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So here are some tips and examples I’ve gathered from my classroom and my work as a one-day-a-week tech coach at my school to help teachers better understand and negotiate the digital push in schools. Give Yourself the Time to Learn

After asking good questions and doing some reconnaissance on tools and apps that your colleagues love, choose a few. Let yourself dabble with the tools. Become comfortable with their interfaces, and give yourself time to understand their purpose and fit (or lack thereof) for your classroom habits and curriculum. At the same time, allow yourself time to say "no" to other flashy new gadgets and tools while you are exploring.

Tips for Tech-Cautious Teachers

The design-thinking philosophy requires the designer to put his or her ego to the side and seek to meet the unmet needs, both rational and emotional, of the user,

Once the student designers have gathered all their research together, they must organize and make sense of it all

Finally, design thinking requires designers to generate ideas—lots of ideas—and prototype them

Social networking tools play a powerful role in building teacher learning networks, but educators still yearn for the chance to gather face to face to polish their craft.

Collaboration is the real step to education transformation. When we gather to produce, our ideas, talents, and skills embody our final outcome.

Solving highly complex problems requires that students have both fundamental skills (reading, writing, and math) and Digital Age skills (teamwork, problem solving, research gathering, time management, information synthesizing, utilizing high-tech tools). With this combination of skills students become directors and managers of their learning process, guided and mentored by a skilled teacher.