If you read my last post then you know we had a bit of a scare this week when suddenly access to our class blog was blocked at school. It turned out that the IT department was upgrading or tweaking the “filter” and Blogmeister accidentally was added to the block file – we had access again that evening. You might think this was a bit of an over-reaction on my part, but when I have conversations with the “higher-ups” in our school district IT department about how we blog .. and make and use wiki pages and Skype and such they always smile and say, “That’s great, but don’t talk about that too much. Just be happy you are able to do that NOW.” Not exactly a confidence builder. So when our blog access was suddenly blocked I thought, “Here it comes!”

We were just about to Skype with a class in Saskatchewan, Canada via Dean Shareski when I first noticed this, so I was slightly seething when we were Skyping.

Afterwards, I shared what had happened with the class and we discussed it for a few minutes. They were a bit upset, but that changed when I said, “What if this is it? What if we can’t blog anymore!?” I paused and let that sink in a minute as I scanned their faces looking for a reaction. You could see the gears turning in their heads and kind of a group realization thing happened.

We decided to blog about the situation … I explained that if nothing else we could post their writing the next day via my wireless card and modem. I’ve cut and pasted a few of their posts below without editing. Remember these are 5th graders, almost all “Second Language Learners” and children of poverty. Most hear nothing but Spanish or Vietnamese at home. You can tell by some of their wording and syntax errors … but these are their words. I’ve written before about how others will read these posts and wonder why you would post student writing that has errors? … but I know from whence these students come. I am blown away by the improvement. It used to take 4 to 10 re-writes and conferences with individual students to get to this point that they get to now on their own. I should just let them speak for themselves. You can read more on our class blog.

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Have you guys ever lost something? Well we lost something that we care about and that is our blog. If you guys take our blog away I would be really disappointed and angry about it.

I like blogging because I like to share my stories with other people in the world and I like learning new things too.

I have improved so many things just by blogging like my English mistakes, spelling and writing mistakes too. I have also learned how to edit my stories and that has help me a lot with my learning too.

Students should blog because it’s an amazing experience and it could help them with many things in school like their punctuation, capitalization and other types of mistakes too. That’s why you shouldn’t take our blogs away.

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How would you feel if you couldn’t blog no more? Well I would feel sad because I love to blog. Let me tell you how I feel about blogging.

If I couldn’t blog I would feel sad and shocked because we can’t be blogging no more.

What I like about blogging is that we can read better and understand more than before. Also we learn how to write better and learn our mistakes.

Students should blog because there are amazing stories around the world.

I also learn how to understand english, type faster and read better. I really enjoy blogging and I don’t want to stop.

My favorite thing about blogging is going around the world reading stories. Also reading comments from around the world.

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I REALLY ENJOY BLOGGING!!!!!

I love to blog! Blogging is chatting with people on the internet.

You put a story on the internet and people read it on the internet, and then they could leave comments too!!

My favorite part about blogging is that people leave me comments.

I think students should blog because they could get better at reading, writing and typing.

But guess what? They have just blocked my classes blogs! Can you believe it? Well I do! I thought that it was just so cruel! Well I hope they put it back on because, I LOVE TO BLOG!

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Bad News For Us

Have you ever felt upset for something like this? Well let me tell you how I feel about not blogging any more. I would feel bad about not blogging because I like blogging and because blogging taught my class how to edit our post. I would also be mad because it is cool and we get to meet other people when we comment them. What we learn about this is how to fix our mistakes on our stories. Since I’ve been blogging I have got better in reading books and editing my blog post.
Students should blog because it teaches how to write stories, put it in beginning middle and end, rereading it, finding correct English, finding mistakes and how to type faster. I am doing this because our school district blocked our blogging. Blogging is very cool for me!!!



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No More Blogging?

If we were not able to blog anymore I would feel really upset. I would feel that way because it is my first year blogging and I want to experience it some more.

Blogging is good because you improve in lots of things like I have improved in reading, writing and spelling. I have improved in reading because we always check our blog for comments and read them over and over. I have improved in spelling because I always spell check my stories and reread them carefully for spelling errors.

I think other students should blog because it is something kids could have fun with and still be learning. Kids also express them selves and enjoy writing stories. Kids also learn alot more things that they did not know.

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If I couldn’t blog anymore I would feel sad and angry because most schools can’t blog. I think every student should have the privilege to blog because you learn a lot about blogging. You learn to write better story’s, correct mistakes and you can learn how to read better.

I like blogging because you can leave comments. You leave comments to tell people how you feel about there writing and if your comment is inappropriate your teacher won’t let it go on.

Students should blog because they can tell people what happens at there school and outside of school. If anyone takes the privilege of blogging away from students. I will fight for blogging until we get it back.

Learning is messy!

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Tags: studentblogging

So it would seem to me that at NECC 2007 Twitter was the buzz, but not adopted yet by enough to be truly powerful. I was, AGAIN, just so busy this weekend I was not able to be involved much in all the Ustreams and Twitter conversations and more going on … but Saturday evening I sat down for about 20 minutes to check email and the like and I was checking Twitter and in just 2 windows I gleaned the following twits from various attendees:

I would say that Twitter has come into its own.

I also saw the end of about 4 presos being Ustreamed and could feel the energy. It reminded me of the energy in the Blogger’s Cafe and the EdBloggerCon before NECC 2007 … except this one lasted a weekend instead of one day.

Since it is looking like I might be able to attend NECC this year too, I can’t wait to see how the bloggercon evolves.

Learning is messy.
 

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Tags: EduCon2.0

Miguel  had a post today about this research on tech use in schools and I just felt I needed to help spread the news (The Influence of Teachers’ Technology Use on Instructional Practices – Glenda C. Rakes, Valerie S. Fields, Karee E. Cox ). For those of you that want to be able to cite research in support of technology use and constructivist teaching download this PDF file of the study. From Miguel’s post:

Thanks Miguel!!!

Learning is messy!

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Tags: research, educational technology

With EduCon 2.0 taking place this weekend in Philadelphia and poor me not able to go, I thought I would share an idea that perhaps the attendees could rattle around.
The host of EduCon, Chris Lehmann, explained what its about this way:

We “edubloggers” complain about and bemoan how slow change is, how difficult it is to get the word out or show best practice examples of what could be, so that others might understand and come aboard. Well, here’s a thought.

We all revel in this great Web 2.0 connectivity and communication, and lately, how powerful the network is. Many of the same people involved in pulling off the K12 Online Conference, which was a perfect example of using all these great communication tools to educate others without having to be in the same locale, are involved one way or the other with EduCon.

Why not use all these great communicators and  communication tools (You know … “The Network” … our network) – Ustream, Skype. Elluminate, YouTube, TeacherTube, blogs, wikis, … to put on an online event. Maybe a one day coordinated (or maybe only sort-of coordinated) event where we showcase all these tools and teaching methods with best practice examples from around the world. Who would the audience be? The media, general public … anyone we can induce to “Pay Attention”.

What better way to explain / demonstrate why all these tools could make a difference in education than by using them to educate those that could make a difference? We could have Ustreamed lessons – or even short pre-recorded clips of lessons and student and teacher reactions that others would be invited to watch live. We could record all the day’s events and send DVD’s after the fact to media outlets that didn’t bother to watch. We are good at this kind of stuff … we could do this … if the network wanted it to. Just a thought.

Learning is messy

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Tags: EduCon2.0.

I have vivid memories about when I first started teaching of having to focus so much on my lesson plan that sometimes my delivery was stilted and prodding and well, boring, or at least hard to follow. Within a few weeks I relaxed and I quickly became much less self conscious about my delivery. However, I was observed so much in my early years (which was mainly a good thing) I think I was focused on a perfectly delivered lesson – which beyond teaching effectively in my mind somehow involved “not making mistakes” in the delivery. The lesson was flawed if I made a mistake no matter that the students learned what they were supposed to.

If I was demonstrating how to add and was computing a column of numbers and accidentally got the wrong answer (which happens to us all from time to time) then I was at least moderately embarrassed and my reaction taught students that mistakes were BAD. In addition, depending on who was observing, that mistake would be brought up in the post conference as one of the pieces of the lesson that went wrong.

I also remember other teachers, when sharing about an observed lesson, mentioning those little mistakes and being upset by them. Teaching was obviously as much a performance as anything else, and we tended to discuss them like actors.

This attitude did not lend itself to transparency in teaching and learning. If something went wrong, often I would ask for patience from the students while I turned my back on them and quickly re-worked the problem as quickly as possible and then showed them the right answer.

Ted McCain, in his book – Teaching for Tomorrow: Teaching Content and Problem-Solving Skills, relates just such a scenario. He then goes on to talk about how much better a lesson it would have been for his students if he had explained what his thinking was as he tried to find his error, what he was doing, how he was doing it and why he was doing that.

Years ago I came to that realization myself, and I think I do at least a pretty good job of making my teaching transparent. One important part of that is stepping aside when I make a mistake ( sometimes even trivial mistakes), or if we observe a performer at an assembly for example make a mistake, and debriefing that a mistake was made and noting the reaction. Did I throw a fit or look like I was devastated? How did the performer handle that?

When I have a new class of students and I share a mistake the first several times and why it wasn’t the end of the world I see students have those aha! moments. “Hey I didn’t even notice he made a mistake. And he’s not all upset and embarrassed, maybe its OK.” The more I have explained my mistakes or noted when a piece of equipment didn’t do what was expected , “it was nobodies mistake,” the more at ease and willing to try things my students become. Oh! And I make sure they see when I make careless mistakes – I’m trying to do something too quickly and point that out to them too. We note how characters in books and movies react to mistakes also.

We are currently in the process of producing a video about blogging. Each group shot their scenes for the video and then we downloaded the raw footage onto each group’s laptop so that that group would edit their piece and then later we will put all the pieces together.

I originally wanted to have the students do all the voiceover work and editing, but this week I realized that we don’t have time for their learning curve on that right now – so to speed things up I am pushing the buttons on the laptop to record their narration and doing the work to line the audio up to the clip so it matches. However, I also explain everything I do to each group mainly to share my thinking about how I am deciding what is working or not, and even having them notice when a piece is not easily understood and when it is much better, and they really light up. “Listen to this clip – and now this one. Any difference?” Then if they don’t pick it up I ask them if they notice how even just one word was pronounced better or the enthusiasm in their voice makes it better. They really get it and understand why that is important.

Many of my students speak English with an accent and that accent really shows up when they are concentrating hard on reading the narration. They are amazed how some of the accent goes away when they have practiced some and are more confident. It also gives me a chance to pick up on letters students totally mispronounce and clarify and correct it with them. In other words because I’m involved so closely with their narration I am diagnosing language issues – “ hmmm, and I thought this was a tech project : ).

To sum this up – have transparency in your teaching, point out your mistakes and how you react to them. Students see it is normal, even when you are trying to be careful, to make mistakes and that makes it easier for them to receive “coaching” about their weaknesses and errors. This is an essential part of “messy” learning.

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This scenario is looming for others I’m afraid too. In the Reno, Nevada, area where I teach housing has skyrocketed to the point where teachers, especially new teachers, are left to wonder if they will ever be able to afford even the cheapest house. My wife and I made the decision to move to Reno 15 years ago because housing costs in the San Francisco Bat Area were so out-of-line that we knew we would never be able to purchase a home there. I took a $15,000 pay cut when we moved here and my wife, who was making more than I was, had just given birth and didn’t have a job and we were still able to afford a house here. NOT ANY MORE! We couldn’t afford to buy the house we’re in now if we had to buy in today’s market even though prices have fallen. Also from the article:

There are many places in the country where this scene has been true for years. I think it is a sad commentary on how out-of-whack this economy is when teachers can’t afford any home in their community. What are the implications of this? Will more people be drawn into teaching when they see situations like this?

Learning is messy!

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Tags: laggingsalaries for teachers

Interesting article in The News and Observer: Laptops a link among more students, teachers.
The tease for the article says –

This one will rate a future blog post from me because I have had some of the same experiences. Well worth a read.

Learning is messy!

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Tags: Laptops, 1:1,

Regular readers of this blog (and even the irregular readers: } ) know about our “on a shoestring” 1:1 laptop program using old iBooks and equally old Apple Airport hubs (these are the original Airport hubs). We even run our 36 HP laptops off these old hubs and until recently they were doing OK unless we got every computer going. They have really started to show their age the last few months though, and anytime we have more than about 8 computers online at once (depending what sites they are on) we slow to a crawl.

Well, things got much worse today. You might remember a month ago my classroom was broken into (as were other rooms). Over the Holidays another part of the school was broken into, and besides a few laptops and a projector one of the victims was one of our 2 working Airport hubs. This doesn’t absolutely scuttle our mission, but it sure throws a monkey-wrench into things. Blogging will probably work pretty well, but having the class access the net at the same time will be very problematic with only one working hub.

The real issue with the hub is that our IT department really isn’t thrilled that we have wireless connectivity. The education side of the IT department has advised us not to push too hard for getting the new Cisco hubs they install now because they come with lots of blocks and issues too numerous to go into right now. We “get away” with being able to access the net in ways others don’t for reasons I only partially understand because we have these older hubs that were “grandfathered” in to the network … getting new ones brings all the “safeguards” the IT department installs. I do have one more of the older Apple Airport hubs but we are not very optimistic that the IT department will give it “permission” to be on the network – and like I said we were already creeping along.
It just seems a shame that this little 1:1program that has accomplished I think a lot, and could do much more isn’t supported more … its just “tolerated.”

I’ve been given the job of “making our case” to get our hubs replaced with hopefully a better solution that will actually support our wireless needs … I’ll keep you updated on what happens.

Learning is messy!

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Tags: 1:1, wireless,

I posted a new piece over at “In Practice” … How Much Better Could It Be With Collaboration? I really believe making a journey like our 1:1 laptop program, or any “new” teaching or learning you are trying, with collaboration of some kind is key. Key to motivation, key to getting constructive feedback, others to help “plow the field” the first time, etc. I push having students do much of their learning in groups … only makes sense it would be good for me (and you).

Learning is messy!

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Tags: collaborative, collaboration

David Warlick posted today about how Circuit City (a US electronics store) laid off its most experienced sales people to “save money” and now that has “surprisingly” (absolute sarcasm intended here) lead to a drop in business because their service quality diminished. This immediately hit home with me because of what is happening here in the state of Nevada.

As background I have mentioned before that Nevada annually comes in last or close to last in per pupil funding of schools and yet has a relatively high standard of living. We actually moved up to 47th this last year (from 49th – out of 50) and had a little money to try some new things including an investment in technology. Our governor who initially said that education funding was sacrosanct abruptly changed his mind at the last minute, days before Christmas … the cut to my school district alone is $18 million.

The Nevada legislature only meets every other year so they have to set budgets for 2 years at a time. This last session it was decided that “to save money” teachers would no longer have their medical benefits partially paid for when they retire. This will be “grandfathered-in” next October. You must retire before then or lose your medical benefits when you retire. This will save money by not having to pay health benefits, but also by having the teachers that get paid the most leave. So guess what? Teachers with the most experience are going to retire in droves this year.

Now superimpose this against the fact that fewer and fewer people are becoming teachers. I get asked to sit on interview teams for new teachers quite frequently. It used to be you would interview 5 to 10 prospects and come away with 3 or 4 people that you would hire in a minute. For the last few years this has not been the case. We usually end interviews by asking who else we can interview (no one) and settling on the best of the rejects. In Las Vegas where they open a new school almost every month they have subs running many classrooms full time. They hire people over the phone if they claim they can pass the “fingerprint test” (no criminal background) and pay a signing bonus.

So we are short teachers … lets force a bunch more to retire early … we’ll save money and the quality of teaching won’t suffer. Obviously counterintuitive … just not to the right people.

Learning is messy!

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