technology and strategic planning.
Some metro students are turning to technology for help with their writing in much the way directionally challenged motorists are relying on GPS.Like the driver who is alerted that he’s missed his turn,burberry outlet online, the student gets immediate feedback on his latest essay with the click of a button. There’s no more waiting for the teacher to wade through and score essays from the entire class.Educators don’t expect — or want — the computer program WriteToLearn to replace the teacher, the way that GPS has eliminated the need for that longtime glove compartment fixture,hermes birkin, the road map.But with increased pressure to churn out better writers, some schools are using the computer program that could be considered spell check on steroids. Not only does it detect misspelled words and bad grammar, it looks line-by-line at students’ writing for everything from organization to reading comprehension and flags potential problems.“Providing this as a tool — and nothing more than a tool — gives teachers the time for conferencing, guiding the students and answering questions, rather than spending their time scoring papers,” said Kay S,Gucci. Elder, director of assessments for Gwinnett County Public Schools, the state’s largest school district.Ten Gwinnett County schools had the WriteToLearn software in classes last year,soccer cleats. After largely positive feedback,Beats by dre, the district is spending about $653,000 this year to have it at 57 elementary, middle and high schools, including Osborne Middle in Hoschton.It’s not brand new. Nearby Cherokee County began using the program from education publishing and software giant Pearson at a few schools four years ago.The district now makes the program available to any fourth and fifth grade teachers upon request, and so far 20 of the county’s elementary schools have requested licenses for the current academic year.“Based on this increased demand,http://truereligionjeansoutletstore.webs.com/, it appears that teachers find it to be of value,” said Bobby Blount, Cherokee’s assistant superintendent of accountability, technology and strategic planning.At Osborne, a school lauded for its writing test scores, principal John Campbell, said he sees “a place” for WriteToLearn.“But I also have some concerns,” Campbell said.The program provides students “immediate feedback on some of the low-level aspects of writing” and enables them to move quickly “to the next phase of their writing,” he said.“The concern that I would have is somebody might think it is sufficient to replace the teacher, and it is not,” he said. “It is a program,Gucci Outlet.”Michael McIntyre, a seventh grade language arts teacher at Osborne, said one of the key benefits of WriteToLearn is that it compels students to revise their work multiple times.“Revision, for a writer, is like halftime for a football team,” McIntyre said. “It’s a time to see what is working and what is not working – what makes sense and what doesn’t make sense. To this end: WTL is a very useful tool for teachers.”In McIntyre’s class, seventh graders Emily Mitchell and Skylar Gibson log into the program, enter their writing assignments and click “submit.” Within seconds, a score flashes on their computer screens, telling them how they did in content, style of writing, grammar and spelling. The software also points out their mistakes and explains how they might be corrected.While they’re thinking through what changes they want to make, McIntyre is walking around the room and looking over shoulders.“The big thing it [the computer program] is looking for is clarity,” McIntyre tells one student. “Are you expressing yourself clearly? Are you repeating yourself?”As after making changes, Emily refreshes the screen and sees that the computer is reporting fewer mistakes.“I like it. It showed me I could fix the errors,” she said.Diane Shepherd, an Osborne eighth grader, said she believes she’s doing better this year in language arts class, in part, because she was part of the school’s WriteToLearn pilot last year.“It taught me good sentence structure, and that was one of my big problems,” she said.
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