Archive for December, 2011
December 7th, 2011
Steve mentions we need to make sure that we aren’t doing “old things in new ways”. He mentions the TechBook and describes how it drives teachers crazy at first because there is no chapter one. We need to do new things in new ways. Beyond the textbook sort of thinking.
Steve talked about his son and the fact that he wants the opposite of what most school districts are trying to provide. He wants his son’s first and last name and location attached to everything that he does. Why wouldn’t he want that? We are all making a digital footprint, why not make the experience into a professional portfolio starting at a young age. A good example of this is College Confidential. Used appropriately, this kind of site can be used for long term planning. Colleges are sure to be looking at a site like that.
Crowdspring is another interesting place that evens the playing field for anyone. Students can be participating in projects there right now. Kickstarter is another project based place. Here students come up with a business plan and actually set it into motion in the real world. These are the places that kids need to be to work on their digital portfolios. The reality is that places will not hire unless you have a positive presence on the internet. Don’t bother with a traditional resume – it isn’t worth anything. Having no presence at all is just as harmful as having a negative presence.
Steve shared a story of a CEO that looks for his VP’s on World of Warcraft and not on the golf course anymore. If you can lead a guild on World of Warcraft, you have the same skills that you need to lead in the corporate world. If you have 10,000 followers on Twitter, that has to mean something about you as a leader.
We must be prepping students to thrive in the digital world. It is open and transparent.
Steve shared some sites that are worth looking at:
The bottom line is: How can we use sites like the ones listed above in a way that they were not intended for? We can’t fall into “Box of Legos” syndrome, where we only build what is on the box.
December 7th, 2011
Not sure what happened here…I’ll get this back up soon.
December 6th, 2011
Disclaimers out of the way first. Wisconsin DPI has an agreement with Google that makes sure that what happens in Google complies with FERPA. Apparently that is a good thing.
Google forms have the advantage of being free, viewable with internet access, and can involve some collaboration. There are various types of forms. Just a text box the title of which can become the header of a column in a spread sheet. You can have a paragraph text, multiple choice, multiple choice but you are choosing from a drop down list, check boxes, a scale sort of rating kind of thing, and a grid which is a scale but for multiple questions at once.
Accessing a Google form is as simple as signing in to your Google account (create one here) and then selecting Docs in the tool menu. From there select Form and you are ready to go. From here on out you are playing around and making your forms.
The bigger question for me is: How can I use Google Forms to improve student learning?
December 6th, 2011
As a followup to this mornings keynote this session is a conversation with educators regarding the ideas from that session.
Scott started by mentioning a post-literate society: maybe there is a time ahead when many of us don’t need to read because electronic devices may be able listen to us and respond. Dependency on text is on the decline.
First topic: Worthwhile Apps.
Scott will post ideas for looking for good apps at his site for this conference.
Second topic: How do we get staff moving and motivated?
Initial urgency and maintenance urgency are the two main issues.
Scott mentioned Mind Dump which is a place where little snippets of information can be found to aid in chipping away at resistance.
Teachers are rational and have real reasons to be resistance. Those issues need to be addressed. They are legitimate.
We need to be aware of the “implementation” dip. How do we make it as shallow and as short as possible? Multiple support structures need to be in place. “There is no place you can turn and not get support.” See the book Influencer: The Power to Change Anything.
Third topic: What do we do about teaching to the top of Bloom’s (top 3 levels) and still maintaining AYP. Testing is asking us to live on the bottom.
What we remember is what we attach meaning to. Decontextualized stuff needs to live in contextualized place. We have to find ways to stay in context so we get the benefit of the top three levels and build meaning for the “remembering” of skills and facts.
Aside: Where do keyboarding skills stand? It should start as early as possible. Keyboarding may be replacing cursive handwriting in terms of time and necessity. In 10 years though keyboarding may not exist.
Fourth topic: What do we do about filtering?
Logging software may be useful.
We spend way too much time locking stuff down instead of teaching appropriate use.
We typically lock 95% of people down for the sake of the 5% that are the problem.
Fifth topic: How can we implement changes in the structure that we currently have?
Imagine that we start with 9th grade. There are no bells, class schedules. You give 15 teachers and every student a laptop and the current curriculum standards and that’s it. What can you build? What can you do?
Sixth topic: What would you implement for 1 to 1 initiatives?
Not an iPad. Not enough content creation – they are mostly content consumption devices.
Maybe a Netbook. Best option is a laptop.
A BYOD policy mirrors what happens in the real world, however there are equity concerns.
See Scott’s link (above) for a research brief on 1 to 1 initiatives.
Seventh topic: How do you know when you have to take a step back and avoid burnout.
Be aware that you need to either give stuff up or find more support structure. See this.
December 6th, 2011
How do we take a school through the process of technology integration? How do we get teachers excited and how do we become good technicians of implementing change?
Prezi is the main tool being used here. Also Poll Everywhere.
Screenagers today are hyper-connected. How do we make learning a freeing experience, rather than a dictated one. RSS feeds, Wiki’s, blogs, etc. Any of these tools must be used with high expectations of quality.
December 6th, 2011
Everything is Scott’s presentation this morning is available here. We can also follow whats going on at TodaysMeet.com/mcleod This is a nice way to follow #slate2011 tweets.
Scott started by introducing #pencilchat as a hash tag where educators take pokes at excuses for not integrating technology into the classroom. Pithy stuff.
Scott’s first point is that We All Now Have A Voice and his second point is that We Can All Find Each Others Voice and then We Can Easily Work Together. This has to change the way we do things. Access is completely mobile now and we can get it anywhere. The lines are blurring now, say, between work and home or between local and global. Google’s Art Project is a great example of blurring the lines. So is Google maps in terms of being in one place but seeing another in “real time”.
We now live in an era where a 12 year old guitarist can get 90 million hits on youtube. That kind of thing used to be reserved for huge record contracts. Lines between producer/consumer and expert/amateur are clearly blurring. Another line that is blurring is the one between Us and Them. What kind of jobs are location dependent versus location independent. The internet is destroying geography. The jobs that we are going to grow and not see disappear because a robot can do them are
those that involve critical thinking, problem solving etc. This needs to be the focus of our classrooms. Not things we can look up on Google. Dan Meyer puts it best when he says “The robots are going to eat our lunch if we are not careful.” We need to spend classroom time doing the things that the robots can’t. Making connections, diagnosing and treating misconceptions, creating perplexing problems that create patient problem solvers, etc.
The University of the People and MIT Open Courseware are blurring the lines between formal and informal learning. Can a student learn on-line all they need to know to pass a bunch of AP Exams and get college credit for that? Why or why not?
Next part of the session Scott challenges us to discuss how we operationalize changes in our schools that actually lead to student learning. What are we doing to combat low-level, wrote memorization, naked skill pedagogy? The first premise is that we need to invent our own solutions. The answer is not “out there”. We need to work it out and make it happen. Do it.
Next we took a look at this Mission Impossible: How do we get rid of textbooks? Each group put ideas into a Google Spreadsheet and then each group looked at someone else’s spreadsheet, identified 2 good ideas and put them on a summary page. We did this as a discussion around textbooks but also to see the value added by doing this is a digital way.
Scott also did a short segment on his iPad and looked at some really decent apps:
Algebra Touch is a great looking app for the iPad for Algebra.
So is Word Wit for English.
iMuscle for kinesthetics.
NYPL Biblion for History (The World Fair).
The Waste Land for Poetry/literature.
