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Wagner's Critique of TechLearning.com

Written for EDUC-8813 Management of Technology for Educaiton...

1. Brief description of site.

Most of you have probably encountered this site before, but as it is the top result when I Google Educational Technology Leadership and because it is the self described "Resource for Education Technology Leaders" I thought I would spend the time to write about it and share it here.

There are sections of the site dedicated to Teachers, Technology Coordinators, and Administrators, so each of us aught to be able to find relevant information. Links to these sections span the top of the page. The left hand column contains additional links to T&L Magazine (Technology and Learning Magazine, with which I also suspect many of you are familiar), Educator's Outlook (a related publication from the looks of it, though I had not previously spent time investigating it), Digital Media (including a bit on "The Art of Digital Story Telling"), School CIO (a newsletter for K-12 technology leaders), Resources (with many links), and T&L events (which are mostly online). Because we are all writing so much about educational technology as a part of our work at Walden, it is also worth noting that there are multiple opportunities to contribute to the site and to the publications. ;)

2. One specific example of what the site offers

Under the Technology Coordinator section of the site, the top link is an article titled "13 Tech Support Strategies", which are categorized into three sections: (1.) Standardize, (2.) Centralize, and (3.) Document. The article concludes with links to other sources of tech support advice.

3. Why I find the site useful

I now apply very strict rules of paper management in my office and my home. I keep nothing that I can access online. So the most valuable aspect of this site is the availability of Technology & Learning Magazine and the other publications, including archives of past editions. All of the articles are searchable and cut-and-paste-able, making them more valuable to me than the print version. For instance, using the search function on the main page, I was able to quickly locate all of the resources related to blogs listed at the URL below. This represents the equivalent of a garage full of back issues, and hours of time free to flip through them.

http://www.techlearning.com/search/resultsw.jhtml?queryText=blog

I hope this has been a useful introduction (or re-introduction) to techlearning.com ... and I am glad to be posting again after a bit of an absence due to a conference, a heavy workload at the OCDE Ed Tech Dept. ... and the birth of my first nephew!

-Mark