JOURNAL ARTICLE REVIEW TEMPLATE

North American University

Education Department
M.Ed. in Educational Leadership / M.Ed. in Curriculum and Instruction
EDUC 5324 Integrating Technology into Education
Name :Zekeriya Yaman

Date:6/7/2016

Cite the reviewed article in APA format:

Dogan, B., & Almus, K. (2014). School Administrators Use of iPads: Impact of Training
and Attitudes Toward School Use. Computers in the Schools, 31(3), 233250.
doi:10.1080/07380569.2014.932660
INTRODUCTION
Research Questions (if research questions are not specifically mentioned, what is
the theoretical background or overarching theme):

1. What is the impact of the training process on school administrators use

of iPads for administrative tasks and personal organization in their professional
duties?
2. What is the impact of the training process on school administrators beliefs
regarding how teachers should use iPads in the classroom?
3. Are there any differences in school administrators survey responses based
on gender, age, years of experience in school administration and education,
highest degree attained, school classification, or school size?
Purpose of the research:

The purpose of this study is investigating the IPAD usage of school administrators and
the applications of IPAD in education before and after an IPAD training
METHODOLOGY
What is the methodology for the research or approach used to understand the
issue? Provide information regarding the following:

Participants: Elementary and secondary school administrators (i.e., principals and

assistant principals) working in one of the largest public charter school systems in a
southwestern state were the target population for the study.
Procedures: Study components included a pre-survey, a training session on the
effective use of iPads for administrative tasks and personal organization, specially
designed resources expanding the topics covered in the training session, on-going
support, and a post-survey.
The study was conducted February through May 2013. As researchers, we developed two

survey instruments as a mechanism to collect data, which were administered online

through the survey submission system hosted at the universitys server. The pre-survey
was administered at the beginning of the spring 2013 semester and the post survey was
given at the end of the four-month study period.
The pre-survey also included questions measuring if and how school administrators were
currently using their iPads for their daily school-related tasks, their beliefs about the
effectiveness of iPads for administrative tasks, and if and how school teachers should be
using iPads in the classroom. Designed as a closure to the study, the post-survey
instrument included questions intended to measure self-reported improvements in certain
tasks after completing the training, as well as items regarding the evaluation of training
session and resources provided to school administrators during the Downloaded by
[76.31.198.76] at 18:17 03 November 2014 School Administrators Use of iPads 237
study. In addition, some of the questions of the pre-survey were repeated in the postsurvey to assess the change in responses during the study.
Training was designed based on feedback from participants and delivered through an
interactive webinar session. The training of school administrators included topics
intended to develop iPad skills and use certain workflow, note-taking, calendar,
productivity, file-sharing, remote-desktop, presentation, and screen-sharing applications
covered specifically from a principals perspective. Additional resources reinforcing the
topics covered in the initial training session were provided later to school administrators
in the form of video and written tutorials for their convenience. Technical support
regarding the training topics and study was available to participants on an ongoing basis.
Researchers provided technical support to school administrators via e-mail and telephone.
Data Collection Methods/Data Source:
Pre-survey, training session, ongoing support and post survey
Data Analysis:
Survey instruments included multiple choice and Likert-type scale items. The survey
responses were reported as frequencies. In addition, paired sample t-test data analysis was
conducted to understand the differences in the responses between the pre- and postsurveys. A one-way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) test was conducted to see whether
there were any differences in school administrators responses by gender, age, years of
experience in school administration and education, highest degree attained, school classification, and school size. Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) software was
used to conduct the data analysis.

RESULTS
Findings or Results (or main points of the article):

The data analysis of this study is categorized into five main groups: analysis of
demographic and contextual data; impacts of the training process on school
administrators use of iPad and iPad applications; impacts of the training process on
school administrators beliefs regarding how teachers should use iPads in the classroom;
differences in participants responses by their demographic and contextual data (gender,
age, years of experience in school administration and education, highest degree attained,
school classification, and school size); and evaluation of training process.
A descriptive analysis of the demographic and contextual data for the presurvey
participants was conducted. The average age of school administrators who participated
was 34.16 years. The average years of experience in education was 8.45, and the average
years of experience as a school administrator was 2.04. The average school size of
participants was calculated as 618.50. All participants in this study owned an iPad. While
27.45% of participants purchased their own iPads, the majority of the iPads (72.55%)
were given to school administrators by their school district. While all participants used
Microsoft Windows Vista, 7, or 8 as their computer platform, 52.94% used the iPhone
(iOS) as their mobile platform, followed by Android (37.25%), BlackBerry OS (1.96%),
and other (7.84%). The majority of participants schools were classified as elementary,
middle, and high school (K12) (62.75%), followed by elementary and middle school
(K8) (19.61%), middle and high school (612) (9.80%), and elementary (K5)
(7.84%). Participants were also asked in the pre-survey about the highest level of
education that they had attained. According to the results, 50.98% of school
administrators held a bachelors degree and 49.02% held a masters degree.
These results suggest that the overall training process in this study had a statistically
significant effect on participants beliefs about the effectiveness of iPads as a tool for
administrative tasks and personal organization.
School administrators were asked to report their opinions regarding how teachers should
be using iPads in the classroom. Virtually all participants in both the pre-survey (98.04%)
and the post-survey (97.30%) stated that they would like to see their teachers using iPads
for teaching in the classroom. When school administrators were asked whether they
thought that computers used in courses would be replaced by iPads in the future, 76.47%
of the participants in pre-survey and 86.49% in post-survey responded yes. The
analysis of a question asking how school administrators would like to see their teachers
using iPads in the classroom revealed that there were slight increases between the preand post-survey in the following responses: using iPad for class communication (e-mail,
messaging, contacting parents, etc.) (11.59% vs. 13.22%); making specific applications
(created by the teacher) that might help students (10.30% vs. 12.07%); using specific
applications (created by others) that might help students (15.88% vs. 16.67%); and
projecting/streaming lessons/presentation to the iPad (17.60% vs. 18.39%). Alternately,

there were slight decreases between pre- and postsurvey regarding the number of
responses selected for remaining items, such as, Requiring creative assignments
involving iPad use (18.88% vs. 16.67%), Referencing/sharing a specific content item
(picture, document, video, etc.) as an example (17.17% vs. 14.94%), and Encouraging
taking notes (8.15% vs. 8.05%).
Neither the one-way ANOVA nor the t test revealed significant differences for the item
asking school administrators to rate their beliefs about iPads being effective tools. The
same result occurred for the item measuring school administrators self-reported levels of
iPad skills and knowledge, with the exception of school classification. There was a
significant difference on the item measuring the self-reported level of iPad skills and
knowledge by the school classification, F(3,47) = 3.23, p = 0.03, 2 = 0.17
School administrators were further solicited to evaluate the training process that they
participated in during the study. A majority (81.08%) responded that they would like to
continue receiving training and resources on the use of iPads for administrative tasks and
teaching. Furthermore, 48.65% of participants found the training session and the
resources provided afterward very useful, followed by 43.24% finding them useful,
and 8.11% finding them somewhat useful.
DISCUSSIONS
Conclusions/Implications (for your profession):

According to results, school administrators believed that iPads were effective tools for
administrative tasks and personal organization. Additionally, administrators were even
more in agreement with this idea after completing the training process. Overall, there
were increases in the frequency of school administrators use of the iPad for
administrative tasks and personal organization in all measured areas. Specifically, the
increases in task delegation, organization, calendar, document sharing,
researching through Internet, and using specific applications for my work areas were
statistically significant. Overall, these results were in alignment with Winslow et al.
(2012) in which school principals also believed that iPads provided measurable
productivity gains in school administrator tasks. Almost all school administrators prior to
or after this study reported that they would like to see their teachers using iPads for
classroom teaching. Specifically, administrators wanted to see their teachers project and
stream lessons or presentations from their iPads, use specific iPad applications that may
help students, and use their iPads for class communication. In addition, school
administrators desired to see teachers using iPads in the aforementioned areas more after
completing the training process. The majority of school administrators believed that iPads
would be replacing computers in the future. This belief was more prevalent in school
administrators who completed the training process. These results suggest that school
administrators in this study had positive views regarding the potential of iPad current and
future use in the classroom by teachers. The encouraging position of principals regarding
iPad use may contribute to the successful implementation of iPads in the school, as
principals are the instructional and technology leaders of their schools (Dawson & Rakes,
2003; Lashway, 2002; McLeod, 2008).

REFLECTIONS
Students Reflections (changes to your understanding; implications for your
school/work):

This study shows that administrators, as an effective leader should be a role model by
increasing the use of technology. Because technology has changed the way educators
teach, how students learn, and the way teachers and students communicate. The IPAD
increases the level of administrators connectivity to their school staff and members in
their personal learning network. It is easy to carry everywhere, and IPAD makes easier to
access tools to manage the principals and the teachers day to day activities for
administrators and teachers. Widespread adaptation of technology has completely
changed how teachers teach and students learn. By integrating technology in the
classroom, we are setting our students up for a successful life outside of school. When
students are not in school, just about everything that they do is connected in some way to
technology. So educators, principals, and teachers should increase usage of technology
and help new generation how to use technology for effective and provide students with
the tools that will take them into the 21st century. As a result, as educators we need to
keep up with the times in order to best prepare our students for this ever-changing world
that we live in.