The Learning Blog

Assessment: We've Come a Long Way, Baby!

2011-11-08T08:06:00.000-07:00

When I began teaching in a private school, in 1987, the report card I filled out for my students was very much like the one in the photograph above. There were slight differences, but essentially, that was it. There was a little box in the far right row of each subject line where I was to handwrite, legibly, a constructive comment for the student. The box was small, and comments were limited to one or two sentences. The marks under each subject were perceived as the domain of the teacher, and at that time, anything from work habits, to homework completion, to behavior, to work quality could be assessed and could effect the grade assigned. While I had detailed lesson plans with objectives from the program of studies to back up my daily teaching, and my collection of assessment objects, there were times when I would be scrambling to gather some evidence of student learning just prior to the reporting period.

Today, a report card can take many forms. While some still use the grade-based approach of letter grades or percentages, many are more interested in reporting on progress in a consistent manner from school to school. The comments are professional and based on curricular outcomes. We no longer take off marks for late assignments, lack of attendance, behavior, or work habits, although we may have some areas in which we may comment on these aspects of student growth. While some consider the current methods of reporting somewhat impersonal, I'm not inclined to get hung up on that point. The report card is only one way in which I communicate student improvement. Emails, phone conversations, and text messages, as well as face to face interviews with parents and students provides a personal element to learning assessment, while the report card provides a professional element. Both are necessary. Although, I do kind of wish I only had to fill in the little form they have in the photo. It would only take me an evening to produce for all my students, as opposed to the weeks long process I engage in currently.

FPS, the Learner, and What Happened to Manners

2011-10-07T15:03:00.001-06:00

If you can't say something nice, don't say nothing at all ~ Thumper

I like my PS3. I especially like first person shooter games (FPS). They are pulse poundingly intense and tricky to master. Call of Duty: Black Ops (COD) is one of the most played of the online FPS games. On the urging of one of my students, I purchased a wireless headset to be able to converse with other players during the game. I assumed that the headset communication would be about strategy, teamwork and commaraderie. In the enlightened age of the digital device, people young and old can meet up, play together, and enjoy an evening of fun and excitement without leaving the warmth of one's TV room.

How wrong I was about that headset. Never in my pre-cloud-age life have I heard such foul language, racial denegration, and poor sportsmanship. Players both young and old use words I rarely let slip from my own lips, not even in real-time situations of great stress when such things "slip out". The language is demeaning both to the user and the recipient. I often find myself turning my headset off altogether, and am discouraged and disheartened at what I have experienced.

I took one opportunity to remark on the language of a particularly colourful and offensive individual who took it upon himself to unleash a disgusting diatribe against an African American individual against whom he was playing. I mentioned that I felt the offensive language was racist and inappropriate for a game environment. I then became the target for the individual's single-toothed, unibrowed, wrath. The individual in question then supported his hatred for those of other races and ideologies by stating "I am an American, and proud of it. Because I'm an American, I can say whatever I want to whoever I want. If people don't like it they can go back to where they came from."

I didn't bother to ask this individual from whence it was that he spawned. I muted him. Then I chased his character throughout the game and exacted COD retribution upon him in silence.

My point is simple, it is a question, really. What happened to morality? When did it become acceptable for people to verbally abuse others simply because technology has made it possible to do so from a distance? When was it that we ceased as a society to care about sportsmanship, respect, and integrity? As I spoke with my students about this incident, they laughed at my obviously old fashioned sense of right and wrong, as they do when I comment on the lyrically explicit content in the music they often share amongst themselves. Where are the lines which, as a young person, and as a middle aged person today still do not cross, such as swearing in the presence of strangers, ladies, and elders?

Does being part of a pluralistic society mean that manners, morality, and common sense are now as outmoded as my religious beliefs? Will there come a time when my adherence to a moral code will become offensive to society at large? Has that time already come?

In this enlightened time of ours, does the concept of a Good Person even count? What am I to teach my students about Citizenship and Social Responsibility in the 21st century moral vacuum in which they live? And to what purpose am I teaching it?

Now, I know enough about people, parenting, and probability to also know that those million or so individuals playing and displaying their disregard for propriety may not represent the population in its entirety, but I wonder if parents realize the kind of language their children use with one another online; the kinds of photographs they share; the kind of friends they make in their digital world. Isn't it about time someone started drawing a line across that digital highway?

Perhaps software and firmware developers already have the tools to draw such lines, but I bet doing so doesn't pay as much as looking the other way.

Riley Loves Me - and I Have the Scars to Prove It

2011-09-12T14:49:00.000-06:00

This is Riley. When we adopted him from SCARS (Second Chance Animal Rescue) - I saw a picture of him and fell in love - the fostering family said he was a three year old Coonhound X who was crate trained and into whatever you were into. They said his hame was Riles. When his papers arrived, he was indeed a coonhound X, but he was only a little over a year old. When we put him in his crate, the experience was traumatic for both the family and the dog, and we aren't at the stage yet where he can go in there comfortably and not feel abandoned.

Riley's much bigger than he looks in the photo. Most people think he looks like a beagle, and then they get close up and realize that he comes up to their knees or hips, depending on the height of the person. He's big, he's agile, he's full of energy, and he's beautiful to watch, strong and graceful.

One word of warning...Riley doesn't like hugs. Well, let me rephrase that. Riley likes hugs, but to him they mean "dog play time" which involves a great deal of social mouthing, ear nipping, and squirming. This summer he discovered water, and now at the dog park he drops the ball on a hill overlooking the gated-off pond, so that it "accidentally" rolls beneath the gate. This affords him an opportunity to have us open the gate, have him charge through it and straight into the pond.

Raised in a rescue foster home, Riley has excellent social behavior with other dogs. He tends to attempt to translate this social learning to his adult family, however, myself in particular. Since he doesn't have prehensile thumbs, my wake up call is a gooey mouth on my arm pulling me out of bed. The signal to go for a walk is a similar tugging, sometimes to the point of tearing my favorite jacket. I leave play sessions with red marks up and down my arms (not bites, but rather, tug marks). It's his love language, I've decided. And smart as he is, he knows that I am the only one to put up with that special language. My daughter and my wife both have an understanding with him regarding the social mouthing.

A lot of Riley's characteristics remind me of many of my students. Each comes with an interesting, sometimes inaccurate, but certainly almost always incomplete historical picture. Like Riley, many of these students are bigger than they appear in their descriptions, or more challenging than one is led to believe upon intake.

Each student is intelligent in their own way, and part of my role as educator is to find how best to communicate with them. No one approach works for all, so all approaches are possibilities. At the end of an exhausting year, the students repay the individulaized approach to learning with success, and the feeling within that they can tackle the next obstacles because of how you have helped them.

And the reward for patience with Riley is his warm head on your lap at the end of an exhausting day, the message he sends you that tells you he is content where he is, that he has found where he belongs.

"Oh, and a little to the left please, when you're scratching just behind my ears."

Close the Shade on Another Year

2011-06-30T14:01:00.000-06:00

I built a bookshelf. It came in a dozen littler pieces, and, using graphic-only directions, I was able to construct meaning from the pictures and create a complete product with now errors. OK, I did have to take the bottom shelf off because I'd put it upside down, but that was the only schtinky bit. Otherwise, I did a fine job.

I won't be putting that shelf to use for eight more weeks. I won't be showing my face here for six more weeks. I've finished this leg of the race, I've beaten this mule, I've gone around this block. In eight weeks I'll be filling those shelves with new names and new coursework, and some innovative ideas about helping students access learning in a dozen different ways. I'm excited about that.

But for now...brewskies on the patio, long walks, and a fair bit of quiet time.

Happy summer vacation, fellow educators. For the remainder of the summer, my blogs will be reflective pieces most likely not about educational issues, nor innovative learning.

Enjoy.

2011-06-28T12:57:00.000-06:00

I'm pretty excited for summer. Last summer was one of worry, sadness, caring for a sick friend, and watching my old pet suffer from cancer. It was difficult to enjoy the vacation time we had, because of the worries, no matter how hard I tried.

This summer promises the newness of a young hound - Riley. It promises the newness of a young couple, my son Ben and his fiancee Laura, as they get married in August. It promises a renewal and celebration of my parents' 50th wedding anniversary. While I spent last summer being thankful for the time I had to spend with now departed friends, I can fully spend this summer with fond memories of those friends, and enjoy the present joy of each moment God has given me.

Perhaps that's why teachers are so fortunate. For our entire lives, we have lived the cycle of the seasons. Our holidays are those we had as children, and each summer is a rekindling of memories of previous summers. There is the newness of fall, the excitement of new things to teach and to learn.

Even a curmudgeon like me can appreciate that.

It's Still Raining....UGH

2011-06-20T10:25:00.000-06:00

The "pile" before the calm

I'm slowly but surely working through my mound of marking. This is late June for an Outreach teacher. Although we try very hard to encourage students to submit work on a regular basis, still a great deal comes in the last two weeks of the school year. It does not provide opportunity for feedback, and so as a learning mechanism, it is weak. This is the pile before the calm. The intensity of focus required to finish the right hand pile of assessment and move it to the left hand pile of completed assessment is high indeed. There are veritable fist fights as nerves are frayed, and Lord forbid one of us should become ill. Ah, now worries. When this day is done, I will be able to enjoy the outdoors, perhaps putz about in the yard.

The "summer" view outside my window

Taking a look out of my classroom window, however, I see the same view I have seen for pretty much of the past two weeks. Steady, inexhorable, exhausting rain. My garden is becoming a jungle. Even Riley-bones, my hound is afraid of tromping in there. I guess the drought in Alberta is over. Of course, up north where the wildfires are gobbling up thousands of hectares of forest, the sun shines daily, providing no natural help to the underpaid, overworked firefighters. I'd gladly trade them this rain for their sun. I'm sure they would do the same.

Blogging through the WinPhone Lens: My Summer Project

2011-06-20T10:10:00.001-06:00

Teachers have summers off. The whole world knows that and envies us for it. Particularly in anti-education Alberta, teachers get a bad rap for all the time off we get, how little we do, and of how little value is the little work that we do. But the vacation bit is what really bugs people. Personally, I would prefer to have my vacation time whenever in the year I feel the need to get away, but alas, I am stuck with Christmas, Spring Break, and Summer. That happens to be the same time everything is at high season rates. And I don't get to go to Cabo in February, when the winter makes me want to punch babies.

I could whine all day about holidays. Ha ha. But I had better get to the point. Seeing as how, with a son getting married in August, and all resources directed towards that goal, it doesn't look like my wife and I will be travelling any great distance this summer. No Hawaii blog like last summer. So, perhaps, this summer, I'll try something different. For me. I know a lot of bloggers do this all the time, but it's new for me. A summer photo journal, with pictures taken from my Windows Phone. And my pithy commentary, of course.

Enjoy. Bon Ete

Famous Last Words

2011-06-14T09:41:00.000-06:00

Don't let it end like this. Tell them I said something.
~~ Pancho Villa, Mexican revolutionary, d. 1923

I think we all wish we could leave having said something amazing, eternal, and meaningful. Truth is, very few of us can think of what that might be. The legacy we leave behind is often the best testament we could give, and often we have left it without even realizing that we have done so. Those of us who embrace change know that sometimes what we leave behind us in an incomplete mess, a morass of attempts and failures and gradual successes - and we call that a career. And we hope that it has been enough. Many of us want something more, we reach for it, strive for it, and, sadly, often find ourselves empty handed, returning to the messiness of embracing change, and striving for something better.

I applaud those who may move on. I congratulate those who have found that "better" thing over the edge of the hill. I wonder why it is that I remain, and face some serious self examination. Ah, but life is like that. There are no famous last words as genuine as those which are not previously contemplated. If I don't return, tell them I said...something. :-)

Taking Back Teaching: A Call to Arms...err...Pencils...er...iPhones?

2011-05-04T09:52:00.000-06:00

“Your goal should be out of reach but not out of sight.” Anita Defrantz

Educational reform is not something that occurs on a bureaucratic level. It doesn't even really occur on the administrative level. True educational reform comes from the ground up; it is a grass roots movement. The individual teacher recognizes a need in the classroom, and seeks to meet the need. Need drives reform much moreso than does research, for it is in student need that we are either inspired or driven to find that gem that will help a student become successful. And truly, that is all that educational reform should seek to do.

By now, there are probably readers champing at the bit to post a rebuttal. They are probably administrators who perceive their leadership role to include promoting educational reform. Let me state that I have no desire to downplay the supportive role of our school administrators in achieving educational reform. But I know from experience that initiatives which are downloaded from administrators or district office leaders are often based on research, rather than need, and sometimes leaves a teacher feeling that the goal of change is unattainable without committing to a three year plan of implementation under the supervision of a paid instructional coach chosen by the district office leaders.

In my career to date, I have improved my self esteem by walking a gauntlet of back rubs. I have made a binder full of rubrics for year plans in courses I never ended up teaching. I have learned twice how to be a highly effective person, and I still seem to be overwhelmed with work. All of these were downloaded initiatives aimed at achieving more competent, enthusiastic, engaged schools. And they were fun. And I enjoyed the learning and time to connect with staff. But very little of it did I take into the classroom.

Initiatives which aimed at specific goals tended to achieve a more direct change. The staff led Healthy Interactions training; the Balanced Literacy mentorship training, and safe schools initiatives tended to have more staff buy-in, because they hit teachers where they live, and were more likely to be incorporated into their pedagogy and professional conduct.

As teachers, we should always be encouraged to learn and to grow, to set goals and strive to achieve them, to be aware of the ever changing needs of our students, and to respond with a targeted plan of attack. It is not enough to ask to be left alone to just do our jobs, because our jobs are changing daily as our students' needs change. In order to achieve educational reform, we must take back our profession from bureaucrats and move on the initiatives we feel our students need in order to grow, learn, and be successful.

Soon enough, with grass roots educational reform, it will be our leaders who will be asking, "How can I possibly support all these teachers with all these incredible ideas for change?" And as educators, we should keep our administrators hopping, because if we don't, they will have to pick up the drum and tap a beat we may not like or want to dance to.

Teacher Mentorsip in the Digital Age Part II

2011-05-02T15:08:00.000-06:00

True Fact: I'm not perfect

And so I went in search of a Teacher Mentor, almost unconsciously, to help me turn the classroom in my head into the one just down the hall from me.

Gerry Smithaniuk's classroom ran like a well-oiled machine. Students knew the expectations, and more often than not met them. I observed great strengths in all of my teaching colleagues, but many of them were my own age, and had been in the business just as long. Many were still riding what I call the Cool Factor, where a young teacher is respected because they can connect with the students due to their youthful outlook. I can't say I had that, as I was already a father of two, my wife was a substitute teacher in the building fairly frequently, and I REALLY WANTED TO ENCOURAGE LEARNING, EVEN IF THE STUDENTS DIDN'T LIKE ME MUCH. So I couldn't go to my same age peers for advice; they had little to offer that I hadn't tried. But Mr. Smith's classroom (short for Smithaniuk, which is a mouthful), hummed with the positive energy of learning, and was quiet at the same time. It was to his classroom I went after one of the most trying days of my career.

I wanted to know what it was he did that was different from what I did. I wanted to know if there was a script or a sanction, or a tone of voice that cowed or subdued, or charmed the students into magically conforming to the expectations of the classroom. What he had, though he didn't say so, was an attitude of expectation. He expected that students arrived on time, sat down, listened when others were speaking, and completed their work to the best of their ability. And because he expected it, and promoted that expectation, students lived according to the expectation. What he had, which was not magic at all, was what Stephen Covey called being proactive. Stop the small things before they become the large issues that make us lose sleep. Gerry couldn't tell me what he did that was so effective, I had to observe it; I had to be willing to listen to criticism of some of my own poor choices in management, lesson delivery, and student interaction.

Gerry was the best kind of mentor to have, I feel, because he was on site, he was open and honest, and most of all because he was willing to be an example, and take the time to work with me on his own time. He never once tried to rescue me when the class was blowing up, but he was totally willing to talk with me about what happened after the day was done. Lessons like those informal talks stayed with me to this day.

Of course Gerry's mentorship was a starting point. I spent the next year being the most strict teacher I could be. I was focused on discipline and structure. I would joke with Gerry that I was after his crown. He always managed to out-do me though. Over time, I found a happy medium between high structure and discipline, and the more relaxed style I currently have, with clearly defined expectations, proactive attention to student behaviors, and a direct, no-nonsense way of dealing with students without making it personal. Students need to know when they've crossed a line, but they also need to know that we accept their mistakes if we see improvement through more thoughtful action in the future. I owe a great deal to Gerry Smithaniuk, and to all of the dedicated professionals with whom I have taught these 25 years. Each year I try to connect with teachers who are doing things I would like to be doing.

While I have enjoyed having Teacher Mentors to help improve my teaching, I have seen a shift recently in how Mentors are perceived and accessed. Many of us are technology focused in our approach to finding information, and even to seeking professional development using online and interactive technologies. I am divided regarding accessing mentors in this fashion, because I believe only half of the equation can be solved in a text-to-text, or voice-to-voice, or even face-to-face communication. A mentor must see the teacher in action to be able to comment on the whole package. I see similar difficulties in online counselling, which I have conducted from time to time. I believe there is a place for digital access in seeking out other professionals for collaboration, although perhaps mentoring is not the best example of such collaboration.

On the other hand, for those teachers who are isolated, or can not find an on staff mentor, the digital environment offers opportunities that would not otherwise exist for those educators. Success in such online teacher/mentor relationships requires transparency, honesty, and deep reflection on the part of the teacher, and perhaps a great deal more patience and willingness to question on the part of the mentor. I know there are studies which demonstrate increased teacher retention rates where mentorship supports emerging teachers. In that case, I encourage every new teacher to seek out a mentor, wherever they must travel to find one. Teaching Mentors assess not only your classroom management, lesson delivery, and planning. Teaching Mentors provide an anchor and an example of what this fine profession can be. Teaching Mentors are those positive influences we must encourage ourselves to be each an every day.

Teacher Mentorship in the Digital Age

2011-05-02T10:44:00.000-06:00

But Clint I love, because Clint was my mentor. I knew nothing about making an Italian movie.

Eli Wallach

When I first started teaching in the public school system, I had already been four plus years a teacher. Yet, being in a private school with, at most, sixteen students per class, a higher than average level of parental support, and being fresh out of university, I was able to accomplish things I have never been successful at since. The first two months in the K-9 public school were overwhelming disasters, from a class managment and pedagogical point of view. I can commiserate with those shell-shocked veterans of the old wars, for I was literally stunned to the point of near inaction those first weeks, with a difficult grade seven home room, and Health classes who didn't respond to my teaching and ignored my attempts at management.

I consulted my administrator, Bob Mitchell, and assistant principal, Barry Medori. Each of them had helpful suggestions as to how I could adapt my own style to this new environment in which I found myself. Try as I may, I was still unable to maintain the kind of long term cooperation necessary to be as effective as I desired to be.

Nobody told me to take the next step. But I enjoy a challenge, and I like to solve problems, so I stepped back and looked at my teaching practises as a problem. I knew that what I was currently doing wasn't working, and I also knew I wasn't going to miraculously change into super teacher unless something significant changed in my thinking about what I was doing. Reflective teaching wasn't yet taught in university, it was more about creating impactful lessons, stimulating excitement in the subject matter, designing lesson, unit and long term plans. My own private reflection enlightened me, as did a dusty leaflet I found in the bottom of my desk: The Master Teacher. I figured since I was definitely NOT a Master Teacher, I should find someone who was.

My search led me from classroom to classroom, and in the third classroom from mine, and across the hall, I observed my own unruly and uncooperative students enter a classroom, sit down quietly, open their books, and wait patiently for class to begin. I was astounded. I half expected a burly door guard, or a Funky Winkerbean machine gun toting hall monitor to be in attendance, but I found none. The teacher was not even in the room yet. I thought "Who is this Master Teacher, that students enter his/her room eager to learn, willing to comply, and ready to go?"

When I returned to that same classroom after school, I had my answer. And as ashamed, intimidated, and nervous as I was, I stepped across the threshold into the world of my first and most important teacher mentor.

To be continued....

Why Can't I Get These Kids To Do...ANYTHING?!

2011-04-20T10:09:00.000-06:00

People take different roads seeking fulfillment and happiness. Just because they're not on your road doesn't mean they've gotten lost.
H. Jackson Brown, Jr.

Over my 25 years as a teacher, I have witnessed many examples of soaring success in learning. I am so proud when I am able to reconnect with past students, now living out their adult lives successfully, and in ways I could not have imagined they would do. For many of those 25 years, the majority of the student body I encountered on a daily basis, was, in a way, unbroken. As I looked over a class list, or a daily record of assignment completion, there was a tendency towards consistent work completion, albeit sometimes with a fair amount of reminder and coaxing. I do recall some students, perhaps many students, not completing absolutely every assigned task, but only one or two students in my many years completed very little.

This year, I seem to be experiencing an entirely different phenomenon. This year, I seem to have a majority of my students producing very little work, neither on their own, nor with reminder and any amount of coaxing. Admittedly, the make up of the group of students I work with includes students with motivational issues, learning issues, social issues, and attendance issues, so my expectations for work completion and time on task should not be likened to those to whom I previously referred as "unbroken". But if you follow my past entries, you know that the program is designed with success in mind. We will put in place literally any appropriate modification to help students at any ability level achieve success. So I am literally losing sleep over the appalling lack of success my students are experiencing.

I have a couple of observations of the process of change over the past seven years during which I have been involved in this Middle Years Outreach setting. The first is the growth of personal digital devices of all sizes, shapes, and functions. Whereas seven years ago, nearly every student had a cell phone, they tended to avoid texting (cost prohibitive), and the technology wasn't yet to the point where they could conveniently access web content. To tell students to only use their cell phones appropriately was redundant, since they weren't using them much at all. The mp3 only played music, and computers were used to research, prepare and publish information. Students welcomed the idea of a low stress environment which was quiet and personal, and they enjoyed the individualization of their programming, as it considered the student at the center of their own learning. This seemed to fulfill a need in students that a brick and mortar school with all it's options and activity did not seem to do.

This year, I have three students out of 24 who DO NOT have a personal digital device on which they can receive and send unlimited texts, watch YouTube, listen to music while viewing the accompanying video, and surf the web. We are told to incorporate these devices into the student's learning by having them text responses, access online content, and participate in discussion groups. Paper based learning is dead, we are told, students don't want to learn that way. Taking away or prohibiting unlimited use of personal devices is not respectful of student's rights and wishes, and instead we should educate students on how to use their personal devices appropriately. Technology has certainly had an impact on how much work students attend to on a daily basis, and this is from personal observation. Without enlisting the assistance of parents in prohibiting student use of the cell phone during learning time, I have been unable to get student cooperation on the appropriate use of personal digital technology on a consistent basis.

Another observation regarding the lack of motivation and work completion on behalf of students resides in the cocooning effect. What was initially forecast as an economic reality, I believe, has become a social problem for many young people. The lack of face to face human contact, the fulfillment of the need for companionship will supercede the right to learn. Students such as mine spend much of their time alone, in front of the gaming system, with limited interaction with peers. They replace this void with text messages which are not an adequate replacement for true human contact. Cocooning at home results in loneliness, and a need to interact, no matter the consequences. This results in off task interactions, and eventually, less work completion.

The final observation I will make concerns sleep patterns. We live in a different time, with many conflicting values present regarding parenting, in particular. Some parents allow total autonomy over bed times, access to television and games systems, eating times and patterns, and on and on. Other parents regulate time, amount, and access. What I see more an more, is that students, regulated or not, are choosing to deprive themselves of sleep in order to access unlimited play and stimulation. Being in a unique learning environment, perhaps the issue of sleep deprivation is magnified, but I don't think it is unusual. Students do not hide the fact that they "pretend" to go to sleep at night, close their door, and play video games until late into the night. They arrive at school exhausted, are easily irritated, refuse to work, sleep on their desks, and talk about how they can't wait to go home to play. Lack of proper sleep leads to lack of attention, which leads to problems at school. My students tend to sleep less, or at least less consistently, and their learning is the sacrifice they make in deference to their play time.

I guess I don't blame the students. It is the sacred duty of parents to model and regulate what young people seem unable to do for themselves. By placing the game system in a common area, a parent can easily regulate when the system is to be used, yet many parents allow and encourage their children to set up an extra television and game system in their bedrooms...AND THEY EXPECT THEM TO GO TO SLEEP WITH SUCH TEMPTATION STARING THEM IN THE FACE. I may be old fashioned in my expectations of what it means to be a parent, but my kids finished school with acceptable grades, even despite the many social issues they had to navigate. Of course, they didn't really have a game system until they were already young adults. And we regulated their sleep as much as possible; more when they were young, so that they regulated themselves more as they got older.

Here, I have tried to identify some emerging issues for educators and parents in the 21st Century. While I feel we must accept and sometimes embrace change in all its forms, I also see that there is a fascination with all things technological that borders on obsession; for adults, as well as children this obsession will need to be balanced with what it means to be truly human. While digital access can connect us to the far reaches of the planet, we can not forget that we come from the very ground, that there is a world around us with which we must interact in many ways. To find balance as a civilization, we must find balance in our daily activities, and we must teach our children that balance. I see the lack of balance on a daily basis, and have reflected some of that here.

The solutions seem easy enough. I'll get to them once I finish playing my turn on Facebook Scrabble...oh, and after I update my Twitter...and, just a sec, I have to text my daughter about that bank appointment.

February 16/April 20, 2011

A Response to Plagiarism: Lazy-doers Beware!

2010-09-29T09:47:00.000-06:00

As I was working my way through a stack of work the students had submitted, I was stopped dead by one piece of writing in particular. The student had a typed piece where normally they would have hand printed the piece. In fact, it was the only typed piece in the student's entire booklet. The student had dutifully and accurately recorded the bibliographic information, a website, which I searched and quickly found. My suspicions about the piece of writing were confirmed, as I found entire sentences copied and pasted together into a pretty close version of the original biography found on the website.

Now, I'm not even going to go on a rant about plagiarism. With the advent of the internet as the main research tool for students (adults too!), low level questions on assignments, or poorly designed questions disguised as research projects INVITE plagiarism. Any question that asks a student to list, define, give an example, or explain a topic may as well just assume internet access and liberal use of the copy/paste function. The "conversation" on "Twitter" is often unrepentant in passing off of the ideas of others without appropriate reference to the originator. I know this to be true in some cases as I've been an observer as the hard work of another has been claimed as the brainchild of someone who should know better.

I believe that we 21st Century leaders and learners alike have become complacent when it comes to an old idea called INTEGRITY. We defend our actions by claiming some Geschtalt world mind, or shared information, but really, many of us do not take the time any more to properly credit those around us who have laid the pavement upon which we stand and become recognized. Call it geschtalt, or call it plagiarism, or call it plain laziness, I think it all stems from a lack of integrity, and perhaps more obviously from many things becoming too EASY.

With my student and the plagiarism issue, I had choices. Many teachers hammer plagiarism hard, assign a failing grade, and call it a day. If an assignment looks suspect, the teacher will cut and paste in, a brilliant counterstroke, the suspect piece, and let the online wizards do the dilligence of checking for plagiarism; once found the consequences for wasting the internet's time are severe indeed.

I chose to reframe the question to provide an opportunity for the student to actually learn something, and earn something. Zero should be the most difficult grade to attain, and should be absolutely painful for the teacher to assign. While it took me time to plan a mini lesson for the student, and it took some effort for me to reframe the question from a retrieval task to a thinking one, I believe the effort will be worth it and the outcome much more valuable to the student.

The Hand: An Source of Infinite Possibilities

2010-09-20T13:30:00.000-06:00

I am only one, but I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something. And I will not let what I cannot do interfere with what I can do. ~Edward Everett Hale

Today was the first day of the Art program. I had my Outreach students (a captive audience), as well as a handful of high school students (earning much needed credit), and volunteers from our partnership program. We started with the very basics of drawing, from holding the pencil to warm up exercises.

I had everyone draw their hand. That was the only instruction, besides a caveat that they would not be allowed to "trace" the hand. Mostly, the results were similar facsimilies of a balloon with sausages attached. The second activity involved "blind contour/gesture" drawing. Students looked only at the hand, not at the drawing. The message travels from eyes to brain to hand in a training exercise in "how to see". The results are always fascinating, and I can see which students "peeked" as their result looked very much like a balloon with sausages attached. The other students discovered a "disconnect" between what their eye's perceived and what their hand drew. The lines were not often "straight", crossing awkwardly, veering madly away from one another, sometimes mere squiggles and at other times very broad strokes of the pencil. But in almost every case where the students DID NOT PEEK, incredibly accurate details of their hand (the many lines of a bent index finger, the sworl of a fingerprint, the valleys between finger and fingernail) emerged from the swirling morass of disconnect. The students, in essence SAW their hand for the first time.

This hand study is a common starting point in drawing. It is an exercise, but a constantly developing art form in itself. While some use shoes, ribbons, cloth as the model upon which to develop the craft, I find the hand a source of infinite possibilities. The hand can be bent, straightened and contorted into many shapes, creating form, shadow, and intricate detail which is then available to the artist to discover and draw. While our small Art class will move on from that initial experience, we shall return frequently to the hand, and to this blind contour technique to track improvement and to develop more fully that connection between brain and hand.

No First Day Nonsense...Let's Get 'Er Done

2010-09-07T10:03:00.000-06:00

A man's work is nothing but this slow trek to rediscover, through the detours of art, those two or three great and simple images in whose presence his heart first opened.
Albert Camus

Within the first ten minutes of the first attendance day of my morning Outreach class, the cast of characters of all that we are, are present and performing according to design.

One student is doing work he has already done before, playing it safe until I present a challenge in palatable form. A second student has brought out his toy collection (!), and I am reminded of the Roman house gods, all neatly arranged in his cubicle to ward of the possibility of human contact.

A third student is assembling and disassembling a Lego(R) person, and alternately staring at an app on his iPod(R), while avoiding writing an autobiographical piece on himself as a reader. Another works dilligently, with goals of an early exit so that he may join the masses at the local high school for second semester. The final three are focused and attentive to the details of their work.

There is no messing about in Outreach. We don't spend a day organizing our work, reviewing the syllabus, setting up our lockers, having share time. With only a half day on site, it's best to get down to the learning as immediately as possible. It's best as an educator for me to see the students on the one day in the year when they are absolutely focused on creating a crowning achievement: the Best Year Ever. For four of the seven who have shown up today, I believe their self-drive will carry them through with some support from myself. For the others, a gentler, or firmer, or altogether divergent approach must be developed. These are the students who will grow despite themselves, who may believe they can not do so, but who, ultimately, I am here to serve.

If learning is a work of art, let us begin with the first tentative strokes.

Lessons from Waikoloa

2010-07-09T18:14:00.001-06:00

"There is more to life than increasing its speed."
Gandhi

I don't have a specific destination or activity in mind on my vacations. I consider my vacation time a form of detox. Teaching takes a lot of patience, a lot of tongue biting, and a lot of making sure the cart is loaded when the horse is ready to go. I don't think most teachers realize the kind of toll such stress takes on the body and mind. As one who has been there and out the better side, I have personally experienced the toll of stress and burnout, at a time when I felt most needed, most appreciated, most collegial, and most energetic.

When life comes crashing to a halt, either because of physical illness or mental fatigue in its many forms (burnout, depression, anxiety), it is not a simple thing to just get up and start again. There is a great deal of restructuring that must occur if one is to travel the same road with different purpose.

Following my personal and professional crash, I made a great number of changes. I monitored my work hours, I jealously guarded my volunteer time, and sought activities away from work which brought joy, balance, and escape back into my life. There are still times when the balance seems out of kilter, and I must reexamine(sometimes with the help of a professional counselor) my choices to right that balance.

One of the promises that I made to myself after my leave of absence was that I would not continue to be so serious about life. Acceptance of the present is much more rewarding than worry about the past or future, and I try to live that every day. I still worry, but I try very hard to discipline myself against dwelling on possible outcomes, and rather only focus on what current action I can choose to make another step towards solving the problem.

This blog is going everywhere. So is my mind. The ocean breeze, the warm sun, the quiet contemplation, and the refusal to think about next school year, or the year past, or the jobs I might like, or the problems awaiting me when I return home all are essential to life as a balanced person.

Whether or not you pick up and go anywhere this summer (winter for you down unders), a small piece of advice - and the cool thing about advice is that it is free to give, free to take, or free to ignore - make time every day to find balance, peace of mind, and calm. You may not get more than two minutes to find it, but that two minutes can save you a half year of therapy.

Believe me.

The 21st Century Classroom is still here.

2010-06-14T14:12:00.001-06:00

George Costanza: You're really moving to California?
Cosmo Kramer: [points to his head] Up here, I'm already gone.

If I have learned anything this year, it is that I already have the classroom of the 21st Century, and so do you all. The problem is that those who created a new box expected us all to abandon our current boxes and climb into theirs. Well, I, for one, like my 21st Century classroom. I have students ranging in age from 12 - 16, each working independently on a program designed just for them. They have access to the web in a supervised environment, and access the vast majority of their research via the internet, as we have a limited hard copy resource collection. Choice is the catch word for my 21st Century classroom. Students can choose to work at home, or work on site. Students can choose an academic or a more practical learning route. Options are available to allow students to make meaningful life choices regarding their education. They are becoming advocates for themselves and their learning.

Now, I'm an old fart. I've been kicking around this profession for 24 years. I had a 21st Century classroom focused on inquiry rather than regurgitation of facts. That was back in 1987. I allowed students choice, and we had access to a room full of computers with more memory than a person would ever need (540 K!).

While recent reports suggest that the human brain is rewiring itself as a consequence of our highly digital interaction with the world, I would suggest that the adolescent brain is not much different than a famous greek philosopher is attributed with saying: “Children today are tyrants. They contradict their parents, gobble their food, and tyrannize their teachers.” Nor is our approach to education much different. The tools change, but the aim is pretty much the same. Admittedly, there is more detail to our helping students understand themselves, society, and the world/universe around them, but teaching is teaching, learning is learning, and the classroom is the classroom. Whether it be on the steps of the agora, or in a brick and mortar building with an interactive whiteboard and 1:1 laptop access, or even in a storefront outreach program, the learning still happens.

If I have learned anything from a school year of blogging and interacting via social media, I think the one constant is that there are students and teachers, and sometimes you can't tell which is which.

I'm sure even Socrates learned a thing or two from his obnoxious students. I think Plato was one of them.

Time to Play...AND Procrastinate

2010-06-07T10:52:00.000-06:00

The two rules of procrastination: 1) Do it today. 2) Tomorrow will be today tomorrow. ~Author Unknown

I will admit it. I am, and have always been, an expert procrastinator. While I have managed to take steps to ensure work is done on deadline, and that my disease does not adversely affect others, the fact still remains that I understand my students best because I live in their shoes every single day of my life.

The Outreach students I work with all enjoy their own baggage. For some of them it is procrastination, for others it is out-and-out avoidance, and for others fear of the uncharted territory ahead.

An interesting observation about my own experience with procrastination, with leaving for tomorrow what could have been done yesterday. When the task is a)energizing, b)interesting, and c)valuable, I rarely avoid it. Procrastination, for me, occurs when the task lacks purpose, immediacy, interest, or reward. Similarly, my students experience a lack of purpose with what they deem to be pointless, unimportant, and not immediately applicable to them.

A big part of the critical thinking process with students, is helping them find immediacy, a sense of purpose, and a personal sense of reward through the task of learning. For me, the tendency to procrastinate disappears when I can teach with that same goal in mind, to focus on what students may get from the activity, rather than what I will have to grade once they have finished.

As I plan to do much more with the critical thinking process next year, I am working through the process in my own mind now, in preparation for that time in front of students. I anticipate their enthusiasm for learning in different forms as we discover what is truly "in it for them", particularly in the area of Social Studies, worldview, globalization, and nationalism. I look forward to challenging my colleagues to pursue a similar path to student enlightenment, and to tapping the vast resources of the cloud in finding ways for students to express and experience learning in a variety of ways.

Share your procrastination stories with me, and how you have overcome the "dread bog".

What Did We Learn?

2010-05-31T13:36:00.000-06:00

CIA Superior: What did we learn?
CIA Officer: Uh...
CIA Superior: Not to do it again.
~Burn After Reading~

This? Is my report card? On what I did? With technology this year?

Implementing New Software in the classroom: B. While I was able to more adequately use available student record systems to more appropriately organize and keep track of student work, I still find myself making templates and physically tracking work with a pen. My goal next year is to use the record system to track and communicate with parents and students while using little to no paper, except where the digital divide warrants.
Implementing Web2.0 applications in the classroom: A-. I have personally enjoyed playing on the web, looking for new applications my students can utilize to make their work engaging, fun, neatly complete, and sharable. Student reaction has been mixed, because as they realize that working on the web eliminates so many excuses the used to have, they have now agreed to complete much more work in an easily traceable format. There is still so much I haven't done in terms of planning and being more proactive regarding applications to course content.
Use of digital media technology in the classroom: B-. I successfully completed one powerpoint to share with staff, in which I embedded both video and music. In the end, it was so pitifully easy that I probably shouldn't even count that. I also used a lot more visual information to convey meaning and content than ever before in my long career. Because of that I have myself the B. Next year I hope to continue with this positive trend, using many more visual cues to link to critical challenges, particularly in the area of Social Studies.

Next year will be all A's. I promise. My principal promised me a new bike if I got all A's.

How Should We Feel When We Become The Ugly Ones?

2010-05-28T12:29:00.000-06:00

http://www.edmontonjournal.com/news/oddities/Mystery+creature+washes+Ontario+lake/3056753/story.html

OK, this is an ugly one. I mean, the picture is of some abheration which washed up in Ontario, called by local elders an "Ugly One". And I also mean that this post may be an ugly one. Part of my Friday chi-chi double entendre.

While this little gaffer washed up on the shores of an Native Reservation in Ontario, thought by elders to represent a bad omen, I wonder if we are becoming The Ugly Ones of our own profession. In our attempts to encourage digital literacy application in learning, at times we must become the infamous Curmudgeon, or the fabled Troll, or, perhaps, an Ugly One.

Let me explain, in my own defence before an unruly mob forms, and I am chased into the highest reaches of my dark, lightning strewn castle. I am a big proponent of allowing students lattitude and choice. But I also do not have a problem with clawing back when students make poor choices. I shall proceed by sharing an example of this process in practise.

1)Student requests use of computers to "research" a science topic.

2)Request granted

3)Student logs onto computer, logs onto internet, types in vague search term, is corrected and directed to a more specific set of choices, and left to research

4) Student loads mp3 site to listen to music while "researching". Site does not contain video, and use of mp3 in classes to reduce distractability from other students is allowed and part of SOP in the classroom.

5) As teacher walks by, student is glimpsed minimizing a screen. Teacher maximizes the screen. It is a YouTube video of popular music. Teacher asks student to keep screen minimized so the video is not distracting, and to return to "research".

6)As teacher walks by, student is again glimpsed minimizing screen. Teacher maximizes screen. It is a YouTube video called =3 which is very popular with 13-15yr old boys. Student is asked to close the YouTube. Student complies, and returns to "research".

7) As Teacher walks by, student is glimpsed playing a game, not minimizing screen, totally engrossed in "Runescape". Teacher, finally reaching limit of tolerance, pulls the plug on the screen. Student is asked to begin writing using research from text.

8) As Teacher walks by, student is glimpsed minimizing screen. Student has removed a power chord from another device and reactiviated the screen. Student is crafty, and, apparently, oppositional.

9) Teacher removes power chords from both screen and motherboard for all four computers in classroom for a week.

I don't know if this would occur in a High School. I tend to hope that students are a little more grown up and self-directed by grade 10 or 11, and certainly by grade 12. This is an unfortunately regular occurence in my Outreach. Students only have mandatory attendance for 2 1/2 hours per day, and still they can't seem to muster enough self-control to avoid "playing" when they should be "researching". I know that there are some of my 24 students who can, and DO, use the computer wisely and appropriately ALL THE TIME. There are some students in my group who must be ENCOURAGED to TRY using the computers and the internet more frequently. I certainly think that this example enlightens us to the reality of the 21st Century learner: they are still young, still students, and must learn digital literacy, appropriate use, time management, keyboarding, research skills, and all the rest just as much now, as they did when the repository of learning was a library full of books, and learning was done with a #2 Dixon Ticonderoga.

Digital learning, Web2.0, webware applications are not the answer, they are the tools by which a new learning medium is opened to students. We Ugly Ones, Curmudgeons, and Trolls still must guard the bridge with vigilance and wisdom, and a little bit of "All Up In My Grill", to help students access and manipulate the digital environment towards meaningful learning, the same way we used to do with the Captain Underpants series, which was desert for eager young minds after the main course.

May, Not April, Is the Cruellest Month

2010-05-21T14:51:00.000-06:00

And indeed there will be time
For the yellow smoke that slides along the street,
Rubbing its back upon the window-panes;
There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
There will be time to murder and create,
And time for all the works and days of hands
That lift and drop a question on your plate;
Time for you and time for me,
And time yet for a hundred indecisions,
And for a hundred visions and revisions,
Before the taking of a toast and tea.
~T.S. Eliot "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"~

Indeed, when May rolls around, the weather warms up, and it seems like the student brain turns off. At this most crucial time of testing, finishing, cramming, and jamming all the curriculum into their brains, students decide it's too nice outside to think about books and paper. Imagine that!

I will admit to having that same melancholy every May. But as the adult in the room, I have to keep the wheel moving. I try to lead by example. I try to work harder than I normally would and thereby encourage the students to work even a little more than they are. It often doesn't do much else than frustrate me with it's utter failure. There are those of my detractors who have critcized me for being too lax, too accepting during the school year; it's my fault, of course, that students shut down in May. I don't believe that it is because I am neither lax, nor accepting of student laziness that students become more lazy in May. I believe that their brains are full, and that we are taxing them at precicesly the wrong time.

Universities and Colleges long ago realized that the human brain can only effectively process so much new information; also that students have summer jobs; also that most students do not live for school. They made their school year last from September to December, and from January to April. Those few students to whom school is an eternal draw choose short session in spring and summer. The remainder rest; the remainder get summer jobs; the remainder find out that there is learning in life outside of school.

Perhaps there is a place for life learning in our schools. Not someone's interpretation of life as in Career and Life Management, or Health courses. But perhaps the community can become partners in life training through real work, or through volunteerism, or something. It's just a thought. What if May and June were life learning months for students, not high stress months for teachers trying to get them prepared for final exams? How would our end of the school year look then?

Would we be measuring our days in "afternoons and coffee spoons?" Would be be finding time for a "hundred visions and revisions?" Would we be fighting nature itself for six hours per day and calling it a life lesson? If so, what specific life lesson are we teaching? Is it "Life's Not Fair?" What, anyway, is the point of that particular lesson. If the students I teach don't realize life isn't fair yet, then let them be blessedly ignorant of the fact.

While I understand the importance of defining learning at the outset, I understand also that learning is not a commodity, but a process. If we want our students to be successful, engaged, active participants in that process, we must stop expecting them to produce results when they are least able to demonstrate their excellence.

I'm not sure what that has to do with Prufrock, but I know there will be time to discuss that, too.

Sometimes We Try Too Hard To Make Them Think

2010-05-03T14:34:00.001-06:00

A fact in itself is nothing. It is valuable only for the idea attached to it, or for the proof which it furnishes. -Claude Bernard

I have just spent half a day reviewing the writing of some of my Grade 9 Social Studies students. In my mind, I am comparing their work(an independent study with some guidelines to work completion) to the product of other Grade 9 students using a module based distance learning program. I am asking myself, "How are these students demonstrating their knowledge, skills, and thoughts regarding the topic at hand." On the one hand, the students with the pre-fab booklets and the five lines per answer certainly proved their tenacity at completing the fourteen page document exactly as assigned. The work lacked sparkle, for lack of a better phrase, and did not necessarily demonstrate the students' own thoughts on the learnng. On the other hand, the independent study students' responses demonstrated both evidence to support their responses, and opinions which were much more carefully crafted. While the "independent study" group did not have five spaces in which to form their response, their work averaged ten to fifteen lines of typewritten script per response. If content = effort, then the independent group certainly put in more effort, and the quality of their writing is similarly more "fragrant" than the lusterless other group.

I compare these groups not because I like to compare the "ducks" and "geese", but rather because I believe that when I put the decision making power in the laps of the students, they more often than not pick it up and take it places much more lush and rewarding than I may have ever gotten them to through a day to day, fill in the blank approach. Open ended assignments allow for choice, allow for differentiation, and allow students to feel empowered enough to reach for the summit, rather than hanging out on the hill with the status quo. Excellence comes from within, I think it is worth remembering, and while I may know a lot about stuff, I think my students can tell me a lot about what they know about that stuff if I let them.

Middle Years Males are a Different Bunch

2010-04-06T12:42:00.000-06:00

I'm pretty sure that when people speak about engaging students via web2.0, they don't have the average middle years male in mind. I have had an interesting year watching a class of 12 middle years boys, aged 12 to 16 as they interact with one another and access the internet during break times. Sadly, their favorite items tend to be watching YouTube videos of other adolescents (and the Dumbass crew) getting "sacked" in a variety of ways. This brings them countless hours of entertainment. I have tried to redirect their interests using many of the suggestions I have received on Twitter, through blogs, and via colleagues. I have come to the distinct conclusion that adolescent boys are not interested in learning, that perhaps their minds are not engaged and resist being redirected out of choice and readiness.

Barry MacDonald, creator of MentoringBoys.com believes (and I tend to agree) that boys are different than girls, and that the differences apply also to how they learn. In his recent newsletter, MacDonald focuses on the need for recess, unstructured play time, to help students remain focused, and to reduce problem behaviors in the classroom.

In my microcosm of the school system, students are expected to work quietly for 65 minutes, then they are given a ten minute break, and must work for an additional 70 minutes. When I first worked in the Outreach scenario, we included a frequent physical education time, as well as a regularly scheduled art class. I abandoned these, as many students were falling behind on work completion required for promotion to the next grade. My work completion rates improved, but I can't honestly say learning improved. Another issue which prompted the reduction in art and physical education was supervision. With the limited physical education facility available to us, students were restricted to six at a time for activity time, otherwise issues would erupt.

I play a constant balancing act between doing what is required, and doing what is beneficial to the individuals in my care. The pendulum is beginning to swing more towards what is beneficial, particularly to the boys in my care, to make the best use of more limited time on task, and to offer opportunity for appropriate physical outlets. It is a balancing act, not a circus performance, and as a professional I must be mindful of the changes I make, not because they are popular, but because they are sound, beneficial, and balanced among stakeholders.

Teacher Looks Ahead

2010-03-15T09:37:00.000-06:00

Beware of all enterprises that require new clothes.
- Henry David Thoreau

While it is only March, and as I struggle to adjust my internal clock to daylight savings time, AND having just finished the second of three reporting periods for the year (I have suggested six...more frequent communication with parents gets more buy in, in my opinion), my thoughts turn to planning for next year. Therein lies the rub. Many possibilities, all roads not travelled. There are an infinity of choices open to us, but which will bear fruit, and which, like those plants thrown on the roadside will wither and die? Below, I ponder some common problems...identify the issue, then develop a solution, the horse before the cart. Let me know what your thoughts are on the issues, and any solutions you may have seen work. Even if the solution works in a different environment than I have, the idea may blossom into something here, as well.

1. Poor attendance in the afternoon grouping. These students chose the afternoon because a) the morning class was full and b) they have difficulty with sleep patterns/or waking up in the mornings.

2. We have a high degree of work completion, but little long term recall. In short, while the students are doing the work, they are not "learning" in the independent environment. In small, controlled activities they are quite cooperative as a group, but all are on differentiated programming, and are not often on the same learning objective.

3. Much of the onus for work completion still falls on me as teacher. I have the students identify their starting and end point for the day, but for the most part it is up to me to "make" them work to achieve the goal.

4. Students (particularly the boys) gravitate to the computers at break times, rather than interacting with the group. If I force them they will avoid the computers, but as soon as they are allowed again, they run right back to the comforting flicker of the screen.

5. In my literacy work, students are writing less, and do so with less fluency than the majority of students. They will read, and enjoy reading, particularly in book clubs where they share their reading with others, but the writing piece still remains a sad cousin with only a handful of brown teeth. How can I get the students to write more and better?

Those are my top five, at least for today. Fire back your comments, suggestions, and success stories. I will surely refer to them in looking ahead to tommorow, next week, and next year.

You May Be Wondering Where I've Gone

2010-03-09T11:04:00.001-07:00

I'm having a Luddite Month. I am pulling away from ed tech as much as possible, trying to divorce myself from my computer and the web as the days get longer and the ice floes break up, and the polar bears run for land before they melt away. I am looking at the world through different eyes this week. I am wondering and reflecting how much more tech I can possible cram into my ed. For those who work in the ed tech field, I am certain the amount is infinite. But I will only apply tech to ed if it enhances the learning. I don't just want a replacement for flash cards, or a replacement for a video casette, or a way to entertain the troops so they don't get restless.

So I'm taking some time. I am certainly no purist, but I am seriously thinking about dropping it all and building a log cabin in the woods. I will cut wood for the fire, chase down a rabbit for dinner, and maybe spin myself a sweater from my dog's shedding winter coat. I may read some poetry from a PAPER book. I may play some music from a REAL guitar.

Truth is, I'm kind of saturated with tech right now. So that's what I'm doing. That's where I'm going for the next while. I would send pictures, but where I'm going, I'd have to draw them, and I don't have your address, nor a stamp for the envelope.

Recording the Criteria Setting Classroom

2010-02-24T13:57:00.001-07:00

One problem...I don't know how to record myself in a meaningful and cohesive way. And I don't know how to create an interesting and short enough video to present to my colleagues on Friday. And I've run out of time.

Student Blogging: The Third

2010-02-22T13:47:00.000-07:00

Our first experiment in student blogging moved forward another step today, as I worked with my original workshop group. This group is much more eager to engage in social learning, and got right to the task of develping criteria for a student blog entry. Here are the six categories/criteria they have set for their blog entries:

A good student blog entry should:

1. Be written with a mood/tone/format appropriate to the audience.

2. Focus on 2 or 3 key points of the topic.

3. Contain points which relate to the topic.

4. Capture the reader's attention.

5. Have a clear point or message.

6. Have good grammar/spelling.

We can easily take these criteria and develop a rubric with these as a framework.

I really respect these criteria, because they came from the students. I did not start with suggestions, I posed the question, and let them discuss for 7 minutes. With a larger class, I might extend the time to give everyone a chance to share. These were groups of four and it worked well with the time alotted.

Thursday, I hope to video the developing criteria lesson of my second workshop group, the one I started this process with last week. It will be interesting to compare the two sets of criteria.

Setting Criteria for Student Blogging: Part Deux

2010-02-18T13:12:00.000-07:00

Today I introduced the "language" of setting criteria for students. I was glad I didn't need to introduce the term "blog" as all but three of my workshop students regularly followed blogs. I don't know if Lady Gaga has a blog, but Justin Beiber probably does. It took some massaging to arrive at the sense that a student blog at school is in some ways quite different in purpose from those which students might follow at home. I planted the seed that we will be contributing to a blog in this round of workshops, but first I would like the students to develop a set of criteria for an effective learning blog. We use the acronym SIR (Specific, Interesting, Relevant) to identify the parameters of criteria. That should rule out criteria such as "It's got to be cool," or "I want a blog about Kid Rock."

We practised on the idea of criteria using the question "Who is the strongest team in Olympics Hockey in 2010?" Immediately students came up with the name of their favorite national team. Some said Russia, others Canada, and one lonely student named the U.S. team. I explained that if I were assessing the quality of their responses, they would only receive 1 on a scale of 3, and I asked them why. Discussion centered around the fact that the question is asking for a preference, so there is no incorrect response. I agreed. Some added that the response fails to explain the reasons why their favored team is strongest. I agreed. Lastly, some lonely student offered that perhaps a short response doesn't explain what each person was using as a basis for identifying the "strongest". We developed a list of what made teams "strong". The Russian camp argued that strong was based on goal scoring ability. The Canadian camp stressed physical toughness and defensive play. The U.S. proponents suggested that having the most balanced offensive and defensive game made a team strongest. As I listed these on the whiteboard, I explained that the students had just developed their own criteria for answering the question. I finished by asking students how their responses might change now that they have the criteria for what defines strength in hockey. Students offered that with this criteria, their response would have to identify what made their choice a legitimate one. I agreed, and explained that we would be following a similar process in developing criteria for our student blogs.

Setting Criteria for Student Blogging

2010-02-17T13:24:00.000-07:00

The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. Intelligence plus character - that is the goal of true education.
Martin Luther King, Jr.

I know I'm a bit out of touch, and a lot behind the miracles of Web2.0. But I tend to ride good ideas whenever I come across them. Having been a blogger since 2006, and more recently having become a more serious edublogger, I felt it important to extend the concept to my students. Many have now become comfortable with the wiki as a tool for responding to course content online. This has significantly reduced paper, and student stress over their own poor penmanship. The task now is to work with students to develop the criteria for a good student blog.

I have a pretty good idea how I would identify a "good" blog from a "poor" one, but part of the critical(criteria based) thinking process is for students to develop their own thinking about their learning. This does not come naturally to most students. For this activity, I am going to identify three areas under which students can contribute ideas: Purpose, Plan, and Process.

Purpose
In other words, what is the topic of the blog? What kind of content will the blog contain. How will the student benefit from the blogging activity?

Plan
What will the blog look like? How many times will the students contribute to the blog? Will the blog be only text based, or will video blogging, podcasting and photoblogs be included? What content is acceptable, and what is not appropriate for a student blog? How often will students respond to one another's blogs, and what are the criteria for comments?

Process
What are the essential steps one takes in bringing a blog from idea to blog page?

By developing criteria with students, we allow them a voice in their own learning. Having developed the criteria by which they are assessed, students also become more accountable for their own success. At least, that is the pedagogy behind it.

I will be working through the criteria with students this week. I'll let you know how it all comes out.

A Teacher Wellness Questionaire

2010-02-10T14:40:00.001-07:00

I have always been a great supporter of student wellness. As I get older and my teeth have become longer, I recognize the need for teacher wellness, particularly because we are in a profession where change, dedication, and a general state of being overwhelmed are almost expected. This is my grass roots questionaire, as I am working on a Teacher Wellness website, but if teachers are already well and "dealing", then such a site may be redundant. Give it a whirl. The results will also help me achieve some of my Tech objectives.

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A Snapshot of an Engaged Classroom

2010-02-09T09:31:00.001-07:00

This post is based on real events. Only the names have been changed to protect the innocent.

Doc: Studies a Science text, posts responses and thoughts as a document...drops finished product into shared folder
Happy: Works on a Math workbook, while listening to ipod quietly.
Sneezy: Finishes a character description for a Canadian Superhero. Then accesses The Hero Machine 2.5 to create his character.
Dopey: Well, Dopey is creating a template using Google Docs, for a research project proposal. I didn't even ask him to. I thought he'd just type it, but he can do things with Google Docs that I'm afraid to try.
Bashful: Is Bashfully researching an origami construction on the web, then making the construction, then completing an activity identifying the parallel lines.
Sleepy: Snow White: Is sticking to the Science text pretty closely, Reading and reflecting.
Sleeping Beauty: Is sticking to her Social Studies text equally closely.
Grumpy

I don't give a whole lot of group instruction. Students have a set program plan that we decide upon together. That serves as the guide to their week as they move along. My job is as coach, and sometimes tutor. I try to get to each student at least twice each work period to check on progress, provide some feedback, ask questions, and provide an opportunity for students to demonstrate their learning. While I know this wouldn't work in a full classroom, the element of choice and planning is essential to effective learning in a differentiated classroom. It saves a lot of headaches, reduces the behavior issues, and encourages students to be meaningfully engaged and present with the lessons.

Twittering the Blogoshpere: Curmudgeonly Observations on Poor Communication of an Idea

2010-02-02T23:19:00.000-07:00

The Blogoshpere is dead...~overheard~

You're not going to like this...

I have been following Twitter very closely for the past two weeks. I have done so because I am told that Twitter has so many applications to education and learning. I heard one administrator proclaim that blogging was dead, Twitter is where the conversation is at. I read another comment to a colleague asking why he was still blogging, implying that Twitter was a much more conversation conducive application than a blog post. Really?

I know I speak a different language than most tweeters. But as a teacher and frequent communicator, I find it difficult to accept eight hundred links to web sites I can't possibly visit with any serious inspection to be conversation, rather, an exercise in futility. Is the hope of the twittersphere that I will find something in the morass that will revolutionize my craft? Where is the conversation? Whenever I tweet someone with a query to a link I find may be helpful, I rarely get a response. There are exceptions. I bow in reverence to those who can follow the speed of the twittersphere. As an educator in charge of a class of pretty needy students, I shudder at the thought of asking them to join such "conversations". I know one in particular that would more than likely lay down a stream of invective heretofore unheard, should the individual be asked to join the cacaphony that is the twittersphere. Now, a blog I may get the student to read with some regularity. It has a recognizable flow, is controllable and doesn't tend to overwhelm.

Twitter may be a fantastic tool for some. Brent Spiner (you remember Data from Star Trek: TNG?) used twitter as a composition tool to "perform" a novel of his own creation. He received a great deal of criticism from his followers. I rather enjoyed it. Call me a purist. I like a conversation with a beginning, middle and end. I like to participate in a conversation. I like it when I respond as a contributor and receive a reply. I am not left feeling like a beached whale, gasping while the pod carries on. In the blogosphere, I feel like a participant in a valuable exercise and a meaningful conversation. Should Twitter eventually replace blogging as a "conversation" tool, I would be sad.

I welcome the continued conversation regarding the use of Twitter in education. I really want to know how I can more fully include and engage my students in their learning using any available resource. Does anyone have the answer, where Twitter is concerned?

I certainly don't.

Kids Today: The Responding Variable

2010-02-01T11:07:00.000-07:00

"What is happening to our young
people? They disrespect their elders, they disobey their parents. They
ignore the law. They riot in the streets inflamed with wild notions.
Their morals are decaying. What is to become of them?" Plato

"I see no hope for the future of our people if they are dependent on
frivolous youth of today, for certainly all youth are reckless beyond
words... When I was young, we were taught to be discreet and
respectful of elders, but the present youth are exceedingly wise
[disrespectful] and impatient of restraint" (Hesiod, 8th century BC)

A characteristic of the normal child is he doesn't act that way very often. ~Author Unknown

In the conversation of the decade, our focus seems to be on the application of web based technology in schools. My twitter feed is flooded with links to web2.0 content that will revolutionize my teaching and student learning. In a sense, the world wide web has become a shopping mall of free stuff. Honestly, I've always been a proponent of doing a few things well rather than a million things poorly. I have watched the conversation become critical of teachers who try to hold back the flood of technology that is obviously the salvation of learning in the 21st Century. It is the teacher who is keeping the student from realizing her potential, not allowing her to bring her smart phone into the classroom. In this important conversation, educators are challenged to worry less about the basics and more about potential. I have posed the question before, regarding the timing of allowing limitless access to the global classroom. I still see it requiring a balance. But that is not the point of this entry.

My point is that, while teachers are responsible for the content they deliver in the classroom, and the method of delivery, there is an unpredicatble responding variable which challenges even the most progressive educator. I am speaking of the students themselves. I know from first hand experience that not all students are at this enlightened stage of awareness of how to appropriately access and learn via the world wide web. I know a portion of them certainly are, another portion will be guided towards that enlightenment, still another group will be dragged, kicking and screaming towards that light of salvation. There is still a fourth group who will defiantly resist it. I must remember that, as teacher, I am responsible for the learning of all in my class. I must be flexible enough to allow those who are able to move ahead, those who are emergent to gain access, and to bring up the others as best as I can towards the inevitable change from paper based to digital based learning.

I am excited about that prospect. I love a challenge. I look forward to getting to work every day because I know that the students are unpredictable, slightly rebellious, and prone to anarchy. The conversation I will enjoy in this decade concerns educating students about digital literacy and responsibility; a new set of rules for a global classroom of seemingly unlimited potential.

Murky Ground and Muddy Waters

2010-01-27T09:57:00.003-07:00

In response to Stephen Anderson's recebt blog post,Disconnected Curriculum... I find myself fighting with myself over the issue of closed versus open curricula.

You see, I teach in Alberta, where our successful and progressive education system was tainted a few years back by someone who felt his students needed a different Social Studies curriculum than was endorsed by the provincial government. James Keegstra was charged with promoting hatred in the classroom, the details to which event can be found here. I have deep concerns when any single educator decides that lattitude with the program of studies allows for personal convictions to be taught to students. The Keegstra case was a hyperbole of this, and I would agree that the majority of teachers would not endorse Keegstra's actions in his classroom. On a lesser scale, how many times has your son or daughter, or the sons and daughters of your own students arrived home to dinner, and made a comment such as "This isn't a balanced meal. There aren't all the food groups present." I know, who would say that, but my own children have corrected me at home concerning my opinion of an issue based on what their teacher told them.

In a round about way, what I am trying to say, perhaps unsuccessfully, is that students listen to their teachers, often more than to their parents. Open curricula is indeed muddy waters to Stephen Anderson's "murky ground" of national curricula. The most wise option, I think, is still the middle ground. Students must be encouraged to learn in a variety of ways, and about a variety of topics. They must be encouraged to develop opinions, be challenged on their thinking, and communicate clearly in a multitude of ways.

Somewhere between the murky ground and the muddy waters may be a sandbar. I hope our schools occupy that space for kids between government rhetoric and assumption, and extreme personal bias.

Teacher Wellness and the Overflowing Platter

2010-01-22T14:52:00.000-07:00

My grandfather once told me that there were two kinds of people: those who do the work and those who take the credit. He told me to try to be in the first group; there was much less competition.
--Indira Gandhi

I am descended from a long line of martyrs to the grindstone. My father never questioned that grindstone, and my grandfather worked the rails since he was ten. I suspect that, coming from good slavic peasant stock, neither reading nor writing, Grandpa spent little time worrying and a great deal of time working. Even when I knew him, sickly, in his ailing seventies, Grandpa enjoyed getting up on the roof of his house to push the snow off, felt the satisfaction of forcing the push mower over an old lawn, and in his spare time, organized the many found items in his work shed, a pastime my father came to adopt, but which, sadly, has missed a generation with me. Nonetheless, I know and appreciate the value of hard work, a job well done, going the extra mile, and, when I'm not feeling at the top of my game, showing up as well as I can do. I confess, I like working.

On the other hand, I have also experienced the pain and futility of a job in the 21st Century. I have watched my own profession dwindle from a noble endeavor in the small country school, to a government meat grinder. I have watched colleagues burn out from not having as many arms as are required by the current teaching profession. I have seen Science teachers challenged to become Social Workers, Specialists challenged to become Generalists, and teachers of academics required to adopt courses for which they have neither enthusiasm nor talent.

I can think of no other profession which requires the flexibility that teaching does. And I can think of few professions with burn out rates as high as teaching has. Virtual Muse offers some interesting thoughts about teacher burnout, as does The Journal of Education Research I have my own opinions. Being a workhorse, I despise burnout in others and abhor it in myself. Somewhere in my slavic peasant brain is a voice telling me to "get up, get going, don't look back". I have followed the suggestions of helpful professionals who hint that burnout is what I have caused, is due to my inability to manage my own workload or job stress, or unruly students, or any of the other dozen or so factors sited as causes of burnout. My GP tells me that I would be surprised at the number of teachers he treats for anxiety related disorders. He says he does not see the same numbers of cases in other professions. So, no matter what my slavic peasant within tells me, teacher burnout is real, is prevalent, and is eroding the quality of our lives as well as the efficacy of our profession.

I don't know that I have any final solutions to offer teachers. I know that having colleagues who support me has saved me from burnout more than once in my career. I know that accepting change and embracing it has helped as well. So has counselling, exercise, daily blogging, laughter, and looking forward rather than back. I take teaching one day at a time, just as I have learned to take life. I look to cherish moments rather than let them overwhelm me. I have learned to step outside myself and watch the show, breath, and dive in.

There are no magic pink pills for Teacher Wellness, although many of us take them daily just the same. We must look to one another for support, as few outside our profession would truly understand our situation.

Today, take a moment and think of someone in your building who needs a kind word from you, or an understanding ear, or a piece of chocolate and a cup of Starbucks. Chances are, if you help someone out today, you'll leave feeling you've accomplished more in that moment than you have all week.

Cheers!

Cooperation, Control, and a Spirit of Collaboration.

2010-01-19T14:29:00.000-07:00

If things seem under control, you are just not going fast enough. Mario Andretti

David Warlick's recent post in his blog 2cents Worth, and Steven Anderson's post in Blogging About the Web2.0 Connected Classroom: Why Have A Social Media Policy Anyway...Take 2 some questions have come to mind regarding the role of the teacher, the climate of the classroom, and the apparent lack of control in the 21st Century classroom. I'll treat this like an advice column, although I will be both the writer and respondent, in this case. I'm not sure my thinking is complete on the topic, so please correct me if you would be so kind.

How do I foster a spirit of cooperation in my classroom? The students never do what I say? ~Miss Guided~
Dear Misguided,
Cooperation in the classroom speaks to me of relationships. If there is one skill, approach, whatchewmacallit, I encourage any teacher to foster, it is the daily practice of making connections with students. Do this as often as you can, as meaningfully as you can. Try to start off by saying good morning to the individuals as they enter the room, and good bye to them as they leave. It is much more difficult for a student to disregard you when they know you are present not only in body but in mind, and for them. From the connection you make emerges the concept of the journey that you are taking with your class. They may not do what you tell them, but they may do something more impressive, and achieve the same outcomes.

You want me to teach students using computers, allowing them to do whatever they want. You want me to teach them all this web2.0 and online stuff. How do I keep classroom control when they aren't in the classroom, and aren't all doing the lesson I have prepared? How are they going to learn anything concrete? ~S.T. Raight-Deskrow
Dear Mr. Raight-Deskrow,
I have never been a big proponent of control as a means of classroom management. Oh, I have envied those who were able to maintain a thumblock on all 30 students at once, and I myself have made kids cry over missed homework. I like nice neat rows and nice quiet students as much as the next teacher, but I have rarely had an "ahah" moment in that setting. See cooperation above. That should give you some tips to developing a learning environment rather than a boot camp. What I think you can be enouraged to look for is controlled chaos as students are working on a variety of projects, using a variety of skills and learning styles in a respectfully conversation-soaked classroom. Warning!! This may well tire you out more than trying to keep control of 26 teenagers(which has been compared to herding cats).

It seems to me that in order for learning to occur in the classrooms of today, a spirit of collaboration, both between staff and with students is crucial to establishing a criteria based, effective learning environment where students have access to a variety of tools to help accomplish their goals. While I know there are times when the teacher serves as the resource, and other times when the students must establish a knowledge base in a more structured environment, I believe these moments become more meaningful in an enriching learning environment. Collaboration is not just meeting to make a decision, it is putting two or more heads together aimed at the same task, and making use of one another's differences to make our learning much more meaningful and unique. That collaboration can be multiplied on a world-wide scale through the utilization of webtools designed to enrich communication.

Balanced Literacy and Higher Level Thinking Skills

2010-01-19T13:11:00.000-07:00

Thursday's session focused on connecting reading with thinking, two of my personal passions. By asking the right questions about our text, we reveal deeper thinking about content. And thinking is the key to learning. When we have the conversation about student engagement, our understanding of the term is that students come to a deeper understanding of text, content, process, and themselves as participants in the activity. This engagement spans the curriculum, is not limited to the Language Arts or Social Studies classroom. Engagement is not an outcome in itself, rather a sign that the student is on the road to producing an outcome which is genuine rather than formulaic.

This is evaluating text in a nutshell.

Classroom Hermitism Is Merely Isolating, Not Edifying

2010-01-14T13:58:00.000-07:00

In the self-contained classroom of the last century, it was easy to plan, deliver, and assess students against a static curriculum. My high school English teacher gave fantastic lectures, which, I later discovered, were actually written verbatim in a three inch binder. That passionate treatise on the thematic content of "For Whom The Bell Tolls" had been rehearsed over twenty-some years of teaching. It was even effective for it's day. I dare say it would not reach an attentive ear in a 21st Century classroom. I know, having done my practicum with that same teacher, that collaboration regarding content and progress occured, but apart from that, collaboration was unknown save for the two allowed workshops the teacher attended...oh, and the annual Teacher's Convention.

In the classroom of the 21st Century, I could not survive without collaboration. I sure hope they insist on collaborative planning and teaching in teacher college. I sure hope there's not a teacher out there any more who just wants to be left alone to teach. If there is, I fear they must feel very isolated, both from their colleagues and their students. With increasing globalization, decreasing nationalism, increasing interconnectedness which defies borders and ideologies, few are searching for the clarity of a hermit. Such a guru would be ill equipped to shed light on a world where information multiplies at an ever increasing rate, technology is in a constant growth state, and change is the new normal. In such an flux-state, the Sage becomes a hyperventilating curmudgeon in a Boston Marathon of young firecrackers.

Perhaps we must abandon the symbol of the guru atop the hill. The best advce I heard attributed to the all wise mage was regarding the secret to long life, to which he replied "Keep breathing as long as possible".

What would be an appropriate symbol for the 21st Century guru? Would it be a child? Suggestions would be appreciated. I'll even post a list of the suggestions. My vote would be for a group rather than an individual. It would consist of educators, students, parents, and administrators, working in league towards the goal of lifelong learning for all.

Who Shines the Light? The Leaderless Classroom Question.

2010-01-08T14:36:00.000-07:00

I have a concern. It's been creeping along my spine for the past week now, as my participation in the conversation over engaged learners v.s. empowered learners has led me to question my goal, our goal, as educators. The suggestion that our ultimate purpose is to create classrooms where students are self-directed learners, self-focused and collaborative individuals seems a rather utopian, albeit a laudable desire. Some have suggested that the teacher in such a classroom is the passenger, rather than the spirit guide, also a lofty and well-intended goal. In the pleasant Utopian classroom, all will coexist amicably, helping one another achieve their learning selflessly, cooperatively and, it seems, without the messy encumberance of a trained educator.

Here is the concern. I have yet to see the bridge between the essential learning of the early years and the collaborative Utopia of the digitally enlightened learner. I know that there must exist an unwritten continuum between traditional and digital learning, I just haven't seen it. What I see are two definite camps and a third, larger camp of spectators.

What does the 21st Century Learner look like? How is she different from the 20th Century one? This learner does not need the classroom of the Industrial Revolution, nor the Assembly Line Age; the rows and desks and paper and pens; the workday pattern of repetition. The 21st Century Learner must be prepared for a world where the workday is flexible, the workplace is ephemeral, and the work doesn't yet exist. It seems logical that such a learner with so many unknowns set before her would be poorly served by an old codger who learned everything he knows by sitting in a desk, in a row, with a piece of paper, a pen, and a textbook before him. I have a few such learners in my program. I have a lot who aren't there yet, but require some direction. I have a few more who may never be there. For them, the term "engagement" as defined by David Warlick and Chris Lehmann is about the only way they'll attend and complete their learning journey in the classroom.

What I have, then, is a collection of three centuries of learners in one classroom. And I guess that's my concern. If there were a homogenous group of learners, all floating on the placid river 2.0, I don't think they'd need a guide. The digital river has guides enough along the way to steer them clear of harm. But I guarantee you that today's classroom requires a lighthouse keeper, a mechanic, a brakeman, and a pilot guide just to keep the learning raft afloat. And the raft comes with an instruction booklet which requires an interpreter for some of the learners, and can be ignored by others.

I fear that this decade will require all of our patience to help prepare all students for the uncertain future ahead. A balance between fascinating students with the art of learning, and empowering students to take that journey with increasing independence is essential, as is the understanding that for some students, the guidance and firm leadership of a teacher may always be necessary.

Chess is a Critical Thinker's Game

2010-01-06T14:36:00.000-07:00

“The chessboard is the world, the pieces are the phenomena of the
Universe, the rules of the game are what we call the laws of Nature
and the player on the other side is hidden from us”
(Thomas Huxley)

The game of chess has fascinated me since I first learned the basic moves in grade six. At that time, as a starter, certainly no prodigy, I was concerned with playing through an entire game rather than comprehending the wisdom of opening moves. In my mind, the board was a battle scene, and the pieces toy soldiers. I was just happy that someone would play with me in my little battle.

It was with the advent of the personal computer that the love of chess was rekindled in me. The computer moves initially were very static, and I disliked the game play, but since I could find few human players in Stony Plain in 1988, I persevered, losing time and again to unforgiving machines. I am not a good player, I believe "patzer" is the term used for players such as I. Then the Chessmaster series of engines gave the computer a chess brain, and playing computer chess became more like playing humans. My favorite chess engine remains the Power Chess game, which never seemed to make it past its first version. The game learned as you learned, becoming more clever as you became more wily. The Power Chess Queen had a sexy voice and complemented you on your good play. Incidentally, she would also have a naughty giggle when you really flubbed up. The engines of today are much more powerful than that Power Chess engine, a version of WinChess, I believe, but it taught me more about the thinking game behind the battle scene, lessons I use to this day in my online chess games.

I say all of this, only to state that I am surprised that more schools are not promoting chess if they hope to promote critical thinking among the student body. Chess exercises the brain in ways that other passtimes seem unable to accomplish. In the wealth of chess literature available on the world wide web, one piece extols the virtues of chess in developing higher level thinking skills.
"http://www.edutechchess.com/whychess.html"
The page is worth a serious read-through, and the game of chess is worth consideration for inclusion into school programs. The game is easy to learn, offers an endless variety of experiences and levels of game play, is portable, cheap, and, most importantly, exercises the brain in ways that push ups and daily physical activity never will.

Teaching Writing is Tough: Writing About Writing is Tougher

2010-01-04T10:35:00.000-07:00

As I look ahead at preparing my students for the written component of the Provincial Achievement Test (PATs here in Alberta), I am attempting to develop writing samples to illustrate the passing levels of achievement.

When I look back at my own journey as a writer, I don't recall the process being this difficult. I'm sure it's a matter of one being out of practise, although the model I developed for a basic piece looked a lot like the senior papers I wrote for English in university. I guess now I know why I had trouble getting the good grades, right?

The activity is one of setting appropriate criteria for writing. Ideally, this task would be accomplished in league with the students. However, seeing as how my students are spread far and wide, and are not yet willing to participate fully in online discussion, I am setting criteria for the project, and developing the exemplars myself. Again, in an ideal setting, I would be using student exemplars of work at each level. Once the first pieces are complete, I will be able to collect exemplars of student work, and use these more sincere pieces to demonstrate writing.

Using Graphic Organizers to Connect Theme to Conflict

2009-12-17T10:28:00.000-07:00

The high school book club met again today. We are far enough along in Heaven Eyes that some of the students are able to see their predictions either verified or refuted. This was not something I prompted, but which alit naturally from our discussion of the section we had just read. It is this spontaneous reflection that confirms engagement in text, for me.

One activity we have undertaken is an ongoing study of the themes in the novel as they develop. While students have suggested themes all along, we are now at the stage where they are collating data to confirm their suggestions. A simple chart listing the themes down one column and the evidence of theme by page number along a row for each theme provides a "quick and dirty" graphic organizer which the students will reference as we explore writing about our experience with themes. This writing exercise will take place in the new year.

The graphic organizer has two purposes for us here. Firstly, it gathers the information into a retrieval chart for future reference. Secondly, perhaps more importantly, it focuses students on connecting previous reading to current tasks. Since we know that meaning emerges from engagement in the literature, as many times as the students go to the well, they will return with new connections, reaffirm old connections, and establish a growing body of knowledge about themselves as readers.

In order to establish theme, we connected it to the coflicts encountered by the characters. This required a quick review of the various forms of conflict. We emphasized the importance of a central problem to drive the character forward in the story. That problem, and how the character deals with it, reveals certain lessons, ideas, or essential learnings, which we can call themes. With these criteria, students were more able to suggest their own ideas for possible thematic content, adding their top choices to the graphic organizer, and searching for evidence in the text.

Al Gore Won a Nobel Prize?

2009-12-15T13:47:00.001-07:00

I don't think politicians should garner Nobel Prizes. It's like giving a realtor an Oscar. If the Nobel committee insists on awarding politicians for their stance on then environment, world peace, and animal rights, then perhaps we should have been awarding every 1970's Miss America contestant with a Nobel for Oversimplistic Ideals Meant to Tug at Heartstrings.

Not that it's wrong to use public office to raise awareness of global issues. That's one of the responsible tasks of politicians. But to reward them, Al Gore in particular for his spin on the environment, to put him in the company of Albert Einstein, Madame Curie, Gandhi, etc., is rather watering down the Prize, in my opinion. Heck, give ABBA members the Prize for contribution to the global musical geschtalt! At least they earned that esteem.

As climate talks continue, as the bickering of the delegates makes way for the glad-handing of the politicians, the pasted-on grimaces, the fireside chats, and, ultimately, some homogenous agree-to-disagree resolution, I wonder if the Pillsbury Doughboy will be among next years' honorees at the esteemed Nobel Awards Banquet.

Keeping it Rolling

2009-12-14T09:57:00.000-07:00

In Thursday's session, we explored the idea of having students evaluate text. This partners well with the concept of having students set criteria for evaluating text, a critical thinking strategy designed to more deeply engage students in their learning.

As I consider the conversations-both web-based and face to face- I have had with my literacy students, I am getting a sense that they are more deeply involved in their own reading. I see that they are discovering reading as a form of communication. This is important. Often we all see reading as a form of escape from communication. While safe, the text, the author, the characters still communicate with the reader. This is an essential partnership to engagement and comprehension, that fundamental connection that the reader must make with the text.

The more the reader connects and communicates with the text, the more they are evaluating the complexity of what they are reading, and how the are reading.

In the new year, we will continue to engage in the text, but by adding the piece involving communicating our responses to others, the writing piece.

Powerful Questions or Powerful Answers to Someone Else's Question?

2009-12-08T18:26:00.000-07:00

You can teach a student a lesson for a day; but if you can teach him to learn by creating curiosity, he will continue the learning process as long as he lives. ~Clay P. Bedford

Somewhere along the 24 year long journey that has been my career, I forgot to ask "So What?" Somewhere shortly after the teaching certificate was stamped PERMANENT I had the idea that learning was a meat grinder, and I was the butcher, making little sausages, each as close to identical to its fellows as I was humanly able. Questions weren't important in that sort of environment. Discipline was important. Compliance was important. School supplies were important. Questions were important only if they came out of the text book, in which case my lovely sausages had a wonderful opportunity to be like all the other sausages and jump into the grinder to produce a benign but accurate response to the text.

While I have come to question my satisfaction with straight rows, read respond and regurgitate, I look around me and see that much of the deli-style education is still being commonly served to learners, sometimes using SMART boards, web2.0 tools and cell phones. Just changing the delivery method does not change the sausage wrapping nor the end product.

Something monumentally important occurred to me as I prepared for classes this year. Well, two monumentally important things, anyways. The first was "How am I going to survive another year as a butcher in the sausage factory of life?" The second, more important was "How will critical thinking help students engage in learning?"

WHAT?? Did I actually hear myself (in my mind, I don't talk out loud to myself anymore) say something about students engaging in learning? ENGAGING? In LEARNING? Wow.

I'll admit it...sometimes I'm slow. I don't always fully absorb an idea until everyone else has taken it in, weighed it, used it a bit, and tossed it aside. That's when I often find it, dust it off, and decide it's worth putting to some use. After all these years of examining assessment practises, developing rubrics, and talking about including students in their own assessment, it finally clicked that this is something that would be beneficial to student learning. Wow.

And, as students ask questions which guide their learning, as students develop criteria by which they are assessed, but ultimately are learning tools to point a direction of focus, alas, they are engaged in what they are doing, a part of the process and outcome. No longer are they little sausages dancing merrily along a string created by someone else. They have become something new, vibrant and fresh.

To question is to lead forward. To answer the question of another is to get half way.

If It Weren't FOIP Protected, I'd Amaze You!

2009-12-08T09:40:00.000-07:00

My Middle Years Outreach students were meeting with their book clubs, this morning, and it illuminated me to the vast differences in the levels of student engagement.

One group was entirely focused on the text, referring to specific pages and quotations as they discussed what to put on a mind map reviewing the aspects of the novel covered to this point. There was a shared learning experience, a meeting of minds where ideas were suggested and accepted graciously, adapted and molded, and finally put down on paper. These were not all honors students, but for some reason the group was actively involved in the process to an honors level.

The second group was a quite different story. The students were lacking engagement, cooperation, and depth of insight. It was disheartening, really, as I prompted them with a number of suggestions, and they continued on their journey of futility.

I mentioned this stark difference in reviewing the activity the next morning. One student, receiving the praise for their book club work, commented that it wasn't as if the bar was all that high, referring to the work of the second, less motivated group. The second group looked at what the more engaged group had done, and took a lesson from their work. This friendly competition encourages others to consider their own effort and contribution.

I don't know if I would make those comparisons every time students were given a project, one must be careful in making comparisons, but I like the idea of open discourse about learning, as it emerges from the students' own experience.

Prediction, Conflict, and the River of Life

2009-12-03T13:04:00.000-07:00

In today's session, we started by reviewing the conflicts which have developed in the novel Heaven Eyes, by David Almond. As a jump off to discussion, this worked well, because it allowed students a platform from which leap into predicting the outcomes of their chosen conflicts. Encouraging discussion without adding to the discussion is taxing for teachers. This is where working with too small of a group presents difficulty, as one student may tend to take on the teacher role, and lead the group in discussion.

Considering this problem, I tried something different. In order to get the students talking about the conflicts, and the events of the story, and about anything in general, I returned to a topic we had touched on in the students' offerings of possible themes, one being the river of life. I had students plot the events and settings of the story along a drawing of a river. This was a group project and I used a piece of chart paper and some crayons(who doesn't love crayons?). This encouraged more discussion of character appearance, round v.s. flat characters, main events v.s minor events, important themes, and chosen conflicts than I had seen from the students thus far. Because the students assumed the task was to draw the map, they considered the task a safe one, and this encouraged discussion. They are mindful of what they are doing, and exploring one another's insights into their own reading, thus strengthening their own understanding of the story, characters, conflict and themes.

Something Tells Me This Was No Accident

2009-11-27T14:31:00.000-07:00

I used to cartoon a fair amount. I was a rank amateur at the art, but it was a form of catharsis for me. I expanded this hobby into a class for a few years in a Middle Years option program, developing a course booklet developing a student's drawing from a basic shape to a finished cartoon.

One of those drawings of mine showed a comic-macabre scene with a rather unsightly corpse, arrows and bullet wounds and an axe; clearly a case of overkill. Standing behind the body was a crime scene investigator, and behind him a uniformed police officer. The CSI points at the body and states, "Something tells me this was no accident."

In having my students make predictions and inferences, I find the first few attempts are about as illuminating as the CSI's words. One can infer from the horrific scene that a man has been killed. One can infer from reading the first few chapters of Heaven Eyes by David Almond, that the world of the story is not the world we live in today. But making inferences requires much more deep insight and questioning strategies than stating the obvious. The question "So What?" comes to mind, as we challenge the students to provide evidence to support their inferences. "When does this story seem to take place?" "How do you know?" "What are three mysteries to be solved? Propose three possible solutions to one of the mysteries you have listed."
"If you were to draw a map of the journey, what important points would you highlight? Why are they important to story? What do you think the next stop will be?"

Students become engaged as they are challenged. We take them into uncharted territory, and guide them towards safety. We repeat this exercise, each time stretching the distance between safety and the unknown as the student gains confidence in the task of predicting and inferring. After all, if we don't take chances, we don't learn. And that is no accident.

Thinking Critically About Critical Thinking

2009-11-17T10:58:00.000-07:00

Really, at this time in November, I should be shoulder deep in tests and quizzes, madly attempting to collect some form of assessment to reflect to parents and students about the student's learning. Instead, I find myself more and more fascinated by how the students are expressing their learning, and less about trying to find a way to put a grade to it.

Today, as we were reading the selection for our Book Talk, an thematic epiphany dawned upon me, and I shared it with the group. We talked and wrote about my own epiphany, and I asked the students to share their questions, ideations and amazements with what they were reading. It was an engaging process, as students paused, and one said "I'll have to go back and find that now, I can't recall how it went." That, to me, is engagement, when a student wants to share, so sets her own criteria for how to best gather information, and then how to express it to others in a format with which she feels comfortable.

It boils down to the definition of critical thinking, "Thinking about how we think." I love seeing a student get that, and launch forward with a success under his belt toward the next challenge.

Hope for Change in the 21st Century Learner

2009-11-09T14:38:00.000-07:00

In today's training session, we engaged in the idea of not only connecting to text, but inferring and predicting. I will not go into a regurgitation of the session itself; rather I will challenge the participants, all of whom are encouraged to comment, regarding the 21st Century learner's ability to engage in deep learning and critical thinking to both text and electronic sources.

Some of my colleagues comment that students still needed to be dragged through the learning experience. I disagree. If learning is engaging, students will go willingly for the waters of learning. We are not now forcing students to read the same book their brothers, sisters, and parents read. We are not, as teachers, or rather we should not be delivering lesson number twelve on X novel: The plot diagram. We must be a long ways past that if we are to engage students in meaningful learning. Our reflective practise demands us to be much more responsive to the ebb and flow of the new learner. Specifically in the realm of literacy, novels for early and middle years students are available that are levelled for readability, content, and theme. To expose an entire classroom of vastly diverse readers to a single novel, to which all must read and respond is restricting their learning, and not engaging the students at their level, especially when one considers the variety of reading material available. In a restrictive environment, some students will definitely need to be dragged to the learning well. In an environment of choice, learning becomes engaging.

So, instead of dragging our students through the static novel study, the stock question packet, and trying to make it mold to a new paradigm, are we willing to embrace the paradigm and perhaps risk falling on our faces? I am.

2009-11-05T11:14:00.000-07:00

David Warlick raises some intriguing questions regarding the Learner in the 21st Century. Moreso, he challenges us as educators to make that important shift from the Industrial Age teacher/classroom to the 21st Century teacher/classroom. I know that it is not an easily accomplished transition. I see the fear in the eyes of my colleagues, and the skepticism in the eyes of others. Many look at the task ahead, and firmly believe that the pendulum of change will once again swing back towards a traditional approach to teaching and learning. Others welcome the challenge like a breath of fresh air. Still others are petrified by the uncetainty of the future.

One thing is clear. Change will occur, has already occurred, will continue to occur. Our choices regarding that change are what will make us more able to do our jobs in the 21st Century, or less.

It is clear also that our students are in some ways already amidst these changes in technology, learning, and communication. In some ways and for many students, these changes are at the same time unattainable and overwhelming. The trick for the educator is to be able to keep pace and create meaningful experiences for those embracing the change while at the same time giving the support to those struggling to meet the challenges of the 21st Century.

2009-10-22T10:17:00.000-06:00

Students completed their first novel today. Some discussion centered around the choices of novels available. What are the solutions to students who find the entire collection "boring"? A second concern today is engaging a limited number of students, keeping a flow when a large percentage of the group is missing, and catching up students who have missed previous sessions.

One of my thoughts is that when a student expresses boredom, she is giving me direction. As the week progressed, I thought a lot about what the student was saying. He doesn't want a book about a certain topic. I looked for an alternative, a book with the same theme but a different approach. David Almond's Heaven Eyes was the offering.

Students were interested by the suggestion of the mysterious, of the idea of a journey, of freedom, of darkness. This intrigued them all enough that we were immediately immersed in discussion of the themes before we'd even begun to read. Students will be encouraged to explore character development, theme development, and expository writing skills as we continue through future weeks.

The First Tentative Steps

2009-10-16T11:08:00.000-06:00

~ The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step. ~ Lao Tze

Our first two sessions have shown increased comfort within the group, and improved engagement with this process. I remember that my intent is to take reading from simplest to more complex. This includes taking students from what they know and where they are to a destination unknown to them.

I have a small group, so rather than dividing them into pairs, a group of four or five have agreed on a novel. The students have now read to Chapter 7. Initially, I had the students read the first three chapters, and I led a discussion about the characters, where the story takes place, and making connections between the cover photo and the precis on the back cover.

Our "one step" during the second Book Club meeting was to write a reaction to the novel. Students were given a set of prompts, and we discussed the aspects of a well written response. Students were able to develop criteria for an insightful response with some coaching, and then they got to work, responding to the text for Chapters 4-7.

I was surprised by the volume of writing, the detail or the writing, and the seriousness with which the students completed the task. The responses showed that the students were indeed connecting with the text in a meaningful way, identifying characters to whom they were drawn, aspects of the story that were interesting to them, and explaining what aspects of the novel had impact on them.

For our most recent session, students were asked to first write down five reactions to their reading over Chapters 8-10. Students were brought together into their Book Club group, and began to share their insights. Each student was expected to contribute three insights. The teacher played the role of recorder, allowing students to focus on one another's contributions. This last activity bridged a wide gap between private independent thought and the risk-taking venture of offering an opinion or insight up for the group. In my way of thinking, this is a springboard activity to the process of more meaningful discussion

The Book Club: An Introduction into Meaningful Reading

2009-10-08T09:28:00.000-06:00

What makes a good reader?
What makes an insightful learner?
What is the difference between being engaged in literature, and reading a book?
How does a book club help us to be deep thinkers, meaningful learners, and fulfilled readers for life?

These questions drive my desire to help others become stronger at the task of reading. I call it a task, because for many, reading of any sort is a chore. Over the years, I have met many people from all walks of life who insist that the only books they have ever read were those assigned by their teachers in school. I've always felt there is nothing worse than being told to read a book. The element of choice is gone, and the only "buy in" for the reader is the attainment of a grade on some summative assignment.

Now, it's time for confession. I admit that during my High School years, I didn't read past Chapter Three of Hemingway's FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS. I did get an 80% the essay, however, and was bang on about the theme. It wasn't about reading after all. The teacher wasn't interested in whether or not I read the book, nor what my reactions to the story were. He wanted me to express a theme statement. I listened carefully to his lectures (which he had written verbatim in a three inch binder), and regurgitated something akin to his own thoughts on the novel, thus garnering praise as a bright young student and a gifted reader.

Flash forward to my university days. I did not read LADY CHATTERLY'S LOVER, but fully participated in the class discussions and subsequent essay assignment on D.H. Lawrence. And three years later, in teaching one of my initial Language Arts classes, fancying myself the literary guru of thirteen year olds, I force fed a class of students on a translation of BEOWULF. Most of the students were able to pass the daily reading quizzes, and complete the essay project which followed our scintillating one-way discussion. I think the point is made, one can't be told what to read and be expected to participate fully and meaningfully in the process. Reading is a personal journey, particularly the reading of novels. While great insight can come from the process, the old novel study approach seems not the wisest choice of project to emply students and everyday readers in thoughtful literary engagement.

A book club is a concept that has been around for years. Oprah has rejuvinated the idea that people can get together and talk about what they are reading. The small market press has seen new growth as people are searching for a "meaningful read". After all, one can enjoy a book purely for pleasure, but once we sit together in a group, it seems pointless to reflect on the plot of a romance novel, if the characters are flat and predictable, and the events likewise fit to a formula of pulpification.

The first novel in recent memory which stirred a great deal of discussion, was THE LIFE OF PI, by Yann Martel. The question of the day was "Which was the true account?" If you've read this wonderful piece of literature, I encourage you to share your thoughts about the story.

Meanwhile, a reflection on my first forays into the Book Club here at school. I am currently working with two groups. The first group is a tenth grade English class. The second is a mixed bag of students from grades seven through nine. Or initial session was spent discussing how we choose novels for our own reading. Students provided a range of preferences. Here are the main choices among them:

The level of reading must fit our ability. It can be challenging, but not so difficult that reading is hard work.
We look at the book covers, and assess our interest based on the title, the description on the jacket (the teaser), and by what others may have said about the novel.
We begin reading, and look for interesting characters. If we relate to a character, chances are we will be interested in the novel.
The length of the novel may give us a hint as to the difficulty of the reading. Non-readers and reluctant readers tended to choose novels which were shorter in length, while confident and avid readers chose novels more often based on the story, or characters, or by genre.

And so, we chose a novel. Students read and discussed the initial reactions to what they were reading. We focused on predicting the next section prior to reading it. It was quite enjoyable to see students engaged in reading, and looking for something yet to come. It was also encouraging to see students asking if they could read ahead, asking if they could take the book home, and showing disappointment when they were not able to. I wanted them to be at the same spot reflectively when next we meet. But knowing that some were finished much sooner than others gives me insight into possible directions for groupings on our next novel.