I haven’t given up … but, the funding I was counting on to go to NECC this year went with the newest budget cuts. Soooo, my search is back on … stay tuned!
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Tags: NECC2008
Collaborative Writing Via Google Docs and Skype
Today we experienced the best collaborative writing experience I’ve ever been part of. Lisa Parisi and Christine Southard’s 5th grade class in New York is involved with my class and a group of other teachers around the country in a writing project using the book “The Mysteries of Harris Burdick.” I blogged about it the other day. Lisa’s class and mine are paired up for this project and today we had our classes collaborating in two innovative ways.
Students discussing their shared story while co-editing it in real time via Google Docs
The students are collaboratively writing stories in groups of 3 or 4 using Google Docs. Today they logged into their shared Google Docs so they could write and discuss the stories they have been brainstorming at the same time. What made this truly transformative was we also set-up computers in our rooms with web cams and had the students working on the same stories discussing characters and setting and plot and everything else involved in their stories over video-Skype, while at the same time editing together via Google Docs. So they were discussing and watching each other edit and add content while seeing and talking to each other at the same time.
Google Doc – students used different colors to keep track of whose work was whose.
I was being observed by a mentor teacher and her 3 mentees during this time … they were blown away by what was happening. Read Lisa’s post to learn about her experience with her principal.
Students discussing comments being left by their writing partners 2,500 miles away.
We are hoping to recreate this experience and maybe even have more computers to Skype with so conversations can continue.
Afterwards I had my students blog about the experience. We used these questions to drive our thinking. Note the word bank we were developing at the bottom.
Learning is messy!
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Tags: GoogleDocs, Skype,
eSchool News Publishes My Article
I was asked early last fall to write an article for eSchool News about our “Inclusion” experience last year. I submitted one and finally today it was published. They gave it a new title:
“Video conferencing, web 2.0 apps help distance learners feel included”
Free services let homebound students enjoy classroom routines
If you follow this blog you probably know the story and there probably isn’t much new here, but I get encouragement from many fronts to continue to spread the word as an example of the power of web based FREE tools among other things … and I would have to agree with that notion. I’ll be teaching a class to teachers about Web 2.0 tools beginning next week and it will be interesting to see how many of them will know much about any of them. Getting the word out is still, unfortunately, one of the things we need to be doing.
Learning is messy
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“The Mysteries of Harris Burdick” Web 2.0 Project
One of my favorite children’s books, and one of the best books for motivating kids to write is “The Mysteries Of Harris Burdick” by Chris Van Allsburg. We recently began a collaborative writing project designed by Lisa Parisi and me – Lisa gets the credit for doing the bulk of the set-up work. She set-up the Google Docs the participants will use, and the wiki page that explains the project. We also met a couple of times over Skype on weekends to pull it together along with numerous Twits and emails.
Students will write stories inspired by the drawings and captions from the book collaboratively. Members of each classroom are grouped in 3’s and 4’s (1 or 2 members from each class), to write about one of the illustrations. They will share ideas via Google Docs and video-conferencing on Skype to brainstorm, discuss and finally author their stories … all the time discussing where it should go next and helping each other proofread. The finished stories will be posted for all to see. Our first Skype session will be Thursday so that both classes can meet.
To prepare my students I had them write “Pass-It On” stories. They were given the beginning of a story:
I was walking home one day when I saw a bird off in the distance flying in my direction. As it got closer I noticed it didn’t look like any bird I had ever seen. It kept flying towards me and to my amazement it zoomed right up to me and landed softly on my shoulder. I wasn’t sure what to do. I thought it was cool, but it also made me very nervous. Then it bent its neck to look me straight in the eye and suddenly …
Each student then took over the story and wrote for 10 minutes … after that they passed their story to the person next to them who then had to continue the story. We continued to pass them around their group, about every 5 minutes, until they got their own story back which they then had to bring to an end. We started to post some of the finished stories on our blogs, all should be posted by week’s end. This doesn’t mimic exactly how the project will work, but I wanted my students to have experience working on a piece of writing that wasn’t all their own.
Learning is messy!
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Tags: collaboration, skype, video-conferencing, Google Docs
With A Little Help From Your Friends
Ever since hearing about the blogs of Al Upton’s 3rd graders being at least temporarily shut down because of fears that too much student information was being disclosed, I’ve wondered how I could help the situation. After much thought I decided to approach the situation with my 5th graders through what we have been learning about the Revolutionary War, and how the United States formed a new government. We focused on freedom of speech and why the founding fathers designed our government with a separation of powers … all the issues associated with “kings” and their abuse of power over the centuries and how that effected how our government was designed.
We talked about how on the one hand we have the freedom of speech and can say what we want, but that we can’t yell “Fire” in a crowded building because people would be put in danger. We also talked about swaying public opinion with a well thought out argument versus complaining and ranting and coming across negatively. Next we talked about the situation with Al’s students and our 1 day experience with having our blogs blocked. That really hit home with them which I was glad to see. They tend to take life on the chin and not get riled about the important things. They wanted to express themselves about blogging and why Al’s students should blog from an academic standpoint and how they could be safe blogging and their parents should allow it based on following some of the guidelines we follow.
So after a group brainstorm students made their points about the value of blogging and why the Minilegends’ parents and school should support it. They left the comments on Al’s post (now well over 100 comments total) and felt like maybe they had learned something and done some good. I felt it was time well spent and helped them make some connections with history.
Learning is messy!
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Tags: Studentblogging, helping others
“Teacher Feature” On Promethean Planet
Promethean shot their newest “Teacher Feature” in our classroom a few weeks ago and it was just posted on their site. I like how they mention our link to blogging (and other Web 2.0 features … the video we used is from YouTube).
Check it out!
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Nevada Ranks 50th In High School Graduation Rate – And There Is A Co$t
a new report by the Alliance for Excellent Education again finds my state wanting when it comes to education. One thing that I note with interest is that our governor recently cut about the same amount from K-12 education as would be saved EACH YEAR if just 5% more males graduated from high school. Since Nevada funds schools at close to 50th in the country it seems it might be a good investment for the future to fund schools at a higher rate and offer more high school programs that are not college prep … like most are now … even though most students don’t go on to college. Maybe providing engaging curriculum that leads to a high school diploma without having to take all the math and higher level science we demand now would actually lead to students getting a better education. I’m not saying do away with the college prep track, but it’s not for everybody. Would some students that graduate with the non-college prep degree still go to college via community college? And some take that degree and go on to a 4 year degree? Probably not a huge number, but I believe so, especially once they been in the real world for awhile and see how that could benefit them. They’ll be older and more mature and perhaps better understand the value of further education. Here are some of the gory details from the report:
Nevada would save more than $230.1 million in health care costs during the lifetimes of each class of dropouts if they had graduated from high school, and if the male graduation rate increased by just 5 percent the state would see an additional $78.4 million a year in crime-related savings and additional revenue.
The 16,000 students who didn’t graduate in 2007 will cost themselves $4.2 billion in a loss of lifetime earnings by dropping out of high school.
The 16,000 students who didn’t graduate in 2007 will cost themselves $4.2 billion in a loss of lifetime earnings by dropping out of high school.
Learning is messy!
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Are We “Bridging Differences” Finally?
Based on a comment I left on a post over at Weblogg-ed.
I’ve been following “Bridging Differences” for quite awhile and so have seen how these two women who at first seemed far apart in their theories and experiences in education have been coming more and more to common ground – kind of shows the value of talking … hashing things out, diplomacy … um but I digress. We’ve heard/seen the same when the Stagers’ and the Richardsons’ (and others) who at times seem to be at odds over things get together to “have at it” in person seem to come away realizing they are not so far apart really.
My other take away here is that however we define or identify the members of those pushing for change in education that are not “techies” – those of us that are believers in educational technology should go out of our way to embrace and converse with them as allies in this whole change process. We will not agree on everything, but much more than not, and we will have magnified and enriched our voices.
Also note that Ms. Meier and Ms. Ravitch are blogging … and I note more and more they are linking to other sources and resources … unless they have someone else doing that for them they are making steps, perhaps unknowingly, towards embracing technology as a communicative and educational lever.
Those in power have been casting aspersions on blogging and bloggers as not having value, of being pawns in a conspiracy to undermine democracy, and all that is good. We all know that TV news, newspapers, magazines … the lot … have never been accused of that … they are sacrosanct … umm yeah.
One of the strongest lessons, in my opinion, from the whole Watergate mess was how the Nixon administration and their surrogates attacked Woodward and Bernstein and the Washington Post as being slanted and biased and off the mark wrong … and we know how that turned out. Both Meiers and Ravitch have faced similar attacks.
This country in-particular has been engaged in a raucous debate over education for a long time and that has been enhanced since the “deployment” of NCLB. Perhaps like Meirs and Ravitch we will begin to come to some common ground and bridge some … or a lot of our differences.
Learning is messy!
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Tags: education
This Blog’s 2nd Birthday!
So today this blog turned 2 years old … somehow it seems older, but March 5, 2006, was the first post. To mark that occasion I am re-posting that first post. Learning is messy!
Why Field Trips, Technology and Project Based Learning?
Originally posted March 5, 2006
Why Field Trips and technology and project based learning? They build schema and experience many of our students don’t have.
School mission statements have revolved around developing students that know how to learn or teach themselves for many years.
“Students will develop the skills required to become lifelong learners,†has become almost a mantra in education. Then we go about this by doing what we have been doing forever – just more focused, organized and, “research based.†NCLB added “the stick†because obviously what was missing was strict accountability.
Language and math “literacy†have become the focus because the thinking is that underachieving students will never make it without the “3R’s.†OK, fair enough – and some of those programs have made a difference – especially in primary grade reading and math test scores. However, as soon as students get to 3rd or 4th grade those scores drop and continue to drop more each grade level thereafter.
Why? Partly because the programs being mandated are so time consuming that there is no time for anything else (field trips, real science, real social studies, art, technology, PE, etc.) where students might experience at least some of the vocabulary and background knowledge required to make sense of what they read – and make it interesting. When students hit upper elementary, reading and math questions stress more and more analytical skills and vocabulary and students often just don’t have the schema in those areas to be successful. Reading then is too often meaningless and boring.
Technology has become a new tool of literacy – like it or not. Just like long ago:
At a teacher’s conference in 1703, it was reported that
students could no longer prepare bark to calculate problems. They depended instead on expensive slates. What would students do when the slate was dropped and broken?
According to the Rural American Teacher in 1928,
students depended too much on store bought ink. They did not
know how to make their own. What would happen when they
ran out? They wouldn’t be able to write until their next trip to
the settlement.
We are not doing our students justice by not giving them experience with the new tools of literacy because we don’t feel they know the old ones well enough. Technology is a gateway to learning that without the knowledge of its use students will be at a disadvantage compared to those that do.
Don’t believe that yet? We will continue to convince you.
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Tags: blogs
Integration Help
I received the following email today (edited very slightly and name withheld). I will answer the best I can, but I sure don’t have all the answers. Anyone willing to share their ideas here?
“I am a fifth grade teacher who really wants to integrate technology but is having a difficult time of it. There are a lack of resources, administrative support, and my own lack of knowledge. That being said, I feel knowledgeable about technology, just not how to effectively integrate it into lessons. I was wondering if you would be willing to give me some pointers on how to add it to lessons. I am specifically interested in furthering my use of blogs, wikis, and podcasts.”
Please go at it in comments with ideas and resources.
Learning is messy!
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