and Schools: AASL Best Apps, Best Websites and the SAMR Model(Link)
Teacher Librarian
December 2013
http://www.ala.org/aasl/standards-guidelines/best-websites
http://www.ala.org/aasl/standards-guidelines/best-apps
Always glad to read how others use SAMR when working with teachers to up their game. Below are several questions we ask as teachers become more comfortable with SAMR and examining projects through that lens:
http://balancedtech.wikispaces.com/SAMR
* Is Redefinition easier to imagine outside of the classroom/school/school day? If we follow the mantra of integrating the technology or having the technology serve the content/common core, can we actually achieve redefinition?
* Are there any methods/techniques that generally move an activity up a level? (App smashing? Publishing for feedback? Interdependent collaboration?)
* Are modification and redefinition more likely to happen the higher up in Bloom’s Taxonomy the task is? (Is this because schools, despite their claims, don’t get there often enough?)
* Are modification and redefinition more likely to happen with cross-disciplinary work? With project based learning? With inquiry based learning? With self-directed learning?
* Are modification and redefinition more likely to happen with projects that involve a variety of technologies at different stages? That integrate output from a variety of technologies?
* Are modification and redefinition more likely to happen with projects that capitalize on the unique affordances of a technology? Are you likely to get beyond substitution if you use a technology that addresses a constraint of the traditional method/technology?
* Are modification and redefinition more likely to happen with projects designed for skills important for today?
* Are modification and redefinition more likely if we redefine writing (multimodal, hypertextual, within networked communities, created by more than one person, published more broadly) and reading (reading books, web sites, blogs, forums, txts, tweets; infographics …; consuming multimodal content; following hypertext; …)?
* How does looking at existing practices through the lens of SAMR compare to examining them through other lenses such as TPaCK, Bloom’s, Habits of Mind, etc? Do you need to combine multiple angles to really assess what you are or might do? A sort of 3D perspective.
@balancededtech
Thank you so much in adding the questions to drive our thinking even further. As I am reading through these questions, I am thinking Yes!Yes!Yes! I believe that in order to truly redefine, we can’t just expect to add a few tech tools to traditional tasks, but need to truly REDEFINE tasks. What tasks are in need to be thrown out, what tasks can be upgraded and what new tasks need to be added. I like to think of redefined tasks as “multi-layered” tasks, similar to what you call a 3D perspective in terms of lenses.
Your questions are very helpful in helping us dig deeper, spark more discussion and push our learning forward. Let’s keep talking…
Thanks for this Sylvia. I’m going to take a closer look at it this weekend, and try applying it with a colleague I’m working with and trying to coach in exactly this kind of transformation all day Tuesday. We don’t use SAMR or TPACK here (none of my colleagues have ever heard of them), so I have a lot to think about and try to integrate into my own thinking. I’ll let you know how it helps, and anything of interest, questions, etc. I’m on a steep learning curve here on a whole new level!
@Cathy
We are ALL on a learning curve. As we are developing the framework and connecting with other educators who are wrapping their minds around SAMR, TPACK and upgrading and amplifying, we are re-thinking, revising and being pushed forward in our thinking. Please share your learning curve, share you learning and contribute another puzzle piece for everyone.
I’ll be honest…I don’t always love everything on Langwitches. But this (and the ensuing comments)…WOW! We use SAMR with our staff and I really appreciate your approach here. It makes it accessible to teachers and really challenges them! Although I can’t make the 2am (here in Kuwait) Google Hangout, I’ll be eager to watch it afterwards. Good luck!
@Lissa,
It has been an interesting learning experience for ourselves. Thinking about, brainstorming, sharing the process and NOT only the final product, receiving feedback, revising, disseminating, etc has been an exercise in itself, put through the framework.
We are eager to see and experience the Google Hangout on February 12 to consciously see if and how it adds further to the learning taking place (for us and the participants). Looking forward to your feedback and learning experiences with thinking about, using and coaching with the framework.
Silvia,
Thank you for putting SAMR into an info-graphic that not only lends a higher level of conceptual comprehension, but also sound application. SAMR is such a challenge right now in part because educators simply aren’t sure how to apply it; although, if you remove the technology piece (just hypothetically) teachers should be designing lessons, tasks and projects that reach the M and R levels consistently anyway. Technology-the use of which facilitates the rapid ability to share with others-brings an advantage afforded with efficient integration.
As a teacher and one of the technology leaders on my team, it has also smoothed the way with my colleagues to stress that not every little skill needs to be designed at the R level. Many skills (especially in younger elementary grades) can be established at S and A and then application and synthesis is those skills demonstrated in an M and/or R activity or project. However, striving for integration of skills into these deeper levels of learning is our ultimate goal. Thanks again for this. I plan to use it this year with both students and colleagues.
Hi,Sylvia. I just stumbled on this post, and the ensuing post with the Google Form Fantastic!! I’m wondering if you have a breakdown of descriptions for the sub categories. I thought I understood them at first glance, but the more I thought about it, the more confused I got… I might be helpful to have “mini descriptions” for clarification and reference. Thanks for this!!