reflexions

How are you Reading

2012-01-18T14:07:00.003-05:00

cross-posted from http://blogs.learnquebec.ca/

I bought an iPad in May and it has definitely changed my reading habits. While I am an avid reader and my house is filled with books, I have started to read books on my mobile device. Why am I switching?

I’ll be moving this year and am looking at the many books on my shelves. They take up an enormous amount of space. While I love to see them and remember the hours of pleasure they afforded me, I also think about how they will fit as I downsize. The books I buy now don’t need to fit on shelves, just on virtual shelves.

I like the pluses of electronic books. I can easily highlight sections, add notes and bookmark parts I want to go back to. I recently read Lorna Crozier’s biography, “Small Beneath the Sky: A Prairie Memoir” and reveled in her poetic language. I highlighted favourite passages and can easily go back to them. (I read this one with the Kobo app).

I love to read in bed and my partner loves to sleep! Now I don’t have to switch on a light to indulge in my simple pleasure. My current read is “Steve Jobs” by Walter Isaacson, which has been revealing as well as a trip down memory lane as I bought my first computer in 1983 and have owned Apple products ever since. I am using the iBooks app that comes with the iPad to read this one.

I can adjust the font and font size to the way I feel most comfortable reading. This is great for students too.

Travelling becomes lighter as both the books I take to read while on holiday and the travel books themselves are all on the one device.

If you have students who struggle with reading, the iPad can read the text to them. They don’t have to be held back by their difficulty deciphering the words. And for those who read, but still need some words defined, holding down on the word opens a dialogue box. One of the choices is define and the word’s definition is readily available.

The biggest bonus comes when reading books that were written for mobile devices. They can be embedded with links, videos, animations. Then reading takes on new dimensions. I have been reading “Playing with Media: simple ideas for powerful sharing” by Wesley Fryer. It is a great way to learn about digital text, audio and video editing and where to post it. As I read, I can watch the videos which provide step-by-step instructions. This book is a great place to start if you are just getting into using digital media with your students as well as for the more tech savvy of you who want to broaden your knowledge.

Many libraries are now loaning ebooks. You can download the book and it disappears from your device after the loan period.

In a future post, I will share a bit about how your students can become creators of ebooks. Consuming and creation are two sides of the ebook revolution.

What are the downsides? I can’t pass my books on to my 93 year-old cousin who is still an avid reader. I am not patronizing our few local independent book stores as I buy the books online. With my choice of an iPad vs one of the less expensive ebook readers, I won’t be taking it to a beach to read.

Do I read everything on a mobile device? No – I still buy books which I want to share. I have a collection of children’s books and love to sit with a child to share the text and illustrations. Though, recently I came across an amazing children’s book that was created for the iPad, The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore. I still buy professional books. I like to take them to workshops and pass them around to inspire others – hard to do with a digital device.

How are you reading? I’d love to hear about how you feel about the switch to digital books. What device are you using? Would you recommend it to others and why or why not. Are you using eReaders with your students?

And, of course, share your favourite titles.

John Grierson

2012-01-18T14:03:00.003-05:00

Living in Montreal, I grew up with films from the National Film Board of Canada. My father had a 16mm projector and my brother rented films for a group of his friends. I got to watch with them. I became a huge fan of Norman McLaren and of course, learned about John Grierson as the first head of the film board. When I was in university, I had the privilege of taking a film course (appreciation of films, not making them) with the man. He was already in his early 70s, but his passion and depth made the course compelling. It was just a couple of years before he died.

The NFB has made its films available on line and today I was pointed in the direction of a film about John Grierson. Well, I just had to watch it. It was worth every minute.

He talked about telling stories -
Walter Winchell asked how people could know everything about everything in the modern world. Grierson thought about how he could help spread knowledge.

Grierson initially was interested in the press - but "if you dramatized things..... as distinct from giving information you might find a way of illuminating the world" Then he got interested in movies. It was he who coined the term documentary film.

During WWII, he was invited to Canada and it was then that the film board was founded. He was an innovator ahead of his time. I think of how we are helping students tell digital stories. They could do well to watch some of the many films available from the NFB to see how the masters, many of the early ones schooled under Grierson's directorship, plied their craft. Grierson knew that the best way to educate, to inform was through story.

Reaching out to the Network

2011-11-28T10:19:00.001-05:00

I just watched two keynote presentations from this year's K12 Online Conference: Playing in Public by George Couros and The World’s Craziest Educational Videos Featuring ds106 by Jim Groom and Tom Woodward. One thing that struck me about both was that they reached out to their networks to help tell their stories. Each is part of a network of learners and they are prepared to do their learning in public.

Jim and Tom describe their experience teaching and learning with DS106, an open course that has participation from people both enrolled in the course and not. People share their work, comment on and help each other and even set assignments which anyone can choose to do. All those who contributed, spoke of this as a life-changing experience. In some classrooms, where peer-editing and conferencing is encouraged, some of this goes on. In DS106, educators are experiencing the "learning in public" that they expect of their students. I'm intrigued, but not yet ready to jump in. I've been part of the Flickr education groups and just keeping up with my own photography and writing in my photo blog, as well as commenting on my contacts' work is time-consuming. I am not yet ready to commit more time.

George Couros' talks about putting learning "out there" - to connect and create ideas with others. Here is his blog post where he asked for feedback. He muses on play being about engagement (and isn't that what we want for our students). He pointed to educators who are posting their learning online and who are modelling what it is to be a lifelong learner. In the video, Dean Shareski points out that teachers have to be learning experts, not just teaching experts. Teachers need to model that learning, to show students that it is not about having the answers, but knowing how to find them, whether through books, the Internet or through our connections.

We have to play together, to connect with others and share our learning. And we have to make sure our students have the same opportunities to connect to learn in the larger community.

Howard Gardner at the Global Education Conference

2011-11-28T09:37:00.001-05:00

I had the privilege to hear Howard Gardner interviewed by his son, Andrew Gardner, at the Global Education Conference. I did not have to go to the conference; it came to me through Blackboard / Collaborate.

I was aware of Gardner’s work on Multiple Intelligences. I was not aware of all the work he has done on ethical issues. He is part of Project Zero at Harvard. Two projects, Good Work and Good Play were of particular interest.

Good Work http://www.goodworkproject.org/

“The GoodWork™ Project is a large scale effort to identify individuals and institutions that exemplify good work – work that is excellent in quality, socially responsible, and meaningful to its practitioners – and to determine how best to increase the incidence of good work in our society.”

He talked about the three "E's" – technically Excellent, personally Engaging and carried out in an Ethical way. This is very pertinent in today's society.

Out of this project came their Good Play project which looked at people participating in new media. The five aspects they looked at are

What does it mean to have a sense of identity in an online world
What happens to a sense of privacy
Ownership and authorship
Trustworthiness and credibility
What does it mean in the digital era to participate in a community

This project led to a digital ethics curriculum aimed at high school students: Our Space: Being a Responsible Citizen of the Digital World. The book is available to be downloaded in pdf form under a Creative Commons license. http://www.goodworkproject.org/practice/our-space/

It looks at the issues listed above through moral dilemmas.

From the introduction

"Our Space is inspired by the belief that young people need to think habitually about online life in
ethical terms.
In this casebook, we define ethical thinking as the capacity to think about one’s roles and
responsibilities in the communities in which one participates, offline and online. Such thinking requires the capacity to think abstractly about one’s roles; to do so in a nonpartisan, disinterested way; and to consider the impact of one’s actions beyond the self and on a larger collective—such as one’s school, community, state, nation, and world. Research conducted by the GoodPlay Project suggests that young people rarely think in ethical ways about their online activities

Part of the problem is that young people have had little mentoring in living in the digital world. In the Our Space Curriculum, there are suggestions to teachers as to how to use the dilemmas and guide discussions. It is not enough to tell students that things are wrong; the discussions around these dilemmas will help students to see the multi-dimensional aspects of these issues. I think this will be a valuable asset to teachers.

You can watch and listen to the session here.

https://sas.elluminate.com/mr.jnlp?suid=M.ED21ED4435E02E4D78111D742981E2&sid=2008350You will be asked to download an app which will then give you the recorded session in Blackboard Collaborate

Some of Dr. Gardner's books include:

Frames of Mind (1993)
Five Minds for the Future (2006)
Good Work: When Excellence and Ethics Meet (2001) with Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi and William Damon
Truth, Beauty and Goodness Reframed: Educating for the Virtues in the Twenty-First Century (2011)

He has written many more.

Links to all archived sessions from the 2011 Global Education Conference

http://globaleducation.ning.com/page/2011-conference-quick-links

Learning any time anywhere

One Day on Earth

2011-10-31T09:41:00.000-04:00

As the seven billionth child has been born to this planet I've been thinking a lot about the Earth and the state of people on it. While I sit in a warm and comfortable home, there are many whose lives are very difficult. Studies have shown that happiness has nothing to do with affluence. We need an attitude shift in the developed world to see that acquisition is not the road to happiness. I know that we will all have to simplify our lives so that the constant consuming does not drain the world of the resources and so that we limit the pollution spewing into our atmosphere. While we downsize others around the world are "upsizing" - gaining access to goods that were once out of reach. We need to even out the divides.

This year for the second time everyone has the opportunity to participate in One Day on Earth.

From their web site:
"On November 11th, 11.11.11, across the planet, documentary filmmakers, students, and other inspired citizens will record the human experience over a 24-hour period and contribute their voice to the second annual global day of media creation called One Day on Earth. Together, we will create a shared archive and a film."

I would love to see students take up this challenge and share their voices. And then - follow up by viewing and discussing the stories told by others around the world. Another way to help our students become global citizens, sharing and learning from others. They need to see the view from other parts of the world and in many cases, other parts of their own country.

Learning 24/7

2011-10-29T12:42:00.004-04:00

Cross Posted from LEARN

As money gets scarcer, it becomes harder to get to conferences and other professional development events. In the twenty-first century, this is not a reason to miss out on professional development. There are more and more alternatives both synchronous (you meet in a virtual space at a specified time) or asynchronous (the session is recorded and may be watched / listened to at any time). Each has advantages. All the virtual conferences listed below are free – and in this case the price does not reflect the value. Top educators from around the world have contributed to these conferences.

Preconference Keynote: November 21
Week 1 sessions: November 28 – December 2
Week 2 sessions: December 5 – 9
For the past five years, I have been participating in the K12 Online Conference. I have learned so much from the many educators who have freely shared their practice. Most of the sessions are asynchronous – not more than 20 minutes long. All sessions have been archived from 2006 to the present. You can watch at your leisure, learning from teachers and other educators from around the world. You can download them or watch online. It’s great to watch some sessions with fellow educators to spark discussion. This year the sessions will be posted, starting with the keynote on November 21. The following two weeks will feature 4 new presentations each week day with sessions aimed at every level of technology user. The thrust is pedagogy and education in general and how technology can help provide powerful learning situations. (Disclaimer – this is the second year that I have been on the organizing committee).
November 14 – 18
The Global Education Conference will be held for the second year between November 14 – 18 in Blackboard (a kind of virtual classroom). Sessions are synchronous, but all are archived so they can be watched later, but, or course, you would not be able to participate in the chat room to ask questions. From their site “ Sessions will take place in multiple time zones and multiple languages over the five days. The 2010 Global Education Conference had 15,028 unique logins and presentations from 62 countries.” I managed to attend some sessions last year and they were of very high quality. The chat room also gives you the opportunity to interact with other educators and perhaps, find partners for projects. Last year’s archive is still available.

November 2 – 3
A new conference this year is the Library 2.011, taking place on November 2 and 3. It is sponsored by the School of Library and Information Science at San Jose State University. Although it is not aimed specifically at K12 Education, I am sure there will be many sessions of interest to school librarians. The schedule should be available shortly.
LEARNING 2.0: The Future of Education January 2012
A new conference is on the horizon, spearheaded by Steve Hargadon. It will be held in January. I’ll keep you posted as I learn more. Steve Hargadon hosts a series of interviews with educational leaders. You can learn about upcoming interviews and listen to the archives of past shows here.
Classroom 2.0 Live is not a conference, but a weekly show (though it is on hiatus for the month of October). Each week there is a guest educator who shares classroom practice often around the use of technology. All shows are archived as well as all the resources the guests provide. I know there are some Quebec educators who have participated (I’ve met them when I have been there) and whose students have profited from what their teachers have learned.
Learning can now take place any time, anywhere. It can be done in small increments (20 minutes for a K12 Online session) so you don’t get overloaded. You can watch a session more than once if you missed something or just need a refresher. I know I have watched a few several times as I have either needed a refresher, a boost, inspiration or wanted to share with a colleague. You can pick and choose the sessions that are of interest to you and watch them at a time convenient to you.
One teacher in Shanghai held a LAN (local area network) party, inviting his colleagues to watch sessions together along with food and drinks. It was a great way for colleagues to learn together in an informal atmosphere and to have discussions about education and about changes they wanted to see in their own schools. I have used his model and invited colleagues – it resulted in some great conversations. We want to help our students become lifelong learners. What better way to show them that learning doesn’t stop when you leave school, than to model it ourselves.
Have you taken part in an online session – synchronously or asynchronously? How did it contribute to your learning? Please recommend some sessions you have watched.
Susan van Gelder

Terry Fox Run: Interview with Debbie Laurie

2011-10-29T12:34:00.002-04:00

Cross posted from LEARN

I just read a blog post which talked about 21^st century skills for teachers and students. One of the aspects mentioned was the importance of community involvement. I had the opportunity to interview Debbie Laurie, a teacher in Port Cartier who has lived this for 30 years by getting involved and involving her students in the Terry Fox Run.

Why did you get involved in the Terry Fox Run?
My dad died of lung cancer at the age of 43 in March 1976. When I turned on the news on April 12, 1980, and watched a young amputee dip his leg in the waters of St. John’s Harbour before undertaking a marathon to run across Canada to raise money for cancer research, I knew right then that I was witnessing something that was special. I followed his progress all summer and when, on September 1^st, I heard that lung cancer had forced him to abandon his run, I cried along with millions of Canadians and knew that, if needed, I would do my part to help him succeed.
How have you involved your students?
Every year our school has participated in the Terry Fox Community Run held on the third Sunday of September. Since 2005, we have joined forces with the two French elementary schools in Port-Cartier, and we all walk together on National School Run Day held at the end of September during school hours. I also read Eric Walters’ novel RUN with my class at the start of the school year (learn more about the book here). He has combined Terry’s story with that of a fictional troubled teen, and the kids learn all about the Marathon of Hope and Terry Fox in a well-written book!
What do you think it has done for your students?
I hope it has made them realize that anything is possible if you dare to dream and have the courage and perseverance to pursue that dream. I believe it has also helped sensitize them to what cancer patients go through and how important ongoing medical research is. It’s all about educating and passing the message on to future generations.
How do the parents feel about yours and your students’ participation?
They support me and have since the beginning. Many came out to walk in the community runs, and some even come out to walk with us on National School Run Day. They help their kids get sponsors as well, often at their workplace. Many of the French kids in the town call me Madame Terry Fox.
You have been doing this for many years, have any of your graduates kept involved?
Every year when September rolls around, I begin to mobilize my resources. Facebook has helped me connect with so many, and some have written to tell me they will never forget that first run we did in 1980, and how proud they are to have been part of it. Some participate in their own area…quite a few are kind enough to sponsor me…usually online. One student comes to work annually at the Terry Fox Centre in Ottawa for a week in February.
Why do you continue to participate?
I made a commitment when I organized the first run in 1980 that I would continue to do it every year for as long as I had breath in me. Terry had a dream, I took it up when he was unable to see it through, and I believe in the same things as he did. “Somewhere the hurting must stop…”
Why do you feel it is important for students to get involved in causes?
As global citizens, they must realize that we must all work together for the common good. There is not one of them whose family has not been touched by cancer. They can also relate to the fact that he was Canadian, young, athletic, and determined. I want them to have a dream and reach for it with all they have. I also want them to realize that they are not alone in this world and that they are part of a global community. As such, they have responsibilities towards their fellow human beings on this journey we call life.
I would like to add that because of my ongoing involvement with the Terry Fox Run, I was selected by Coca-Cola to carry the Olympic Torch in the Torch Relay for the Vancouver 2010 Winter Games. On November 10, 2009, in Sept-Iles, QC, I became a part of Olympic history, and it was the greatest night of my life!!
Debbie’s involvement in the Terry Fox Run has impacted on her students. Have you involved your students in fundraising for causes? How has that affected your students? How have you integrated this activity into your teaching? Do you have students who have initiated these efforts? Share your stories.
Susan van Gelder
Educational Consultant
LEARN

No Excuse

2011-07-27T09:12:00.000-04:00

I will be adding my notes for the ISTE Conference - but I've been sidetracked with other things. In the meantime

You didn't get funded to go to a conference? This is not an excuse for missing PD opportunities.

Watch the keynotes from the November Learning 2010 Conference
You can watch this year's keynotes live.

From ISTE 2011
Watch John Medina's Keynote
Watch Chris Lehmann's closing keynote

or go to TED talks
Here is a sampling from the education talks

More to come...

ISTE 2011

2011-06-27T20:56:00.000-04:00

This blog has been dormant for quite some time, but conferences always push me to share what I am learning. It is great to be back at ISTE, to meet people I only know online, having met them through flickr, through my photo blog, through edtech talk and through the K12 Online Conference Echos. And then there are all the new people I am meeting - exchanging ideas, hearing what is happening in other places and sharing frustrations. Years ago I was given the advice that when at a conference, walk the halls and indeed those conversations that start with other delegates that really get me thinking.

I know these old and new connections will continue to nourish me after the conference. This is not to say that there is nothing to be learned from the sessions. In some cases sessions just reaffirm what you already know (especially for those of us who have been in the field a long time). In some sessions you pick up gems - ideas to mull over, applications which make a difference for students, pedagogical tricks and inspiration to see how some teachers are making a difference.

I have yet to tackle the exhibit area - a daunting place the size of a few football fields. As it is, I am sure I am getting my 10000 steps each day going from session to session. What will follow are my notes from some sessions, impressions of the conference and musings.

K12 Online Echo

2010-01-13T10:50:00.003-05:00

I am starting a new show at EdTechTalk, the K12 Online Echo. It will be held twice a month at the EdTechTalk studio. Guests will be drawn from the 2006-2009 conferences and will feature a representative sampling to target beginners, the technologically comfortable, administrators, teachers of students of different levels etc.

The first guest, on January 26 will be Jen Wagner whose 2009 presentation, If You Host It They Will Come will be streamed. There will be time for discussion, questions in the chat room, etc. This is a big leap for me, though I co-hosted Teachers are Talking in the past, technology changes and I have to get up to speed on newer ways of streaming.

It is wonderful to be part of a supportive community both at EdTechTalk and at K12 Online. I urge people to get involved in either organization. I am constantly learning, challenging my beliefs and building virtual friendships. It doesn't get much better.

October K12 Online LAN Party

2009-10-19T22:23:00.001-04:00

Please join us on October 20, 2009
from 6:00PM to 8:00PM EDT (10pm GMT)
for a second live event of the
2009 K12Online Conference

On October 20^th, the K12Online Conference is hosting a LAN party from 6:00PM to 8:00PM EDT (10pm GMT). We invite everyone to gather in the EdTechTalk chatroom with colleagues in order to view two past conference presentations and then engage in lively discussions in the EdTechTalk chatroom at http:www.edtechtalk.com/live. The following presenters will be in attendance:

6:00 – 6:45pm Travel Through Space and Time
Silvia Tolisano
Born in Germany, raised in Argentina and living in the USA, Silvia graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree in Spanish & International Studies and a Master’s Degree in Instructional Technology. Silvia is currently teaching at a private elementary school where she serves as the Instructional Technology Facilitator and Webmaster. Having lived on three continents and traveled extensively, Sylvia is well aware of the importance of instilling global awareness & cultural sensitivities in all her students.

6:45 – 7:30pm How Can I Become Part of this ReadWriteWeb Revolution?
Alice Barr, Cheryl Oakes and Bob Sprankle
Alice Barr has lived, taught and traveled on five continents. She now lives in Maine where she is the high school Instructional Technology Integrator in a 1:1 laptop environment. Alice also teaches in the summer at The University of Southern Maine and provides professional development sessions during the year.

Alice was a Technology Learning Leader with SEED, Spreading Educator to Educator Developments and worked with teachers during the beginnings of MLTI, the Maine Learning Technology Initiative. She is now part of the SEEDlings webcast show, along with Bob and Cheryl, which is streamed live three Thursdays a month at EdTechTalk.

Cheryl Oakes lives and works in Maine and around the world virtually! Cheryl works with students and teachers in Wells, Maine and throughout the states of Maine and New Hampshire. “I am also lucky enough to be involved with folks from around the world through my online networks of the Webheads, Worldbridges, EdTechTalk and Seedlings. Join in any of these conversations. You will flatten your classroom.”

Bob Sprankle comes from Wells, Maine, where he is a Technology Integrator in a K-4 Elementary School. Bob teaches over 500 students technology skills for the 21st Century and has been integrating technology in a 3/4 multi-age class for 10 years prior.

Bob was involved with the SEED group in Maine as a Technology Learning Leader and helped train the first wave of teachers using laptops for the 7th and 8th grader MLTI project. He was awarded Maine’s Technology Teacher of the Year in 2006 from ACTEM. Bob’s students have received world-wide recognition for their “Room 208 Podcast”, and have appeared in numerous articles, including, The New York Times and Apple’s Education Site. Bob’s professional development blog and podcast, “Bit by Bit”, is geared to helping teachers incorporate technology into their classrooms and can be found at www.bobsprankle.com.

The EdTechTalk community will host this event at http://www.edtechtalk.com/live.
For questions or more information, contact Susan Van Gelder, Live Events Committee, at susanvg@mac.com or on Twitter at @k12online.

K12 Online Live Event

2009-09-22T16:06:00.006-04:00

Please join us on September 26, 2009
for the first live event of the
2009 K12Online Conference

On September 26, K12Online Conference will host a LAN party from 2:00PM to 5:00PM EDT and encourages everyone to get together with colleagues and engage in lively discussions. Past presentations will be shown and you are invited to participate in live conversations about the presentations with the featured presenters. A K12Online Conference overview is scheduled at the EdTechTalk website 30 minutes prior to the LAN party.

2:00 – 2:45 Film School
Mathew Needleman, Apple Distinguished Educator, has been integrating video in the classroom for seven years as a teacher of kindergarten, first, and second grade. Make better classroom movies with simple tips that will help elevate your vodcast to the next level in terms of artistic and technical merit. Learn how to storyboard like a pro, choose shots that support the telling of your story, and capture better lighting and sound.

2:45 – 3:30 Open, Social, Connected
Dr. Alec Couros is a professor of educational technology and media at the Faculty of Education, University of Regina. This presentation unravels a recent open graduate course offering titled “Open, Connected, Social” that was offered at the University of Regina, Winter 2008. The presentation describes the theories influencing the course, types of open practice, reflections and outcomes, and goes on to describe the emergence of “open teaching”.

3:30 – 4:15 Wiki While You Work (Basic)
A former high school English teacher, Mark Wagner has since served as an educational technology coordinator at Estancia High School, the Newport-Mesa Unified School District, and the Orange County Department of Education. His session briefly introduces participants to the Read/Write Web, and to wikis in particular. A live demonstration of wikispaces.org and wikipedia.org will illustrate that…, “If you can use a word processor, you can use a wiki.”

4:15 – 5:00 We Like Our Blogging Buddies: The Write Stuff With Blogging Mentors
Kathy Cassidy is a grade one teacher at Westmount School in Moose Jaw, SK, Canada. In the winter of 2008, Patrick Lewis’s university class of pre-service teachers were blogging mentors for Kathy’s grade one students. This presentation talks about that collaboration and the results of the research that was conducted about the effect this mentorship had on the students’ writing.

Erin Gruwell: Freedom Writers

2009-07-04T00:37:00.001-04:00

Session Information

The closing session of NECC09 was given by Erin Gruwell - teacher and originator of the Freedom Writers. Her inspiring story of working with seriously at risk students and helping them find their voices was powerful. She has truly made a difference in their lives and they, in turn continue to grow and make a difference themselves. They have not only graduated from high school, but continued on to university and some are helping with the foundation.

Learn more about the foundation

From Banned to Planned - Hall Davidson

2009-07-04T00:28:00.004-04:00

Session information

Hall demonstrated cellphone use in a variety of ways

Polleverywhere - students can text in opinions, answers...

Call an expert
Liz Kolb author of Toys to Tools from ISTE Liz' wiki
http://K12CELLPHONEPROJECT.WIKISPACES.COM
resource to share k12 projects

One project she described:
(Dear Abby – in context of Romeo and Juliet)all assignments have been cellphone based – e.g. students taking on different roles. Students have taken ownership and come up with ideas (take on persona and call in)

Voicethread (can call in) - how teachers are using cell phones
Blogtalk Radio - listen to some back shows
http://www.cellphonesinlearning.com

The new 3Rs Rethink Rejuvenate Rename

New cell phones affect all aspects of kid's lives – music, video,camera,

Take the village to the child -

Students studying civics - come in to class – here are the numbers you should have.

e.g. supply the number to the planning commision

Maslow

Fulfillment and self-actulalization
esteem and status
belong and social needs
safety and security
basic physiological needs

phone can fulfil all these needs (from bottom - order food, call for help, texting friends, ...)

Free speech – we are becoming the press, right to assemble (twitter mobs)

Banned in Iran – to stifle dissent and human rights – what is your school's excuse?

Challenge based learning

- call someone who picked or processed your food

qik

lets you broadcast live from your cell phone
can embed in a blog or wiki, and put a place marker on a map
you can visit qik's from around the world

Sites to try
Gcast.com
Gabcast
Jott.com
Voicethread.com
Twitter.com
YouTube.com
Flickr.com
YouMail.com

input and output device
can gather info – go to a database and then send it back

shazam

if you hear a song playing and hold up cell phone and get the data – who wrote and the title

CAOS living book

changes every 7 days - written in QR code - you need a bar code reader
qr code generator creates bar code - can use a bar code reader to go from site to site

reader.kaywa.com

You can read QR code - in Japan they are on buildings
bar code from a quiz
- to generate code: http://qrcode.kaywa.com/
just data – so data in has to be as good as data out - but can change the url if you make an error.

Amazon

bought image recognition company

object recognition software

Vicki Davis -

determining mobile technologies for classroom use - when is it expedient - when should you use other tools (depends on students' mobile plans)

Need to have a good letter and rationale for parents.

Joe Fatheree

cell phones – snow day -a student created a video with his phone - led him to harness the power of the phones in his class.

used phones to speak, create, communicate

create a pathway to success – brainstorm with kids how you want to use the tools in the classroom

action plan
then sit with principal -
parents do a technology survey to find out limits to plan and if they are willing to let the device to be used in the classroom
Kids are showing how the mobiles can be used in the classroom.

Film on the Fly

mobile phone video challenge
writing prompt – send out text message
make a video – send it to YouTube

Handouts and powerpoint can be downloaded at Discovery Channel

Here Comes Learning: Will Richardson Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach

2009-07-04T00:07:00.005-04:00

Will Richardson / Sheryl Nussbaum Beach

Session Info

Will Richardson shared a video of a child trying to start a fire with a bow drill he made

What was interesting is that the child

understands how to use the internet – gets help - asks for help
doesn't show face or name, username is anonymous
he got a lot of responses

How did he know he would get a response?
How did people find him?
Learn with and from other people

He understands connecting and community

Sheryl -spoke about telementoring

learning from the wisdom of the crowd
pre-service teachers – set up virtual learning community (she used tapped-in)

from her own PLN – brought them in as mentors
ENDAPT

wasn't mentorship as she thought – thought mentors would be knowledge givers, but it became a learning community – masters to masters, novices to masters, masters to novices, novices to novices

It's not about the tools – it's about the learning – but need an understanding of the tools
- how to change delivery of instruction to make use of what the tools have to offer
- greatest insight – urgency for change – kind of PD should be around managing change

what needs to change?

Will – if you are not feeling challenged as an educator you are not paying attention.
He quoted Shirkey – the ability we have right now is to form groups

We can form groups around our passions

a tectonic shift
use technology for collective action (e.g. Iran)

kids are using the technologies – but in reality – using in ways to socialize

friendship
interest based (like the bowdrill video)
millions of potential teachers for our kids – and kids are doing this without us
no adults teaching them how to use these technologies as contexts for learning in this world
need to be learners in these contexts – teachers need to take time to immerse themselves in these kinds of environments

Sheryl

help children to learn via their interests
teachers become co-learners (and will learn as much or more than the learners)
PD in 21^st century needs to operate from connecting and collaborating
there are pockets of innovation – want to see better scalability
job embedded learning works
Teachers need to share from their expertise (out of diversity true innovation comes)
Linda Darling Hammond – we need to be learning collaboratively and on the job
need – no administrator left behind – they don't get pd – should be with teachers – learn together or with other administrators and superintendants
if you want best practice in PD – a team approach that meets several times / week
NSDC – teams
working in community – co-created content
The process of social learning that occurs when people who have a common interest in some subject or problem collaborate over an extended period of time to share ideas....
communities of practice – one of top ten jobs will be community instigator or community leader
social communities of practice – need to be designed so they evolve over time
what develops is co-created and collaborative with multiple opportunities for member feedback and ownership
The Scaling Framework (microsoft)
plp (personal learning portal) delivery model

Build in Workshops Webinars Virtual Learning Community

- become professional learning teams
- secret ingredient (build it on professional learning teams)
- champion building model

powerful learning practice

seek out schools willing to invest some time in exploring the challenge of 21^st century

Cheryl Lemke - The Ripple Effect

2009-07-03T21:43:00.010-04:00

Cheryl's handouts are here

Innovation ripples through

Adolescent learning 2.0

We have to think differently – begin to listen to and know them more.

A lot of learning going on outside the school
facile with technology but don't necessarily know how to learn with it
the are hanging out, messing around, and geeking out

- adolescents internet use is:– friendship driven (for peer group) and interest-driven (interest driven is often interactive gaming (94%) m and f)
- adults have to add value to animation thing they want ot know
- should we begin to understand what websites they are going to (e.g. cars, baseball, interactive gaming)

The reality is – in interest driven area there are other adults out there leading the learning in the informal space (getting into space as a learner and participant)

There is a lot going around gaming – writing technical manuals, writing modules to change and simplify game – whole environment and life around it. - one entry point to grab them into writing process

- missing the boat when we don't do that
- they are looking for genuine interest and guidance from teacher

Global Kids – get kids connected globally

Multitasking

Multitasking and background tasking – nobody multitasks – we have an executive function that we can only do things serially – distracted vs focused – kids are faster at serial tasking because they are younger
if you have 2 complex tasks that you are working on at the same time you are not being efficient.
Kids are mainly background tasking *other tasks not complex (even music with lyrics takes attention away) – we have to help kids understand that they need to have environment without distractions when doing something serious.
Working memory only holds 5 -9 things that are text or sound – only 4 that are visual
overload – working memory fills up – e.g. child just learning to read may be spending working memory on decoding and cannot then comprehend.
Visuals important – sites for combination of text and visuals

Continuous partial attention – Linda Stone

Student Engagement Matters ranges from Defiant/withdrawn/compliant/tactical/intrinsic

Intrinsically motivated kid has interest in topic

Looking for Deep Learning -To engage – you have to know the students use a learning environment that engage: web 2.0 and technology

Content - /substance organization novelty / variety choice
cooperation and collaboration – so powerful when topic is complex

Your students have access to:
MIT courseware, iTunes U - etc. should be dealing with complex tasks/ issues in school

Interactive Gaming

Democracy2: try to keep a country alive as a ruler
Collaboration trumps competition trumps individual learning (Johnson & Johnson)

Collaboration involves
- Balance of formal and informal
- positive interdependence which promotes personal responsibility
- considerable promotive interaction
- shared workspace
- iterative group reflection and processing to improve effectiveness
If you give students choice – grades go up – more committed.

Involving Students

There is very little sustained discussion in most classes - more teacher to student1, teacher to student2 ...
Sustained discussion – students talking to students

Meyers AP Government blog

Teachers assign blogs (interest not generated )is there sustained discussion?
Blogging to learn (The Plague of Circumstance) Teacher used the blog to make sure students were doing the research

The movie physics rating system
commenting on the physics e.g. in the roadrunner (Voicethread: Video Doodling)
Voice thread – clip in movie – is this possible? Please comment on the physics you see in this video clip

Can use Voicethread to
- check for prior knowledge
- make visible some of preconceptions and misconceptions

Interesting tools to provoke discussion

Flowing Data
use of visualization in learning (Flowing Data)
-takes a data set and graphs it

Democratization of knowledge
http://www.gapminder.org

Students need to know how to search to get the information they need to solve problems

Check out the wizard tools try giving an Internet search challeng

Modeling: Scratch – programming and gaming in very powerful ways

www.metiri.com - presentations

Jamie McKenzie - Reading Between Digital Lines

2009-07-03T13:50:00.006-04:00

Session information
I have heard Jamie McKenzie before and have enjoyed his books. He is really about pedagogy, not about tools, other than in how the tools can serve deeper learning. His session was based on articles he wrote:
- http://fno.org/mar09/digitallines.html
- http://fno.org/apr06/naep.html

He spoke of the need to keep children's wondering and curiosity alive. "Right answer teaching and peer pressure makes the kids' possibility of looking at the unusual drop off".

We need to help the students look through primary source material
e.g. - What kind of person was Matthew Flinders - knowing he was a British naval captain who was the first European to circumnavigate Australia?
Then look at letters - back up statements with evidence
http://www.nmm.ac.uk/flinders/

We have to get away from topical research into thinking.

A taxonomy of synthetic thought and production

invent - design – conceive – originate
distill – refine – extract the essence
improve – make better – enhance – fix (up)
adjust
paraphrase
summarize – reduce
smush – compact – condense - truncate

The scale moves from bottom to top.

You can find out more in his article: A Taxonomy of Synthetic Thought and Production

The term “ reading” must be applied more broadly to include: reading images (faces), students have to understand how to “read a page”, understanding how we are being manipulated

Here are links to a few other of Jamie McKenzie's articles - he is always worth the read.

The New Reality: Making Sense of the World in an Age of Distortion
http://fno.org/mar08/newreality.html
Filling the Toolbox: Classroom Strategies to Engender Student Questioning
http://fno.org/toolbox.html
Managing the Poverty of Abundance
http://fno.org/oct06/poverty.html
great resources for searching, finding photographs

Go to his site - there is lots more to read.
http://fno.org/

Digital Citizenship - Vicki Davis and Julie Lindsay

2009-07-01T10:27:00.010-04:00

Session Information
Vicki Davis
Anne Bubnic
Julie Lindsay (Beijing China)

Students have a lot of technology on them all the time. Spion James Bond Super Mini Digital Camera Spy Pen
- these were used in Iran to capture footage.
We can't ban everything - we have to change behaviour.

Be Careful - This machine has no brain - use yours
Things are becoming unblockable (students have cell phones with data plans) - we have to get to behaviour - can't act as a police state - it's about getting at behaviour.

Digital Citizenship - the norms of behaviour with regards to digital use

Digital Citizenship Digi Teen
http://digiteen .ning.com
Nine elements within three main areas have been identified that together make up digital citizenship (Digital Citizenship in Schools by Mike Ribble and Gerald Bailey)

Digiteen pedagogy
Communication Collaboration Content Action
To be a digiteacher -

research technology and connect yourself
monitor and be engaged
Avoid the 'fear factor' Make a difference

http://digiparent.ning.com
For parents to understand digital citizenship
what is digital literacy

Anne - Digital Citizenship Tools Resources & Best Practices -
bookmarking on diigo - Join the digital citizenship group
Nine Themes of Digital Literacy
http://www.ctap4.net/projects/cybersafety.html
- excellent resource - posters, info, what to do if there is a problem, AUPs - resources for administrators
Excellent poster
Materials can be taken and repurposed, adapted for your own use.
There is a ppt available for teachers - can be printed out
Where does cybersafety fit into the curriculum

students made public service announcements
science - MISSING from Web Wise Kids
dizzywood.com - social networking environment for very young studetns - used for social skills - had to learn to collaborate as teams
Adina's Deck http://www.adinasdeck.com - highly recommended
on diigo wiki http://www.diigo.com/user/abubnic/DCwiki

Vicki's Netvibes
http://www.netvibes.com/coolcatteacher#Ad4dcss
You can have public and private pages - - public shows all your public pages

Easy to feed from Diigo into wiki, blog, Pageflakes..... by tag, by group, etc.

Virtual World - Digiteen Island
http://www.reactiongrid.com
Interview with BBC - and Vicki's students in reactiongrid
9th graders constructed an area to teach about cyber citizenship

Woogi World - to learn about internet safety

Have a discussion with your students about what you reveal
Discuss and agree before hand
First name, last name, pseudonym
age
gender ...
Discuss ahead

With global projects be careful about
- showing affection in photographs
gender
language awareness
cultural sensitivity
responses to others
Be aware that others may interpret and react to things differently - teaching respect for other cultures.

How to deal with problems
Fireshot - takes a screenshot - you can annotate it, blur it,
When you have a problem - if you delete content - then you can't deal with problem - grab a copy and then delete it. Send public comment - because it has been seen publicly.
Print page as pdf
copy pdf to student's teacher
communicate between teachers

Advocates for Digital Citizenship, Safety and Success - NECC sessions with content dealing with digital citizenship

Bernie Dodge: Puzzle Pieces

2009-07-01T08:33:00.013-04:00

Session Information
Bernie Dodge is a self-avowed map lover.

How can we take advantage of Google Maps and Google Earth in a way that makes pedagogical sense?
It's all about place. Kids hear about history as words - place provides a way to glue these things together. It contextualizes and gives another way to think about it. Spatial abilities reside in the hippocampus - straddles both hemispheres. Historically people have known the importance of place.
Simonides - we have a fragment of his poems - he was at a banquet and was reciting a poem. He went out for a moment and while he was out the hall collapsed - because of his visual memory he was ab le to identify who had been there. The method of loci - where something is located - using place to remember by attaching things to places you already know. There is a connection between place and things you want to remember.

He talked about learning that Mark Twain and Harriet Beecher Stower were neighbours - it became a new way to look at them.

Taking kids outside - is novel - their attention will be activated. If you are in a strange place - activate uncertainty. Walking - triggers the senses - the concreteness.

http://promiseofplace.org

getting out into communities - taking advantage of the attention that comes from being outside.
http://www.peecworks.org

Geocaching - his class put together a geocache with travel bugs - one of his students wanted his bug to go to Berlin. He can now share with his students where the bug has been.

Field trips - so much energy spent on permissions etc. the content and forethought of a field trip often go by the wayside.
Criteria

low - no cost
easy
quick

PlacePuzzle is a map-based activity designed to encourage close reading of a complex text. It uses a limited physical space to priovide a context for learning and includes short-answer clues that require recall and creative interpretation.

Critical Attributes
Resources - to be studied ahead of time
Map -of a related place
Clues -on the map that relate the map to the resources and require both recall and ideation

Optional Attributes
Scores kept based on speed and accuracy
Roles to divide up the reading
- Leaderboard posted publicly (gamers like this)
Clues made available one at a time based on performance (like a treasure hunt)

Communication channel allowing players to collaborate in real time

Chaos in Teheran - place puzzle

Clues - Map
Tinychat - embedded in a page or blog
Real Shoestring -
Google Maps - Google Sites to embed the map (at the moment it doesn't always work)
Type in clues - google forms / spreadsheets / docs
You can know when each team solved each puzzle
Eventually Google Wave

Placemark is a clickable clue
"He worked near here and waited patiently for them to pop the question. The grass nearby might remind you of a dairy pasture" - use clue, readings to figure out the clue

Clue |Possibilites (visual - street view, visual - photos, text - wikipedia, proximity - what's nearby)

http://tinyurl.com/cluewriting
Trade Secrets in writing Treasuree Hunt clues
http://www.riddleme.net (pay for service for creating scavenger hunts)

Curricular Opportunities
historical events
distance - area - shapes
literature - novels,
geography concepts
language learning (street view lets you zoom in on street signs etc.)
current events
Field Trip prep - getting kids ready to go somewhere so they can immerse themselves in a place before they get there
Campus orientation
Earth Science and oceanography

|Implementation possibilities
-timed special event (only available at a certain time)
- self-promotion - promote school
- interschool competition / collaboration - have kids create for another school

Novelty, uncertainty, concreteness, time pressure, competition...

Design steps
- Pick topic
- Identify resources
- Pick locations
- Write Clues

He is working on an interface to help with the design - not quite ready

Google Earth - with street view - you can include different clues

Outdoor Version - change format so clues require you to be in the place. Growth in mobile learning will help kids get outdoors.

Web Site Story - http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1913584 - so hooked on Google Earth we don't get outside to see it.

http://placepuzzle.org - will be available with examples, tutorials, forum - authoring tool
July 21, 2009 3:59 pm PDT will be live

Very intriguing ideas

http://www.neccning.org/forum/topics/placepuzzles-1
Links to session slides

Global Connections - in the Primary Classroom

2009-06-29T12:36:00.008-04:00

Session Information
What a privilege to be in a session with Kathy Cassidy, Amanda Marrinan and Maria Knee. I have read their blogs and seen videos of their work with their students. It is obvious that they make learning engaging and enjoyable.

Kathy Cassidy explained how much better learning was when it came from other children. Connecting to each other - Amanda Marrinan- heard about Maria Knee's students going to tap the maple trees. Maria's Knee's students made a voicethread to explain the process which they shared. It was magical. Maria - it's all magic to 5 year olds. She uses technology because it's there - just learning where Brisbane Australia is or Moose Jaw Saskatchewan is - now they go to Google Earth and can explore everywhere - what is the same and what is different. Could not have done that without the tools. They have Google Earth up as part of the project time.

What are the challenges?
Amanda - the children are too young - no - it actually inspires them to want to read and write. Odeo - helped them read what was on. Parents help and learn with the students. When wireless was weak - Skype - around the world - it was a different kind of connectivity.
Maria - safety - she doesn't use names or pictures and names together. She educates the parents - get permission, makes sure the parents know what she is going to do and teaches students how to stay safe.Tells parents that they will have a window into the classroom any time they want.
All agreed that all comments have to be moderated. Cathy spoke of how occasionally inappropriate comments come from students - it became an opportunity (without naming names) to discuss the appropriateness of comments. Everything is a learning experience for the students.

All three teachers spoke of the ways they have their students record their learning, through photos, videos, podcasts which get posted on their blogs. They can revisit and use these for reinforcement and sharing with their families.

Nice to see how primary teachers help students make technology part of their learning environment in powerful ways, to learn, to share, to reflect, to discover and, especially, to communicate.
Session wiki

Steve Dembo NECC 09

2009-06-29T08:37:00.010-04:00

Session information
Sometimes a session is about learning new things, sometimes about confirming that what you think about , use, teach others about is what others are doing too.
Although I no longer use bloglines, the ideas he is sharing is similar to some of what I do in Pageflakes. Next web 2.0 tool - Delicious. A district can have one account - gives everyone access to bookmarks (e.g. grade one math ) which can then be used by teachers and parents alike

ShareTabs
allows you to add a list of links and then clikc tabify - can then get you to all those sites easily (with preview and tabs on your browser.
Can bounce from one site to the other without actually losing
sharetabs.com/?discoveryedu4you

drop.io
publish to web - fax it in, text it, email it, call it
and then share - can do a full podcast (add view share)
can even do conference call
can see things with a variety of views
chat box if more than one person on the site at a time
If you go into settings and enable rich media rss - can automatically share to iTunes for example
Don't need anything fancy to create a podcast - call it in (room for about 400 minutes if you just use site for podcasting)

JayCut.com
video editor in your browser - students can work online - upload media into jaycut - can keep private only to you or publicly
add images just like imovie or moviemaker
even has transitions
Can download in a variety of formats to computer, phone...
gives embed code
unlimited size
Can upload a "bucket" of media and 5 log in to the same account and use the media to create different videos

Edmodo
twitter for students
microblogging with students - behind a password - can choose to have some pieces public but don't need to. Can set up groups and only send to specific groups.
Can add assignments, schedule events
new version coming - faster, ability to embed video files, slideshare etc. can watch within the interface

Poll Everywhere
classroom response system via text messaging 30 votes per pole for free
shows individual votes and can download to spreadsheet
Can set up ten polls in a row and select and create ppt with the polls which will be live so students can go through and answer polls
can also be accessed through computer
There is educational pricing for larger groups

Extranormal
animation site - create 3D animations, text to speech, diff languages, can adjust camera angle`
animate characters etc. When finished - rendering takes time. Can publish to you tube, embed ...
There is a trailer ad before the movie. Paid for version including greenscreen

Livestream
broadcast - can embed in blog
can have multiple webcams, bounce from camera to camera
record student concert and bounce from student's camera to camera

Prezi
presentation done today in prezi
once you have laid the whole thing out - chose the path you want to take through it.

Great ideas!

NECC Sunday

2009-06-28T18:15:00.005-04:00

Malcolm Gladwell - Author of - The Tipping Point, Blink and Outliers

He doesn't talk about anything that his audience knows more about so he is talking about Fleetwood Mac. "A bunch of kids get together in a basement - there is magic and boom they become famous and rich" But that is not the reality. The formation of the band kept changing, they recorded multiple albums before they actually made it big. The band had a long history before they moved to LA and evolved into the band we know. This took about 10 years and 16 albums - it takes time to master something - this is not easy.

In Outliers he talks about 10000 hour rulem(about 4 hours / day for 10 years) for someone to achieve success. We think of prodegies but really there are many hours of hard work behind the success. What are the implications - behind learning there has to be an attitude about effort (I believe my effort is crucial to getting somewhere). It's not just about talent.

Math tests - are really about the willingness to sit still and focus - this attitude has to be communicated to students. The idea that doing well in math is based on talent is a self-defeating profesy - (i.e. working hard won't change your results). However, students who work hard, will do better.

The road for Fleetwood Mac was very rocky (members quitting, including the driving force behind the band) but they persevered. They don't succeed from success - they built on their failures. Compensation strategy - compensate for your weaknesses. When it succeeds - very powerful. Hunger plays a big role - the hunger to achieve something.

Large percentage of entrepreneurs have LD - connection between their dyslexia and success - they have learned to compensate. (The prisons are also filled with people with LD - didn't learn to compensate). They learned leadership skills - delegate (get people to read and write|) learn to talk and be persuasive, convincing, problem-solving - all skills that are part of being a successful entrepreneur.
We need to have respect for difficulty. Create constructive disadvantages in learning environments? Learn compensating strategies

Fleetwood Mac - over the course of their early albums - get better and better; they experiment with the kind of band they want to be. Trial and error to see what kind of music their talents were best suited for. Experimental innovator - find their way to genius through a path of trial and error. For example - Cezanne was in his 50s before he reached the apotheosis of his career - needed a long period of experimentation. Feedback - timely and targeted is important to growth and success (e.g. Pisarro and Cezanne - Cezanne was learning from the master and getting feedback).

Preconditions to approach learning. Challenge - to use energy and enthusiasm and creativity to make learning environment as meaningful as possible.

(I would rather have heard an educator - no great revelations)

Ada Lovelace Day

2009-03-24T20:24:00.005-04:00

I remember learning about Ada Lovelace some 25 years ago. She was such a pioneer both as a woman and a thinker. As, really, the first programmer for Babbage's difference engine, she was an innovator.

As part of Ada Lovelace Day, I am helping to celebrate by honouring some women who, I feel, have helped to advance the role of computing in education. I am privileged to work with some women who have been on the forefront for many years.

I first met Bev in the 80s when we were members of ALICE (Association for Leadership in Computers in Education) which brought together the early adopters in the English school boards in Quebec. She always championed the aspects of computer integration which encouraged critical thinking, creativity and communication - those skills which we now refer to as 21st century skills. She was and continues to be forward thinking. Bev has pulled together a team of people who have worked for many years to achieve those goals. What started as a grass roots effort has evolved through several incarnations into LEARN. I have learned so much being part of that team for the last six years.

One member of the team, with whom I work closely is Christiane. She has been involved for many years with telecollaborative projects. In addition to initiating a number of projects which enabled teachers to learn to use technology for collaboration in a secure and nurturing environment, she found ways to help teachers make connections when they were ready to initiate projects of their own. The most recent development has been the launch of a project registry. Now teachers from Quebec and from anywhere in the world can advertise their projects and find partners for collaborative knowledge building. She is helping to open classroom walls to let the world in.

I have the fortune to be involved in online communities that put me in touch with many forward-thinking educators who push my thinking and learning. The third person I want to honour is my fellow webcaster, Lisa Parisi who has embraced the possibilities of technology to reach every child in her class. She involves them in authentic learning situations, reaching out to other teachers to offer collaborators and audience for her students. Like my colleagues, she is a life-long learner whose enthusiasm for what she does is contagious.

Ada Lovelace was ahead of her time - the early adopter extraordinaire. I think if she were alive today she would be astounded by what computing has evolved to. And I think she would be thrilled to be part of the social networks that have evolved that support communication, learning, relationships, collaboration and problem-solving.

Response

2009-01-20T17:21:00.003-05:00

I always find it interesting how when I'm involved in a project it focuses my thinking so that suddenly I am noticing everything around me that pertains to it. Yesterday I was at a meeting for English language arts teachers and we were talking about response. I thought of my participation in the 2009 - 365 photos challenge and my blog. Both the photos and the writing are forms of response. And I realized how much my mind is primed for certain kinds of photos - what I bring to the picture. Today I had a hard time deciding on which photograph to post.

I knew that many people would be posting photographs of Obama - and I, like many, took pictures of my television. My response to a world event, wanting in some way to participate on a larger basis. I watched my Twitter friends commenting on the event and joined in the discussion, the sense of wonder and hope that the world may be feeling a little brighter. Text to world - How would the text seen and heard on television affect my vision of the world? Another response to this text - I called my daughter and asked her to join me at the television. This event was too big to witness alone. I needed the face to face contact with someone to share.

Taking out my garbage this morning I saw two large crows in a nearby tree. I snapped a photograph. Here was a great example of text to text. In my head I heard the song There were two ravens... This is an old Renaissance song which I have heard sung by Daniel Taylor among others.

There were two ravens sat on a tree,
Down a down, hey down, hey down,
They were as black as black might be,
With a down.
The one of them said to his mate,
Where shall we our breakfast take?
With a down, derry, derry, derry down, down

I don't think I would have taken the photograph if I did not have that experience. So now the photograph and the song are paired in my head.

I finally settled on a photograph of children building a snow fort.

It brought back my time teaching - when snow forts were both positive and negative aspects of schoolyard play. There was always the joy of building but there was also the need to possess and the children were not always good at sharing their fort. I guess forts were always made to keep people in and keep people out. But in this photograph, at least, the children were playing peacefully. Here I brought my experiences - the response to the photo - text to self.

Response is not the reason I started this project - but it is interesting to see how different aspects of my life and experience find their way into my photographs and writing.

Reflecting on the Experience

2009-01-10T12:27:00.002-05:00

It's only day 10 of the 365 day challenge to post a photo a day and I am really enjoying it. My eyes have taken a new focus - looking in a new way.

I just read a blog post by Bud Hunt. He talks about his experience last year. His post led me to an old post of D'Arcy Norman who started the challenge last year. A number of things in his post resonated with me.

He talked about how to become a better photographer - one point being that you examine photos you like and try to imitate (isn't that what we do when we deconstruct ads, images etc. with students to understand the codes and conventions in order to help them become better communicators). I already find myself looking at the photo gallery and asking myself why some photos work and others don't.

He talked about "mindful seeing"

"I mean the act and process of being deliberately thoughtful about what you are seeing. To see what you are looking at. It’s something that doesn’t happen automatically - we go through life filtering what we see, reducing input and stimulus to the point that we aren’t as distracted by visual stimuli. Mindful seeing is the process of turning off the filters, of seeing your surroundings unfettered and unobstructed."

This seems to happen naturally for this challenge. To find a photo a day, I find myself looking in a different way - shadows, silhouettes, even shelves of books become interesting to look at. And I find myself looking more and missing less.

And more from Norman's post

"When viewing the world without filtering, even the most boring and banal subjects can become wondrous and interesting. We are constantly surrounded by interesting things that we normally don’t see textures, lighting, patterns, shapes, objects, groupings, even messages."

Even without the camera my eyes have started to focus on those things.

I hope to transfer some of the mindfulness on the visual to other aspects of my life, which is too often in fast forward as I multi-task. My head is too often filled with trivial details of todo lists, shopping lists and other things and not often enough focused on the present. So each day now, I take time to select my photo and reflect on it - to respond to it as we ask children to respond to their reading - and tell my stories. And so far slow good.

365 photos and more

2009-01-07T11:21:00.005-05:00

I have joined the group 2009/365 photo sharing on Flickr. It has made me think about a number of things. I am looking at things differently. As I view some of what others have posted, I am starting to see the ordinary as unique. A number of people have posted photos of their breakfast and I realize each of these tell a story. And that is what I want to concentrate on as I post my pictures. What is the story each tells...

I started to think of the breakfasts I shared over the holidays and how each represents different aspects of my life and the different cultural habits I share because of my parents and where I was born. The croissants and espresso - so French, so much part of the Quebec culture in which I live. The Montreal bagels and smoked salmon - my Jewish heritage. And my everyday mix of healthy cereals with skim milk - an acknowledgement of my my aging body and attempt to keep it functioning well. So these may be featured in future photos. But it's not just about the story but also about the composition. I started to think about how to make each of these photos visually pleasing - which dishes to use, etc. Photos I have seen of things on a table made me look with new eyes at the objects around me.

I am going to start a new blog - with my daily photos. It will be a new kind of journal - a peek into the different aspects of my life from the mundane to the frivolous and everything in between. I'm looking forward to this adventure.

Seven Things

2009-01-05T19:45:00.007-05:00

I decided to follow Kathy Cassidy's example and write seven things about myself without being tagged. As someone who hates chain letters ( I guarantee I will break the chain and risk all those terrible things that are threatened), the notion of tagging someone with a meme is not much more appealing - more like appalling. But it is fun to let people know more about myself - put substance to the one-dimensional web presence.

1. I am passionate about music - I own many recorders (from sopranino to great bass - a recorder that is about as tall as I am).

Just some of them are pictured above. I play duets with my partner, play in a recorder orchestra, play Baroque music with friends and play in a quartet. Then there are the many concerts I attend. I also go to music camp, CAMMAC, for a week every summer.

2. I love to travel - use it also as an excuse to write. I don't write often enough, but when I'm on the road (or the seas, or the rails...) I take the time to journal and describe my experiences - the last few trips I've written travel blogs.

3. I'm not as adventurous as I would like to be. I'm a risk-taker in terms of trying new things in my career - but I like the security of home and have never lived outside my city.

4. I bought my first computer in 1983. My husband had died way too young in November of the previous year. A friend had recently purchased an Apple II plus - I was intrigued. I needed something to occupy my thoughts. I bought a Franklin Ace (64K and showed upper and lower case on the monitor!) and it sat on my desk for about 2 weeks before I dared to turn it on. Took a course and was hooked. I would put my kids (at the time - aged 1 and 3) to bed and then stay up and play - Logo, an early adventure game... I took my first online course in 1987 - no Internet yet. That was a feast for my brain - I could have adult contact via our online messages while I stayed home with my young children.

5. I love to play with words - my kids groan over my puns. I'm addicted to Boggle and Scramble on Facebook.

6. I have two cats who know how to get the best of me. They are Cornish Rex (sometimes I think they are Cornish Wrecks as they wreak havoc in the house) - supposedly less allergenic. They have been called everything from rabbits to rats - but we love them.

7. Here in Canada we had a wonderful morning show - Morningside with Peter Gzowski. My 15 minutes of fame - I was a guest. There was a panel talking about technology in education. I represented the constructive (and constructivist) view of using computers in schools. That was about 10 years ago.

So if you read this - I hope these words will have added a little colour and painted a slightly more vibrant picture of who I am.

Teachers Are Talking

2008-12-03T12:42:00.003-05:00

About a year ago, I became a webcaster on EdTechTalk. I met my two co-hosts when we were in Webcast Academy, an online, informal course which introduced us to the possibilities of webcasting. The three of us, one from Michigan, another from Long Island, NY and I, have a monthly show where we interview educators from around the world. Recent guests have included David Warlick, Ben Papell and Steve Muth (the founders of VoiceThread), and Wesley Fryer, an educator who is very involved in the K12 Online Conference as well as a new project, StoryChasers.

You can find out more by visiting our blog: http://teachersaretalking.blogspot.com/

Upcoming guests include: Kristen Hokansen (who specializes in copyright issues in the US as a librarian) on December 18 and Helen Barrett (portfolios) on January 15 - both at 7:30 pm

How do you listen to a webcast from EdTechTalk? During shows, listeners can use any common media player (i.e. Windows Media Player, Real Player, or iTunes) to listen to the discussion and use the chat room to make comments and ask questions. The show is located at: http://edtechtalk.com/ Just click on Participate Live, chose the icon for the player you want to use to listen and the audio should start streaming. You can Login to the chat to add your comments.

If you want to listen to past shows, go to EdTechTalk. On the left is a list of shows. Click on Teachers Are Talking and you will be able to download the shows. Or - go our blog for links to specific episodes.

Why do I webcast? It gives me the opportunity to meet, "virtually", people I wouldn't otherwise have access to. I have a monthly opportunity to learn, discuss and share with fellow educators. It has put me in touch with a virtual learning network of educators who keep me informed, share ideas, discoveries as well as personal stories. It makes me risk (though in a supportive community), something I keep telling teachers they need to learn to do. It makes me try on a role I don't usually take. Hope to see you in the chatroom at one of our webcasts.

Crossposted to LearnConnect

Kiva

2008-12-01T23:01:00.005-05:00

I have been meaning to get back to blogging for a while and there always seems to be something that takes precedence. But today I read a blog post by Karl Fisch that pushed me. I was disgusted by the news of the man who was trampled at Walmart - that buying that discounted item was more important than human decency, that stampeding into a store seemed to be acceptable behaviour. As the holidays approach I am struck by the excess consumption and by the buying of wants - not needs. Karl Fisch wrote about Kiva - an opportunity to help people, not with handouts, but with dignity. Kiva is a microlender. People who need small amounts for their businesses and for other purposes are able to get loans. They have a 97% payment record - what North American bank can match that!

Our world is in a financial crisis because people made loans for homes that were beyond their means and the financial institutions played the game. Kiva borrowers live in reality. Their stories tell of the need for small amounts to stock a pharmacy, to buy a cell phone to operate a calling service, to buy a henhouse. These small loans make these people self-reliant. I have joined Karl's group on Kiva.

This is what Karl has requested:

First, I’ve donated $25 to an entrepreneur ($25 is the minimum they accept). But I’ve also purchased two $25 gift certificates that I then emailed to two members of my PLN. I’m asking those folks to then do two things. First, they can choose which entrepreneur to loan the $25 to (they can pick the one I picked, or any of the 773 currently available). Then I’m asking them to consider doing the same thing – purchasing two $25 gift certificates and emailing them to two members of their PLN (with the same request that those folks continue the cycle, a Kiva Pay It Forward plan). It would also be great if they blogged about it and left a comment on this post.

I've made my donation and will send gift certificates to members of my PLN. Let's make a difference and make a shift from excessive consumption to generosity in meaningful ways.

Personal Learning Network

2007-11-19T14:32:00.001-05:00

Crossposted at learnconnect

I have been thinking a lot lately about the people who have influenced me in my learning and those who play a part in my learning now. It has been an interesting journey.

I taught for 18 years at a private school in Montreal where I was the computer teacher. I am grateful to my colleagues there and to the environment that was fostered by the administration. We talked education frequently and they became a part of my learning and growth. We debated whole language, grappled with what it truly meant, planned and implemented many projects together and always questioned our practices and approaches. However, as the only computer teacher in the school, there were areas of what I wanted to know for which my colleagues could not be my mentors. I had to go elsewhere. There were books and certainly Seymour Papert was a huge influence in my becoming a more constructivist educator. But I did not have contact with him directly except on a rare occasion when I heard him speak at a conference.

I often think of Frank Greene, a professor at McGill who encouraged and nourished me. He spoke of walking the floor at a conference - that the contacts and conversations were as important as listening to the speakers. So true.

As I attended and spoke at conferences, I met people from outside my city and, through e-mail was able to start expanding my circle of mentors. I learned that people, even those on the conference circuit, are approachable and are truly happy to share what they know. People in the education business seem to want to share, to see the changes they are hoping for multiply.

When I left teaching and started my current job, my new colleagues were as collaborative and supportive as those whom I had left. Our conversations have forced me to think and rethink about my beliefs and to read and reflect about what I would like to see in education. As we do not meet often face to face, our conversations were often through e-mails and my personal learning network expanded.

However, it has been through the advent of web 2.0 that I have been able to have access to the people in my field on a regular basis and my own growth has been exponential as a result. I regularly read blogs (though I have learned to limit the number), listen to some podcasts and through online communities have come to know people as friends and collaborators whom I have never met face to face. I have many people I can call on to answer my questions, reflect back my thinking and to expose me to their explorations and ideas. Now I can walk the floors virtually and carry on conversations or just listen in on them to nudge my thoughts and point me to articles, new applications and exemplary student work. It has been an exciting time.

I know that teachers have limited time, but I also know that we want our students to be lifelong learners. I feel we have to model this and continue to learn ourselves.

So here are my questions
Who have been your mentors?
Who is part of your personal learning network (face to face or virtual)
How can you use the people in this group to expand your knowledge, share your ideas or create community?
Challenge
Choose one new thing to learn this week.
Where are you going to go to learn it (real world or virtual?)
Who can help you?

Don’t keep the answers to yourself. Share them by commenting on this entry.

Susan

Travel Through Space and Time

2007-11-01T22:25:00.001-04:00

Sylvia Tolisano, in her K12 Online Conference presentation, described an interesting way to open up the world to the students in her school. Two teachers were funded to go to China and communicated with the school along the way. She tells the story of this experience and talks about the importance of story. The school started a global studies curriculum with the objective of introducing the students to a new country in each of their years in the school.
Travel - 2 Faculty travelled for two weeks and collected artifacts and data
Connections - students connected with the travelling faculty through José the Bear as well as through blogs and podcasts etc.
Interdisciplinary Studies - units designed to teach conceptual and procedural information to bring all subjects together.
The teachers tried to make a connection for the students. Based on the book "Letters from Felix" they brought along José the Bear. He spent a few days in each class before going away. Each grade participated in different ways. How could they make the experience almost synchronous for the students so they would feel they were travelling along? They recorded sound-seeing tours, videos etc. Blogs, comments - gave students a lot to learn and to connect with. A virtual connection was made through the use of technology. A blog on which videos, audio files and text were shared. Images went to Flickr and the slide shows were shared. Skype was used for some video-conferencing. You can learn more about the global studies program here.

I think it was great that the students learned about another country. How much better it would be to contact people in the country and learn from children their age. I also found some of the activities rather directive. Nice to be a teacher there - with travel opportunities! However, global understanding will happen more when we reach out and learn from each other.

Holding a Mirror to our Professional Practice

2007-10-29T22:28:00.001-04:00

Holding a Mirror to our Professional Practice the K12 Online Conference keynote by Derek Wenmoth is a thought-provoking presentation. He says that "mirrors provide a reflection of ourselves" and that we need to provide a reflection of the way we behave.

He talks about how we need to change our practice - and need to reflect - but we need enough teachers to do this to get change. It is only through reflecting that we can see if our espoused theory is actually being put into practice. In New Zealand they began a cluster-based PD program. They had money for PD activities and schools had apply in clusters. Teachers tried to get ICT into their program -
questions: What is effective integration of technology
How can we ensure it has educational value?
What is educational value?
People picked up many new technology uses - but is it making a difference?
We need to reflect to see if what we are intending to happen is happening and is it working.
He and his colleagues have developed a tool to assess teaching and learning with ICT in classrooms and results are reported as a map.
He talks about examining why you are introducing tools - what are the educational intentions and then reflecting on whether or not those educational intentions are being met. He says that reflection requires time, challenge and mentors for it to be truly helpful. Then it is important that teachers share what they have discovered. New Zealand's e-fellows - teachers released for close to a year to reflect on their practice, to share with the other e-fellows and thus expand on their thinking allows them to grow and then go back to their schools and help others grow. The teachers involved talked about how important the interacting with other teachers was for them. "The collaboration with others that really has broadened my depth of knowledge and taken me out of my comfort zone." one of the teachers said. This reinforces the idea that learning is social. We need to transfer that idea to the classroom.

They talked about how using ICT in the classroom and how their pedagogy changed - that the classroom was more collaborative. Sharing ideas is valuable for reflection on practice. Technology allows for this kind of sharing.

He asks
What are the mirrors you are holding to your professional practice?
I have started to blog - though sporadically. I am getting braver and am publicizing when I post. I keep saying to teachers - that we need to model risk-taking and this has definitely taken me out of my comfort zone.

Who are the mentors that you relate to?
I have to say that my online community is growing, especially through being part of Webcast Academy. I can twitter questions, write in my blog and share it, skype my professional colleagues. I am fortunate to be part of an organization with people who want to share and reflect.

What is the professional reading that you do?
I read a number of blogs - though inconsistently. I appreciate recommendations from my online community and have been directed to some powerful posts. I have been "reading" the K12 Online conference - slowly but attentively.

What communities of practice do you belong to (online or f2f)

Where do you record your ideas and reflections - blog?

What RSS feeds do you subscribe to and with whom do discuss them?

When did you last visit another classroom?

When did you last present a workshop (to a staff meeting or conference) expose your practice

I won't answer all the questions here - but will come back to them for myself. How can we inspire teachers to reflect on their practice and see themselves as lifelong learners?

Pushing the Envelope or How to Integrate Web 2.0 Tools on a Shoestring

2007-10-29T21:35:00.001-04:00

I am listening to Lisa Durff's presentation: Pushing the Envelope or How to Integrate Web 2.0 Tools on a Shoestring and I am struck by how she just plunged into trying things out with her students. She is a self-professed newbie to web 2.0, but, although she says she is a baby, she has experimented fearlessly and involved her students immediately. She has created a large personal learning network. As she says "knowledge is collective" The larger her network, the more she can know. I am so impressed with what she has done with her students, from video conferencing to blogs, from instant messaging to wikis, RSS to podcasting and so much more. She has tried all kinds of free tools with her students. She is really a great role model for other teachers who may be afraid to get involved. Bravo!

Assessment & Evaluation: Konrad Glogowski

2007-10-17T22:11:00.002-04:00

It's hard to follow all these sessions and still work. That is the beauty of the K12 Online Conference. I can stay at this conference for many weeks or even months and learn at my pace. I'm sitting and listening / watching Konrad Glogowski's presentation on Assessment and Evaluation in an Age of Networked Learning. He talks about how traditional assessment blogs the flow of learning by stopping conversations - implying the end of the task. "grades tend to divide learning into chunks that once completed seem unrelated in the minds of students to other tasks...." In blogging classrooms, it is more about a continuation of learning with conversation - assessment should encourage further engagement. He discusses Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's notion of flow - when a person is fully immersed in what s/he is doing.

In a blogging classroom, Glogowski focuses on 3 of the characteristics of Flow - Goals are Clear, Feedback is Immediate, A Balance between Opportunity and Capacity. Goals all along the way should be clear. Feedback from others and self should be continuous. Complexity will keep people involved. Glogowski talks about the need to set goals, both longterm and short term (how to get to the long term goals). Blogging is a journey. not about finishing an assignment but about engaging with ideas. to produce a body of work

How to grow a blog.
Top - name long term goals for their blog - for their own success in grade 8
What do I want to accomplish?
What do I want my blog to represent at the end of the year

Bottom - habitat
Think about steps they need to take to create the right environment for their blog
How do I sustain?
What resources do I need to tap into to nurture myself as a thinker and writer.
What will make my blog grow?
Predict commitment and habits necessary to reach goals

This helps long term planning but also the little steps to take that will get them their.
He shared some good examples of how students wrote about their goals, habits and habitat they will need to find to help them reach these goals.
How the community they grow around them will support them? How will they support others? This is a social environment.

Feedback - in blogging classroom, feedback is often immediate via comments.
He also gives an example of a feedback sheet for "How to Grow a Blog" The feedback is anecdotal - with simple images to indicate progress. Comments is on progress (work already done) and work that needs to be done. He uses 21 Classes as his blogging platform. Comments by peers and teachers are separate. He feels this feature encourages conversation.

Constant challenge is needed to create flow provided the increase in complexity is not too big a leap so as to produce anxiety. Glogowski feels that stopping for self assessment helps the students stay in flow - to visualize their progress, their level of engagement and sense of ownership. Promotes reflection and conversation between teacher and student, provides opportunities to examine the quality of what has been done and the quality of what will be done.
- skills and challenges are in balance.
Self assessment leads to thought about all aspects of blogging. Who are they as bloggers? Where are they on their journey towards their goals?
Teachers need to ensure that students have ownership for their work.
I recommend listening to Glogowski's presentation. It may not have the pizazz of some of the others, but it is full of things to think about, to reflect on and to challenge. And as Glogowski suggests that it is conversations that guide and empower, we as educators should engage in conversations to support and develop our own learning.
If you want to read more - go to Glogowsi's blog.

Good How Tos

2007-10-17T15:00:00.001-04:00

I have been watching Sharon Betts' presentation on Google Tools. She gives a good step-by-step demonstration on how to use Google Notebook, moving the information to Google docs and then creating a presentation- first with Google Docs' presentation tool and then through Page Creator. The latter can be found in the Google Lab section: tools still in testing stages. It is an easy way to create web pages. I have played with it a bit - found that saving took forever. I have some concerns about the ease with which you can copy and paste from notebook to doc - will this encourage plagiarism?

One suggestion I found interesting was the idea of using a Google group for discussion and reflection.

You can find out more at Sharon Betts' wiki

Google Tools are great for collaborative projects. I use them frequently when working on presentations with colleagues. I have yet to try them with students.

Classroom 2.0 Clarence Fisher

2007-10-15T09:18:00.001-04:00

Classroom 2.0 -

Here are the high points.
Clarence Fisher lives in a small, isolated town: Snow Lake, Manitoba but his students have access to the world. Classroom 2.0 is about change - not about the tools. He talks about changing the possibilities in classrooms. Pedagogy comes first - we have to change the way we teach. We can't just teach our kids to memorize. Tools that promote collaboration can help us change how we teach. Collaboration can happen within our school and around the world. He also talks about how important it is to foster good thinking in our students - so that they can be creative workers, responsible citizens. Finally there is the curriculum.

Clarence doesn't just talk. He tells a visual story.

He spoke about the tools he uses in his classroom - blogging, rss, Flickr, Voice Thread. A classroom that is concerned about information and relationships relies on Internet based tools. His classroom is about relationships. Change has to happen regarding power. They are not just consuming information , but also creating information. It gives them another perspective. Day 1 - relationships are important. That sets the tone. The classroom isn't about "me" but about "us" - what we can do together, learn together - and not just in the classroom.

The most important thing that has to change is society's view of education. They think they have an idea of what should happen in classrooms. That has to change. We have to redefine what we think should happen in classrooms. We should think of the classroom as a studio. It should be a place where lots of different things go on. Not everyone is doing the same thing. It may be a bit noisier. When you think of a studio - time doesn't necessarily go in regular blocks. The studio metaphor is better for how we think of classrooms.Paraphrased a quote by Tom Carel? Learning today is a collective effort and not an individual one. Learning is social and we need to give our students opportunity to interact both in and out of the classroom to construct their learning. Alan November - every classroom should be a global communication centre. Learning is something that is networked.

I certainly know, that for me, this has been true. My learning recently, with my webcast academy community has been moving. We all need networks, connections that help us see new things and things in new ways.

Technology Buzz

2007-10-10T08:37:00.002-04:00

I try to stay up to date - take occasional vacations from the fast pace of shared learning - but yesterday threw me into superspeed. Not for the faint of heart. Last night I settled in for the Fireside Chat with David Warlick only to be pulled into warp speed as I tried to follow David's talk, the chat which flew by and various Skype messages Twitters that chirped and pinged at me. It was hard to ignore the chat when it was peopled by some of the top tech people in the world. Too bad there wasn't a Clustr map to show where everyone was from.

Fortunately, David's talk and the questions only elaborated on what he had said in his keynote - as it was difficult to concentrate on what he was saying (it will be archived). On the chat someone announced that Will Richardson was going to be doing a Ustream - so that was my next stop (trouble-shooting with my webcast partner on Skype simultaneously). If you want to see some of what Will is doing, have a look at weblogg-ed-tv So much to learn - and one of my webcast partners is gung-ho to try it all out.

After a brief interlude with my webcast partner and a successful attempt at streaming and recording on the Webcast Academy sandbox, I turned my attention to Women of Web 2.0 and an interesting discussion with David Jakes and Ewan Macintosh. I'm now feeling both exhilarated and brain dead.

So I'm living life in the fast lane. Trying to learn faster than my brain likes - but it's a great feeling. I'm living what I would like the teachers I work with to live - taking risks, but in a protected and secure community and feeling the support that all offer. My Skype friends, webcast cohort and Twitter community make it possible for me to learn. It's an amazing experience.

David Warlick's presentation: Inventing New Boundaries

2007-10-08T13:48:00.001-04:00

Well - here goes - 3 weeks of thought-provoking presentations to watch and listen to in the comfort of my home from the K12 Online Conference. But the discussion doesn't have to stay there. Through blogs, twitter, wikis and chat rooms the conversation continues. That really is one of David Warlick's messages - the importance of networks for learning, building knowledge and collaborating. So spread the word to others, if you read this post.

I am now watching David Warlick's pre-conference presentation.
He is talking about the importance of side trips in education. Walls are invisible for both teachers and students and it is possible to learn any place. But this comes at a price - how do you get the interaction that happens face to face? What are the new boundaries (not classroom walls)? The traditional boundaries are going away - we need to create new kinds of boundaries to find a sense of structure in this new world.

He goes on to discuss: With the speed of change our children can no longer look to us to see their future. We can no longer describe the future - it is unpredictable. Change is happening so fast - when we talk about digital natives - which it is really about adapting to the constant change. The territory is shifting so quickly. The big difference between digital natives and digital immigrants is not being afraid of the technology and knowing where to go for help. Students know how to find networks that can help them problem solve their technology problems. They are part of a community. They are learning about the power of collaboration - through social networks, online games, text messaging. Our classrooms do not take advantage of this. Instead - we cut them off.

New literacies -
Information (find information, evaluate it, organize it into personal digital libraries)
Math (numbers now apply to full range of content - binary)
What information is competing for our attention
Can you produce an information product that competes for information attention
we can shape and reshape information to create new learning experiences. We can make students remixers of content
Many of our students know how to do this, how to publish online. Our new classrooms are flattening - students and teachers must all be learners.
3 converging conditions
Info-savvy students and tech savvy - know how to play the information, they need us to help them learn to work the information
New information landscape - information increasingly networked, digital, participatory
Unpredictable Future - preparing our students for an unpredictable future - need to teach students how to teach themselves

And I will add - teachers need to learn how to teach themselves - to be open to lifelong learning and to welcome the excitement that comes of mastering something new.

Participation in online communities

2007-08-28T07:23:00.000-04:00

After a long hiatus, I'm back - hoping to post on a more frequent basis. I just read a post by Derek It's an old post - but new to me. He talks about the different levels of participation in an online community. Yesterday I worked with a group of teachers to help them become part of the online community. We're setting up ways for them to be connected to share their learning and to support each other as they get their students involved in online work. I talked about the fact that lurking is an acceptable beginnning step to becoming part of a community. I liked Derek's four categories: consumer (my lurker), commenter, contributor and commentator.

I think any of these levels are acceptable entry points - much depends on the person's personality. I hope to help the teachers see the value of online communities. I know I have gained and grown so much by being part of the online world in education.

Cyberbullying

2007-03-30T17:21:00.000-04:00

Today is Stop Cyberbullying Day and I felt I should post something about it. Fortunately I have never been a victim, but when I was still in the classroom I certainly had to speak to my students about it as they (by grade 6) were already starting. I don't know why people think it is acceptable to do things behind the annonymity of a computer that they would never do face to face.

I was horrified recently to read about the plight of Kathy Sierra. I cannot imagine what she must be feeling. Blogs have been a rich source of educational exchange for many of us. It would be tragic if people stopped writing out of fear caused by a few deranged individuals.

Here are a few sites that might be helpful for teachers, students and parents

Wired Safety
Cyberbully.org

We all have to spread the word to educate people to behave responsibly, whether on line or in other areas of their lives.

Podcast interview with Sharon Peters

2007-03-28T20:44:00.000-04:00

Listen here

It was a delight to interview Sharon Peters. She is an amazing teacher who understands the need to help our students become global citizens.

Show Notes

Global Virtual Classroom Project -

Lower Canada College - Grade 7
Percy Julian Middle School - Grades 7, 8
Santan Junior High School - Grade 8

Grade nine student wiki projects:

Glengarrypedia Wiki
The Glass Castle audio interviews -

The collaborative literature project with Israel -

Israeli class
LCC class

The travel blog for the Australian students - / (1400 visits in 1 month! WOW!)

Women of Web 2.0

Teachers Without Borders

Music by Ensemble Caprice excerpts from Rondeau and Les Barricades, composed by Matthias Maute -used with permission.

Planting Seeds

2007-02-08T19:12:00.001-05:00

I have been very busy giving and preparing to give workshops. It is a time when I read blogs, go off on tangents that the bloggers send me to and find myself thinking a lot about what I want to transmit to the participants in the workshops. Terry Freedman warns about being an evangelist. I want to plant seeds. In some people the seeds will germinate quickly. In others, it will be more like those seeds which need a fire to help them germinate. The seeds may lie dormant for a long time, but later a fire will be lit that will let them flourish.

I get very excited by the possibilities of web 2.0 and wish that others shared my enthusiasm. I worked recently with some teachers who are trying out podcasting. The seeds are flourishing. I helped them set up blogs where they will be putting up the show notes and linking to the podcasts. We have also set up a joint blog where they can document their process, share documents such as rubrics and help each other along. I am excited about this. I hope it is well used. But the seeds are there.

Next week I am giving a workshop with my colleague on 21st century literacy and web 2.0 tools. How do you gently introduce without being an evangelist? I have set up a workshop wiki. I wonder if the participants will go there. I say to myself that the participants have chosen to come to the workshop so I hope they will be open to what we are saying. Perhaps the seeds planted in the workshop will entice them to the wiki to learn more.

Gardening is always full of surprises.

Second Life for the First Time

2007-01-21T19:05:00.000-05:00

I have finally succombed. I have started to explore Second Life. The Women of Web 2.0 offered a tour, which for me was a great way to start. I'm still just getting the hang of walking around, but I don't mind being seen as gauche. I can hide behind the anonymity of my avatar.

Our guide skyped the participants so we had the advantage of voice interaction as well as the Second Life interface. I was impressed by the Space Museum. There is certainly a lot to explore there, with many links to Internet sites to elaborate on what you are seeing. I would not be ready to take students there as, when I looked at the list of most popular places (even when I did not click "include places in Mature regions" I found arms testing and gambling. Not my speed. On a further visit (while listening to a webcast done by Steve Hargadon of EdTech Live (who is an excellent interviewer) with Sarah Robbins, I learned about more educational areas in Second Life. I can now teleport directly to the library and other educational venues. More exploring to be done. The interview is worth hearing. Sarah talks about how she tries to create an environment for her students that is different from what there would be in a face-to-face class. Otherwise there is no point to using the virtual space. She commented that some students were more comfortable, especially initially, with the virtual space. More students contributed to the discussion. Her class met face-to-face once a week and in Second Life once a week.

I know there is a lot to be said about virtual environments. I would like to see a safer virtual environment if students are going to use it. From what I understand there is a youth only section, but that bars adults. We need to have a safe place where teachers and students can interact. I know that students would find this very engaging. I'll reserve judgement until I have explored more.

Going with the Flow

2007-01-21T07:23:00.000-05:00

I am finally taking more time to read some blogs despite the fact that many work deadlines are looming. Today Bud Hunt quoted a comment by Bruce Schauble. I'll quote it here:

"....the best classes, for me, always seem to be the ones that go sailing off in some direction I hadn't anticipated. I used to worry about having to pull the kids "back on track." In recent years I'm more interested in trying to explore with them where the new track is leading. Truth to tell, a great deal of my lesson "planning" is actually done after the fact, trying as you say, to figure out, given today's surprises, what would be a good thing to do next.

And all of that connects to the objection that I think we both share to curriculum design driven by standardized testing. There's no room there for side tracks, we've got to get to page 48 by Thursday.

The artfulness of teaching is about knowing when and how to respond on the fly to things you hadn't anticipated. And if you don't provide room for those things to happen, if you don't give the students room to make them happen, education devolves into something mechanical and soul-deadening."

This is the way I have always tred to teach - to leave room for side trips and sometimes that side-trip is better than the planned trip. I am involved in developing an online course. That is a concern for me - how to build in room for side trips. I would hate to be "teacher-proofing" the experience and thus soul-deadening the students. This was a good reminder.

You Tube and the Arts

2007-01-13T17:34:00.001-05:00

I have been exploring youtube after reading an article from The New York Times about youtube and culture and started exploring for myself. I came across and astonishing number of videos of interest to me in a short search. In dance I was able to watch short clips of Nureyev, Alvin Ailey's company and others. I watched short clips of Glen Gould playing Bach and talking about Bach. These could be very interesting to show in arts classes. Here's an example.

It is easy to include the video in a blog, so you don't have to send students to youtube.

I've Been Tagged!

2007-01-04T22:24:00.000-05:00

The latest blog meme going around is "five things people don't know about you" . I've been tagged. When you get "tagged" you are supposed to write 5 things about yourself that others may not know about.

So for Pam Shoemaker who tagged me.

1) I taught dance many years ago.

2) I love orchids. I buy them when they are cheap and marvel at the way they reflower under my benign neglect.

3) I'm a mac-aholic. I work to support my habit. My first computer was a Franklin Ace (an Apple II compatible).

4) I'm intrigued by the far north and want to go there some time. I would love to see the Northern Lights in a variety of colours.

5) I have a turtle collection. My many years of working with children and Logo in its many incarnations is what started the collection. Once children know you have 2 turtles, they are eager to add.
I've always loved Ogden Nash's poem. My explorations with children using the turtle were certainly fertile.

The Turtle
by Ogden Nash

The turtle lives 'twixt plated decks
Which practically conceal its sex.
I think it clever of the turtle
In such a fix to be so fertile.

Tag - you're it! Jill Hammond Janice Stearns Lucy Gray Steve Hargadon Ian Jukes

New Year's Resolution

2007-01-03T09:29:00.000-05:00

I guess it's that time of year when thoughts of self-reform surface. I took a hiatus from blogging as other aspects of my life became more time-consuming. And I still work to find a balance. While I think blogging is important, I also need to keep time for music, exercise and people in the real world. But I know I need to take the time to think - so 2007 resolution is to take more time to reflect.

I listened to a podcast interview done by Steve Hargadon with Will Richardson and while it didn't say anything new, it did remind me how important it is to take the time for reading and writing. I do recommend listening to the interview.

I also read some of the responses.
Steve commented on others who talked about star bloggers

Certainly, for someone like me who does not have a "large" readership,
most of the motivation for blogging is the ability to think and learn
and network. Is it different than posting to a list? For me, yes,
because my blog becomes a personal repository of my journey. In the
same way that a young person likes to bring a friend over to see their
room, the posters they have on their wall, and the music they listen
to (ergo, the appeal of MySpace, I believe), my blog is a way for
someone to come and see what I am thinking about and working on, in a
way that used to be reserved only for those who were prominent enough
to be published by traditional media.

I liked this for several reasons. I give workshops to teachers about blogs and am often asked "Why blogs? - why not just a listserve or forum as a place for a conversation? I think Steve pointed out one important reason - a personal space, a place to watch your thinking develop, a place to invite others in to view your thoughts and musings. A part of me likes to think of it as a private space, that others may see, but if they don't, that's fine. It's a place for a conversation with myself as much as a place for a conversation with others.

So - to avoid being thought of as odd - and talking to myself in the street, I hope this year to talk to myself virtually, try to make sense of where my thinking seems to be going and if others drop in, that's OK. If not, that's OK too.

Technorati Tags: blogging

Podcast with Terry Freedman

2006-11-30T21:31:00.000-05:00

I had the privilege of interviewing Terry Freedman about the upcoming second edition of Coming of Age.

You can listen to the podcast here

Here are some links re the show.

Terry's site about Coming of Age (first edition)
http://www.terry-freedman.org.uk/db/web2/
http://www.ictineducation.org/db/webw/

Blog with information on the upcoming second edition
http://web2booklet.blogspot.com

Also of interest is Terry's presentation on the K12 Online Conference
http://k12onlineconference.org/?p=72
Selling Web 2.0 to Senior Management

I'm looking forward to seeing the second edition. The first was great!

Technorati Tags: podcasts, web2.0

K12 Online and controversy

2006-10-28T10:46:00.000-04:00

I have been following some of the controversy around the K12 Online Conference
and have been thinking a lot about what Stephen Downes has been writing. My feeling is that one has to weigh the positives and negatives. Nothing in this world is pure any more. I understand his feeling that associating with a company may taint the speakers. However, I also know that there are many people who never get to conferences (and there is nothing quite as commercial as NECC - quite a shock the first time there). This online conference is giving access to a community and to information that may be hard for newcomers to find. It is giving people opportunities to listen / watch and decide who they wish to continue following and the great show notes give links so that people can decide who to add to their blog reads. I have not had a chance to listen to all the presentations, but I have been struck by the generosity of people who freely publish their contact information and offer help to one and all. Yes - there are probably some presenters who are involved to publicize themselves. But the majority of what I have heard just really want to share.

We are surrounded by commercialism in North America. Let's trust that most of us as educators are aware of this. In fact this is on all our agendas when we teach about literacy. Who owns the site? How does that taint the information? How do we know this information is valid? We are teaching students to be careful, judicious consumers of information. I would hope that we approach this conference, or any conference with the same wariness.

As someone who often works with teachers, this conference has provided me with a one-stop place to point some teachers to so they can be introduced to Web 2.0. I love what Jeff Utecht is doing with his LAN parties and only wish Shanghai were not so far away. Since when have people had parties around thinking about education?

There is a buzz of people who are building networks to foster their own learning. I, for one, am grateful to all those who share online.

Technorati Tags: k12online06, web2.0

Community

2006-10-15T21:48:00.000-04:00

I'm sitting in Prince Edward Island, visiting a friend (dialup only) and thinking about how interconnected we all are. Even with dialup I was able to listen to the Women of Web 2.0 webcast from World Bridges, follow the chat, chat on Skype with someone else, check my e-mails, read a few blogs (OK - only a few - I'm supposed to be on vacation). Tomorrow, I'll meet some people I only know through my online reading and listening and yet, I feel I will be meeting people I already know. That sense of community, of being part of something is quite amazing. Together people are building community for themselves and for their students. Something powerful is happening.

Technorati Tags: social-computing, web2.0

Podcast with Darren Kuropatwa

2006-09-27T14:20:00.000-04:00

This is the first in a series of podcasts being done for LEARN. It is an interview with Darren Kuropatwa about the upcoming K12Online Conference.

Listen to the podcast here:

Show Notes

K12 Online Conference
Don't forget if you blog the conference to tag your post as k12online or K12online06

Darren Kuropatwa's blog:
A Difference
Inspiration for the conference came from the
Higher EdBlogCon Conference

TechCrunch
Hitchhikr

David Warlick's
blog
David Warlick's podcasts
Bud Hunt's blog
Ewan McIntosh's blog
Anne Davis' blog

From Anne Davis' blog:
Seize the Time
EdTechTalk
The Thinking Stick
Jeff Utecht

Technorati Tags: K12online

Best Practice

2006-09-13T15:06:00.000-04:00

David Warlick blogged about best practices - what are they and who defines them as such. I really liked Terry Freedman's response

The very concept of “best practice” is flawed: best practice for whom? Who says it’s “best” practice? In the UK we (ie the educational tech community, including government agencies, have moved away from highlighting so-called best practice and towards interesting practice. What can I, for example, take from watching you and bring back to my own school? What works for you may not work in my context — but there may be one or two ideas I can adapt, if not adopt.

What is really important is the notion of sharing. So many teachers still teach in classrooms with the doors closed, not welcoming collaboration. David Warlick has also been talking about designing a new school. I think a crucial aspect has to be time. Give teachers the time to prepare and to talk together about pedagogy. Overload is a serious issue.

I have a particular concern for my home turf.

In the province of Quebec there is a shortage of math teachers among others. People are being hired to teach who have the content background but not the teacher training. I really wonder if we will see any best practices coming out of those teachers or if they will turn to "chalk and talk" as their method of delivery. I hope they will be getting inservice and will truly become teachers and not just content deliverers.

Technorati Tags: education

K12 Online 2006

2006-09-06T17:32:00.000-04:00

I am very excited about the upcoming K12 Online 2006 conference and would encourage people to take part. I will certainly set aside some time to participate. I had the pleasure of meeting Darren this summer and know that anything he does will be done well.
Here are some highlights from Darren's post about the conference:

Announcing the first annual “K12 Online 2006″ convention for teachers, administrators and educators around the world interested in the use of Web 2.0 tools in classrooms and professional practice. This year’s conference is scheduled to be held over two weeks, Oct. 23-27 and Oct. 30- Nov. 3 with the theme “Unleashing the Potential.” A call for proposals is below.

There will be four “conference strands”– two each week. Two presentations will be published in each strand each day, Monday - Friday, so four new presentations will be available each day over the course of the two-weeks. Each presentation will be given in podcast or screencast format and released via the conference blog (URL: TBA) and archived for posterity.

THE FOUR STRANDS ARE:

Week 1

Strand A: A Week In The Classroom
Strand B: Basic/Advanced Training (one of each per day)

Week 2

Strand A: Personal Professional Development
Strand B: Overcoming Obstacles

So far there will be keynotes by
Bud Hunt, Ewan McIntosh, Anne Davis

Anyone interested in presenting should get in touch with Darren Kuropatwa Sheryl Nusbaum-Beach or Will Richardson

Technorati Tags: k12online06

For Librarians

2006-08-27T11:20:00.000-04:00

Should there be any librarians reading this blog, I thought I would share this. Joyce Valenza a librarian I was fortunate to meet in Boston has been doing a lot of thinking about how new technologies are changing and will change how libraries function. At this site she also explores the implications of the changes. It's well worth reading. (via Will Richardson) As David Warlick says - Shift Happens. Let's make sure we understand what and how things are shifting.

What is happening with blogs?

2006-08-26T09:20:00.000-04:00

I just finished listening to Miguel Guhlin's podcast with a group of teachers who are using blogs with their students. It takes about an hour but is worth listening to. One thing that really comes through is the social aspect of learning - how important it is to learn through conversation or written feedback. The students were motivated to write because they had a real audience, but they were also interested in reading what other students wrote and commenting on their writing.
Another important issue that came out of the podcast is the ongoing learning for the teachers. They, too, are reading blogs, learning from others in the field and reflecting on their own practice. This has certainly been the case for me and I thank all who are sharing.

Technorati Tags: blogs, community, web2.0

Code of Ethics

2006-08-24T22:37:00.000-04:00

When I worked in a school we had an acceptable use policy. It was quite simple - statements about taking care of hardware, respecting people etc. Today I read one on David Warlick's blog. It is much more complex but included some interesting ideas. First of all it states that ethical teachers and students..... I like the document addresses all the school users, that students can see that they are held to the same standard as their teachers.
Included in the statements about using information respectfully and citing sources were

"Tell the story of the human experience boldly, even when it is unpopular to do so.
Examine your own cultural values and avoid imposing those values on others. "

Those are important messages to give students. It's about thinking and not parroting. It's about the responsibility to be thinking citizens who think beyond oneself and one's own needs. The AUP becomes an ethical statement that goes way beyond the use of school equipment. I like it!

Technorati Tags: ethics

My new Tune Talk

2006-08-14T21:55:00.000-04:00

I spent most of last week at a literacy workshop for teachers, consultants, librarians.... I brought my new Tune Talk mic by Belkin with me and am now working on editing some podcasts which will include some of the snippets I recorded. I'm learning. I discovered (I'm not a good manual reader) that I have to be quite close to the speaker to get a good sound level. But on the whole, I am delighted with the quality. I'll have to play around some more. More podcasts in my future.

Technorati Tags: podcasts

Introducing Teachers to Blogs

2006-08-10T11:03:00.000-04:00

How do you get teachers excited about learning? about joining a community of learners? Teachers have so many pulls on their time from the demands of the students to the demands of the administration. Whenever I introduce blogging to teachers i always get someone who says - not another thing to check, another thing to read. How can I get them to see the power, the energy you get from being part of a community of learners?

Some of them "get it" and see the connections to what they could do with their students. And they see how easy it is to use the blogging tools. There is a sense of "I can do this". Slowly teachers will move out of their closed-door classrooms and enter the community. I just did some workshops for language arts teachers and got some aha's! One teacher even saw how she could use a bulletin board blog (not enough computers available for the real thing) to start discussion and writing within her classroom. A blog made concrete. The important thing is starting conversation.

Technorati Tags: blogs, community

Social computing?

2006-07-31T18:57:00.000-04:00

I have moments when I feel very anti-social towards social computing. A couple of days away from my computer and the number of blog entries to read has multiplied at an alarming rate. It's summer, but everyone's brains have forgotten to take a vacation. After going to BLC I vowed to pare down my list of subscriptions. I have put in hours, making decisions, cutting out blogs that I haven't gotten around to reading, but still the number of unread entries is way too high. There's not a lot social about sitting glued to the computer. But oh, it is so adictive.

Technorati Tags: social-computing, web2.0

Sara Kajder

2006-07-29T23:06:00.000-04:00

I have been involved in giving workshops on digital storytelling, but it is always interesting to see how others approach the subject. I am pulled by the purists who talk about personal narrative and have seen some compelling stories created by young children through to adults. Sara Kajder spoke about personal narrative as well as about some online tools for creating digital stories.

session notes:
Digital Storytelling

2 essential questions - What are the unique capacities and limits of this tool?
How does this tool allow us to do something better?

Content -- Communicate -- Create

Narrative Inquiry - A fusing of research and storytelling practice which results in a product that tells a story of how individuals understand their actions, experiences, environment and culture

using the pieces of our lives to see what really matters.

Sara Kajder has a recent book Bringing the Outside In There is a support web site

stories structure the meanings of culture

We as members of communities have social networks - digitial story -
pbs - The civil war - images of the civil war

Create a document of lives lived.
Redheads: A digital story - by a 3rd grade teacher You can see it on the storycenter.org site.

What are the elements of a digital story?

point of view
dramatic question
emotion
voice
soundtrack
economy
pacing

A reflective component - take a look at the past - who we were and who we want to become
Connect to - this is not a place to do a book report - you can make digital book reports, but that is not a digital story
Dramatic - the good ones are raw
Opening a door that is uncomfortable
Have to care about what they are writing
Voice
Soundtrack - this is just the icing - lyrics will run counter to student's voice
Economy - affects only to convey narrative meaning
Pacing - stories breathe if they are written well - the students need to learn how to unpack something

Scripts are written on the front of a 3x5 or 4x6 card because words are only 1 element

Steps of construction

- pre-writing "What do I have to say?
- artifact search (visual elements)
- draft of script , storyboard
- script-sharing circle (critical English teaching part, read aloud (used Skype to have other people present but it didn't work as well as face to face feedback) sometimes gets in other adult help) Students taught to preface feedback "If it were my story I would....)
- script revision
-construction (1 day in lab ) - first get down images. Bells and whistles , transitions are absolutely the last record narration 1 -2 sentences at a time.
- screening, viewing and discussion - invite everyone who can breathe - movie makers get a pat on the back, discussion is important too)

If people aren't taught the language of sound and images, shouldn't they be considered as illiterate as if they left college without being able to read and write.

Online programs
Bubble Share
Eyespot does not allow for as much audio control
jumpcut - any user can post video and films - not a safe place
opsound - metasite to upload their own musical content and get safe music

Technorati Tags: BLC06, digital-storytelling

Andy Hargreaves Sustainable Leadership

2006-07-29T21:54:00.000-04:00

Last night I went to see "An Inconvenient Truth" - Al Gore's movie on global warming. The message is clear and straightforward - we all have to contribute to the solution. But there is a solution. We have to move from a "me" society to a "we " society. Until we see that our actions and those of others have effects far beyond our immediate vicinity, we will not change. Andy Hargreaves also talked about social responsibility - how a sustainable school is one which is in harmony with its surroundings. Magnet schools, private schools, etc. afffect not only those who attend them but also those who don't . We have to start working together for change.

Notes from the session:
Professor at Boston College
His powerpoint is available at his site. http://www.andyhargreaves.com
es.com He did not show most of the Powerpoint but it is an excellent reference.

Andy Hargreaves is a passionate and eloquent speaker.

Links between professional learning communities
moving into the age of post-standardization
Spenser Foundation -- looking at 8 secondary schools in Canada and US - looking at change - followed over 30 years

work in UK - has left behind the age of standardization (as have most of Canada, Australia, Singapore and even Japan)
building on positive peer pressure rather than fear and compliance
America is conlonizing the model that most English-speaking nations are leaving behind
have to equip ourselves as educators
how do you lose your integrity? how do you lose your moral way?
Ian McKuen - The Innocent - character makes tiny shifts step--by-step, each of which make sense in relationship to the last one but the whole do not make sense and he finds himself way over his head. He lost his moral core - not by big dramatic moments, but by small adjestments and suddenly finds himself in a place he should not be. We have to be sure this does not happen to us, that we do not lose our integrity.

What is unsustainable - American policy
What is sustainablity? not only whether it can last but also without compromising the development of others in the surrounding environment, now and in the future. (also about social justice)

What is the oppositie? unsustainability?
imposed short-term targets
In the UK, targets in literacy and numberacy failed miserable (National Literacy Standards). What improvements there were were due to test items being made easier.

What does a sustainable company look like -

Put purpose before profit
Start slowly, advance persistently
Do not depend on a single, visionary leader

In US - what is happening?

focusing on reading and math at expense of the arts and other "frills"
focusing on the 20% just below passing to make test scores look better
rates of literacy go up but rates of reading for pleasure go down

Schools are becoming the Enron of education

What is sustainable leadership?
- 7 principles
1) Depth (it matters)

Learning leads to Achievement leads to testing
NOT data driven instruction Testing leads to achievement leads to learning
We need evidence informed practice. The first year things may get worse but in the 2nd year it starts to get better and continues to.

2) Endurance (it lasts)

Sustainable leadership - few things succeed less than leadership succession. - your best legacy is in principles, practices and people
All school improvement plans should have succession plans - where the school is, where it is going, what kind of leadership it needs
- professional learning communities
from slide - Professional learning communities

Transform knowledge
Shared enquiry
Evidence informed
Situated certainty

3) Breadth (it spreads)

distributed and shared leadership
veteran dominated leadership is exclusionary - does not give space to young
novice dominated leadership - driven by enthusiasm rather than expertise - leads to burnout
Best culture is a blend of older and younger
provides mentoring
reciprocal learning

4) Justice (it does not harm the surrounding environment)

5)Diversity (it promotes diversity and conhesion)

networks
respond to changes - in the environment
network schools together
peer support and positive peer pressure

You learn more from people who are different from you, than ones who are the same

6) Resourcefulness (it conserves expenditure)

7) Conservation (it honours the past in creating the future)

From the Powerpoint:
Leaders of sustaining learning:

Passionately advocate and defend deep learning for all students
Combine and commit to old and new basics
Put learning, before achievement, before testing
Make learning the paramount priority
Become more knowledgeable about learning
Make learning transparent
Be omnipresent witnesses to learning
Practise evidence-informed, inquiry-based leadership
Promote assessment for learning
Engage students in decisions about their learning
Involve parents in their children’s learning
Model effective adult learning
Create the emotional conditions for learning

Hargreaves & Fink, 2006

Technorati Tags: BLC06

Bob Pearlman

2006-07-28T13:48:00.000-04:00

Bob Pearlman is a good speaker. He described his work with the New Technology High School. Much of the approach sounds very much like the Quebec Education Program. You can read an article by Bob Pearlman at Edutopia. He echos the writing of Thomas Friedman in talking of how the world has changed and we need to prepare our students for that new reality. My question is - how do we get teachers to change? Bob talks about revamping schools, but I find schools to be firmly entrenched in keeping the status quo.

Notes on the session:
Getting and Assessing 21st Century Knowledge and Skills

Presentation posted at http://www.bobpearlman.org/blc2006.htm

Results that Matter -
Standards that are being tested are low level - need not only content knowledge -

SCANS US Dept of necessary skills 1992
Partnership
www.21stcenturyskills.org

These are the CCCs in the QEP (Quebec Education Program)
Assessment is the key (not for accountability purposes) assessment for learning
just in time assessment - to be in charge of their own learnng

At the core is a student centered, project and problem based teachig strategy that is tied to both content standards and school wide learning outcomes
Teachers start each unit by throwing students into a realistic or real-world project that both engages interest and generates a list of things that student need to know. Projects are designed to tackle complex problems, requiring critical thinking.

Project and
to learn collaboration, work in teams
to learn critical thinking, take on complex problems
to learn oral communication ,present
to learn written communication, write (all kinds - memos, business plans, reports)
to learn technology, use technology
to develop citizenship, take on civic and global issues
to lern about careers, do internships
to learn content, research and do all of the

project - 2-8 weeks long
Students form a team, develop a work contract - build a work plan
online briefcase - assessment criteria

teacher facilitates a dialogue - what do you need to know, how are you going to find that out,
students experiment, apply learning, get to work and collaborate
build presentation - rehearse, present, to authentic audience (who judge - act like a jury and hammer kids with questions)
- can't cheat in this context

When project over - write a reflection - what they learned, assess peers on collaboration skills

PBL example

President's dilemma
get a letter - you are my council of economic advisors. Oil prices are going up, popularity going down. I need a report in 15 days
(need to learn about oil,....)

Moongames
Students are ocommisioned by TOYCO and NASA to create or modify games played on earth to work on Lunar colonies. Using Newton's laws design games that work on the moon

Together we stand
prepare a museum exhibit (images, stories, ....)

The Buck Institute for Education www.bie.org
The project-based learning handbook

Embedded in projects
management, temawork, oral communication, assessment and feedback for students

Have to design project to have multiple deadlines (sub-assignments - interrum benchmarks, process documents - scaffolding )
provide checkpoints
proposals, outlines, plans, blueprints, drafts, edit drafts, models, revised drafts, product critiques,.....)

Process - group work contracts, roles and duties of group members, student generated task or "to do" lists, project calendar, group progress reports, student time cards)
pressure coming from peers not teacher - develop project calendar,

Develop Assessment
Design rubrics for content AND broader learning outcomes
Rubrics should articulate the various performance levels.
Rubrics MUST be handed out in the early stages of the project when they can be used to set expectations.

Rubrics are for students not for teacher - what are key criteria? what constitutes basic work and more advanced?

New Technology High
http://www.newtechhigh.org

1;1 computer ratio

integrating technology into every class
interdisciplinary and project-based
internship class consisting of classroom curriculum and unpaid work in technology , buisiness or education
Digital Portfolio

http://www.newtechfoundation.org/html/NTHLearningSystem.html
You can learn more about their computerized learning system (digital portfolio, etc.) here.

New Technology HS Learning Outcomes

Technology Literacy
Collaboration
Critical Thinking
Oral Communication
Written Communication
Career Preparation
Citizenship and Ethics
Curricular Literacy (Content Standards)

the Big Picture

How can we help students stay on task?
Course calendar (click on any day and gives detail)
- accessible from home or school and to parents with a secure password
How can we beter hold students accountable for their collaboration skills while working in a group?
- teamwork evaluation database - created a rubric - online tool - fill out on each of peers. Over time you can start to map your own scores. Data is available to put in your portfolio
How can we capture evidence of oral presentation - rubric - presentation evaluation database - accessible by students as evidence of performance

How can we give students and parents clear feedback on student performance that better reflects our authentic assessment practices?
Grades broken down - work ethic, social studeis content, collaboration , presentaiton skills, english literature content, writing mechanics, critical thinking, senior project (whatever is relevant to the project)

Grade Portal - the grade book they have created - it is a living report card - available any day of the week. Only finalized at end of term. Students can check at any point and see where work is needed.

Students make professional portfolios
use it to get a summer job, and for applying to college

Curriculum library
digital portfolio
NTHS Gradebook
Collaborative Evaluator

June Edutopia - New Skills for a New Century

http://www.bobpearlman.org

Technorati Tags: BLC06, project-based-learning

Whiplash

2006-07-26T07:08:00.000-04:00

Darren Kuropatwa took us on a whirlwind tour of web 2.0 tools. Ten minutes per tool
http://whiplash.pbwiki.com/

Fortunately there is a wiki to support the workshop so I did not take as many notes. I have admired the work that Darren has done with his students in Winnipeg. His student blogs on mathematics are a model to follow as is his exploration of wikis with his students.

Here are a few notes:

Furl - 5GB storage space

copies the web (text and links) and saves a personal copy of the page for you.
Recommendations
Furl mates - what are other people saving

Feed windows - getting information automatically from other places.
It would be nice to have a Hitchhikr for specific content areas or specific topics. That way you could automatically bring in tagged articles with a specific subject (e.g. JaneAusten NCLB) This can bring in different points of view for your students to explore. You can create feed windows with feeds from different newspapers to read the current stories from different points of view.

Darren shared 3 feed windows.
Feed windows - http://grazr.com/
http://feedostyle.com/
http://jade.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/feed/
You can see samples of how they look on the wiki.

If you want to know how teachers are using wikis - look at Darren's list here: http://whiplash.pbwiki.com/Wikis

The last section of the talk dealt with the cool and ubercool tools that are available. Have a look A number of people have been promoting Flock as the best browser available. It is Mozilla based and has many built in features. (Windows, Mac Linux). Explore the tools - the future is exciting. But be careful you may get whiplash.....

Technorati Tags: BLC06, web2.0

Alan November

2006-07-25T17:41:00.000-04:00

Alan November tried to address what are the problems of today - how can we shift from planning for technology to the quality and application of information and communication. He touched on how the teacher's role has to change. An interesting issue was the notion that schools are going to have to service families more. In particular, with the changing of jobs, adults will need frequent retraining. People who have had bad school experiences are going to have to be lured into schools for positive experiences.

In the US there needs to be more attention to all aspects of the child. Education without decent health care and living space can change little. I am fortunate to live in Canada where health care, at least, is addressed.

Session notes:
What is the compelling problem?

Why are companies no longer funding education? "Why would we fund public education when we can hire engineers overseas? " Up until now you had to fund your own country.

Peter Swartz - The Art of the Long View
using scenarios He worked for Royal Dutch Shell - when oil embargo hit the company
The world is undergoing unheaval and we are trying to fix the current reality.
Stanford University is offering Virtual High School - $12000 / year. - how can you compete with that?

Every library should become an online learning centre -
We have not made tan overwhelming case for technology

If you build scenarios, than compare it to what you have at the moment. The pressure to change is close - no change and then a cataclysmic event (9/11). Process engineering - looking at why things are done and is there a better way to do it? Incentives to change don't exist in education (no competition). should go out into the real world - what are the conversations (internal, customers/suppliers,) apply to education system - what are your relationships with the families. Communications technologies. If we compared education to companies - big gap. Best practices not necessarily in the field you work in. We are used to comparing education against other education settings. Need to look at vision and mission.

Airforce academy hires every student they teach. Measure quality years after graduation. Education measures quality at the moment of the last test. Should be looking at long term - how did we prepare students? Training - asked CEO of HSBC - what are the most important skills - empathy because we operate world wide we need people who understand a different cultural point of view. Passion (Marco taps into empathy and passion).

Have to end technology planning - we need learning results planning. Need to take technology out of title. You are viewed differently if you come as a technology person or as a "empathy and passion" coordinator.

Job description of a learner - who owns the learning. Shift ownership to the students. It is happening despite schools. What are the ways we can get students to own learning - give them real jobs (e.g. I need a podcasting team for the school). Teachers have to know what a podcast is - needs students who know how to do it. No more staff development unless every teacher brings 2 kids with her. What do kids think is important?
Must put a team of children together to put together a code of ethics. The kids must own the code of ethics. It is now greater than AUP. Code of ethics is to protect kids when they are not in school. Role of the child is to help parents. Have to ramp up on family engagement. (In Kansas - producing math videos to help parents) - take advantage of all those colour TVs and DVD machines. Kid videos on how to help parents help learning at home. Reexamine relationship betwwen school at home. Research says family involvement is a huge predictor of student success.

Students can research teacher websites and bring them to the teachers. You have to know what your competition is doing. Do your teachers know who the best teachers are in their field? When the teacher in the room gives assessment - it is harder. Students in IB program more willing to accept criticism when it comes back from unknown marker. Need every teacher to join a learning community - an international community - then creating authentic audience. Students need authentic audience.

New job description of teachers (need to rewrite job description of the family, the learner)
-extend the boundary of social discourse beyond the classroom
- comprehensively manage services across ... (in England - education, social services, medical services)
You have to find real problems in the world and base your curriculum on real problems.

We need to extend our top performing students much higher. Bringing the bottom up leads to mediocrity. We need more gaps across the board. The people who can afford it have bought out of NCLB.

Work on job descriptions
students, teachers, families, leaders - need a mix of all people in each group to do this.
Create a protocol for observations to benchmark other professions (is there a gap between the world we are sending students to and what we are preparing them for?)
Re-engineering of quality control with families. Can take advantage of technology to engage families. Invest in every home, especially in low socio-economic areas. In UK - have picked the most poverty stricken areas and are putting computers into homes. Will be more in family-education business. If we change the family it impacts the child.

By blocking cell phones, iPods.... we are preventing students from thinking about these devices in creative ways. Every school needs a student team to meet monthly (not in leader's office) what are you doing outside of school? what do you hate the most? make link between the outside and what you hate.
Every leader should have a blog.

Every family have a blog. Every teacher will blog. RSS will bring all relevant content to blog. Empower every family with RSS feeds with connection to all teachers. It's not about technology planning. it's about redescribing jobs......

Technorati Tags: BLC06, community

Building Learning Communities

2006-07-25T17:25:00.000-04:00

Started July 18 - completed July 25.

I have only been at this conference for a day and I am very impressed. There are only about 300 people here, which means that you actually get to see the same people over again and continue conversations started earlier. A reception held yesterday allowed people to meet each other and talk. Alan makes sure he talks to everyone and truly wants to encourage community building. I remember Frank Greene, who taught at McGill, saying that when you go to a conference - walk the floors. Meet people. Alan November just said that it's not the sessions that are important, it's the conversations.

July 25 - the conversations were great - and so were the sessions. But it's that lasting impression of being part of a buzz, part of a larger community that is buzzing. Will Richardson talks about the education he has had through his years of blogging and I have to agree. But what is so special is that the education is not just one way. You read, reflect and really think deeply about the ideas. It's much better than any university course I ever sat through. And how do we get students involved and excited about this kind of conversation? Learning is heady, exciting, especially when the learner is constructing his/her own understanding of ideas and issues. What is astounding is how supportive this community is. We scaffold on each others' learning to build something better. It is not about competition.

Oh that the world could learn to work that way......

Technorati Tags: BLC06, community

Marco Torres

2006-07-25T12:03:00.000-04:00

Marco Torres is a powerful presenter. He speaks with passion and spreads his compassion. It would be impossible not to be touched by his stories. You can read more about him here.

Session notes:
Marco Torres from Los Angeles. He showed "When I become a teacher..." - San Fernando. Students mainly Mexican (Aztec). Two cultures - gangs and folklore. He wanted students to understand their culture and population. They took census data and plotted Latino population on a map. Also looked at where poverty was and then people without a college diploma. It was quite telling. It gave the students a good idea of how poverty and lack of education go together.

There are about 5000 students in the school. 56% turnover rate with students and about 36% of teacher turnover. Use limitations to the advantage. 26 letters, 10 numbers, 12 keys on the piano, 116 elements, 3 colours - look what we can build.
He sent kids out to collect data during the walkouts. Their footage and

Traditional communication

Traditional Now
text see hear

Images are extremely important. Peru Negro (there is an area in Peru where a lot of slaves from Columbia moved in. This group is from that group) - hit the college circuit (music) when he saw them he realized the CD is not the right channel for them. Video would be better. He called he band and offered the students to video and would give footage to the band. We listened with our eyes closed and then watched the movie the students made.When the students gave the video to the group - they had a video they could use - were then able to get money to make a documentary and they hired 3 students to travel with them to make the documentary.

School holds a film festival every year. They made a TV commercial to advertise the film festival. iCan film festival. After the commercial audience went from 200 people to over 1000 people. You can see a lot of the films at SFETT You have to see them; talking about them doesn't do them justice.

Language Creativity, Self Esteem & Multimedia.
Marco Torres is a social studies teacher not a media or film-making teacher. He tries to teach them the language of media. School made everyone assign a 15 page paper. He assigned a movie - deliver the importance of voting. Power of 1 The makers got hired by MTV. A very powerful piece about how many world events were decided by one vote.

The Story of Little Suck a Thumb (HS kids went into elementary school to make fiml of stories written by ES students. He sent the students to the library to find the worst children's story first and made a quick movie) Then they made the movies for the grade 4 children.

Be distinct or be extinct! Edna Mole (the Incredibles)
A year round school so no opportunities for summer camp or sumer jobs.
Being Creative: Learning to solve problems

Perspective - changes how you react to a situation. If he saw himself only as a social studies teacher it would be limiting.

Barrier - Obstacle - it can be a barrier
Make it relevant, meaningfull applicable, enthralling
With technology you can connect more with people. His students haven't left community but can communicate with the world. - his kids are publishers

First barrier - self-esteem. He wants to make sure they are patted on the back as much as possible. Connected his kids to little kids. 4th grader wrote story - instead of using fancy tricks - went for simple.
Fortunately..... did about 45 films which were shown at the local library for the parents of the students of both the 4th graders and the HS students. DVD made for all families. Grade 4 students certainly looked up to HS kids. Publishing for a larger audience.

Communicate with family - a lot of projects where they interview family members. Capturing stories. OUr stories are just as important as formal history. When showing at the film festival - standing ovations. A lot of affirmation for the students. The student's grandfather passed away but still have the film footage and preserve an important part of the culture and the history of the kids.

Connecting student to the immediate community. In the community there are many people without children - wanted to include them. Made a movie of who makes the best tacos. Put fliers in all the taco shops.
Best Taco in San Fernando - interviewed owners of taco shops - gave copy of video to taco videos. The video was shown on community television.

Connecting student to community - a lot of kids came to US as kids without parents. They are raised by friends of the family, siblings, grandparents.
Separados
He wanted to make sure the kids were not just statistics at the school. This year music has been important. He has some background in recording. Relationship of his students and some rappers in Belgium
&Drew and LeFic -
Kids are producing a lot of CDs. They give his CDs

Seat belt winner - he wants to make sure that his kids are producing things so different that they are noticed - creativity plan
17000 entries - 6 of top 15 from his class.

Embrace Obstacles
Relevant Meaningful Applicatble
Create a business plan

Record a band and make a business plan for them
Built a web site for the band, started a MySpace account
snuck into battle of the bands with small cameras - made a gritty video
Real economics business plan - not artificial
One of the DVDs got in the hands of Christopher Nolan. The music was used in a triler for Batman movie
The band got a contract because of this - bought a car

Frankie and Rachel
Adrian is a good hip hop rapper (keeps all local musicians in a database so they can use them for movies
Dreams - got in the hands of other rapper and they invited him to rap with them.

David Pena - mariachi - recompose the star wars songs in mariachi style The theme of the film festival Reurn of iCan - When John Williams heard it he wrote to David and sent him a signed score of the original Star Wars

When you put the family in the movie the parents and extended famiy show up to the festival. Have outgrown several venues.

embrace your obstacles (Be a snowboarder)
Make it relevant
Make it meanignful
Make it applicable

Innovate
Infect Others with Curiosity

Do important work, valuable work, liberating work

http://homepage.mac.com/torres21/

Take 2: I went to the "after the keynote session"
A group of his students went to college and thought they would get even better than what was in the ghetto.
Being digital in an analog world (hard to pay attention - lectures for visual people - teaching today using yesterday's tools This is an amazing piece of work. This was done by his former students in different universities who planned the whole movie using iChat, planned the kinds of shots they needed, edited, etc. without meeting face-to-face.

One way and that's the way you have to do it. - real time learners
"The jobs that colleges are preparing us for are being outsourced now, We have to teach kids to advocate

In a school where he doesn't recognize staff because of the constant turnover
He created a team - only 6 left.

Students - because of planning structure, the sudents write a lot more. - they just don't realize this.

Every project he showed was done in a day - quick victory builds will.
What would make it boring - try not to do that. Build story boards
Marco has created a series of podcasts (and vodcasts) with his students: Flickschool.com You can find some how-tos, tips etc.
find experts - create a network so you can get on iChat to help each other.

When a student was asked why he makes videos he said, because my mouth doesn't do my mind justice.
We have to provide the right channels for our students to get their voices heard.

Technorati Tags: BLC06, digital-storytelling

RSS, podcasting- Will Richardson

2006-07-25T11:03:00.000-04:00

A full day workshop needs more than one blog item. In the afternoon we whizzed through RSS, podcasting.... The important message is that this will engage students, give authentic audiences, bring in authentic up-to-date materials for critical thinking. How do we engage the teachers?

Real Simple Syndication - feeds of information can go to an aggregator. If you want to search on Google for a feed, you can add RSS to your search. e.g. New York Times RSS. You can also see the sign on the site that there is a feed.

Aggregator - Bloglines.com It is easy to set up. (The bigger problem is that you soon have way too much to read!).

Flickr - photo feed
can subscribe to photos on a particular topic
In Del.icio.us can find articles on a particular topic - can subscribe
Can find others who are reading on a topic. Can go to an individual. You can then subscribe to that individual's list on that topic. You can have researchers 24/7 just by subscribing to what they are reading. Tagging on a social site because we want to share it.

You can really mine the intellectual prowess of other people to inform your own practice.

You can take RSS feeds and put them together (mashups) in a web page to share with others.
suprglu.com

Feed2JS - if you have a static web page into which you want to bring RSS content. Put in the feed address. Generate the javascript. You can aggregate content on a page on a particular topic. You can follow your eBay auctions, track packages.....

You should check your bloglines account daily. You can create your own newspaper e.g. education feed from NY Times, science feed from CBC, music from

When working with kids - use Furl - Furl saves a picture of the page. If the page goes, the document is still there. You can also create citations with Furl in MLA, Chicago, and APA.

Podcasting - much more than recording audio
Room 208 Bob Sprankle in Maine
Radio Willow Web - Tony Vincent
Mabryonline Tyson

1. Have to be able to record audio - Audacity (if you don't have a Mac with Garageband) You also need the lame encoder. That's what will allow you to export as mp3

2. Need a way to edit audio (same software)

can bring in another track

3. Publish as an mp3 file
4. Get mp3 file onto a server that creates a link to it.

You can upload to ourmedia.org (free) - they will give you the link. You can then link it to your blog.

5. A podcast is a series - that can be subscribed to

At podcasts - submit a podcast

Odeo - login and odeo will allow you to record through the web interface. This is a quick a dirty way - it gives you a link. It gives you a piece of code that you can paste into your blog.

Camtasia - easy video editing software will create video iPod format. (not free)
Screencasting - capture screen while you are talking - windows media encoder (PC only)

How do we get teachers enthusiastic about these technologies?
...small steps

Technorati Tags: BLC06, RSS, web2.0

Will Richardson on wikis and blogs

2006-07-17T13:32:00.000-04:00

Wikis are for content - blogs are for conversation.

pbwiki - peanut butter wiki

You need to know how to use the discussions the editing and history. You can find Will Richardson's wiki at
http://webloggedlinks.pbwiki.com/ To learn more about wikis click on the wiki section.

High School collaborative writing
http://schools.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page
All can contribute to specific articles. Teacher put in a template e.g. State your first reason, state your second reason, I...

You can use a wiki for projects that are much bigger than your classroom wikiville - http://www.wikiville.org.uk/index.php/Main_Page
You can explore the other links from Will's site.

Can have a wiki only visible to members, only editable by members - there are various levels of security. Collaboration needs to be done assyncronously.

pbwiki.com
With pbwiki you have 1GB of space. We learned to create a wiki. pbwiki automatically has Google ads.
A wiki could be used as a portfolio.
Blogs are for conversations.

Edublogs.org - give you a media wiki with your blog. Media wiki is a little more powerful than pbwiki. pbwiki is looking for feedback from educators - so you can send in suggestions.

Blogs can be used for many purposes. The "blog snob" answer - to do something I can not do on paper. A different genre of writing - the ability to link and the ability to connect - Connected Writing. Blogging is intellectual sweat - about thinking. The real benefit of using a blog is to connect to others. If you really want to engage your ideas and the ideas of others and to start writing in depth - blogging is the way to go. Blogging does not start with writing. it starts with reading. Journalling starts with writing.
It is a process - read - thinking about what you are reading in one's own context. If it's important, create a post - here's what I read, here's what I think. and implicit in that is - give me feedback. Writing for an audience, making thinking transparent. A post may be a synthesis of a number of ideas. Will talked about having a real sense of ownership of his blog. If he is going to write a comment, he leaves a comment with the link to the full reflection on his blog.

Kuropatwa - scribe posts. His students are teaching others - they get more hits from outside the class than from within.

blogger.com - simple solution
edublogs.org - wordpress blogs

The workshop went on creating a blog with nlcommunities. This is a nice software. If you want other teachers to post to your blog, they have to be members of nlcommunities. Once they are members, you can create a group block with multiple authors. There are some nice features.

To become a more public blogger - go to other blogs and leave a message - I posted a comment on my blog. Write the responses. You have to become a blog reader. If you know some bloggers with a high profile, send them links. There are people out there who will read your stuff. But don't get discouraged. A small community of practice / of learning can lead to some excellent discussion.

Categories: wikis, blogs

Will Richardson - On-line communities: Blogs, wikis and other cool tools

2006-07-17T09:25:00.001-04:00

Here I am in the Alan November conference - 5 hours with Will Richardson. Lucky me. I'm jealous - he has an iTrip on his iPod so this session or parts of it may be available later. When is the one for the video iPod going to be ready? - -

I am now writing on July 25 - going over my notes and polishing what's here. AND I now have my new mic for my video iPod! Will took us on a whirlwind tour of a variety of apps. Schools have to change to meet the needs and learning styles of today's students.

Educators need a context for the use of the tools -
Will do Blogs, wikis, RSS, other cool tools
You can find a lot of information at Will's wiki http://webloggedlinks.pbwiki.com/

This is a changing world.
- imagination - how can we think about how to use the technology?
Kyle of One Red Paper Clip - used his imagination to connect with the world and traded up to his house.
Animé video and other audio - and create mashups - and publish

Can share in ways we haven't before.
Over 1 billion people connected to the web - in 9 more years there will be 2 billion. There are 1 trillion links
Used to just consume information and now can create and contribute our own ideas and thoughts.

"We are at a turning point in the technology industry and perhaps even in the history of the world " Tim O'Reilly
Technorati - good search tool for blogs and does research on the blogosphere.
Now we are linking ideas, conversations, and people. Blogging can be a powerful learning experience for kids.

"society of Authorship"
an active and participatory web

Read Free Culture - Lawrence Lessig - available free online
Mentioned Creative Commons

25 million kids creating content online
Kids are tapping into the technology easily
Matthew Bischoff - podcasting in November 2004 (only 2 months after podcasting started) - at 13 he was a teacher - who was teaching to an audience.
Will's daughter made a weather book. Will scanned it and put it up on Flickr - she can see the number of readers (over 1000 already).
Sandaig School website all done by kids
The way to learn something is to teach it - these students are teaching others.

We can connect to things much more powerful outside our classrooms. Need to change classrooms
MIT Opencourseware - you can take over 600 courses free
The entire South African Curriculum is on a wiki which is part of a larger project - wikibooks
It's an organic text which is evloving (and hopefully geting better) Over 1000 books are in development

Rip, Mix and Learn environment
The Web changes teaching - teacher as connector
"Teacher as DJ"
H20 - playlists - can pull in the most relevant resources as needed.
Skype - a classroom gave classroom presentations while their parents were Skyped in.

How can we re-envision teaching?
Learn Anything Anywhere Anytime
"ubiquitiously connected and pervasively proximate" (Mark Federman)

From just in case learning to just in time learning (in case you need to know this)
Nomadic learning - self-motivated
"Learning networks based on meaning not proximity" - Stephen Downes

So many ways of sharing
Digg ( from the site: Digg is all about user powered content. Every article on digg is submitted and voted on by the digg community. Share, discover, bookmark, and promote the news that's important to you!)
del.icio.us social bookmarking
Flickr photo sharing

From Hand it in to publish it - changes fundamentally what we ask kids to do.
What needs to change for students to publish to larger audiences.

We need to teach kids to read in hypertext environments
Small Pieces Loosely Joined - David Weinberger

Literacy is Editing

JumpCut - can edit movies through a web browser can then send it out

Thinkfree online office
Google spreadsheets
More and more the web is becoming an application

MySpace would be the 12th most populated country in the world
We are up in arms about how youth are using MySpace, but they are only following

Rupert Murdock owns MySpace and plans to make it the biggest advertising - need to use it to teach about media literacy Students need to learn how to be functional about social environments. We have to teach our kids. We need to know MySpace. We need to get in there to understand it.

Change is inconvenient - Al Gore
But change is coming.....

US - School 2.0

but - we take the tools they use out of their hands - schools are looking less and less about the real world
Chris Lehman

Technorati Tags: BLC06, web2.0

Will Richardson - On-line communities: Blogs, wikis and other cool tools

2006-07-17T09:25:00.000-04:00

Here I am in the Alan November conference - 5 hours with Will Richardson. Lucky me. I'm jealous - he has an iTrip on his iPod so this session or parts of it may be available later. When is the one for the video iPod going to be ready?

Educators need a context for the use of the tools -
Will do Blogs, wikis, RSS, other cool tools

This is a changing world.
- imagination - how can we think about how to use the technology?
Kyle of One Red Paper Clip - used his imagination to connect with the world and traded up to his house.
Animé video and other audio - and create mashups - and publish

Can share in ways we haven't before.
Over 1 billion people connected to the web - in 9 more years there will be 2 billion. There are 1 trillion links
Used to just consume information and now can create and contribute our own ideas and thoughts.

"We are at a turning point in the technology industry and perhaps even in the history of the world " Tim O'Reilly
Technorati - good search tool for blogs and does research on the blogosphere.
Now we are linking ideas, conversations, and people. Blogging can be a powerful learning experience for kids.

"society of Authorship"
an active and participatory web

Read Free Culture - Lawrence Lessig - available free online
Mentioned Creative Commons

25 million kids creating content online
Kids are tapping into the technology easily
Matthew Bischoff - podcasting in November 2004 (only 2 months after podcasting started) - at 13 he was a teacher - who was teaching to an audience.
Will's daughter made a weather book. Will scanned it and put it up on Flickr - she can see the number of readers (over 1000 already).
Sandaig School website all done by kids
The way to learn something is to teach it - these students are teaching others.

We can connect to things much more powerful outside our classrooms. Need to change classrooms
MIT Opencourseware - you can take over 600 courses free
The entire South African Curriculum is on a wiki which is part of a larger project - wikibooks
It's an organic text which is evloving (and hopefully geting better) Over 1000 books are in development

Rip, Mix and Learn environment
The Web changes teaching - teacher as connector
"Teacher as DJ"
H20 - playlists - can pull in the most relevant resources as needed.
Skype - a classroom gave classroom presentations while their parents were Skyped in.

How can we re-envision teaching?
Learn Anything Anywhere Anytime
"ubiquitiously connected and pervasively proximate" (Mark Federman)

From just in case learning to just in time learning (in case you need to know this)
Nomadic learning - self-motivated
"Learning networks based on meaning not proximity" - Stephen Downes

Digg
del.icio.us
Flickr

From Hand it in to publish it - changes fundamentally what we ask kids to do.
What needs to change for students to publish to larger audiences.

We need to teach kids to read in hypertext environments
Small Pieces Loosely Joined - David Weinberger

Literacy is Editing

JumpCut - can edit movies through a web browser can then send it out

Thinkfree
Google spreadsheets
More and more the web is becoming an application

MySpace would be the 12th most populated country in the world
We are up in arms about how youth are using MySpace, but they are only following

Rupert Murdock owns MySpace and plans to make it the biggest advertising - need to use it to teach about media literacy Students need to learn how to be functional about social environments. We have to teach our kids. We need to know MySpace. We need to get in there to understand it.

Change is inconvenient - Al Gore
But change is coming.....

US - School 2.0

but - we take the tools they use out of their hands - schools are looking less and less about the real world
Chris Lehman

That's the content - just notes from the first part of the session. There will be some elaboration on some of the tools when I get the time.

Categories: blc06, web2.0, will-richardson

Conference Blogs

2006-06-30T09:17:00.000-04:00

David Warlick has set up a new service: Hitchhikr People can register conferences, suggest tags and Hitchhikr finds all blog entries that use that tag. It's one stop conference reading and viewing as Flickr images are also available. It's not perfect - I looked at an entry and it had BLC in it but it was not the Alan November conference, but it is quite amazing that you can get everything in one place.

So.... if you are going to a conference please share through a blog. Don't forget to tag your entry You can check the tags at the Hitchhikr site and even get the code you need to enter into your blog. Then you can enter the the url of your blog and ping Technorati, again through the Hitchhikr site to be sure your entry is found.

I'll be at Building Learning Communities mid July and I'll be blogging.

Categories: hitchhikr, conferenceblog

Games - capturing students' interests

2006-06-02T14:44:00.000-04:00

Wow - I just visited Bud Hunt's blog and saw a student production on Othello. This student has combined his love of games with a class on Shakespeare. Talk about engagement! I am sure more work was done on this project than on a standard essay. Did he learn about Othello - yes. Did he make that learning his own? Unquestionably. Bravo to both the student and to Bud Hunt who provides a classroom where this is not only accepted but celebrated.

Fences or Free Access

2006-05-23T23:32:00.000-04:00

I have been reading a lot of blog posts lately that deal with the possible legislation to ban access to a number of online communities. David Warlick's post: New Story Case in Point : DOPA provides rebuttles. Putting up walls will not keep students safe. It is education that will. If there is no access to the learning communities in school, students will go in their spare time from home when they are unsupervised. We need to make our students Internet savvy and to do that we need access. But I think it is even more than that. They need to learn to use the tools well. Insipid chats of Hi, what R U doing? can be replaced by blog entries or exchanges for deeper learning and understanding. Let them see the power of the tools.

Change

2006-03-26T10:36:00.000-05:00

I found this quote on Possibilities ---- blog.

"You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete." --Buckminster Fuller

I have been thinking a lot about change. Fuller's words make me think about the conversation David Warlick has started on "the new story". Education has to change. The old model is for an earlier time. But there are stakeholders (textbook companies, testing companies) who rely on things remaining the same and I fear they have political clout. We have to get people to understand that a 20th century education will not equip our students for the realities of even the current world, much less the future.

In David Warlick's latest post he says:

Its not so much that technology has changed the nature of teaching and learning, but that technology has changed the nature of information and how the world works, and how people work and learn and play. Because the world that we are preparing our children for is changing so dramatically (and continuing to change), we must rethink the what, how, and why we are teaching our children, and retool our classrooms to accomplish new goals.

I think it is more than retool classrooms. Although I don't agree that schools will disappear (if nothing else, parents need a safe place for their children while they are out working), but they have to change into a more fluid place, where students interact more with other students of varying ages and where they is a lot of contact with the outside world, both virtually and physically. We need to retool our schools. This is a big subject and will need a lot of thought.

The art of commenting on blogs

2006-03-25T09:57:00.000-05:00

I have just discovered a couple of new blogs, one by D. Kurpotwa whose blog, A Difference led me to his blog on mentoring. He writes about how to comment on blogs and podcasts and how important these conversations are. Another blog on the same subject is A Pirouette: Commenting by Lani Davis. Here are some of her suggetions for comments.

treating all bloggers with respect.

seeking first to understand what is being said.

celebrating another's accomplishments.

using school appropriate language.

rephrasing ideas in the blog that made me think, made me feel, or helped me learn to let the blogger know his/her voice has been heard.

commenting specifically and positively, without criticism. If I disagree, I will comment appropriately, politely stating my perspective.

being mindful always that I may be a role model to my audience, especially if they are younger than I.

making no reference to, link to, and/or giving access to any information that may be inappropriate for a school setting.

asking at least one question in my comment with the hopes of continuing a conversation and deepening thinking.

using a triple check before submitting any comment: Would I be happy to have my mother read this comment? My grandmother? My favorite teacher?

I think it is important that we encourage students through our comments in an authentic way. The more we can foster a larger conversation through blogs and podcasts, the more we can clarify thinking and learning. My blog reading has certainly led to a lot of reflection on my part. Let's get the kids involved too.

Quebec education

2006-03-22T07:36:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I posted about how Maine educators seem to have their priorities straight. I live in the province of Quebec. I am happy to say that we do not have the same kind of high stakes testing. Many teachers would argue that we have too much testing, but we have a different kind of testing. What is being created are "Learning and Evaluation Situations" These exams include collaborative work and research. What they don't include are multiple choice questions. Then what is the problem? To do this kind of exam takes time. Teachers resent the two weeks (an hour a day) it takes to administer the exam. I envy the discussion Bob Sprankle described in his podcast of the Maine training for the laptop program. Here people are using the changes to curriculum as something to boycott for leverage in contract talks. The teacher contracts have now been settled, but the years of anger have caused many teachers to have negative attitudes towards what I feel is an amazing program. You can read about it here (lots of jargon - but the underlying aims are sound and exciting).

I see a lot of resistance to change. Bob talked about teachers going in to teaching because they like to learn. I have met many teachers like that. But I have also met many who just want to continue teaching the way they were taught. However, until society really values teachers and truly sees teaching as a profession with specific skills, some teachers will not value teaching either.

We have a teacher shortage coming up here. Our government has proposed as a solution - let students who are in their last year of teacher training go into the classrooms and finish their degrees at night. Or have people with degrees in a particular subject area (but no teacher training) go into the high schools to teach. What does this say about teaching? Is what we learn at university worthless? Perhaps if salaries were better the profession would attract more people who would like to teach, but need to earn more.

This is a bit of a rant. But I get discouraged and understand when others talk of their frustration in trying to convince others that the world has changed. But tomorrow is another day. Change is inevitable - it just may come more slowly than some of us want.

More Web 2.0

2006-03-21T11:32:00.000-05:00

I recently listened to the podcast which addressed David Warlick's Telling a New Story. Wesley Freyer gathered a group of educators to discuss the notion of telling a new story. Today I listened to Bob Sprankle's response. He talks about education constantly reinventing itself.

He talks about how the new tools (blogs, podcasts) provide teachers with ways to learn and share information. The conversation can now take hold. Collaboration is possible on a global level. The isolationism is gone - teachers can enter into the discussion. In blogs and podcasts teachers are reflecting on best practices in a public way. Everyone can get in on the discussion. Like Bob Sprankle, I feel I have been able to receive incredible professional development through these and other new tools. I admit to being a blog adict (not writing as much as I feel I should, but reading). I have my favourites who I read daily and others which I sample occasionaly. The wonderful thing is how it keeps me thinking and reflecting on educational practice

Maine sounds like a great place to teach. Bob Sprankle talked about how in training for the laptop program, teachers were interested in how they would change pedagogy. The laptops were only the tool.

In both podcasts, there was a lot of talk about pedagogy. The web 2.0 only provides tools to

help students create a purpose for their learning
allow for reflection and assessment of learning
build community
continue the conversation

It is a vehicle for networking. Listen to these podcasts. They'll get your mind working.

Categories: web2.0, Warlick, Sprankle

digital stories

2006-03-11T10:11:00.000-05:00

The more I look at digital storytelling, the more I realize the power this can have. I just came across an interesting website - Murmure - the Montreal version or Murmur - the Toronto version. The site has clickable maps. Each red dot represents a personal story related to the spot on the map. What a neat project this would be in schools. The students could create their own maps or use Google Maps to pinpoint places on a map. The audio stories could then be connected to those spots. This could be personal narrative - the students' own stories, interviews with seniors to find out what the neighbourhood was like, historical moments - stories of important historical events, a walking tour of the neighbourhood.

Interestingly, in The Gazette there is a 5 part story tracing the story of a house in which the author lives. An architectural plus personal tour of a neighbourhood would be interesting. When we tell stories we start to look and to see new things. Let's open our eyes and hearts and tell the stories.

Categories: DigitalStorytelling

The value of blogs and Web2.0

2006-03-01T14:25:00.000-05:00

If anyone is still questioning the value of blogs in education think about this. A student who participated in a math blog has, on his own initiative joined the new math class in order to mentor them. D. Kuropatwa writes about it on his blog. Blogging is a natural environment for students. From Xanga to MySpace to other social digital environments, they are used to the exchange of ideas (perhaps not on a sophisticated level - but fostering that is up to educators)

David Warlick in a recent post talks about the Web 2.0 and what he sees as the important aspects.

Content is Conversation

Millions of people are talking now, and they are talking in such a way (blogs, wikis, and podcasting) that the world is potentially their audience. This is important, I believe, because in a time of rapid change, the answer to brand new questions may not come from someone who got their PHD ten years ago. It may just come from something, that somebody said, yesterday.

Content is organizing itself

Well this is a rather melodramatic statement, meant to start a conversation about how the way that information flows is largely resulting from the behavior of its readers. Aggregators, mashups, blog linkings, and other more esoteric techniques are causing us to reshape the information environment on a global and on a personal level.

People are connect to each other through their content

This one has had a personal impact on me, as I have made new friends through the comments and blog-passing of people who react to my ideas. Far more important is the fact that through these exchanges, I have learned. My ideas have been challenged and they have grown, as have I.

It is this interconnectedness that I think is so powerful for students. Kuropatwa's former student saw value in connecting to the new group. Because of the asyncronous nature of blogs this was feasible. What math student can take the time to go sit in on math classes of a course he has already taken? Yet with a blog this student was able to mentor the new students.

It is essential that we help students become thoughtful contributors to the web - and equally important that we help them become thoughtful consummers of what is available.

Categories: Web2.0, blogs

Is it a game?

2006-02-16T18:36:00.000-05:00

I met Andreas Ua'Siaghail over a year ago at a computer conference here in Montreal. He spoke to me of some software he was developing: Pax Warrior. He subsequently showed it to me. It is a simulation based on the Ruandan genocide, with original film footage as well as interviews with genocide survivors. The job of the player (hopefully in collaboration with classmates) is to experience the constant decision-making that General Dallaire needed to go through. The player is given as much information as Dallaire had. Each decision may result in worsening the situaion or not. This is a very realistic situation in which you face many ethical issues. You can't change the past, but can you change the future. By becoming informed decision makers, perhaps our youth will make ethical decisions which may put humanity before money. I was impressed by the software. Andreas sent me a link to an interview on the BBC (only available this week) which is worth listening to. The item which precedes it on the show is interesting too! Have a look at what this simulation can do.

Cultivating Digital Literacy Through Blogging

2006-02-12T17:31:00.000-05:00

I really enjoy listening to Wesley Fryer. He shares generously both his thoughts and experience. Some of his podcasts feature speakers at conferences. I just listened to one of David Thornburg talking about the use of Linux and Open Source software.

Wesley Fryer talks about blogs and podcasts as disruptive technology. It's not about transmission based education, but rather is a technology that engages students, that meets them where they are. Many people talk about 21st century literacy skills Cheryl Lemke in enGuage talks about digital age literacies, inventive thinking, effective communication and high productivity. Fryer contends that blogs and podcasts are a great way of developing these skills. Blogging allows for social discourse. If you have never listened to a podcast try this one. His passion is palpable. Check the links on the website. One thing that Fryer recommends is commenting on students' blogs, how important it is for the students. If you don't know where to find student blogs, Fryer has tagged a number of them on his Del.icio.us account

Engagement, relationships, storytelling - the keys to learning (Fryer) Can we make that part of education?

NewCon - Conferences

2006-01-31T14:11:00.000-05:00

David Warlick just wrote about the possibilities of a new style of high tech conferences where we could participate through networks. I already feel that conferences are reaching me in ways they could not before. I have listened to a number of keynote addresses via podcasts and webcasts. But this is unidirectional. I can't interact with the speakers or the other delegates. The advantage is I don't have to spend the money to get to the conference and I can listen independent of the time the actual session took place. But imagine what it will be like when people can participate more actively from a distance. We have the technology - let's put it to good use.

There are already a number of opportunities for networking. I have occasionally listened to EdTech Talk You can either listen to archived copies of shows or you can listen live. When listening live you can take part in a real time chat with other participants - build community. The show features interesting people in the field from around the world who connect via Skype. If there is room in the Skype conference and a member of the chatroom has been making some interesting contributions, they may be invited to join the Skype conference.

Another interesting model is Tapped In, where educators can connect for real time and participate in a realtime exchange with other teachers and to get information from a leader. Topics are focused and the calendar is available well ahead of time. Goal: join a session.

The possibilities for connection are growing. The world is growing smaller - or flatter!

Categories: NewCon

Personal Learning Space

2006-01-25T21:04:00.000-05:00

There has been a lot of talk of a blog as a personal learning space. This resonates with me. The more one personalizes a blogspace the more it becomes a one stop place to read, reflect and write. posting blogrolls on the site or the blogs you are currently reading and putting links to other resources you consult regularly, the blog can be the place you go to read the latest musings of those who you respect and a place to respond to those posts.

I like to use my blog as a place to hone my thinking (though I don't write often enough ). Note to self - write more and spend some time making this space more of a personal learning environment.
Categories: PLE, blog

Sticky Memory

2006-01-11T14:10:00.000-05:00

I just read a post from Will Richardson on literacy. He talks about the amount of information we process now and it is astronomical. One point he makes is that aside from organizing what he reads through del.icio.us and bloglines, he makes the information sticky by blogging it (just what I am doing now). Another point he makes is that students, faced with this enormous quantity of information are going to have to learn how to vet it and learn to recognize patterns in what they read.

I too have found that writing not only helps me retain what I read but also helps me understand what I read.

David Warlick talks about the 4 E's : exposing knowledge, employing information, expressing ideas, and ethics on the Internet. Education will have to change, but as I said in my last post - this is not easy.

Categories: literacy

Time Flies

2006-01-11T12:21:00.000-05:00

Well - it is a long time. House renovations are over and I can now get back to thinking about education and technology. I have been slower in my reading but have been listening to a variety of podcasts. January and the new resolutions......

I listened to David Warlick's podcast on his thoughts about education in the future and I have to say I am not as optimistic as he is. I do see a faster push for schools to adopt 1:1 computing, but will it change educational practises? There are some amazing teachers out there, but I find change is not a feature of many educators or the parents of the students. There is the attitude of "If it worked for me why should I change?" I have seen laptops go into a class and be used for writing, but little changes regarding how the teaching and learning is going on. A computer is not just a fancy pencil. It offers new ways of thinking and relating to the world.

Categories: education

I'm back

2005-12-03T19:47:00.000-05:00

I took time off due to a variety of pulls on my life, but I have been listening to podcasts and reading blogs and felt I have to get back to reflecting and sharing, should anyone care to read this. I just finished listening to two webcasts from EdTechTalk #27 Back to Basics and to a conversation between David Warlick and Terry Freedman (show #25). The first thing I want to say is how generous these people are with their time and their knowledge. Many of us cannot get to conferences very often, but now I can listen to shows like these or to a variety of podcasts and hear what others are thinking and doing. If you are new to "Web 2.0" listen to the Back to Basics show. You will be introduced to new technologies. The show notes provide links for further reading. The conversation in show #25 provides a lot of food for thought. EdTechTalk is run by Dave Cormier (from PEI) & Jeff Lebow (from New Hampshire). This is actually a live show that is archived. Hosts and guests in the webcast participate via a Skype conference. Others can join by taking part in the chat room. It's not quite face to face, but it does give you real time access to some of the innovative people involved in exciting educational uses of technology - with education being what counts!

Comments on Blogs

2005-08-14T14:16:00.000-04:00

I took a lot of time off from this blog and now I am back, trying to read and catch up on the many blogs I read. I came across a post in Blog of Proximal Development on Cliques and Comments. Here I find myself doing exactly what he described his students doing. Rather than writing comments within a blog, they often commented on other students' blogs within their own blog. Personally, I find it easier to do this. Why? It is less public - only people reading my blog will see what I am thinking. I have a sense that a smaller audience will see what I write and I feel more comfortable playing with my thoughts in a less public way. Is it insecurity? Is it that I want to draw people in to me? I'm not sure, but it just seems more comfortable.

Blog as Portfolio

2005-06-15T07:06:00.000-04:00

I have taken a hiatus from my blog because of other committments so I am behind in what I have been reading. I just read Will Richardson's post on assessing blogs. and then at The Blog of Proximal Development: Grading Conversations. I loved Konrad Glogowski's description of how his class functions

"grading blogs (especially at the elementary level) has to be a very holistic process that focuses not only on the quality of their work but also on the extent to which their work reflects the context in which they work. I think that student bloggers should be recognized for writing as part of a larger community of inquirers. Some of my most successful writers are those who are aware of what their friends are writing about and who participate in conversations with other bloggers in their class. This is an important part of knowledge- and community-building, especially when (as in my class) students investigate and write about related ideas."

I can understand the need to assess student work but I do not see a blog as a portfolio. Although it is a collection of work, the student is writing regularly on the blog and is not making a selection of the work to include as in a portfolio. A portfolio should contain work that is selected for a reason (to show growth, to illustrate understanding of a concept, to showcase particularly fine work). In addition, there should be some self-reflection on the pieces chosen. While I find blogs excellent for self-reflection - it is reflection about ideas, not necessarily about a piece of work. In addition, as Konrad points out, it is a place for community building.

Building Walls

2005-06-02T13:41:00.000-04:00

In the past few days I have read posts by both David Warlick Network or Netblock, and Will Richardson, Schools not being schools. Both talked about the issue of walls preventing students from getting out to parts of the Internet. I know many of my colleagues face issues with their IT departments. When are we controlling too much so that we are putting up walls between our students and their learning?

Through the Labyrinth

2005-05-28T10:58:00.000-04:00

When I was assigned the job of creating a site for leaders and learners of ICT, I thought I wasn't a geekish enough. I was into the human side of computing, not all that tech stuff like php MySQL and all the Open Source coding I hear some of my colleagues discuss. Little did I know that I would be embarking on an adventure through a labyrinth that would connect me to an amazing virtual community of educational bloggers. They don't know me, yet, but I know them through their posts.

I have come across Bud the Teacher. He has been blogging with his class. One post I enjoyed, recently was The End, in which he described how his students explained their blogging experience to another teacher. It showed both that students can teach teachers, but also in reflecting on one student's response, it gave Bud a new perspective on his students' experience. I also am getting to know Bud through the links to blogs he reads. One link took me on a path to Nancy Mckeand.

Nancy writes a blog called Random Thoughts. Her post on Question #3 in which she responds to a question of Mr. McNamar (The Daily Grind) She reflected on whether or not blogs should be assessed and if so how. She quoted from Tyr who is a student of Bud. Tyr wrote:

Students, at the beginning of the class should explain what they want to accomplish with their blog as a final goal or as a 'major' goal. The occasional assignment/prompt from the teacher is fine to keep people on track and to make sure they have an accurate depction of what they are meant to do. If a student then does not do what attempted to set out for the class goals, then s/he will not receive an A, the grade would then fall into the hands of the teacher based on the other work this student has submitted.

Students understand goal-setting and reflection. What fascinated me was the interconnection of the blogging community. People respond to each other's blogs both through comments and through more extensive reflections in their own blogs.

I had to go and see what Mr. McNamar had written. His post: Reflecting on a Blog is a wonderful model of teacher reflection. He states articulately the issues he is thinking about and what the questions are that he will be pondering. Writing has put the ideas out, not only for himself to examine, but we can share his voyage. The power of the blog is that people have added their comments giving Mr. McNamar (and me) food for thought and other perspectives coming from different experiences.

Each blog takes me on new adventures in the labyrinth. I do come up for air, but the atmosphere of the Blogosphere is heady and it lures me back frequently.

Commerce in the classroom

2005-05-25T21:08:00.000-04:00

A colleague of mine sent an e-mail around on whether to post a link to a site that is selling something on our very non-commercial site and it got me thinking about commerce in schools. There are several issues that come out of this.

We do not have company advertising in the classroom - should we go to Internet sites that have advertising?
How do we teach students to be alert to what is advertising and what is content?
How do we teach students to be aware of the effects of advertising (the codes, conventions and techniques used to entice, persuade, convince.... viewers )?
Many important thinkers have web sites that also sell things (e.g. Kathy Nunley's site, which has good information on brain-based learning, also sells her books). Should we link to those sites?

We live in the age of commerce. It is impossible to go on the web for more than a very short time without bumping into ads, so it is unrealistic to think we can navigate the net without meeting up with advertising.. Just as when we walk through the streets in our neighbourhood, we are surrounded by commercialism, when we walk out of the classroom into the virtual neighbourhood, we meet the same reality. We have to street-proof our students so that they can understand the neighbourhood and think critically about what they meet.

There is a difference between meeting sites with advertising when students are researching and pointing students to a site with advertising. Are we, in some way, endorsing products? I think this is something we have to address with students.

I firmly believe we have to teach students to use the net carefully, to learn ways to keep safe and to understand the strengths and weaknesses of the environment. We have to give students the tools to look critically and be able to read a web site. Then they will be wary of the commercialism they find everywhere.

Synchronicity

2005-05-13T20:09:00.000-04:00

I have been thinking about synchronicity - how things in our lives that seem to be disconnected come together and make things clearer. I am an avid reader and recently read "Three Farmers on their Way to a Dance" by Richard Powers. Written in 1985, it is a story woven around a photograph taken in 1914. So much in there resonated with the reading and workshops I have done on digital storytelling. Syncronicity - choosing this book to read. For beginners in digital storytelling, I have suggested using photographs rather than shooting video. Powers, via his characters examines the effect of photographs on the viewer and the effect the viewer has on the photograph.

He writes about how photography gave a person the possibility " of being subject, audience and - by commisioning, posing and selecting the final work - auteur."

He also writes of how images take on a life of their own. "The strange persuasion of photographs rests on selective accuracy wedded to selective distortion.The reproduction must be enough like the original to start a string of associations in the viewer but enough unlike the original to leave the viewer room to flesh out and furnish the frame with belief. "

Another quote I really liked. ..."composition, vision, and decision are precisely the skills any intelligent viewer uses when standing in front of and appraising a finished picture. The process of making the thing becomes qualitatively indistinguishable form that of appreciating it."
The reader brings him/herself to the image. This is true of all texts (images, film, words..)

Powers talks of the interplay of image and viewer. " Every mechanical landscape, interior, or portrait comes to the viewer over time, a memory posted forward from the instant of the shutter waiting to come into conjunction with the instant of viewing. Noticing the image, observing it at once implicates the viewer as a paartner in that memory. Looking at the photo, we act out and replay, to a copied phantim, parallels of the very decisions and criticisms of the photographer. We ask "Who would I have to be, what would I have to believe in to have wanted to preserve this instant?"

Interesting ideas to think about as we create our digital stories. I also wonder what Powers would write in light of the use of digital cameras and the way we can manipulate reality. Automatic cameras democratized the process of picture taking. Digital cameras can turn us all into artists. Photography can affect the way we see. Our choice of photographs directs how we tell our stories.

Enough rambling.... The book is worth a read.

Identifying Oneself on a Blog

2005-05-08T22:22:00.000-04:00

I read an interesting post on Will Richardson's blog regarding identifying oneself in a blog. His reference is to students, but the issues are the same for anyone. He talks about the possibility of future employers (or lovers!) googling your name and finding things written years before which would then reflect on whether or not to hire you. In my naive (50 +) head it never occured to me that would happen. Yet I realized, that if you google my name, you do come across items from as far back as 1990. The Internet keeps a long term record of thoughts that we have made public. To me, one of the strengths of blogs is that we can put down ideas and then objectify them both for ourselves and for others who read them. Although the discussion may be public (it is incredible that we can include the world in our conversations), how long do we want our fledgling ideas to haunt us? For it is in discussion that we clarify and change our thinking. Those first ideas may get turned on their heads once we have had the chance to examine them. How do we encourage this aspect of blogs without fearing the way the future may interact with it?

In an article linked from Weblogg-ed Making Teachers Thinking Visible, the author addressed teacher accountability. Will fear of a threat to one's job interfere with healthy discussion of educational issues? Many people talk about 21st century skills - one of which is learning to learn. Blogs can enhance the social aspect of learning by opening up the community of learners to a larger constituency, thus enlarging the variety of backgrounds and points of view. It is through "messing about" that we can open our minds before solidifying our "final polished" ideas.

Are pseudonyms the answer? I admit I have not put my full name here. Still nervous as a new blogger? When I admire something I find in a blog or on the web, I do google people's names to see what else he / she has written. Any solutions? The doors are open to interchanges. We don't want to close them out of fear and create online gated communities.

Voyage of Discovery

2005-05-06T09:30:00.000-04:00

I have been going on a voyage of discovery, but unlike Franklin or Hudson, mine is done virtually in the comfort of my home. No ice floes or hard tack, just sleepless nights and a brain that won't stop processing. In working to produce the ICT Leaders and Learners site (which will be public, shortly) for QESN-RÉCIT I have been filtering through many web sites, blogs, etc. I am now subscribed through Bloglines to 34 feeds ranging from blogs on blogging to e-portfolio to educational technology...... What do I see as important topics? I keep coming across Digital Storytelling. Interesting after the workshops at AQUOPS and McGill. I guess our topic and site were timely. And of course, the whole aspect of social computing. To understand more about it I have started 2 blogs and want to see what kind of response I get to them. This one is for my educational musings, the other for my other passion - Early Music in Montreal. It will be interesting to see who comments and if the audience grows. I have learned to send photos to Flickr which can then be included in an article.

My travels have brought me to the feet of many educational gurus, who unbeknownst to them, have generously shared their ideas. I have not climbed mountains but I have have seen many interesting views.

As I truly believe learning to be a social activity, I hope others will share my musings, reflect back to me and, as they go on their voyages, travel part way with me.

First Time Blogger

2005-05-04T21:54:00.000-04:00

I am not used to making my ideas so public. I plan to use this space to muse on what is happening in education and the occasional post on music ( my other passion). I have recently started to read many blogs and decided I could only begin to understand them if I started one myself.

reflexions

How are you Reading

John Grierson

Reaching out to the Network

Howard Gardner at the Global Education Conference

One Day on Earth

Learning 24/7

Terry Fox Run: Interview with Debbie Laurie

No Excuse

ISTE 2011

K12 Online Echo

October K12 Online LAN Party

Please join us on October 20, 2009from 6:00PM to 8:00PM EDT (10pm GMT)for a second live event of the2009 K12Online Conference

K12 Online Live Event

Erin Gruwell: Freedom Writers

From Banned to Planned - Hall Davidson

Here Comes Learning: Will Richardson Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach

Cheryl Lemke - The Ripple Effect

Jamie McKenzie - Reading Between Digital Lines

Digital Citizenship - Vicki Davis and Julie Lindsay

Bernie Dodge: Puzzle Pieces

Global Connections - in the Primary Classroom

Steve Dembo NECC 09

NECC Sunday

Ada Lovelace Day

Response

Reflecting on the Experience

365 photos and more

Seven Things

Teachers Are Talking

Kiva

Personal Learning Network

Travel Through Space and Time

Holding a Mirror to our Professional Practice

Pushing the Envelope or How to Integrate Web 2.0 Tools on a Shoestring

Assessment & Evaluation: Konrad Glogowski

Good How Tos

Classroom 2.0 Clarence Fisher

Technology Buzz

David Warlick's presentation: Inventing New Boundaries

Participation in online communities

Cyberbullying

Podcast interview with Sharon Peters

Planting Seeds

Second Life for the First Time

Going with the Flow

You Tube and the Arts

I've Been Tagged!

New Year's Resolution

Podcast with Terry Freedman

K12 Online and controversy

Community

Podcast with Darren Kuropatwa

Best Practice

K12 Online 2006

For Librarians

What is happening with blogs?

Code of Ethics

My new Tune Talk

Introducing Teachers to Blogs

Social computing?

Sara Kajder

Andy Hargreaves Sustainable Leadership

Bob Pearlman

Whiplash

Alan November

Building Learning Communities

Marco Torres

RSS, podcasting- Will Richardson

Will Richardson on wikis and blogs

Will Richardson - On-line communities: Blogs, wikis and other cool tools

Will Richardson - On-line communities: Blogs, wikis and other cool tools

Conference Blogs

Games - capturing students' interests

Fences or Free Access

Change

The art of commenting on blogs

Quebec education

More Web 2.0

digital stories

Please join us on October 20, 2009
from 6:00PM to 8:00PM EDT (10pm GMT)
for a second live event of the
2009 K12Online Conference