Technology for Learning

photo credit: in da mood

Another leg of my journey to developing a K-12 Parent Portal is completed. The first compilation of “What would you do in a K-12 Parent Portal?” is now posted on the Parent 2.0 wiki. It is a work in progress, as I continue to receive feedback from the blog postings at Technology for Learning and at other forums where I have posted links and received comments (Cafemom and the Canadian Parents Forum).

You can also read about some existing parent portals in the Parent 2.0 wiki. These examples from Florida, Idaho, and Alberta contain both public and secure spaces for parents. Links are posted to the sites and in some cases videos about the sites. What is striking is the similarity of the core content of each of these sites – marks, attendance, homework – and also what appears lacking – a parent-directed and owned component. In several forums I have heard that parents want to create an online community. Whether school portals are not the place or whether parents have not forged this direction, such an online community was not present in these samples.

This work is in preparation for creating an Implementation Guide that could help any school district interested in creating an online Parent Portal. The objective was to discover what would be useful in a Parent Portal, as well as what are the pre-conditions for a successful implementation. Using technology by itself will not improve the relationship between parents and schools, but if schools are embarking on a path to engage parents then using technology appropriately can help. The history of implementing computer systems that simply automated bad business processes is a lesson for implementing portals as well.

So in addition to identifying what the stakeholders would look for in a portal, there are other elements that have been identified through requirements collection and reviewing other sites:

1. Schools (principals and teachers) must be prepared to participate by keeping information current and informative.
2. A mechanism must be in place that makes it both simple and secure for parents to access only their child’s information. Sensitive information must not be available to other parents or the general public.
3. Building a portal is not a once and done activity. Giving the players an opportunity to try out the space and provide ongoing feedback and direction will contribute to its success.
4. Issues of ownership must be defined. That is, who will control the content and use of the portal environment? Will the portal be considered as a single environment for this decision, or will different groups (parents, schools, trustees) own different components of the environment?

This investigation has been enlightening, but as in all things that incorporate human behaviour a new series of questions is raised. Please join me in this journey to promote technology-supported parent engagement in K-12 learning.