Haiku

I was invited to attend a district meeting last week with a handful of teachers who teach high school courses online. At first I was excited to see teachers who have taken on the task of online learning as novices, but it disappointed me that more teachers haven't taken advantage of the new online network to help improve their teaching experience. The meeting mostly discussed how to use the district's newly acquired online learning management system, Haiku. Similar to Blackboard, Haiku is catered to the needs of a K-12 education. It's easy to use for both students and teachers in that information about a teacher's classes can be accessed from one platform. Teachers can embed lectures, Power Point presentations, videos with options for students to literally voice their comments (VoiceThread), photos, and post discussions and Google docs. They can embed the web, including lectures from AcademicEarth.org, videos from SchoolTube.com, and photos from flickr. Teachers have access to a plethora of options on Haiku, but how can it kick off if not enough teachers know how to use it? Haiku needs to be implemented consistently throughout the school's staff so that all students can go to one platform to access information for all their classes instead of having to flip-flop from individual teacher web sites to student portals. But how do you get them tuned in on the wave of online learning, especially tenure teachers who are too stuck in their ways? It seems as though the district has initiated the first step in transitioning teachers to online learning, but they've failed in executing the plan so that all teachers can become users. There needs to be more teachers who are willing to understand and implement Internet and technology to improve their curriculums. Teachers need to get on board, have no fear and learn to use evolving online learning systems and tools before it's too late.