Learners and Their Environment
South Carolina Technology Plan Goal:
The South Carolina Department of Education (SCDE), school districts and individual schools will use research-proven strategies to provide home, school and community environments conducive to our students’ achieving technological literacy by the end of the eighth grade and to raise the overall level of academic achievement in South Carolina.
K–12 Technology Initiative’s Efforts to Support the Goal:
Legislative mandates addressed under this dimension include providing environments that increase student achievement. The national push toward STEM education explains the importance of having learning environments to support effective teaching of science, technology, engineering and mathematics. To South Carolina’s credit, funding made available by the Governor and General Assembly through the K-12 School Technology Initiative helped to make possible a 2006 South Carolina Virtual School (SCVS) pilot that has become a thriving program today.
During this pilot, students throughout the state had the opportunity to enroll in 34 different virtual school courses, including algebra, geometry, English, Web design and global studies. The pilot gave SCDE an opportunity to gauge the need for and response to the program around the state. Additionally, the pilot helped gauge the Department’s strength in supporting the South Carolina High School Redesign Commission’s recommendation for the use of virtual learning to meet legislative mandates to give all students equitable access to high-quality instruction.
The K-12 School Technology Initiative has played a key role in supporting the mission of the SCDE’s Office of eLearning; to develop and deliver standards-based, student-centered online instruction. This instruction will expand educational opportunities to teach 21st century skills enabling a smooth K-20 transition.
As of March 2008, a total of 5,550 individual students have registered for a SCVSP course. The total number of student registrations is based on data that were collected in early March. Since that time, the number of student registrations has continued to rise. The SCVSP serves South Carolina students from a broad range of demographic groups.
Another invaluable resource contributed to by the K–12 School Technology Initiative is Digital Information for South Carolina Users (DISCUS). Administered by the South Carolina State Library, DISCUS uses K–12 School Technology Initiative funds to help provide an electronic library of essential information and learning resources to all state residents through schools, higher education institutions and public libraries. Public libraries, along with K–12 school media centers and academic libraries, receive direct benefit from DISCUS.
South Carolina Educational Television’s (ETV) StreamlineSC is another immensely beneficial program for S.C. educators and students that directly enhances teaching and learning by using video-based content. ETV partners with SCDE and school districts throughout the state to produce video-based standards aligned content, containing over 40,000 video clips as well as a tremendous database of illustrations and photos. All schools access the service without charge through funding provided by the State and distributed by the K-12 School Technology Initiative.
Another important resource for providing enhanced video-based classroom learning is the use of Instructional Television (ITV) videos; a resource the K-12 School Technology Initiative has a rich history of supporting. ITV videos, cooperatively developed by the SCDE’s Office of Technology and ETV, had a total of 133,124 views during the 2007 school year, an increase of over 32% from the previous year. Of the total videos viewed during the 2007 school year, ITV videos accounted for 6.1%, up from 5.0% during the previous year.
Yet another invaluable electronic resource widely used in South Carolina is ETV’s Knowitall.org. Knowitall.org is the portal for ETV produced free, Web-based multimedia resources designed for K-12 use. The content includes interactive learning modules, simulations and virtual field trips, as well as lesson plans, classroom activities and media rich content. This portal has been viewed over 10 million times by students, parents and teachers since it was developed, and of these users, 76% connected to Knowitall.org from the state’s K-12 schools and districts.
ETV’s Knowitall.org continues to grow due to the fact that it leverages many of the same features that attract students to the Internet and to the world of gaming and simulations. Scholarly research continues to indicate that education-driven gaming (also known as serious gaming) engages students at levels and in ways difficult to achieve in the highly structured classroom, while resulting in improved educational performance.
Here's what South Carolina students and educators have to say about technology and education.
Read the 2008 Progress Report of the South Carolina K-12 Technology Initiative. (You will need Adobe Acrobat Reader to view the report. If you do not have it, click here to download it for free.)