Develop the Cohort's Plan for Innovation
The Innovation Cohorts represent the heart of the Learning Generation model and are the means to design and implement creative uses of technology in teacher education. Ideal cohorts include teacher education and liberal arts faculty, pre-service student(s), practicing teachers and K-12 students. While this is the ideal structure, cohorts have been formed with various permutations.
Cohort development evolves through seven steps: 1) genesis, 2) consultation, 3) planning, 4) initiation, 5) action, 6) assessment and 7) celebration. For further description of these steps see the Steps in Forming and Innovation Cohort. This section focuses on Step 3 Develop a Plan that articulates the cohort's vision, membership, goals support needs, timeline, deliverables and evaluation strategies.
Outline for the Innovation Cohort's Plan
Title: Describes the proposed innovation
Brief Abstract: One paragraph suitable for the website expressing cohort vision, purpose, plans.
Purpose/Vision/Need: A two-three paragraph expression of the reason this cohort should be formed: What is the primary area of interest? What issue will be addressed? Why are these issues important?
Members: Name members of the cohort who have already begun to work together, or identify the "types" of people who will be recruited for the cohort and their roles.
Scope of Work: Explain the types of activities, meetings, etc. that the cohort will engage in.
Deliverables: Listing the products that the cohort agrees to create for sharing. These will vary in size, complexity and nature. The first step should be the production of a white paper that expresses the group's about sense of he issues (see examples of possible products below).
Timeline: List proposed start and end date. Create benchmarks or milestones toward the completion of the plan and the deliverables for those dates. Please include approximate dates for meetings including progress review meetings.
Resources: This section provides a list and justification for resources that the cohort would need to achieve its goals. Please indicate the new resources that you are requesting and what sources might be leveraged to obtain the resources.
Impact and Sustainability: A discussion of how the cohorts work and products would continue to make an impact on the Teacher Education program beyond the formal life of the cohort. Explain the initiatives that might be adopted or how the initiative could continue.
Evaluation: Explain how the cohort's products, project, and processes would be evaluated including the process and products.
Examples of possible cohort deliverables
A cohort might choose to undertake the development of a technology "product" or a "process" that the faculty member will use in his/her current classes. This might be a way for a faculty member who wants to better use/model technology in his/her classes to get some very directed assistance in the learning of technology and the development of teaching aides or materials. These would be sharable. One could imagine SOE faculty working with CLAS faculty to co-produce such learning objects for use in both faculty member's classes.
Integration activities that the cohort could assist the faculty member in creating that would change the way the students in the faculty member's classes are encouraged/expected to use technology in the engagement of learning in that class. This would include changes to syllabi, descriptions of assignments, lesson plans, and in best cases examples of expected/anticipated student outcomes. All of these would be sharable. Examples: students engage in creating a website explaining all of the historical references in the Billy Joel song, "We Didn't Start the Fire. Students might be engaged in creating a web-based portfolio. Students could create a series of PowerPoint presentations that teach something. Students might use HyperStudio to demonstrate mastery of a concept/process/task. Students could set up an example class website that they might use in their teaching. Students might be engaged each semester in helping to add to a list of children's literature titles and reviews. Students creating a website "debating" a topic of educational interest/concern. Students creating a website to be updated each semester that provides links to web resources that would teach content could be organized around standards in a content area, or even Hirsch's Cultural Literacy work. Students could create an online poetry site/contest/journal. The possibilities are endless.
Research based project that the faculty member would design to specifically attempt to learn about some aspect of the use of technology in teacher education. For example up very good online course supports and measuring student satisfaction with them in other words do effective online supports make students do better in a class or at least have a better experience. Or, perhaps a faculty member might like to study the use of technology in K-12 schools in a content area survey the bookmarks or history of actual classroom computers or proxy server logs to find out what sites are really used in a school. The research would be sharable, resulting in publication and/or conference presentations.
Service projects which have the cohort creating a resource that is designed in cooperation with a K-12 teacher and intended to be used in the K-12 classroom. In the best of worlds this type of cohort would also produce research about the use of the resource. These could be TrackStar tracks for use in certain content areas. Moving up a notch the cohort could produce a site that would be targeted a providing information in a content area that schools want/need but that are not available on the web. Part of this process might include extensive web searches, creation of a sharable index of good sites in the area and then the production of a website that fills a content void. An example in math might be links to biographies of great women mathematicians and the production of biographies for notable mathematicians for whom no web based information seems available. Other examples that get more ambitious would be units of study that are web based like the KSGOV site or even online learning modules aimed at home school environments or enrichment activities.
Academic projects like the start up of an online journal or the taking over of an online index in a content area. The creation of an online textbook for use in teacher preparation programs, production of online modules for use in teacher preparation programs, or the production of specific learning objects of use to people wanting to create an online classes. All of these would be shareable and significant. A cohort might do work to create a position paper on how the KU teacher education program might be modified to bring it in closer alignment with emerging standards or needs.
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