Education Week - October 1, 2014 - Special Report - S9

EDUCATION WEEK

OCTOBER 1, 2014

Piecing Together a Smart LMS Strategy > www.edweek.org/go/LMS

Lms companies' practices in providing professional development vary according to the goals
of their platforms and the types of clients they
serve.
D2L, based in Kitchener, Ontario, does not
mandate the amount of professional development that districts that buy its product must
use, though it strongly recommends that they
pursue some sort of training, said Pam Martin,
the manager of the company's training and communities programs.

Training Needs Vary
Some schools and districts may need minimal training, while others may need extensive
preparation to use the product. Still others may
be switching from using another lms, which
usually means acquainting them with new processes, even if they understand the basic functions, Ms. Martin said.
D2L has eight full-time trainers devoted to
working with new clients. The company also
has a separate team of staff members, formed
last year, who focus on a "wholistic approach"
to training, working with individual districts to
tailor the lms to their specific needs and correcting problems as they arise.
Alma, a relatively new developer of learning management and student-information
systems, leaves it to its school clients to decide
how much training they want, and in what
form. It offers live webinars to explain its lms
to clients, as well as in-person training, said
Andrew Herman, the Portland, Ore.-based
company's ceo. The company has worked exclusively with private and charter schools to
date, he said, though it is now marketing itself
to entire districts.
But Alma officials are also convinced that
the power of their lms, or any lms, ultimately

rests on its ease of use-meaning that not much
training should be needed on how to use it,
added Jack Macleod, Alma's president.
"Simply using the system is professional development," Mr. Macleod said. An lms should
help teachers "in a very intuitive way."
Julia F. Freeland, a research fellow for the
Clayton Christensen Institute for Disruptive
Innovation, a San Mateo, Calif.-based nonprofit, agrees with the idea that an lms, ideally,
shouldn't require an overwhelming amount of
training. Making lms products and other education technologies intuitive helps districts partly
because they have a finite amount of time available for professional development, she added.
But when they do provide professional development, companies need to think beyond just
explaining the nuts and bolts of how their tools
work, Ms. Freeland said. Many ed-tech businesses are inclined to focus on basic "product
training," rather than what's more important:
helping K-12 officials customize products to
meet their needs, said Ms. Freeland, whose organization seeks to promote innovation in education and other areas.
"If you want your tool to be used strategically,
there's training involved in that," she said. That
sort of strategic training should not be "single
event," she added, but continuous.

'Closing the Loop'
When Alma officials design professional development, they structure it in a methodical
way. The company purposely trains administrators in schools on using its lms before it begins
with teachers, recognizing that if school leaders
aren't on board with the technology, teachers
aren't likely to use it effectively.
Then, after meeting with teachers,
Alma goes back and debriefs the administra-

tors, effectively "closing the loop," Mr. Herman
said: "We want administrators to hear what
we hear from the teachers."
Another company that develops learning
management systems, Follett, offers two paths
for training-for curriculum directors and for
teachers-which it delivers through videos, reference guides, and lesson plans. That training is
delivered either primarily through Follett staff
members, or through training district educators
to train their colleagues-a more popular option
partly because it is less costly, said Caroline K.
See, the director of professional learning for Follett, which is based in Westchester, Ill. Either
way, that training is essential, she said.
"You have to do the pd to be successful, honestly," Ms. See said. The lms "has so much power,
and there are so many components, it would be
hard to get up and running" otherwise.
The type of professional development districts
use with their respective learning management
systems also depends on the type of technology
infrastructure they have in place.
The Gwinnett County district, for instance,
has a bring-your-own-device plan in which students are able to use their own digital devices
for learning purposes in school. But at Lanier
High School, Ms. Weetman said her students'
access to technology is uneven. Some students
have their own devices in school and at home,
while others have to use school-issued devices
during school hours. But Ms. Weetman said
she's gradually learning how to give out assignments that students can handle, allowing them
to work at their own pace, even if they're only
online, using computers at school or elsewhere,
for relatively short amounts of time.
At the same time, she's also experimenting
within the lms for lessons that will inspire students through technology. Next spring, for instance, when her students are reading "Julius
Caesar" and other Shakespeare plays, Ms. Weetman plans to upload video clips from dramatic
performances and embed them within reading
assignments, in an effort to bring the plays to
life.
The goal, she said, is to use technology to give
students a different perspective on the words on
the page-or rather, on the screen. "I can start a
discussion thread," she said, and ask, "How did
it change your perspective on the play to see it
performed?" n

Far left, Brooke T. Webb, a
teacher at Lanier High School
in Gwinett County, Ga., trains
a group of fellow Lanier
educators who are interested
in implementing eClass,
an online educational platform
used for teachers and students
to share work, engage in class
discussions, take tests,
receive grades, and
accomplish other tasks.
This page, clockwise from top:
Lanier teacher Kimberly
O'Connell listens during
Ms. Webb's training session,
while teachers Jane Langan
and Bryan Smith follow along
on their laptops.
Photos by Dustin Chambers
for Education Week

http://www.edweek.org/go/LMS

Education Week - October 1, 2014 - Special Report

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