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Giving Them the World:
www.ncat.edu/~schofed/swat |
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If you think of the world as a giant website, then Lucy Miller's SWAT Team page would have hyperlinks to democratic education, technology education, cooperative learning, special education, assistive technology, curriculum integration, community service, and self development to name the most obvious. As Microsoft's 1997 National Technology Teacher of the Year, Lucy is a teacher with a mission - a mission "to give kids the world" now while they can learn to have purpose and feel responsibility by making real contributions, and, in the future, when they will gently hold all of our futures in their hands. |
MIDTech(MT):
I like to hear "beginning" stories. How did all of this begin? Tell
me about the beginning of SWAT, especially about the link between your efforts
to learn technology and then how they led you to SWAT?
Lucy: That's easy because I share it in conferences all the time. It started years ago when I was a special ed. teacher working with multiple-handicapped kids. Our mission, working with all the specialists, was to help these very involved children. We know that there is something inside those children and we want to help them communicate. Through assistive devices and augmentative communication devices, we helped a lot of children communicate with us and with each other. So my interest began with assistive technology years ago with the simple battery-operated devices that Linda Burkhart designed and shared with teachers at workshops. I found it fascinating to just hook up a battery device to a cookie sheet so the student basically made a movement to indicate with a template a yes-no response. That was just so exciting that I could communicate with someone who didn't have the verbal capabilities.
After 10 years of teaching special education, I transferred to general education. Then I went into general education. My principal suggested that I take a computer Lead Training course to become a model class for technology in the Fairfax County Public School System. I always felt comfortable with computers, we had Macs then, and I worked to integrate the curriculum through the use of technology and not just to teach computers as a tool. 10 years ago I was an active user of the Fairfax County Public School email system, because I had access to a phone line in my classroom. During the summer, I worked on many technology curriculum design projects, one of which was designing templates that teachers could use to send student comments about their research to another school studying the same specimens.
Then I came down to North Carolina when my husband got a job here. I assessed what technology was like in this state when I went to a symposium in Wake County, and I was amazed at the lack of computers in the schools. This was four years ago and so I thought that when I got into a school that I would help make a difference. So then I was hired by Pat Andrews at Davis Drive Elementary School. It was the beginning of a new school. My first job was as a fourth grade teacher but I was upset because I didn't have a computer in my classroom, so I did a lot of complaining. I didn't really realize that schools had to raise the funds to get the needed money to buy the computers. It wasn't just handed to us as it was in Fairfax County, a much richer state and county area. I had complained so much that my principal designed a position for me as the Technology/ Grants Resource Teacher. It was an experimental position in Wake County and she pretty much told me I had to make my salary and get enough grants to fund technology for the school. We are fortunate to have the IBM Matching Grants program so we could equip our schools with 95 network computers. That was the first year phase and our assistant principal was real active acquiring the computers and coordinating the Network. The second year of operation, through my involvement as the tech coordinator, we were able to purchase some more things through grants that I received. We purchased a digital camera and scanner to set up the publishing center. But that position was very administrative. I was doing a lot of grant writing. I was doing a lot of networking troubleshooting. I was also on the student support team because of my special ed. background, so I was doing a lot of paperwork. By mid year I decided, I needed to work with children again.
Lucy: I made
an announcement and said, "I really want 10 kids to design a web site.
Who would be interested? And I want to call this the SWAT Team (Students
Working to Advance Technology)." Well, the next day 135 kids came to
me and said, "I want to be on the SWAT Team, Mrs. Miller,"
and I thought, "Oh, no. I can't take 135 kids!" So I thought, let
me really look at this. I looked at the technology competencies. I looked at
the curriculum and I looked at my goals and what I thought I would like to happen
with children, and I also looked at the needs of the school. I think that's
the first place. When I go to other schools now, to the pilot sites, I say,
"What works for my school may not necessarily work for your school."
At that point in time, we still only had one phone line, and I knew that the Internet was becoming very popular and useful to teachers for classroom lessons to supplement ideas for research. So I thought, "I need some Internet researchers -- some kids who can go out and do some research for teachers to save teachers time." Hence the "Internet Researchers." Then we were getting new computers in the first grade classes, and I knew the teachers were pretty fresh and needed some help and assistance just with the little ones getting used to use the computers. So I thought, "Well, computer buddies can help with that. The fourth and fifth grade kids are pretty comfortable with technology, so they can help the teachers." So I set up a group called "Computer Buddies." We are fortunate enough to have closed circuit television in our school, and I thought that this is another way we could integrate technology because we've got the weather right on the Internet. The kids can go to it, capture the weather, videotape it and show it to the whole school, so this way the whole school benefits from technology. So I designed the "TV Weather Internet Team." Then for my original goal I wanted the web page designers, so they were up and running, too. I just needed a few kids to really hack away, learn Front Page and I taught them basic html. I had a college student come in and within three months the website was developed. Just by fifth grade boys and a few other kids who worked interviewing teachers and getting information. I started with four task groups, and I think I said them all: the internet task force, the computer buddies, tv weather internet crew and the web page designers. So we were really busy. I wanted parents to be a part of the training as well as have them going back out in the community to share what we were doing. Also, I really hoped to have the extension with the middle school so that my students could be SWAT members at that level. I have had a few meetings but it hasn't been up and running yet as I hope it will be.
All the SWAT students are developing valuable technology competencies. I am now the process of doing a correlation between what they can do and what's required at each grade level. And, in turn, because this year, they are even more sophisticated, the students are providing staff development for teachers. So teachers are getting some basic technology competencies met just by virtue of learning from our students.
I think that's how I was inspired. When I made the cross over the "great divide" from the MacWorld to the PC World, I was teaching fourth grade. It was my first year here, and I fussed a lot because I didn't have a computer. And when I did get a computer it was a PC, so I didn't know what to do with it. Fortunately, I had a lot of very bright students in my classroom and one of my students came up to me and said, "Mrs. Miller, this is not going to be a problem. I will sit down with you and I will help you learn." So he patiently helped me. I thought that there was a lot of power behind what this child did for me. And, I think, with that experience I knew that the SWAT Team would work. I knew from my experience with fourth and fifth grade students that they were capable of taking on the challenges of what I needed the SWAT Team to do. So the first year I made it formal that the children had to apply and interview, so I could cut back on that mass of 135 students that I didn't know really what to do with. So, serious, involved dedicated students came forth, some who didn't necessarily have knowledge in using computers. The bottom line was that they wanted to learn more about computers that they had a natural interest to learn more. Those, I thought, would be the more dedicated kids.
Then after I won the award the national award, the Department of Public Instruction (DPI) hired me to pilot these SWAT Team programs. I thought maybe this is a chance to really make this program more sophisticated and more refined, and that we could start to take some data about the importance of integrating technology in a certain way. So I decided to add two more task forces: a mobile unit for outside of school and a central unit for inside.
The mobile unit students and parents are working on the weekends at Eva Perry Library, our local library as "kid consultants" and "tiny tutors." They have had extensive training, and parents have been a part of every bit of the training. The unit members are learning about the library system. And we also have a representative from Eva Perry coming here next week to teach the internet researchers and the mobile unit kids how to conduct internet research and how to answer questions that people may have when the come to the library to ask for help. So I am providing support and individuals to work on Saturday mornings while parents are taking over on Saturday afternoons, Sunday afternoons and Monday afternoons , the high volume times. We did a little research and they told us what they would need. And it's funny because they are just getting their computers in and they are just getting those connected for theYouth Services center, so our SWAT students will have computers while they are there.
There also be an evaluation, so that people who have been helped can let us know about it. And there will be an interest survey, so that students can request help on a particular topic and there will be a SWAT Team member to help those children to conduct research.
I have also received a grant this year from the Wake County Educational Partnership
Creative Grants to use videoconferencing. We are hoping to use a quikcam at
the library site, so that teachers and students could communicate. 
We're still thinking about that, but we think that the teachers could communicate
with the library and let them know ahead of time that they were studying some
units on dinosuars, so they are going to be swamped. So yes, they can do it
over the phone, but we thought this is a great way to have them integrate technology.
And then we were thinking that the SWAT kids could use the NC State reflector
site for videoconferencing. That way, the other SWAT Teams could share
resources that the kids have found while working with other children. We're
going to keep the camera here and then Eva Perry is going to buy a camera, so
we are all going to learn the technology, and that's what's fun about it. The
Eva Perrry staff are running with us. It's the kids who are pretty much the
ones that have the knowledge -- which is interesting. The teachers are less
reluctant to ask for help when a child is involved, and I think that's one of
the benefits of students on the SWAT Team.
I didn't mention the central unit which is a group of students who are assigned to our school base to work on computer maintenance. They are working with the technology teacher here to clean the computers. They have a little computer vacuum, and they are going to be cleaning the drives. Mrs.Willis, the technology specialist, is very technologically astute and knows the insides and outsides of any computer. I am going to also help the SWAT Team with mulit-media projects and everything that I learn through my position as an educator-on-loan at DPI, so they can share that knowledge with anybody else. I am also teaching them to develop Power Point presentations for staff development purposes. For example, we have a technology presentation next week. I have three students presenting, and the central unit students did the backdrop for the presentation. It didn't take them much time to figure out how to embed images and graphics and how to put a title in there so they were really proud of themselves.
Lucy: And that's
what I am really looking at the children's self esteem and what they are gaining
from being on the SWAT Team. I see it happening, I see the smiles on
their faces. I see them proudly walking to school with the nicely designed SWAT
Team t-shirts. My principal has commented many times that she is so proud to
have a few kids that you can call on any time for support. We've cut down on
the downtime with one person running to the classroom to work on a minor computer
problem. Now the SWAT Team students just step in. Teachers simply say,
"Where's my SWAT Team student?" They are known by the school
community as not necessarily the more advanced, but the kids who feel confident
in helping another person with computers. I don't like to say that they are
better than anyone else. I just want to say that they are confident computer
users.
The twenty Internet researchers were chosen based on their knowledge of practical usage and their Internet capability at home. We only have one phone line here and the access is difficult, so they do a lot of the research at home that the teachers need.
I want to emphasize what I am doing with the pilot
sites. I was fortunate to work with Chris Cobitz at NC A & T to design a
website, so I could inform other teachers who are interested in doing the pilot.
That was one of my goals at DPI to pilot this idea in a few counties across
North Carolina. We were thinking of four or five sites. Well, after the website
was developed and I started talking at conferences, we have thirty pilots, (as
of January 1998). On our website you can link to find out about the pilot task
force and you can see pictures of the kids in action. There's also a place that
teachers can go to get replication materials. Any form that I develop is on
there, so that a teacher could then take a form and apply it to their needs.
There are middle school and high school teachers taking on the SWAT Team
and they designing it to meet their school's needs.
So as part of the application packet there is a planner so that teachers and teams of teachers can get together to discuss the needs of the school and then look at how they can become a SWAT Team pilot. I have a map on the website with shaded areas showing North Carolina counties that are involved as SWAT sites. There are pilot sites in Rhode Island, Maryland, Virginia, California ,and I just got a new one in Long Beach, Florida. I did get email from South Africa and they are considering taking on a SWAT Team as well. So you see there is so much power behind what is happening and it has evolved into something I never imagined. I am very proud of it and honored that I did have the opportunity to step back from teaching to pilot it to the level that it is now. My dream is to take the SWAT Team concept and continue to promote it nationally. I would like to also get more community involvement, and I can see the SWAT Team reaching out to hospitals, home bound kids or children who are receiving instruction through home schooling. The YMCA is a prime spot, especially the family YMCA program. There's a natural connection with what we are doing that's why I wanted what we are doing at Eva Perry to be a model for other schools. It's a perfect example of how you can extend to the community.
Some teachers are just starting with five kids a SWAT Team and their computer buddies. That's fine. That's fine. Teachers can use it in any way. I did the six task forces because I thought that was the ultimate model at this point, but they can pick and choose whatever they want.
On the website there is also a link to proposals any grants that I wrote that were successfully funded are there for the teachers to take and fit to their needs. There also links to Who's Who on the SWAT Team so you get to see the kids. And there are links to Eva Perry Library, Davis Drive Elementary School and DPI.
Particularly important are the DPI links to the competencies, so you can see how the competencies integrate with what the SWAT Team is doing. I think that what people are struggling with right now is that, yes, we have the tools, and yes, we have the competencies, but the competencies are so basic -- learning word processing, learning databases -- what teachers need are the courses that help us integrate the technology. I think that's why the SWAT Team is so successful -- the competencies are met in a natural environment in a fun leaning environment for kids where they are gaining a lot of self esteem.
Lucy: I've asked
the pilot sites to collect some information about self-esteem and student involvement
and how the project may have changed students' attitudes toward school. I have
a good story to tell about my SWAT Team. My special ed. pilot sites are
really close to my heart since I'm a former special education educator. I was
at a conference in Greensboro and I talked to teachers about the SWAT
Team. In my session there were two teachers sitting next to each other from
the same county who didn't know one another. They listened to my talk, and then
they said, "Wow, I could start a SWAT Team at my school. I have
special ed. kids," and the other teacher said, "Well, I have special
ed. kids, too. How can we work together?" That synergy was phenomenal!
They came to me and said,"We have special ed. sites and we want to work
together. Can we do a special ed. SWAT Team? I said, "Of course,
you can. You can do anything you want."
I just visited the schools. One is called Web Street School and it is the alternative school for the more involved handicapped children. Those children are going to go over to the middle school and work with the special ed. resource students and the resource students at, William C. Friday Middle School, will be working more with regular kids. So it's sort a trifold of interactive SWAT experts. The SWAT experts would be at the Web Street School for their own school, and they will also work with peer tutors and the SWAT buddies over at the middle school so they have two responsibilities. All 25 resource students at the middle school will be SWAT students.
MT: That's great! So instead of the regular students being the SWAT Team it is going to be made up of the special ed. resource students.
Lucy: There
are now probably 500 students involved with SWAT Teams. And, again, the
most interesting aspect to me is the growth in self esteem that comes from being
a member of a group of kids that are helping other people. One of my boys said,
"Well, Mrs. Miller, you said this was community involvement? Can I earn
scout points for being on the SWAT Team," and I said, "You
bet, especially for the mobile unit task force goes out into the community."I
think that goes a long way I think it makes kids feel good that they are helping
others. In the interviews to select SWAT Team members, when I asked them
why they wanted to be on the SWAT Team, the response I got most often
was, "I want to help others." And to hear that from a child and then
to give them the opportunity to help others well, I think the bottom line
is that it makes them a better citizen all around. And it also helps the community.
I think the goal of the school or school community is to develop good citizenship.
I think the SWAT Team helps develop technology competencies while it
helps develop good social skills and good citizenship skills.
MT: I can see that what you are is a broker of human talent and energy. Especially compelling are your stories of your work with assistive technology and special ed. connection. Those kids don't always have the opportunity to even use this kind of technology let alone become leaders in using it.
Lucy: And that's what is happening at Web Street School. The SWAT students at the special ed. center are now going to be helping the teachers with some of the assistive devices and I thought, "Wow, isn't that powerful?"
MT: It really is. That's has got to be one of the most gratifying things.
Lucy: Oh, it is. I was so excited. Those special ed. sites are going to become models for other schools. The important thing is to look at those kids who you have in your school, and it's not just those kids who are the academic stand-outs but let's look at all the children. I think that SWAT gives opportunities to any child who wants to help others and feels comfortable using technology.
I love to share this story. I prepared ten students to present at a state conference in technology and it took us two months of practicing and getting it together. They were so excited. The parents were excited. And they all hopped in the car and went to Greensboro and joined me for an hour presentation in front of over 200 and handled themselves as professionals. They were so proud of themselves! One student, after the fact, said to me, "Mrs. Miller, this was so exciting I'm ready to go national now." [Laughter.] Talk about self esteem!
And, so now, I have invited three of those students to present at our family PTA technology night. They are pulling it all together and organizing it themselves. I said, "I need each one of you to do two task force teams and come up with your speech about them." They are going to meet me today for lunch and we are going to go over it, hack it out, and get it ready. It's really a lot of work on writing skills when they were developing their speeches because we have to edit and edit and edit and refine.
One student has speech difficulties which I never realized until his parents brought it to my attention. But, he plugged away and practiced and I could see in his face that he was trying not to get upset over having to do this. But he did it! He made the most of an opportunity to perform in front of several hundred people and got through it with beautiful success. I think he is going to be a lot more confident in all those situations where he will have to speak in public. I think it was important for his future and his job skills.
I have a fun story about another student, Jessica, who is very articulate and I thought she had everything under control until about an half-an-hour before we were to present when she said to me, "Mrs. Miller, I foresee my lunch coming back on me." That's exactly how she said it, instead of saying it like I would have said it. I said, "Jessica, you're going to be fine." And she did a beautiful job, so she overcame any fear that she might have had about getting up there.
MT: Well, there
are so many layers in this project I had no idea when you first started
talking about assistive technology and special ed. That's a wonderful, wonderful
connection and then the community school connection. It's just astounding what
you can do with that.
Lucy: I didn't realize when I designed it. I thought, "Well, we're just going to have a computer club." I did say in the beginning that we are not just going to play. I did want to formalize it so it was a group with a goal, and the kids have stayed serious all along.
MT: They have. The one word I heard over and over when I talked with them was responsibility. I heard so many children say, "I feel responsible."
Lucy: And that was built right into the application and interview process. First and foremost, we need to be responsible. It's very important to me that every child who does apply for the SWAT Team that I take them. If they are not responsible to fill out the application and come to the interview, they don't get on the SWAT Team. We take every single child who applies. Even if the child has had no experience with technology but just really wants to be on the SWAT Team -- that's enough for me.
MT: It's a question of equity. That's one thing that strikes me. In exploring what possibilities may be out there for children. They understand that they have to know how to use technology and how to work with people. So what you're doing is giving access to many kids who before would not have these opportunities.
Lucy: They know what their future is probably much more so than I do. They teethed on computers. I didn't. And I think adults in my age range are scared and confused and not sure what's important. This is the best story I can tell to illustrate that. I thought that if I had to take the time to teach the children how to use Front Page, to learn it thoroughly myself and then design a lesson plan to teach the children they would have never had learned it. So I put it in the hands of the kids. I believe in William Glasser's control theory model -- put it in the hands; let them play with it; and let them go with it. They went out and bought their own book called Front Page for Dumbies. They hacked away with it on weekends. I had them come to my house many times and we learned together. And it wouldn't have happened if I hadn't stepped back and said, "This is your site not mine."
And they knew I was serious. We even had an administrator come in one day and say that she didn't like the background color on the site and asked if I could change it. And I said, "No, I couldn't and that this is their website they are responsible for designing it, so I'm going to let them make the decisions about changing it." The kids looked at me, and they couldn't believe that they really had that power. And so I learned through this.
They were so proud that they were the kids behind
designing the website. Now every conference that I can I take them along to
tell their story, too. And that is a wonderful aspect of it -- being able to
take some of the kids to conferences, so they actually receive the affirmation
that, "You guys are responsible for making this happen." When the
librarians at Eva Perry said, "We really need kids who can come on Monday
afternoon." I said, "I can't come on Monday afternoon because I work
at another location that day," Tara Sheldon, a parent, stepped right up
and said, "I'll do it. I'll help those kids." So we brought her up
on stage at the Greensboro conference and acknowledged her and what she as a
parent has done for the children.
MT: That's a vital link.
Lucy: Yes, I've been invited to the PTA Synergy Conference in Augusta, GA, and I'm taking a PTA parent with me to that conference so she can tell our story. PTA is another extension.
MT: It's like hyperlinks.
Lucy: That's right.
MT: How about administrating this huge 78-member SWAT Team. How do you do it?
Lucy: The leadership team, I guess, would be myself and Dan Courtine, a brand new fifth grade teacher, who is providing the web design as well.. Beth Willis, the Technology Coordinator here now, is going to help with the central unit kids, and teach them how to maintain the computers. Amy Vanleberghe is the academically gifted teacher, and she is very good with technology. She is going to be helping with the videoconferencing and multimedia. A parent, Tara Sheldon, is heading up the SWAT Team Mobile Unit on Monday afternoons at Eva Perry Library. We have monthly meetings for every task force team and share ideas, successes, and problems.
MT: I think
that the beauty of your project is that it recognizes that technology allows
kids to be responsible in a real way doing real things and making a real
contribution it's not delayed to when they grow up. It's like right now.
I think that's great and it's something I hadn't seen from technology yet. The
kids get the message that "I could stay right here in my own environment
and with technology reach out to the world and work to change things."
Lucy: It's changed my life! I wrote a simple proposal about a simple project that was recognized by a major corporation and now people want to know all about it. It's really exciting and it's an honor, but the bottom line is that it's for the kids.