Do More, Do Better, Do New
As you rethink the boundaries of the traditional classroom and lean on technology in brand new ways, the VATT Framework can help you harness the power and promise of technology in instruction to ignite new potential.
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Value Add of Technology on Teaching (VATT)
Despite unmatched levels of edtech use and the growing investment in the development of new tools, there is much more to understand about maximizing the impact of technology on teacher practice and student learning.
That’s why we developed the Value Add of Technology on Teaching (VATT) framework, a reflection and planning guide to help you evaluate the value an edtech tool or platform provides in various areas of practice.
“We heard from teachers that a lot of the focus in the edtech arena was on all the amazing features of technological tools, not necessarily their needs or responsibilities. Chief among the needs was capacity. It already felt like an impossible job and adding tech without explicit connections to teachers’ core work was not going to help.”
Albert Kim, Managing Director of Innovation
The Need
Edtech is everywhere. But how do you know if it’s making a difference?
With growing investment in edtech products and platforms, there’s a growing need to think critically about how these tools integrate with and enhance effective instruction.
8000+ verified tools
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1,400+ tools per month
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140+ individual tools per year
used by teachers and students
About the Framework
Technology Value Adds
The VATT highlights three Technology Value Adds, representing research-backed ways technology can positively impact teacher practice. The Technology Value Adds are distinct, interrelated, and contextual based on school and classroom conditions, contexts, and educators themselves.
- Do More: Increase access to necessary instructional and skill-building resources as well as time-saving practices
- Do Better: Strengthen impact on student thinking and engagement, quality of instructional strategies, and responsiveness to individual needs
- Do New: Push the boundaries of the status quo and invite creativity and innovation into practice
Areas of Impact
The rubric is divided into three Areas of Impact that reflect the primary responsibilities of educators across various contexts, including but not limited to content area, grade level, and geography.
The Areas of Impact are:
- Teaching & Learning
- Classroom Community & Culture
- Practice & Growth
The Areas of Impact align with common instructional and teacher evaluation frameworks as well as broad categories of education technology products and/or tech use cases within the marketplace.
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Related News & Stories
Learn how the VATT is helping school systems make more intentional choices about where to focus their technology efforts.
“The VATT framework has been our foundational document to get really, really clear on how to stand up and revise the process to narrow [our use of technology]. The framework does a good job of thinking through the different constituents and the different questions for each constituent to ensure that you're not just narrowing to narrow, but you're being intentional, and you're really thinking about the instructional core as the driver of this work.”
Dr. Simone Wright, CAO at Denver Public Schools
Beyond VATT: School Teams AI Collaborative
Since the VATT was released in April 2023, technology has continued to advance rapidly. Now, school systems are grappling with how to best leverage new generative AI tools and capabilities. Therein comes the School Teams AI Collaborative, a first-of-its-kind national initiative from Leading Educators and The Learning Accelerator to put real educators in the driver’s seat of identifying, refining, and spreading promising practices for using AI to advance excellent instruction.
About Leading Educators
For more than a decade, Leading Educators has helped passionate educators meet students’ big dreams with teaching that prepares them for the future they deserve. We specialize in building systems, habits, and capacity for continuous adult learning focused on creating more predictable access to excellent teaching.
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