How do teachers use technology?

By Meris Stansbury, Managing Editor for eCampus News, @eSN_Meris

Read more by Meris Stansbury

May 15th, 2014

National data on all public school teachers reveals teacher technology use across the U.S.

In education it’s easy to get data from one school, district, or even state. But obtaining national data, encompassing most of the teachers in the U.S., is no easy feat, and breaking that data into technology use is even rarer. However, that’s exactly what the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) accomplished.

The data compiled by the NCES is one of the most comprehensive breakdowns of how teachers use technology in classrooms, from professional development to its use in parent and student communication. It also details the availability of the technology, and whether or not teachers make use of it.

What’s interesting to note, is that technology availability and use don’t differ as dramatically across geographically, and perhaps socio-economically, diverse schools and districts as many may think—perhaps computers really are ubiquitous these days.

There is one catch, however: The data, which is the most current in terms ofscope, is from 2009. Interestingly enough, this snapshot of a few years ago leads to some interesting thoughts, such as:

Would incorporating the use of social media for learning in the classroom be as low today as it was in 2009?

Do teachers still use eMail as the main form of communication to contact parents?

Would the most used software in 2009 (gradebooks) be the most used today?

If data was collected on the scope and depth of technology used by teachers today, would computers still be the only device measured, or would tablets and smartphones also be included?

Supposedly, the NCES will have teacher technology use data available soon from the 2013 survey. Be sure to check back, as surely this data will have some interesting results of its own!

Infographic looks best in either Chrome or Firefox. For a closer look, click on the URL: https://magic.piktochart.com/output/1862395-teachertech

Reference in the infographic is hyperlinked to its original source for more information.