Substitution
The device stands in for something analog. The task itself does not change.
In our classrooms
A vocabulary quiz in Microsoft Forms instead of on a worksheet. Same words, same questions, faster to grade.
A lens for planning
Ask what the device is actually doing for the learning.
SAMR names four ways technology can show up in a lesson. It exists so you can make that choice on purpose, not so every lesson climbs to the top.
The model
Four levels, one question
Every level answers the same question. What can students do now that they could not do before, and does it matter for this lesson?
Augmentation
Still the same task, but the tool adds a real functional gain the paper version could not offer.
In our classrooms
That same Form scores itself, so a student sees which items they missed before they leave the room.
Modification
The task gets redesigned. What students are asked to do changes because the tool makes different work possible.
In our classrooms
Students build the practice set themselves in Wayground, then revise their questions after seeing where classmates got stuck.
Redefinition
The task could not have existed without the tool. New audience, new format, or new collaborators.
In our classrooms
Students publish a study guide other classes actually use, then revise it from the questions those readers send back.
Enhancement
S and A. The task holds still and the tool improves how it gets done.
Transformation
M and R. The task changes shape around what the tool makes possible.
Color marks where that line falls, not a ranking. All four levels are legitimate places for a lesson to sit.
The part worth attention
The line between A and M
The first two levels and the last two do different work, and the gap between Augmentation and Modification is where that difference shows up.
Below the line, the assignment would still be recognizable to a teacher from 1985. Students write the essay, take the quiz, label the diagram. The device makes that work faster, cleaner, or easier to give feedback on. Those are real gains and they are worth having.
Above the line, the assignment itself is different. Students are doing something the paper version could not ask of them: working on one artifact at the same time, running a model through twenty variations, sending work to readers outside the building. Remove the device and the task does not shrink. It stops existing.
A quick test when you are unsure. Describe your lesson without naming any app. If the description still makes sense, you are probably below the line. If it stops making sense, you are above it.
The point of all this
Higher is not the goal
SAMR gets drawn as a staircase, and staircases suggest climbing. That reading turns the model into a scoreboard, which is the fastest way to make it useless.
A five minute retrieval check should be a Substitution. It needs to be quick, low stakes, and over. Rebuilding it as a collaborative multimedia project would burn twenty minutes of instruction to reach a level on a chart. The level is not the goal. The learning is the goal, and the level just describes how you got there.
What the model catches is the other failure: a lesson that uses a device out of habit, where the honest answer to "what is this doing for us" is "nothing yet." That lesson is not wrong to sit at Substitution. It is wrong to sit there by accident.
Three questions before you plan around a device
-
What is the learning goal, stated without any tool in it?
If you cannot write the goal without naming an app, the tool has become the assignment.
-
What does the tool do here that paper could not?
Speed and legibility are honest answers. So is "nothing, and that is fine, this is a warm-up." An answer you cannot give at all is the signal to stop.
-
Is that gain worth the setup time?
Count the minutes of logging in, distributing, and troubleshooting against what you get back. Sometimes the paper version wins, and choosing it is good teaching.
A worked example, grades K through 8
One weather unit, four levels
The same fifth grade science task, written four ways on an iPad. Watch what happens to the assignment as it moves.
-
Substitution
Students record the week's temperature and cloud cover in a Word document instead of a printed chart. Same columns, same seven days.
Word -
Augmentation
They enter the readings in Excel, which charts the week automatically. Students see the trend without spending the period drawing axes by hand.
Excel -
Modification
Every group logs into one shared workbook, so the class holds three weeks of pooled data. Students compare their site to the others, argue about the outliers, and write a claim they have to defend with a column of numbers they did not collect themselves.
Excel in TeamsOneNote -
Redefinition
Students trade weekly data with a class in a different climate, then build a short Clipchamp explainer for that class showing what the two sets of numbers say about where each school sits. The other class sends questions back, and the video gets a second cut.
TeamsClipchampCanva
The first two are the same assignment with better handwriting. The third changes what students reason about. The fourth gives the work a reader who is not the teacher, and that reader changes how students write.
A worked example, grades 9 through 12
One source analysis, four levels
A high school history task on a MacBook Neo.
-
Substitution
Students read two primary sources as PDFs and type their comparison in Word rather than writing it out. Same prompt, same rubric, same page.
Word -
Augmentation
They annotate both sources in OneNote, tagging claims and evidence by color, and use version history to show how the argument changed between drafts.
OneNote -
Modification
The class builds one shared evidence table in a Teams channel, where each student owns a source and has to reconcile their reading with whoever tagged the same passage differently. The disagreement is the assignment.
TeamsExcelOneNote -
Redefinition
Students publish an annotated edition of a local archive document, sourcing notes attached, and offer it to the historical society that holds the original. Real users find the errors, and students fix them.
CanvaWordTeams
Both ladders end somewhere ambitious, and neither one says to run the last version every unit. Running it once a year, on purpose, is the realistic target.
What you have to work with
Devices and software in this district
Suggestions on this site stay inside this list, so nothing here asks you to request an app we do not have.
Devices
- iPads in grades K through 8
- MacBook Neos in grades 9 through 12
- Staff MacBooks
- Managed with Mosyle
Microsoft 365
- Word, Excel, PowerPoint
- OneNote and Class Notebook
- Teams and Forms
- Clipchamp, Sway, Whiteboard
Apple
- Keynote, Pages, Numbers
- GarageBand and Clips
- iMovie and Freeform
- Swift Playgrounds
Also available
- Canva for Education
- Edpuzzle
- Wayground
- Minecraft Education
A fair caveat
Where SAMR falls short
The model is useful and it is also incomplete. Three limits worth knowing before you lean on it.
The shape implies a ranking. Four levels drawn in a row read as a climb whether or not anyone intended that. In practice the level should follow the learning goal, and sometimes the goal calls for the bottom rung.
It says nothing about the teaching. A Redefinition project can rest on a weak prompt and a vague rubric. A Substitution warm-up can be part of an excellent period. SAMR describes the technology move, not the quality of instruction around it.
The levels blur. Two thoughtful teachers will place the same activity differently, especially around the A and M boundary. Treat any label, including the one this site gives you, as the start of a conversation rather than a verdict.
Other frameworks fill some of these gaps. TPACK looks at how technology, pedagogy, and content knowledge overlap. The Triple E Framework asks whether the tool helps students engage with, enhance, and extend the learning goal.
The SAMR model was developed by Dr. Ruben Puentedura.
Try it on a lesson you already teach
Describe an activity in your own words and get a level, an honest read on why it landed there, and one specific move toward each level above it. Or browse the example library first.