Technology in North Omaha

I teach at Omaha North High Magnet school. We are an engineering magnet. We offer a four year engineering program called Project Lead The Way. This is a unique opportunity for students who want to get a jump on their engineering education. We are the only school in a five state region to offer this opportunity. We have additional opportunities at the middle school level at McMillan Magnet Center. Students in the 7th and 8th grades can begin their education of engineering at McMillan and then advance to North and possibly receive credits toward college before graduating from high school.

In the picture to the right you can see the new addition to North High. This is a science and engineering wing. Many classrooms in this wing offer computers for every student and wireless projectors for class presentations. The computers are equipped with CAD programs for engineering as well the basics like Microsoft Office. On the roof is a green space where science class can grow plants to experiment with. There is also a green house on the southwest corner of the wing. And did I forget to mention the room with a green screen where students can experiment with video and broadcasting?

To hear this it would seem that Omaha North has it all. Well, I would like to think so, but that is the new wing. The school is currently in the process of mounting a projector in every room, and just this last year every teacher has been equipped with their own personal laptop. Each room has also been equipped with a laptop port and an additional monitor so that we can view twice as much information at one time. Time and training are sometimes difficult to come by. Administration is doing a better job of providing training during staff development days. We do have multiple computer labs as well as a lab in the media center, and we have great support staff to work with teachers and students in both areas.

I have used my projector to present power point lessons to my classes. I have used Geogebra, a program that allows me to work with graphs in a coordinate plane, work with slope and construct geometric figures. These are all great things, but I need the ability to physically draw and write on the screen. If I had an interactive whiteboard or Smartboard that would be great. Students find the chalkboard difficult to see at times and my overhead can be somewhat limiting. This must sound terrible to some of you that have stood the test of time and progressed from dittos to photocopiers and thought the overhead with a roller was the second coming, but to keep kids interested we have to stay on the edge. When we get new technologies, we have to experiment with them and let the kids use them as well. I think I have many advantages at North; the only thing keeping me from using them is me.