Posts from — March 2011
Seedlings @ Bit By Bit Podcast: Show 111
Seedlings @ Bit by Bit Podcast: Show 111
March 24, 2011
We’re joined by Shelly Moody —Maine’s Teacher of the Year!
Links from the show:
“Geek of the Week” Links for 2011-03-24
Chat Transcript from EdTech Talk
Music:
Technorati Tags: bitbybit, seedlings, education, cheryloakes, alicebarr, bobsprankle, shelly moody, maine teacher of the year, maine
March 25, 2011 1 Comment
What’s Your Backup Plan?
(cross-posted at TechLearning)
This past week, our Internet went down in the school. The reasons it crashed are complicated, mysterious, and most likely beyond my scope of understanding (not being an IT person).
Since I teach in the computer lab, I’m hit pretty hard when the Internet goes because most of my lessons are online. However, I always have a backup plan (though I work really hard on using mostly Internet-based resources, I do have some software for just such events… namely, the National Virtual Manipulatives software that, while accessible for free online, is also available for purchase in disc form). Luckily, my 3rd and 4th grade lessons were happening in Garageband and Scratch this week, so those classes were able to continue our work without the Internet.
Besides my own lessons, though, the shutdown definitely had a huge effect on all of us in the school. For instance, this week is REPORT CARD week, which like most schools, is done online. Not being able to complete grades definitely increases stress levels for people. Additionally, lack of email access breaks down our normal channels of communication. Also, all of our attendance and lunch count is done online. These are hurdles suddenly throwing monkey wrenches into an already busy day, but perhaps the hardest thing for people is not knowing when the Internet is going to come back online.
On the bright side, I try to remind people that the loss of Internet used to happen on average several 
times a month in years past. Unfortunately, that doesn’t really help quell the panic because people didn’t rely on it years ago as much as they do now. The more time that’s gone by, the more we’ve become web-based, in lessons and in daily operations.
That’s a good thing. It’s what we’ve been trying to get people to do for years: to integrate technology seamlessly into instruction, and get people comfortable in using the new tools available for data management, communication, publishing, and accessing information.
All it takes is one day with the Internet down for people to get frustrated, though, and pull back —even if just a little— into not trusting these new tools to be manageable or able to be ubiquitous. I’m proud to report that, for the most part, my colleagues took this “black out” with a sense of calm and humor, and luckily, the connection came back within a day.
But… let’s imagine that it was “broken” for a longer period. What’s our backup plan?
If we were to lose electricity (and trust me: living in Maine with snowstorms and ice storms, this happens more often than you’d think), our school has a back up in place: a generator. Not all schools have this, but we’re lucky to be an “Emergency Shelter” site in town. Things keep on humming here at school even when our town has lost power for days due to a nasty ice storm. School isn’t closed. There isn’t any “waiting it out.” We’re confident that the days will run with relative regularity.
But what about the Internet? The more we become a digital school (lesson-wise, data collection, daily routines like attendance, email, lunch counts, etc.), the harder it is (and perhaps the more frustrating it becomes) when we are suddenly “cut off.”
Sure, we could go back to the “old routines” of paper, and handwritten attendance and lunch counts, and Report Cards could always be delayed (for a couple of days at least), but the farther we get away from the “old routines” of analog practice, will it become harder to revert back?
We had a “blip” the other day. No big deal. But I’m sure many communities have taken harder hits with “digital infrastructure.” You can just look at the current news to see weather or disaster or political related interruptions to all types of services, not just Internet.
Our school planned ahead when it purchased a generator to keep power going in the event of outage. To my knowledge, I don’t know if we have a plan for an extended Network/Internet outage. Much of our infrastructure is outside of the district’s control, managed by third party vendors or state run systems.
What alternatives are out there? How is your school prepared for an extended Network outage? Do you have a backup plan? Is there such a tool like a generator to insure that things can keep running smoothly? Is this something we should be thinking/planning/worrying about?
Thanks for your comments!
March 24, 2011 2 Comments
Book Anouncement: “The Art of iPhoneography: A Guide to Mobile Creativity” by Stephanie Roberts
I’m honored to be a contributor in the book The Art of iPhoneography: A Guide to Mobile Creativity by Stephanie Roberts, available for pre-order at Amazon and for sale in stores in April.
March 19, 2011 2 Comments
Seedlings @ Bit By Bit Podcast: Show 110
Seedlings @ Bit by Bit Podcast: Show 110
March 10, 2011
We’re joined by Jenn Bogard and Mary McMackin Talking about “Revision on the Run!”
Links from the show:
“Geek of the Week” Links for 2011-03-10
Chat Transcript from EdTech Talk coming soon!
Music:
Technorati Tags: bitbybit, seedlings, education, cheryloakes, alicebarr, bobsprankle, Jenn Bogard, Mary McMackin, Livescribe Pen, writing
March 11, 2011 3 Comments
Play Time! (Please Don’t Cry)
(cross-posted at TechLearning)
I’ve been meaning to post about the topic of PLAY for a while now, and was motivated to finally get to it after reading this excellent article called, “The Case for Play” over at the Chronicle of Higher Education. My students and I are currently talking a lot about Play right now —which we refer to as Sandbox Mode— so this post is particularly relevant for me now.
Though the term Sandbox or Sandbox Mode has been around for ages, I must pause to give Vicki Davis credit for making the term a building block of my curriculum, as she discussed it years ago with me and how important it was to identify it as an essential step in learning. I’ve mostly identified the term Sandbox as a place to “try things out with coding or software without actually destroying the world;” a place to try things without committing them to an actual finished project.
I really integrated the term “Sandbox” into my curriculum when one day a student asked me: “Mr. S, how did you get so smart and learn all you know about computers?”
I stopped everything I was doing right away and let the student know two truths:
1. I’m not actually as smart as you think I am.
and
2. I’ve learned pretty much everything I know about computers from simply playing around with them.
I don’t think the student bought it (at least number 2).
Teachers have long passed out “new tools” to students and said, “Explore with them,” before the actual lesson gets underway. It just makes good sense. For instance, introduce students to Base Ten blocks and the first thing that they’re going to want to do is build. They’re not thinking about the blocks as Mathematical Tools yet; they first see them as FUN! So, whether you want them to or not, they’re going to build with them the moment they get them into their hands, so go ahead: let them get it out of their systems. Tell them “You have X-number of minutes to do what you wish with these tools (within normal safety expectations),” and then get down to the “serious” work (note: I still think Base Ten blocks are fun even when used for Math because I think Math is fun).
So, I let students do this as much as possible in the Computer Lab (just as I did when I was a classroom teacher), but I now call it “Sandbox Mode” because I’ve added some parameters around it.
One of the main things I want for ALL my students is that they have confidence, belief in themselves, and are not afraid to try things. This isn’t just about computers (I want them to feel this way about everything), but using computers as an example: I want my students to leave me being able to sit down at ANY computer, running ANY type of Operating System, and immediately be able to figure out things about ANY piece of software. Again, I pause here to give another hat-tip to Vicki Davis for she really helped me understand that I have to make this goal (and all the stages necessary to achieve it) explicit to the students. I can’t just do my lessons and hope that they get there, or somehow infer what skills I ultimately hope they leave with.
So, I call it “Sandbox Mode” instead of play.
The rules that govern Sandbox Mode are:
The first rule of Sandbox Mode is you don’t talk about Sandbox Mode(just kidding with this one)
- Sandbox Mode will only last for 5 minutes
- You may not talk during Sandbox Mode
- You may not shout out your discoveries during Sandbox Mode
- You may not ask questions from anyone during Sandbox Mode
- And… YOU MAY NOT ASK QUESTIONS FROM ANYONE DURING SANDBOX MODE… NOT EVEN ME, THE TEACHER!
Now, before I give these parameters, I’ve learned to get the students ready with a little “comedy routine” in order to get them laughing and relaxed (if you’d like to hear it, click here… it’ll give you an idea of my “routine”). The reason I do this, is that I’ve learned that if I don’t get students laughing and relaxed before Sandbox Mode, some students get very stressed during the 5 minutes that I ask them to work entirely on their own…. some to the point of tears.
In fact, there have been times when I’ve put adults in Sandbox Mode, and some of them have gotten stressed… also to the point of tears.
This begs the question: why? Why can’t some students (and even some adults) work entirely alone for 5 minutes without becoming distressed? I don’t think this just happens with technology… I think it happens across disciplines. If you listen to my audio that I linked above, you’ll hear my “theory” about why this happens, but I think it’s better told by two students I know.
I met Maya and Priya Ganesan at the TEDxRedmond conference last year, and I think both girls show an understanding in their talks that help us get at a part of the problem.
First, listen to Priya Ganesan’s talk on on “Creativity in Schools”:
You’ll hear her talk about her experiences in school where “half of the work” has been done for students, as in her example about writing a poem. She questions why schools don’t trust students of being “capable” to create the entire poem themselves.
This is a profound question. Does it actually have to do with trust, or are students provided half of the poem to speed things along in order to get through the curriculum? Or is it a matter of control… making sure that all students reach the desired (successful) outcome? No matter what the reason, Priya brings to light that students aren’t being allowed to fumble on their own; aren’t given the time to create an entire piece independently; are restricted by strong routines set in place.
Are we as teachers —unwittingly, and with the best intentions— doing too much of the work for the students?
Look: I know I do it. If I really had the guts, I would extend Sandbox Mode for a longer period than 5 minutes (perhaps most learning should be done in Sandbox Mode). But I am looking at the clock and the calendar and realize that I only have the students for such a small amount of time, so I hasten to show them how to use the software (or whatever I’m teaching) rather than allow them to discover it on their own (which, as stated above, is the way that I myself prefer to learn about software).
In a “factory model” setting (i.e., large classrooms sizes, little time, huge curriculum to cover), it is simply nearly impossible to allow for true inquiry-based learning.
Does this matter?
I think it does… and perhaps more than ever. We need to facilitate learning environments that allow for students to become confident, independent thinkers who are not afraid to discover on their own. It will be thinkers and risk-takers that are going to solve many of the issues facing the world today… and tomorrow’s issues that are yet unrealized.
I can’t help but see an overlap with Priya’s TEDxRedmond talk and her sister, Maya’s: “The Definition of Perfection:”
Looking at her examination of how this idea of “Perfection” can lead to serious health issues, I think about Priya’s questioning of why we don’t allow students time for independently accomplishing tasks, or even making their own creative decisions. Could this absence of independently solving problems and tasks lead to a lack of confidence that later plays out in such serious issues like eating disorders described by Maya?
If you’d like to hear more from Priya and Maya, head on over to the Seedlings’ Podcast from February 10, 2011 when they were guests on the show.
In the meantime, will you help me to answer the following question:
What factors are leading to some of our learners becoming distressed to the point of tears when told to PLAY with their learning? And what are we doing about it?
Thank you for your input in the comment section below.
March 8, 2011 No Comments
Process vs Product
(cross-posted at The November Learning Blog)
Years ago I accompanied a student who I was working one-on-one with to an event at his school where his entire grade level was having a special “showing” of their Social Studies Projects. I can’t remember the unit they were studying. I can’t remember what the project was (I vaguely recall the “Oregon Trail” or “log cabins,” or maybe “wetlands,” but I could be completely wrong on each of these guesses). What I do remember is that this particular school had been running this event yearly for a very long time —and that it was important— VERY important. The whole community showed up for the event —parents, teachers, siblings, grandparents— and walked around the gymnasium viewing the completed work (dioramas maybe?).
For most readers, I realize that I only have to add one detail for you to see what played out that evening (and I guess every year for this event): the project had been assigned for homework.
In other words, completely at home; not at school.
Let me interrupt here to say that I am not focusing on homework for this post (that is a much longer post, and I think Alfie Kohn has already taken care of that for us). So let us leave the issues and pros and cons of homework to the side for now, and just zoom in on those completed projects (were they poster boards…?).
Can you see them?
Some of those projects (whatever they were) are pure expressions of genius. They’re masterpieces. Works of art. Feats of engineering not yet realized. Color schemes compliment the themes. Just the right amount of glitter; not too much, not too little. If glue was used, all evidence has been camouflaged. Lines are straight as a ruler and circles seem to have sprung from lathes run by magical elves. The structures are sturdy enough to have survived the car rides over to the school and will last for generations to come, perhaps transforming from their original purpose into Thanksgiving centerpieces or by taking their rightful places on trophy shelves. Throughout the evening of presentation, there will be large crowds gathered around these projects. One will have to wait in long queues to get to see them. No one will be allowed to touch.
Further down the line, past the crowds, there will be another breed of product completely. These projects are the complete opposite of those described above. Gone are the realistic astro-grass lawns, the miniature people procured from a real Hobby Shop. Shellacked and interlocking dowels will be replaced by Popsicle sticks and toothpicks. Glue-gobs will not only be visible, they will still be in the process of drying. It will be obvious that Magic Markers replaced paint and you will be able to spot exactly where they began drying up during their application. Perhaps the projects have survived the car rides here, but their fate for the trips home are in critical mode, and some will barely make it past the parking lot dumpster. Whereas the other products were life-like, these projects will sorely stand out among their more professional counterparts as representations of ideas rather than something familiar to the physical universe. In fact, the most generous compliment bestowed upon them is that they look as though a “fourth grader” made them.
Which is, by the way, exactly who made them.
This grade level, after all, is fourth grade.
So let’s identify the “elephant in the room.” Some of these projects were created entirely by 4th grade students (as they were supposed to be) and some of them were created (at least in part) by… parents. There’s no real secret about this either: most of the murmurings in the gym that night were of the flavor of, “no kid made that!” or “this was obviously made by a parent!” Of course, these assessments were heard from those families that let the 4th grade student do all the work independently. There are probably infinite reasons for why this was allowed: could be that parents really believe in their students’ right to create on their own, or they don’t believe in “cheating” (not my words, by the way; this is what students who had done their own work called it), or, on the a less optimistic side of possibilities, parents had no interest in finding out about their students’ assignment and no desire to get involved.
Again, without getting into the issue of homework, as well as not examining the obvious “equalizer” of requiring all projects to be created entirely at school with access to uniform supplies and support, we must take pause and examine what it is we are celebrating on an evening like this.
It clearly is PRODUCT. As we move around the gymnasium, we see only the final “image,” if you will, of a journey untold. The learning involved, the struggles and successes, and even the purpose of the finished creations usually remain a mystery. At times, journals accompany the work, or a write-up by the teacher is posted at the front of the exhibit, but it is the PRODUCTS that win the attention, hands-down.
Which is… of course why some parents feel compelled to “chip in.” If PRODUCT is “king,” then that becomes what counts, and will always overshadow the PROCESS, or the learning.
Imagine, if you would, the same evening of celebration for students, however, this time, parents watch from the sidelines as students actually create the products, or if the products on display were accompanied by audio/video/journals of what the students learned. The evening could be extended to give the students time to share their learning, but also to teach their families what they learned. Parents could be given short quizzes (created by the students) to give the students feedback on how well they taught the information. Or… after the students teach their parents the information, then the students and parents could build the final product together, all the time consulting reference material, the student’s notes, and discussing the curriculum standards being acquired. These final products could then be shared by publishing pictures of them to the Internet… or not. For the question is: what is the purpose of publication?
There are numerous answers to this question: making work purposeful, providing an authentic audience, making learning a conversation (on a blog, for instance), but I think we too often forget another important aspect when we ask our students to publish: to show the journey of learning, in other words, how did the student get to this final point?
Whenever I give a workshop on blogging, invariably, a teacher will ask what I think about leaving students’ original misspellings (or invented spelling), incorrect grammar, lack of punctuation in the entries. I believe, without a doubt, we want our students to arrive at publication that is polished… students should be asked to go back and fix mistakes, and if they aren’t able to find the mistakes, then it’s a perfect opportunity for mini-lessons on the skills.
HOWEVER… why aren’t we showing all steps to the final product? What is so wrong in publishing each draft along with the final polished draft? This transparency would show the student’s steps of learning, showing both growth as well as struggles. And, if a student is not yet able to attain a certain skill (even after additional mini lessons on the desired skill), then what is the point of the teacher fixing the errors? Doesn’t that just “cloud” the “snapshot” or continuum stage that the student is at? Everything looks perfect on the blog, for instance, but then the student’s report card says otherwise?
And what is so wrong in showing our sloppy mistakes and struggles? Isn’t that what school is all about? Aren’t we there to perfect our skills and get to the level where our work is truly “polished?”
Why are we reticent to show the struggles students experience, the “bumpy” journey of learning, the truth that students will attain skills at different stages and pacing from their peers, and present only the final PRODUCT, which can never encapsulate the story of where the student started and how he/she got to this end.
Recently, my after school Tech Group presented their work-in-progress to parents. This group of students have completed all work as a collective group, with very little input from me. All decisions have been made by the students. The entire presentation was put together by the students… in fact, I barely knew what they were going to present until I heard it for the first time, along with the parents.
At first, you could see the parents were a bit uncomfortable with this method. They kept asking the students about what had already been accomplished, or what will be accomplished, or, what PRODUCT they had to show. Since the students are really at the beginning of their work (i.e., are closer to the beginning of the journey and still making decisions on what their goals are), they presented their ideas, how the ideas were created, what plans they might have, what decisions they had already made, and what the next steps were going to be.
Parents were seeing the process of them actually building their work. In fact, during the presentation, there were several times when the students began generating new ideas and broke into discussion between themselves, with the parents suddenly relegated to the role of witnesses. The last part of the students’ presentation was taking questions and comments from the parents. The students have used some of the parents’ feedback in their subsequent meetings as they continue their work.
It took a while, but I think the parents finally understood that they were not there to hear a “finished” work being presented. The students never promised such an event, and in fact, it was the parents who had originally asked the students to present what they had accomplished so far.
From where I stood, it was a marvelous experience: parents got to see the very rare building of the work (something usually shrouded and mysterious) and the students were able to get great feedback and accolades during the process of the work they’ve been doing.
There were no “projects” to take home that evening. Instead, everyone left energized and there was a feeling of excitement for not only of what was yet to come, but what was being created right before our very eyes.
March 5, 2011 2 Comments
Seedlings @ Bit By Bit Podcast: Show 109
Seedlings @ Bit by Bit Podcast: Show 109
March 3, 2011
It’s the “Horizon Report 2011″ Show!
Links from the show:
“Geek of the Week” Links for 2011-03-03
Chat Transcript from EdTech Talk
Music:
Technorati Tags: bitbybit, seedlings, education, cheryloakes, alicebarr, bobsprankle, horizon report, new media consortium
March 4, 2011 No Comments
