Jukes (committed sardine) says that we need a 25 week "digital diet" where we are trying something new once a week for 25 weeks. What could this look like for teachers at Clayton that teachers would actually agree to? We need a list of things that we should be doing or could be doing or should be exposed to with technology to match up to the 25 weeks with the goal of exposing those teachers to what kids know about and that (some of the kids) can do.
1. We need to catch up (through that 25 week digital diet)
2. Teach to the whole new mind (A Whole New Mind-check out the book)
we've changed from an industrial society to an information society - we need to stop the "left brained teaching" and understand the right side of the brain. Who's job is it to develop constructive thinking skills? What are the skills that kids need today? What do they need for a modern working world? There's more emphasis on creativity, problem solving, and higher level thinking.
3. Literacy isn't enough: we need to move beyond reading and writing and numeracy and move toward fluency. Reading has changed. Multimedia, blogs, wiki's have changed things and will continue to do that. We need to teach kids to be good and responsible producers of content as they are also a good con unconscience sumer of content. And that content comes in multiple forms in both cases, not just text. Fluency are skills where you unconsciencly know what you need to do next. Ex. Riding a bicycle is a fluency. What do our kids need to be fluent at? Technological fluency: with a pen, you are directly engaged with your brain and a piece of paper. You are not thinking about the pen. This helps kids be better communicators. The teaching of the tool is a byproduct to get to that level of communication. You don't say that you need a digital camera. You say that you need a photograph. Using the camera is a byproduct. Media Fluency: this is about being able to look critically at the content of a website a movie, a wiki, any other content, and understanding why this media is being used to communicate the message and understand how its being used to shape the thinking and evaluate how well it's being used. What is the most appropriate media to communicate the media that you need to effectively. Information Fluency: the ability to interpret information in all forms to extract the essential knowledge and determine its significance. a. Kids need to be able to ask good questions. b. kids need to have access the information form the most appropriate source. c. kids need to be able to analyze, authenticate the raw materials (we wouldn't give a kid the keys to a car before we taught them how to drive-can't do it with the internet. d. Kids need to be able to apply the data to a real world task or a simulation of that task and move it from vision into practice (reteach the content and apply that concept to a real life task or simulation of that task-allows kids to retain 90% of information) e. Kids need to be able to assess the product and the process.
4. Shift the instructional approach from lecture (more of the time) to become the facilitators of learning. Stop giving the students the end product of our thinking and let them come up with the end product of their thinking. We need to learn to "teach lazy" and progressively withdraw from students lives. ??How much do we withdraw by the end of fifth grade and what does that look like progressively?? When someone is learning to walk, we watch kids fall, help them up and encourage them to try again. ??Do we do that in schools??
Teaching for Tomorrow - Another book to check out
Follow his web at committedsardine.com and go to ianjukes.com
discount code ug8ju6mz www.understandingthedigitalgeneration.com I think the discount is taken at amazon?!?
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
Alan November Teleconference at CSD
Well, here is the second posting dealing with Alan November, so I'm looking forward to seeing how this presentation differs from the last. As a fan of his book, Web Literacy for Educators, I'm always eager to see what Alan has to say about technology in the schools and how students and teachers use it. Maybe one day I'll actually make it to his conference.
Alan "Someone told me that only 15% of students are taking accurate notes at a given time in school."
If that's the case, then what if we doll out projects on note taking to several students through Google Docs?
1. Write down questions
2. write down stories
3. Write down all websites
4. Teacher has document up and checks periodically to see what's happening
Then publish the document as a webpage and link that web address to the classroom website. Or use tinyurl.com to make a managable address.
At a Captain setting, where does that happen with kids taking notes? How does computer location allow this or disallow it? Two other kids are researchers. Other kids are keeping up those global connections.
www.easywhois.com Shows you who owns a web site. Important for research. Another aspect that he's spoken about is how Google ranks pages. (look into this) and how that contrasts how students and teachers perceives Google to rank pages.
Alan has a call for students to be web literate. That becomes more important for research issues...gettting to information. If you can't do that, how can you understand that information, process it, synthesize it, solve problems, or use it in any other way if they can't get to the information?
archive.org site has the wayback machine to look back at it's past looks. When you find a dead page, go to the wayback machine and see if you can find it.
Every classroom should be a global communications center. Every teacher should work to get students to understand different perspectives. For example, in fifth grade, what is the British version of the "American Revolution"? How do we search for that? Search within .ac.uk for academic institutions within the the UK. (Do this search later: "American Revolution" "General Gage" site: ac.uk) Could I wrap this into a lesson on searching within the fifth grade curriculum.
"I would teach web literacy before I teach anyone how to use PPT." in relation to elementary settings. When should you start tearing apart the internet? (to understand the parts and pieces) His response: "When do you start to teach reading?" So we're talking about kindergarten here. "Knowing url etensions is like knowing the alphabet."
If kids are using facebook as soon as they get home, then that means that what they really want to do with technology is to talk to other people. Then they come to school the next day and we let them talk to no one. So students want to be collaborative, and to look at an earlier comment, they don't take good notes. Shouldn't every teacher, every day, have a team a scribes working in Google Docs. And you should go over the notes, as a teacher, to make sure notes are accurate. Ask students to
How do you globalize the curriculum? How do you connect students with others around the world?
Copyright Law: Newest ruling on copyright law with regard to schools (fair use) "If you create a new use of the content and it does not compete in the marketplace, then you can remix it. The original intent was to create a balance between society and users Check out this Blog Link in School Library Journal (great blog by the way...I follow it)
When anyone uses facebook, you give up your rights to all of that content. Check this out! Facebook is blocked, but we don't teach the dangers of Facebook. They could be doing damage to themselves personally & professionally and we're not doing anything about that. Filtering social networks is an incomplete solution at best and very harmful at worst.
Check out the Number the Stars Book Trailer on youtube. What if students create that? What would that do for motivation? Also, "every teacher should go into youtube and find information that relates to their subject matter. They should use that in meaningful ways in the classroom to see how that content can be utilized."
Look at Michael Wesch in youtube. No specific video's highlighted, but referred to with regard to students being producers of content. Warning! Scroll below the video and the commentary is not all nice. So the question is if kids put up content on youtube outside of the classroom, then how do they know how to deal with nasty comments when they do happen. Would we rather be talking with students on how to deal with these type of anonymous comments inside of the school instead of them dealing with it on their own?
Talking about Nings. Here's an example. Use it to create a community for student work.
We must teach kids web literacy. They have to be critical thinkers on the web. We have to globalize the curriculum. The role of the teacher should be to build community. Replicate what works on social networks wrapped around rigorous academic content. We should be taking advantage and leveraging content on the web instead of blocking it. Students should be doing curriculum research. What are the most difficult concepts? Send students out to find answers and solutions.
Last tidbit: Why homework should be done at school and schoolwork should be done at home: Video
Check out others' notes for the presentation at http://bit.ly/27S4oT
Alan "Someone told me that only 15% of students are taking accurate notes at a given time in school."
If that's the case, then what if we doll out projects on note taking to several students through Google Docs?
1. Write down questions
2. write down stories
3. Write down all websites
4. Teacher has document up and checks periodically to see what's happening
Then publish the document as a webpage and link that web address to the classroom website. Or use tinyurl.com to make a managable address.
At a Captain setting, where does that happen with kids taking notes? How does computer location allow this or disallow it? Two other kids are researchers. Other kids are keeping up those global connections.
www.easywhois.com Shows you who owns a web site. Important for research. Another aspect that he's spoken about is how Google ranks pages. (look into this) and how that contrasts how students and teachers perceives Google to rank pages.
Alan has a call for students to be web literate. That becomes more important for research issues...gettting to information. If you can't do that, how can you understand that information, process it, synthesize it, solve problems, or use it in any other way if they can't get to the information?
archive.org site has the wayback machine to look back at it's past looks. When you find a dead page, go to the wayback machine and see if you can find it.
Every classroom should be a global communications center. Every teacher should work to get students to understand different perspectives. For example, in fifth grade, what is the British version of the "American Revolution"? How do we search for that? Search within .ac.uk for academic institutions within the the UK. (Do this search later: "American Revolution" "General Gage" site: ac.uk) Could I wrap this into a lesson on searching within the fifth grade curriculum.
"I would teach web literacy before I teach anyone how to use PPT." in relation to elementary settings. When should you start tearing apart the internet? (to understand the parts and pieces) His response: "When do you start to teach reading?" So we're talking about kindergarten here. "Knowing url etensions is like knowing the alphabet."
If kids are using facebook as soon as they get home, then that means that what they really want to do with technology is to talk to other people. Then they come to school the next day and we let them talk to no one. So students want to be collaborative, and to look at an earlier comment, they don't take good notes. Shouldn't every teacher, every day, have a team a scribes working in Google Docs. And you should go over the notes, as a teacher, to make sure notes are accurate. Ask students to
How do you globalize the curriculum? How do you connect students with others around the world?
Copyright Law: Newest ruling on copyright law with regard to schools (fair use) "If you create a new use of the content and it does not compete in the marketplace, then you can remix it. The original intent was to create a balance between society and users Check out this Blog Link in School Library Journal (great blog by the way...I follow it)
When anyone uses facebook, you give up your rights to all of that content. Check this out! Facebook is blocked, but we don't teach the dangers of Facebook. They could be doing damage to themselves personally & professionally and we're not doing anything about that. Filtering social networks is an incomplete solution at best and very harmful at worst.
Check out the Number the Stars Book Trailer on youtube. What if students create that? What would that do for motivation? Also, "every teacher should go into youtube and find information that relates to their subject matter. They should use that in meaningful ways in the classroom to see how that content can be utilized."
Look at Michael Wesch in youtube. No specific video's highlighted, but referred to with regard to students being producers of content. Warning! Scroll below the video and the commentary is not all nice. So the question is if kids put up content on youtube outside of the classroom, then how do they know how to deal with nasty comments when they do happen. Would we rather be talking with students on how to deal with these type of anonymous comments inside of the school instead of them dealing with it on their own?
Talking about Nings. Here's an example. Use it to create a community for student work.
We must teach kids web literacy. They have to be critical thinkers on the web. We have to globalize the curriculum. The role of the teacher should be to build community. Replicate what works on social networks wrapped around rigorous academic content. We should be taking advantage and leveraging content on the web instead of blocking it. Students should be doing curriculum research. What are the most difficult concepts? Send students out to find answers and solutions.
Last tidbit: Why homework should be done at school and schoolwork should be done at home: Video
Check out others' notes for the presentation at http://bit.ly/27S4oT
Sunday, July 5, 2009
Final Post on NECC
Well, this will be my final post on my NECC 2009. I'm not going to cover content from the conference, although there was other great sessions out there and interesting news from vendors and ideas from poster sessions. Instead, I'm just going to share a quick reflection.
I thought this was a great way to share information from a conference. Too often, teachers in the last two districts I have worked at have gone to a conference, come back, and had no impact on any professional outside of their classroom. I think this is a shame. There is a lot of money spent on teachers attending these professional conferences. My trips always impact the professional development that I offer teachers as well as the equipment that I purchase for my primary building. But there should be a standard of sharing information and this seems like a reasonable way to do that. Most teachers take notes at conferences anyway. If this is the case, what is the difficulty of taking an extra 10-15 minute per post and adding links, commentary, and polishing up the writing? It actually seems like a great way for the teacher to revisit their notes anyway.
Also, there were a lot of other blogs out there, much better than my first attempt, that gave great resources from the conference and interesting perspectives from these individuals. While this was a technology based conference where blogging might be more prevalent, I would wager that all major conferences today have someone blogging about their experiences and perspectives.
I'll be sharing this blog with teachers at my district, suggesting it as a great way to share with others, and providing support, if requested, to set up a blog for their own sharing.
I thought this was a great way to share information from a conference. Too often, teachers in the last two districts I have worked at have gone to a conference, come back, and had no impact on any professional outside of their classroom. I think this is a shame. There is a lot of money spent on teachers attending these professional conferences. My trips always impact the professional development that I offer teachers as well as the equipment that I purchase for my primary building. But there should be a standard of sharing information and this seems like a reasonable way to do that. Most teachers take notes at conferences anyway. If this is the case, what is the difficulty of taking an extra 10-15 minute per post and adding links, commentary, and polishing up the writing? It actually seems like a great way for the teacher to revisit their notes anyway.
Also, there were a lot of other blogs out there, much better than my first attempt, that gave great resources from the conference and interesting perspectives from these individuals. While this was a technology based conference where blogging might be more prevalent, I would wager that all major conferences today have someone blogging about their experiences and perspectives.
I'll be sharing this blog with teachers at my district, suggesting it as a great way to share with others, and providing support, if requested, to set up a blog for their own sharing.
Friday, July 3, 2009
Here Comes Learning!
This presentation was by Will Richardson from Collective Learning (check out his blog) & Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach. It went in several different directions although the idea was to sell everyone on the idea of Virtual learning communities for teachers. I was trying to take down lots of commentary and ended up with a lot of short blurbs that aren't directly connected, but I'm going to leave this pretty much as is. There will be several areas that just read "check this out". I intend to do just that, but think it would be valuable for anyone to do the same, so I'm not going to go too in depth in this blog since I haven't gone to all of the links or articles mentioned below.
Making significant shifts in our classrooms takes significant shifts for us as learners (not teachers).
YouTube Video (help with bowdrill set)
See how this kid is showing his learning and then asking for comments/help from the viewers of the video – he shows what he knows, what he did, what he doesn’t know, what he failed with and how he knew he failed. And he asks for help and that is his primary purpose for doing this – to get feedback.
Notice that he didn’t say his name, show his face, or give indications of who he was. He’s using some sophisticated security measures.
How did he know he would get a response? How did the responders find him? How did he connect his needs to the experts who could provide him information?
Virtual learning community/virtual community of practice
Allows teachers to ask for help, to show “weakness” to someone outside of the face-to-face community within the district.
Here Comes Everybody by Clay Shirky (book to check out)
It’s what happens after we publish that becomes powerful, collective action. Raw data can be posted, examples can be given by others.
Example, presenter put up a tweet on twitter complaining about Orbitz. Shortly after he gets a call from customer service call from Orbitz completely based off of his tweet.
Online publishing allows for more complex ideas behind the learning of reading and writing.
Hundreds of people negociating to what the entry for the Michael Jackson would be on Wikipedia after his death. (and are probably still doing s0)
Cnet article: survey: teens ‘sext’ and post personal info - check out article (despite the article title, it says that teens are often MORE safe online than we would think)
Kids are using the technologies in way to socialize, and are connecting with adults outside of their physical spaces – sounds bad, but it is teachers that they can connect to – not actual teachers but to connect to people who will teach them.
“new study shows time spent online important for teen development” Macarthur article – check it out
Many students have no one that is showing them how to use these web 2.0 tools for learning and teachers can’t learn how to do that with traditional pd, a three hour “sit and get”. Teachers have to immerse themselves in the technologiy to understand it, understand it, meld it with their own knowledge of content and more importatntly, pedagogy, to start to understand how teachers work with students where students LEARN to use these tools for learning.
What does job embedded professional development look like? Does it look like the Lab classroom Teacher program that they’re putting together? (professional question based on something we're doing in our district)
Partnership for 21st century learning: best practices in 21st century pd - check this out
NSDC’s definition of professional development –and- their rationale for learning communities
Socoial communities of practice need to be designed in such a way that they evolve over time
What develops is co-created and collaborative with multiple opportunities for member feedback and ownership.
You have to take a whole team through the process, not one or two people (wondering: what are the different ways that we can define “team”)
Need to ask ourselves, where are the tools, ideas, and resources to really implement change at a building, in a classroom?
Making significant shifts in our classrooms takes significant shifts for us as learners (not teachers).
YouTube Video (help with bowdrill set)
See how this kid is showing his learning and then asking for comments/help from the viewers of the video – he shows what he knows, what he did, what he doesn’t know, what he failed with and how he knew he failed. And he asks for help and that is his primary purpose for doing this – to get feedback.
Notice that he didn’t say his name, show his face, or give indications of who he was. He’s using some sophisticated security measures.
How did he know he would get a response? How did the responders find him? How did he connect his needs to the experts who could provide him information?
Virtual learning community/virtual community of practice
Allows teachers to ask for help, to show “weakness” to someone outside of the face-to-face community within the district.
Here Comes Everybody by Clay Shirky (book to check out)
It’s what happens after we publish that becomes powerful, collective action. Raw data can be posted, examples can be given by others.
Example, presenter put up a tweet on twitter complaining about Orbitz. Shortly after he gets a call from customer service call from Orbitz completely based off of his tweet.
Online publishing allows for more complex ideas behind the learning of reading and writing.
Hundreds of people negociating to what the entry for the Michael Jackson would be on Wikipedia after his death. (and are probably still doing s0)
Cnet article: survey: teens ‘sext’ and post personal info - check out article (despite the article title, it says that teens are often MORE safe online than we would think)
Kids are using the technologies in way to socialize, and are connecting with adults outside of their physical spaces – sounds bad, but it is teachers that they can connect to – not actual teachers but to connect to people who will teach them.
“new study shows time spent online important for teen development” Macarthur article – check it out
Many students have no one that is showing them how to use these web 2.0 tools for learning and teachers can’t learn how to do that with traditional pd, a three hour “sit and get”. Teachers have to immerse themselves in the technologiy to understand it, understand it, meld it with their own knowledge of content and more importatntly, pedagogy, to start to understand how teachers work with students where students LEARN to use these tools for learning.
What does job embedded professional development look like? Does it look like the Lab classroom Teacher program that they’re putting together? (professional question based on something we're doing in our district)
Partnership for 21st century learning: best practices in 21st century pd - check this out
NSDC’s definition of professional development –and- their rationale for learning communities
Socoial communities of practice need to be designed in such a way that they evolve over time
What develops is co-created and collaborative with multiple opportunities for member feedback and ownership.
You have to take a whole team through the process, not one or two people (wondering: what are the different ways that we can define “team”)
Need to ask ourselves, where are the tools, ideas, and resources to really implement change at a building, in a classroom?
Thursday, July 2, 2009
NETS T and Integration Awareness
I attended a session titled " Differentiating NETS*T: Moving Teachers Toward Transformative Technology". It focused on the NETS T that came out last year from ISTE. If you buy the short book that goes more in depth on the NETS T, you'll find a rubric showing a teacher's progression with labels ranging from Beginning to Transformative. The speakers did a decent job demonstrating how they analyzed the rubric to differentiate teacher's levels when it came to the NETS T.
What I wanted to share though was an additional rubric using the same language, but looking at Integration Awareness. The descriptions below the words in bold are a combination of the speakers and my own. There seems to be an ongoing disagreement within my district that teacher's need training or support that addresses integration. I am of the thinking that you have to show them more than the technology tool and a couple ways to use it in the classroom. That is somewhat based off of the TPaCK framework as well as 12 years in education and using technology as an educator. This rubric gives some language to that thought of integration awareness as well as expands my own thinking.
Nets*T and Integration Awareness
| | Beginning | Developing | Proficient | Transformative |
| Unaware | Beginning awareness “I’d like to integrate technology” | Aware Not planning themselves, co-planning/ co-teaching w/ ET; no spur of moment thinking of integration | Active awareness Teachers can pull out technology tools and plan for technology use on their own; initial thoughts may not always be best choice | Flexible awareness Constantly reacting and adjusting to outside needs; possibly in constructivist classroom |
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Alan November Session
Alan November is a great speaker and author. I highly recommend his book, Web Literacy for Educators which I've ready with my building technology committee. He also hosts a yearly conference in Boston which I hope to go to in the next couple of years. I have some coworkers who have attended and spoke very highly of it.
I will say that he goes in a few directions, so my notes below do as well. I've cleaned them up a little, but didn't want to over-do the work-over. I am going to put all of my thoughts in italics. All of these points refer to something specific going on within my school or school district.
Alan started by speaking about a pattern with pioneering educators who are transferring management of class to students who are creating content, doing research, etc.
Social engagement gives students a let up on understanding information that they don’t understand from a class.
5 ways to shift ownership of learning to students. (This is the big point of the talk.)
Screencasting: every teacher should have a screencasting tool in their toolbox. (jingproject.com)
What about a math wiki with math screencasts of students doing problems to demonstrate understanding of the concept?
A different voice explaining the same content has an impact on student understanding.
The digital content should be available online, iPod, dvd and in as many digital boxes as possible
Rich Curriulum Review:
Podcast planning has a team leader where he/she uses a chart of parts of podcast: title and description, people responsible, written, recorded, mixed to track progress of the podcast. This is created and posted weekly by students as an overview of curriculum from the previous week. It was unclear, but I think the planning took place throughout the week and the recording took place the following Monday.
Used a mixer and microphones? That seems a bit over the top and $$$.
Search Engine Design Team:
Create Custom Search Engines for searching for younger students. What if you created a search engine for each topic, subject area, general resources. What if you had one just for Captain? Aligned to curriculum. (I've created one of these and the thought of what it could do if I could get teachers to let me do more, let students do it, or just make the tool be used more often blows my mind!)
Official researcher: (kids find their own quality content and this teaches kids to search with mini teachable moments put in here.)
One kid a day is the official researcher for the class and will use a machine to find the resources . Use this to grow that search engine since questions will be based on the curriculum.
Collaborative Note Taking:
Why aren’t kids taking collaborative notes when taking notes in class? Teacher assigns headings and students fill out parts; then we come back at the end and ask the whole class: What’s missing?
(homework, when done incorrectly, reinforces errors, because they don’t get feedback quick enough so the incorrect thinking is reinforced through the doing of homework)
But what if they do the tutorials at home (see above) and homework type work is done at school and gets immediate feedback to redirect thinking.
Social Responsibility:
www.kiva.org
Allows you to be a microlender. You can research and invest in someone’s business venture for as little as a $25 investment. You can follow them with an RSS feed.
Kivapedia.org to look up info on kiva groups, who has invested, etc.
I love this concept. Much better than the general fundraisers that I see happen ALL the time at our school.
Add to global knowledge:
Write an article on a local location/event, etc. through research & field trip and then write up for wikipedia. Find something that doesn’t yet have an entry.
Teach children to find the work of other children:
Searching book titles through youtube often shows student work/blook trailer, etc. Why are we not looking for these for further understanding if we’re not creating these (and of course we should be creating these)
They use that work from kids to base their work off of. Children become curriculum researchers in a sense when we teach them the research tools to do that. Can be motivating to do their work and shape the quality of their work (and may enhance what teachers are assigning) When students show a piece of work that they want to emulate, they own it. That’s powerful.
Okay, somehow I have seven things here, so I don't know if he just threw two in for free or if I'm missing connecting two of these together. Regardless, there are some great "guiding forces" to move a school or classroom forward and focus them in their use of technology. I personally want to make sure at least one class or group uses Kiva next year and at least one class or group puts an entry on Wikipedia next year. I'm definitely going to work on the others because I can see the power they can contain if they are done on a regular basis in a classroom.
I will say that he goes in a few directions, so my notes below do as well. I've cleaned them up a little, but didn't want to over-do the work-over. I am going to put all of my thoughts in italics. All of these points refer to something specific going on within my school or school district.
Alan started by speaking about a pattern with pioneering educators who are transferring management of class to students who are creating content, doing research, etc.
Social engagement gives students a let up on understanding information that they don’t understand from a class.
5 ways to shift ownership of learning to students. (This is the big point of the talk.)
Screencasting: every teacher should have a screencasting tool in their toolbox. (jingproject.com)
What about a math wiki with math screencasts of students doing problems to demonstrate understanding of the concept?
A different voice explaining the same content has an impact on student understanding.
The digital content should be available online, iPod, dvd and in as many digital boxes as possible
Rich Curriulum Review:
Podcast planning has a team leader where he/she uses a chart of parts of podcast: title and description, people responsible, written, recorded, mixed to track progress of the podcast. This is created and posted weekly by students as an overview of curriculum from the previous week. It was unclear, but I think the planning took place throughout the week and the recording took place the following Monday.
Used a mixer and microphones? That seems a bit over the top and $$$.
Search Engine Design Team:
Create Custom Search Engines for searching for younger students. What if you created a search engine for each topic, subject area, general resources. What if you had one just for Captain? Aligned to curriculum. (I've created one of these and the thought of what it could do if I could get teachers to let me do more, let students do it, or just make the tool be used more often blows my mind!)
Official researcher: (kids find their own quality content and this teaches kids to search with mini teachable moments put in here.)
One kid a day is the official researcher for the class and will use a machine to find the resources . Use this to grow that search engine since questions will be based on the curriculum.
Collaborative Note Taking:
Why aren’t kids taking collaborative notes when taking notes in class? Teacher assigns headings and students fill out parts; then we come back at the end and ask the whole class: What’s missing?
(homework, when done incorrectly, reinforces errors, because they don’t get feedback quick enough so the incorrect thinking is reinforced through the doing of homework)
But what if they do the tutorials at home (see above) and homework type work is done at school and gets immediate feedback to redirect thinking.
Social Responsibility:
www.kiva.org
Allows you to be a microlender. You can research and invest in someone’s business venture for as little as a $25 investment. You can follow them with an RSS feed.
Kivapedia.org to look up info on kiva groups, who has invested, etc.
I love this concept. Much better than the general fundraisers that I see happen ALL the time at our school.
Add to global knowledge:
Write an article on a local location/event, etc. through research & field trip and then write up for wikipedia. Find something that doesn’t yet have an entry.
Teach children to find the work of other children:
Searching book titles through youtube often shows student work/blook trailer, etc. Why are we not looking for these for further understanding if we’re not creating these (and of course we should be creating these)
They use that work from kids to base their work off of. Children become curriculum researchers in a sense when we teach them the research tools to do that. Can be motivating to do their work and shape the quality of their work (and may enhance what teachers are assigning) When students show a piece of work that they want to emulate, they own it. That’s powerful.
Okay, somehow I have seven things here, so I don't know if he just threw two in for free or if I'm missing connecting two of these together. Regardless, there are some great "guiding forces" to move a school or classroom forward and focus them in their use of technology. I personally want to make sure at least one class or group uses Kiva next year and at least one class or group puts an entry on Wikipedia next year. I'm definitely going to work on the others because I can see the power they can contain if they are done on a regular basis in a classroom.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Future of Brick and Mortar School Debate
This is my account of what happened during the debate with some commentary at the end. Thought interesting points were made, but the one solid thing I did was subscribe to Gary Stager's blog!)
Tuesday started with a debate on the future of brick and mortar schools. Robert Siegel, moderator of All things Considered on NPR was the moderator. All attendees, numbering in the hundreds, were able to vote on a response system before and after the debate.
Michael Horn, author of Disrupting Class, was the first to speak against brick and mortar schools. He states that defining a school by its brick and mortar boundaries restricts what can be considered learning and are detrimental because it assumes that those in one school learn in the same way or have the same needs. Research shows this is not true. Bricks and mortar schools can’t provide the resources to motivate and teach all students. Online learning holds the potential to allow students with distinct needs to reach resources that can help them. And with research showing promise, online learning in its infancy makes this an exciting time. Socialization is limited to a small community, but with distance no longer an obstacle and communication and community expanded across the globe, restricting community to a neighborhood short-changes students. Students need to be able to communicate with and collaborate with those across the country and across the world.
Brad Jupp, senior advisor to US Department of Education, speaks for public schools, He states that our schools are not only necessary, based on the fact that we need to get together to “learn something”. Schools stand for a cause of bettering our students and therefore our communities. Of the 140,000 schools, many are run down and in need of help, but if we redouble our effort, and utilize great technology and know how, we can make them great again. Schools hold together our community, our clubs, our neighborhood organizations, and even a place to access technology for those who can’t get it elsewhere. Most of all, schools allow us to anchor our students in their effort, where they play school sports, where they work with great teachers, and where they meet with each other, working with each other where they can work together to come out greater than when they entered. We can’t leave schools behind and discard them before we’ve fully put forth an effort to utilize the benefits of it.
Dr. Gary Stager, (or catch his blog here) Executive Director of the Constructivist Consortium speaks against brick and mortar schools. The trouble is administration and we focused technology on No Child Left Behind, on datawarehouses and online testing, instead of utilizing technology to have students do real learning. Maybe physical schools should be for dance classes, orchestra classes and high tech learning labs. But these are the first things to get stripped away from public schools. Maybe online learning isn’t the answer either. Because many courses don’t allow for the type of communication and customized learning that is possible that should mirror the strengths of the best physical schools. (a lot got left out because he spoke so fast, but was incredibly well spoken.)
Cheryl Lemke, CEO, The Metiri Group spoke for physical schools. She stated that we aren’t for the “old way”, but are for 21st century learning and equal opportunities for all students. It’s not one or the other or all black and white. We hear of the success stories of online virtual learning, but what about the children who come from single parent households or homes where parents can’t provide all of the support that virtual learning requires. Students don’t come as self directed as they need to be to take advantage of virtual learning. Teachers in a physical school, in an evolving role, need to work with students to help with those things. Distance learning, by it’s very name, has distance between teacher and students that doesn’t benefit all. Instead, a hybrid model may be best where face-to-face as well as virtual is the best solution. Also, we need socialization because of the development of social capital so that our children have an investment in communities, to give back and be a part of the community, so students need to be a part of not only a global community, but also a local community. (most convincing arguments yet!)
Marshall Thompson, Senior at Walt Whitman High School, did a rebuttal against physical schools. He stated that we the problem is that we live to learn for eight hours a day in a physical school, but we need to set ourselves up as part of the international community. We have the capability to live on an international level. We don’t need a place to “get together” to learn something. Getting together on an online community allow us to get perspectives that don’t exist in a local community. Looking through a bricks and mortar lens hasn’t led us to update these schools, in fact we’ve dropped programs that are essential to learning, so staying with
Eric Bakke from West Springfield High School speaks for physical schools. He shares that while his school is not physically perfect and is a bit run down, as the summer winds down, he is excited for the beginning of the next school year, not only because of what he will learn, but because of where he will learn and who he will learn with. We have one need that we share in common, and that is to learn to work together. We learn that through coming together. The effort put forth by the teachers in contagious to students and helps us become the learners that they want us to be. They help us to take on the passions for the subjects, the arts, that they have in themselves. It is through those teachers that I have learned to love the subjects that I have a passion for today.
Gary Stager presents the summation against physical schools. He reinforced that all students don’t learn the same way. That we can give students access to a wider array of resources through online learning. There is a bankruptcy to our imaginations in what we expect of our teachers and of our students.
Cheryl Lemke argued that we need schools that are not our parents schools and not our schools but are our children’s schools. We need the community and the online community to work with students to offer them everything that they need. There is common ground no matter what side you’re on. Local and global connections can and need to coexist.
This followed with a question answer session, but I’m going to take some time to respond. I wish that I could have put more of Gary Stager’s speech. Although he ended up speaking against faulty thinking and not necessarily physical schools, what he said was thought provoking and forward thinking. It didn’t pull punches and stated some of the things that don’t make much sense when it comes to utilizing technology. For example, he stated that, as far as he can tell, there are just as many teachers that are forward thinking today as there were 25 years ago. Where does that get us? No further than we were 25 years ago for those teachers who are resistors to technology’s use in the classroom. Also, the large focus on interactive whiteboards seem to reinforce the focus on the front of the room instead of collaboration as we talk about. These were powerful statements to make in front of educators who believe in the strengths of technology in education and received a mixed reaction.
The ideas of a mixed model end up making the most sense to me, but I wonder about where the great models are for this. I’m sure they’re out there, but they aren’t put to the forefront and examined enough for my liking.
Tuesday started with a debate on the future of brick and mortar schools. Robert Siegel, moderator of All things Considered on NPR was the moderator. All attendees, numbering in the hundreds, were able to vote on a response system before and after the debate.
Michael Horn, author of Disrupting Class, was the first to speak against brick and mortar schools. He states that defining a school by its brick and mortar boundaries restricts what can be considered learning and are detrimental because it assumes that those in one school learn in the same way or have the same needs. Research shows this is not true. Bricks and mortar schools can’t provide the resources to motivate and teach all students. Online learning holds the potential to allow students with distinct needs to reach resources that can help them. And with research showing promise, online learning in its infancy makes this an exciting time. Socialization is limited to a small community, but with distance no longer an obstacle and communication and community expanded across the globe, restricting community to a neighborhood short-changes students. Students need to be able to communicate with and collaborate with those across the country and across the world.
Brad Jupp, senior advisor to US Department of Education, speaks for public schools, He states that our schools are not only necessary, based on the fact that we need to get together to “learn something”. Schools stand for a cause of bettering our students and therefore our communities. Of the 140,000 schools, many are run down and in need of help, but if we redouble our effort, and utilize great technology and know how, we can make them great again. Schools hold together our community, our clubs, our neighborhood organizations, and even a place to access technology for those who can’t get it elsewhere. Most of all, schools allow us to anchor our students in their effort, where they play school sports, where they work with great teachers, and where they meet with each other, working with each other where they can work together to come out greater than when they entered. We can’t leave schools behind and discard them before we’ve fully put forth an effort to utilize the benefits of it.
Dr. Gary Stager, (or catch his blog here) Executive Director of the Constructivist Consortium speaks against brick and mortar schools. The trouble is administration and we focused technology on No Child Left Behind, on datawarehouses and online testing, instead of utilizing technology to have students do real learning. Maybe physical schools should be for dance classes, orchestra classes and high tech learning labs. But these are the first things to get stripped away from public schools. Maybe online learning isn’t the answer either. Because many courses don’t allow for the type of communication and customized learning that is possible that should mirror the strengths of the best physical schools. (a lot got left out because he spoke so fast, but was incredibly well spoken.)
Cheryl Lemke, CEO, The Metiri Group spoke for physical schools. She stated that we aren’t for the “old way”, but are for 21st century learning and equal opportunities for all students. It’s not one or the other or all black and white. We hear of the success stories of online virtual learning, but what about the children who come from single parent households or homes where parents can’t provide all of the support that virtual learning requires. Students don’t come as self directed as they need to be to take advantage of virtual learning. Teachers in a physical school, in an evolving role, need to work with students to help with those things. Distance learning, by it’s very name, has distance between teacher and students that doesn’t benefit all. Instead, a hybrid model may be best where face-to-face as well as virtual is the best solution. Also, we need socialization because of the development of social capital so that our children have an investment in communities, to give back and be a part of the community, so students need to be a part of not only a global community, but also a local community. (most convincing arguments yet!)
Marshall Thompson, Senior at Walt Whitman High School, did a rebuttal against physical schools. He stated that we the problem is that we live to learn for eight hours a day in a physical school, but we need to set ourselves up as part of the international community. We have the capability to live on an international level. We don’t need a place to “get together” to learn something. Getting together on an online community allow us to get perspectives that don’t exist in a local community. Looking through a bricks and mortar lens hasn’t led us to update these schools, in fact we’ve dropped programs that are essential to learning, so staying with
Eric Bakke from West Springfield High School speaks for physical schools. He shares that while his school is not physically perfect and is a bit run down, as the summer winds down, he is excited for the beginning of the next school year, not only because of what he will learn, but because of where he will learn and who he will learn with. We have one need that we share in common, and that is to learn to work together. We learn that through coming together. The effort put forth by the teachers in contagious to students and helps us become the learners that they want us to be. They help us to take on the passions for the subjects, the arts, that they have in themselves. It is through those teachers that I have learned to love the subjects that I have a passion for today.
Gary Stager presents the summation against physical schools. He reinforced that all students don’t learn the same way. That we can give students access to a wider array of resources through online learning. There is a bankruptcy to our imaginations in what we expect of our teachers and of our students.
Cheryl Lemke argued that we need schools that are not our parents schools and not our schools but are our children’s schools. We need the community and the online community to work with students to offer them everything that they need. There is common ground no matter what side you’re on. Local and global connections can and need to coexist.
This followed with a question answer session, but I’m going to take some time to respond. I wish that I could have put more of Gary Stager’s speech. Although he ended up speaking against faulty thinking and not necessarily physical schools, what he said was thought provoking and forward thinking. It didn’t pull punches and stated some of the things that don’t make much sense when it comes to utilizing technology. For example, he stated that, as far as he can tell, there are just as many teachers that are forward thinking today as there were 25 years ago. Where does that get us? No further than we were 25 years ago for those teachers who are resistors to technology’s use in the classroom. Also, the large focus on interactive whiteboards seem to reinforce the focus on the front of the room instead of collaboration as we talk about. These were powerful statements to make in front of educators who believe in the strengths of technology in education and received a mixed reaction.
The ideas of a mixed model end up making the most sense to me, but I wonder about where the great models are for this. I’m sure they’re out there, but they aren’t put to the forefront and examined enough for my liking.
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