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Currently I am filling in for the LD teacher at my school, so integrating technology into the classroom is sometimes difficult, but often interesting. I think that students with special needs usually appreciate the change of pace a bit more than traditional students, and are inspired to demonstrate that they, too, are technologically savvy. We have three desktops in our room, which seems like an inadequate amount, but in our small group setting it works. Most of what I have had students do involves simple fact-checking related to class discussions/assignments- although most of them are quite adept at related tasks, sometimes the temptations of games and surfing are too strong. Because they require such a high degree of individual support, and because I have but 2-3 periods per day with most of them, much of our tech use is contingent upon what their other teachers have assigned them.

I'm sure many teachers can echo the sentiment that a limited district budget prevents our system from truly taking advantage of all that technology can offer us, but I believe my school does a really good job of providing professional development opportunities related to tech-learning. Teachers have various workshop opportunities, and many inservices are directly related to further development of relevant skills. One area I would like to see us improve upon is in assessment. We have a brand new school with many modern benefits (increased # of computers, labs, etc.), but we might lack a universal focus of what we should do with all of it. I would be interested to know what the rate of use is in this school compared to the last, which had very limited capabilities. Obviously you can't really tell teachers to use the media center ten times a semester or else, and I think many of the faculty are somewhat reluctant to alter past practices, which is understandable. The average age of our faculty is relatively high, and old habits die hard, I guess.