Area AEA professional finds new technologies exciting

(Photo by Kris Todd) Karen Appleton, an instructional media and technology consultant with Prairie Lakes AEA, is the 2008 recipient of the Herb Braselman Award. [Order this photo]

The Herb Braselman Award, named for the late first president of the National Association of Media and Technology Centers (NAMTC) organization, is presented in recognition of exemplary service and leadership for regional media centers and for outstanding contributions to the field of educational media and technology.

Karen Appleton, an instructional media and technology consultant at Prairie Lakes AEA who served as a language arts and vocal music teacher at a school district prior to her last 20 years' work in the AEA, marks the 15th recipient of this award. She's also the first from Iowa to be named.

She was introduced to the NAMTC by a former boss. The unique group includes education professionals and vendors, distributors and producers of educational media. In the end, the NAMTC connects sources of tools -- ranging from 16-mm film to digital networking equipment -- with their end users.

Appleton has served as the association's publications chairperson and was elected as its treasurer seven years ago.

Presented with the Herb Braselman Award at the annual NAMTC leadership summit, the following was said of Appleton: "As an officer and executive board member, Karen's opinions, values and readiness to lead behind the scenes have made her a valuable member of our organization. ... Karen is a true contributor to our media and technology profession. She has been able to represent the school teacher-librarian and media specialist. Her straight-forward approach to the integration of media and technology into the curriculum is based on the needs of the classroom teacher and students. Karen is well-respected by her peers and colleagues in our educational media arena, and represents a sense of quality and classic good judgment. Colleagues often comment on her unending patience and listening skills. She continues to demonstrate a sound understanding of the latest technology -- but not for the sake of technology, but for the impact it will have for student improvement. She continues to develop new skills and demonstrates those skills in support for emerging technologies in the schools."

Karen Appleton can trace a long evolution of media and technology advancements within Iowa's schools.

The instructional media and technology consultant at Prairie Lakes AEA can remember when "educational television" was the new thing. The black-and-white box placed in front of a classroom allowed a "talking head" to conduct experiments and activities for students to witness.

This was a newfangled invention when Appleton attended school as a young girl. It marked a time, she recalled, when schools didn't having the resources or ability to bring hands-on things into the classrooms.

But over the years, educational television has made way for advancements -- such as computer labs with simulation software and access to the Internet -- designed to better meet students' evolving needs and learning styles.

"In times such as this, when we look at how public funds are being used and spent, I want to emphasize that as a staff at the AEA, our primary (focus) is making sure we're doing the best for kids -- no matter where they live or what kind of home they come from," Appleton said. "When they walk into a local school, we want to make sure they have the best opportunities possible to learn, to become personally productive and to be responsible citizens. ... And our primary concern is making sure that we're supporting the schools who are supporting our kids."

During her 20 years employed in Iowa's AEA system, Appleton has worked for the former AEA 4 in Sioux Center, the former Western Hills AEA and, for the last four years, Prairie Lakes AEA. Even though she's carried different titles -- including media consultant, instructional media coordinator and technology specialist -- her role has been much the same: To serve schools focusing on the use of media and technology resources, and instructional technology.

In her current role as the instructional media and technology consultant for Prairie Lakes AEA, Appleton serves 27 school districts in Buena Vista, Clay, Dickinson, Emmet, Kossuth, Palo Alto and Sac counties. Dorothy DeGroot, her counterpart officed in the Pocahontas headquarters, serves 21 school districts in seven counties.

Those walking into her office, which is based in the Spencer school district's central office building, will find Appleton's room filled with a myriad of magazines and resource materials, along with a desk hosting two computers and a TV monitor connected to a video-conferencing unit known as a polycom. Connected to the Internet, the polycom is a successor to the "very fixed and mature" Iowa Communications Network (ICN) system, initiated in Iowa classrooms in 1994.

Appleton, who has been on the frontier of both, not only understands the use of technologies in the classroom, she readily models their use for everyday tasks.

The AEA consultant also finds herself weighing how new technological advancements could be best used, as well as how school districts and their students could benefit most from their implementations. Recent examples include a handful of districts' one-to-one computer initiatives and one area district's work to establish a network in which students can access the Internet with their own computers.

Appleton indicated she's also fielding questions about interactive white boards, which Spencer has unveiled in its classrooms.

"One of the questions I asked them (Graettinger/Terill) was: What are you willing to give up in your classroom? Because you can't keep adding on. Truly, it's not possible to be juggling all of the old stuff and adding in the new stuff. Something has to go away.

"Even though textbooks are not going to go away," she continued, "we have to balance our resources and our recommendations to include both the digital and the more-traditional print resources and access."

When asked to predict the next emerging trend in school technology, Appleton answered, "I think the greatest emergence will be looking not so much at any specific tool as it will be looking at how we have tooled ourselves to operate. ... There are people who are starting to say things like schools have to be looked at and used differently than they have been. And, we need to start looking at our buildings and how they're set up and how we staff (them) and how groups move through them differently."

As an example, she referred to an expert in the field of library science who recently stated he foresees school libraries becoming "learning commons" areas, with surrounding pods that teachers and resources alike would be located and available to students.

"Our kids are different. Their brains are organizing themselves differently. So what is emerging," Appleton said, "is that we need to restructure our approach to what we call school. Because the 25 kids sitting in desks with the teacher in front of the classroom is not going to deliver what we need."