The 21st Century School House

A little more pushing, a little bit of progress

2008-12-22T20:11:00.004-05:00

Despite some skepticism and pre-Christmas pessimism, I have to admit I am a little energized by our school's new attempt to use a wiki. It's a step we needed to take.

The purpose of the wiki is to gather some of the professional "voices" in the building as we move our curriculum and our instruction into the 21st Century. Right now, we're using it to share ideas and build consensus on the definition of several different student learning behaviors. We use these learning behaviors as points of focus for learning walks by the administration and leadership team. Conversations about how to define these behaviors have been a valuable part of our professional discussion recently. Now part of that conversation can be done with the help of a collaborative wiki.

In this case, we needed to use the technology for the sake of using the technology. Only then will we begin to see just what potential the technology holds and how we can best use it. If, along the way, we extend the conversation beyond our regular meetings, then that's gravy.

What makes a wiki such an appealing tool is that it can help promote such a conversation in a different venue. But more important, the process becomes part of the product. That can be powerful. That needs to be explored.

We'll see.

A Colorado school turns the homework model upside down

2008-12-15T20:53:00.010-05:00

Here is a novel idea worth thinking about. Several math teachers at a Colorado high school have turned the homework-schoolwork model inside out. Instead of using class time to introduce content (my translation: lecturing or providing direct instruction) and then sending students home to solve problems or grapple with that content, they've decided to flip it. Class lectures and other such materials are now available online or burned on a DVD for students to take home. During class time, the students solve problems and work more directly with the teachers. The TV news folks, of course, portray this shift in educational thinking as a renegade high school doing away with homework.

Anyway, it sounds like something that can easily be done in math or maybe science. But what about English? If I flipped the model like that, what would it look like? Kids could listen to discussion of a novel or hear background about the author at home, while we spend time in class reading and making connections to what we read? I don't know if it has quite the same effectiveness. According to the state of Connecticut, my focus should be (in my words) to teach important literacy skills such as making connections to what they read, identifying the craft of the author writing, and even to "appreciate" texts from a variety of cultures. What I do inside F14 must be with those standards in mind. What is it, then, that we need to flip?

We need to find ways to extend and inspire the conversation outside of class so students can understand the richness of exploring a text and making deep personal connections to it. Just exactly how should that be done? If I had the answer to that, I'd open up my own consulting business and charge people for the answer. (By the way, the teachers mentioned in the video do run an educational consulting company. A feature on the 11 o'clock news can't be bad for business.)

Until then, there are ways we can try. I've experimented with having students post comments on a class blog, write blogs themselves and link to one another, create wiki pages and read one another's work. Right now, I'm starting with Google docs, asking two students to collaborate on gathering quoted evidence from The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds. Down the road, I'm thinking of asking students to use Google chat to have a dialogue outside of class with a classmate about a piece of literature or issue we're discussing and hand in a transcript of that chat session to me.

What else can we do? What have you done?

Show me the Money!

2008-12-14T22:08:00.010-05:00

Been thinking about money lately. Not because the economy has dominated the news for the last six months. And not because I won the lottery, that's for sure.

I've been reading a wonderful blog with a great title - Get Rich Slowly. Although the blog is not written for educators or to explore the digital possibilities of web 2.0 applications, it is one of my favorite regular reads. The blog is devoted to "sensible personal finance," preaching patience as a core belief. That appeals to me, whether we're talking about money or my own professional practice in the classroom. It's also a good reminder for these down times when I feel more frustrated than excited.

Get Rich Slowly is well-written, relevant, and thought-provoking - everything a blog should be. While I enjoy it for it's own sake, the teacher part of me wonders what part of the author's educational experiences prepared him for what he's doing with this blog?

Blog author J.D. describes the blog this way: "You will not find any get-rich-quick schemes here. Nor will you find multi-level marketing fads or hot stock tips. I am not pitching any product or book. Instead, you’ll find daily information about personal finance and related topics... Please note that I am not a financial professional. I’m just an average guy who found himself deep in debt. When it finally became too overwhelming, I began reading personal finance books, hoping to find answers. I wanted swift solutions to my problems. My research revealed that few people get rich quickly, but almost anyone can get rich slowly by patiently following some simple rules."

We can all stand to embrace such a philosophy. First of all, it must be obvious that if more people in this country adopted such a frugal, long view philosophy, then we might not be in the mess we are right now. As classroom teachers trying to make sense of the radically changing educational landscape, we need also to remind ourselves of the sound thinking espoused in Get Rich Slowly. If we want to get "rich," we need to take a long view and be satisfied with incremental steps towards our ultimate goal.

The idea of getting rich and teaching students share many parallels. In the classroom, my ultimate goal is for students to learn the literacy skills necessary to be successful in a changing and increasingly diverse global community. But it's not like I'm ever going to show up for school one day and declare mission accomplished. It just does not work that way. That can also be said for getting rich. To me, it's more about adopting a philosophy than reaching a concrete goal.

With a little tweaking of the 12 key beliefs that form the core of the Get Rich Slow philosophy, I can inform my own teaching and professional growth. In the interest of brevity, here are some highlights of the key beliefs as they apply to enriching our craft by incorporating relevant 21st Century skills and using powerful web 2.0 technology in our classrooms.

Small amounts matter.: Don’t be frustrated if the teacher next to you seems like a tech genius and you are still getting comfortable with a computer. Try out a new tool with a small lesson or a part of an assignment. You have to start somewhere, and saying you could never do it like Mr. Tech Wizard is a lame excuse.
Do what works for you.: Each person is different. What works for one person may not work for another. There’s no one right way to teach 21st Century skills or use technology efficiently as part of the learning process. Be willing to experiment until you find methods that are suited to your class.
The perfect is the enemy of the good.: Here's one area where too many teachers get stuck. Too many people are reluctant to start because they don’t know what the best first step is. The best first step is the one you take. Don’t worry about getting things exactly right.
Failure is okay.: Just don't give up. 'Nuff said.
Do it now.: It’s easy to put things off. But the sooner your start moving toward your goals, the easier they are too reach.

Food for thought...

My beliefs, our cellphone and the 21st century (of course)

2008-11-08T17:43:00.014-05:00

As teachers, we all know how important it is for us to encourage students to try new things, but what happens when it gets turned around on you? Or even worse, you find you too may have to think hard about something? Right now, I am in that territory.

So I got my students involved in the "This I Believe" project through NPR. It's a novel idea and one that was brought to my attention by Anne, who is a teacher in Karl Fisch's school in Colorado. For several years now, she's been assigning the essay to her students, posting them on a class wiki to foster collaboration, and then submitting them to NPR. This year, she's expanded it to other teachers in the world and right now, there's a whole slew of interested educators.

As part of this project, my 21st Century Journalism students are paired with a school in New Jersey. And that means it's time for me to push this thing forward, even if the students resist a little. New things and change are always tough for anyone, adults or children. Of course, pondering the logistics of this latest project, I also find myself grappling with what it is I believe in. That's a hard one.

But we had an interesting discussion in class the other day. It somehow meandered to the ubiquity of the many tiny digital devices and gadgets that make our modern life everything from more convenient and easy to much more busy and complicated. Those same devices popping up in my classroom everyday also help illuminate another width of the divide that exists between education and the world of those we educate. I can see the irony and contradictions that exist in our world and how tend to ignore it, rather than embrace it.

Even before we started carrying cell phones and plugging into ipods, the adult world was full of these type of contradictions. How many times have you heard teachers complain about students not paying attention in their class, only to see those same teachers sitting in a professional development workshop chatting away or grading papers. Today, I'm sure you wouldn't be hard pressed to find a teacher's cell going off in class on one day, and the next day that same teacher confiscating a student's phone. To me, that's just one more instance where the classroom becomes an artificial environment that does little to replicate the real challenges and obstacles we encounter in the real world.

What's the message we send to kids today? What can we do about it?

For me, the best thing I can do right now is write my own "This I Believe" essay along with the students. I'm not exactly sure how it's going to turn out or where it will end up, but I'll soon find out.

Keeping track of those connections

2008-10-27T21:01:00.006-04:00

Several of the students in my 21st Century journalism class have asked about how to find and reach a larger audience with their blogs. Right now, they've been mostly confined to our classroom. I'm the audience. However, that model's no different than just typing away on a word processor and handing in a sheet of paper.

The next four things I need to teach and encourage in class:

They've got to register their blogs with a blog tracking service such as technorati.com.
They have incorporate hyperlinks to other blogs they read as part of their writing.
They have to keep reading other blogs to help spur ideas and thoughts for their own blogs so they can link back to those blogs when they write. See number two above.
They have to leave comments on other people's blogs and get themselves involved in the discussion generated by someone's posting.

You know, the more I think about it, I can't just think of this as a prescribed step-by-step process. Yea, I can show them how to sign up for technorati and then subscribe to the feed for their blog links. It's going to take a broader approach and one that does more to provide a broader understanding of what a blog is, how to read one, what it's purpose is. I've touched on this before. In a way, it's like teaching a short story unit. You might start off with Edgar Allan Poe's theory of a short story, then you might read different examples that illustrate plot, irony, or symbolism.

That's where I am now, looking for resources on types of blogs, and examples to illustrate different components. Where should I go? Stay tuned.

Content, digital tools, and glimpses outside the classroom

2008-10-26T23:11:00.000-04:00

Although I haven't kept up with this blog as much as I have in the past, I'm still here in F14 - or whatever room I happen to have a key to - plugging away at this thing called 21st Century learning. In the nearly two years since I started this blog, my thinking has evolved, and my practice in the classroom has grown more refined, yet my time spent reflecting on it in this space has dropped precipitously.

The teaching challenge is still there for me - how can I embed digital and web 2.0 tools into my students' learning?

Well, let's see...

This year I've had the good fortune of teaching a class called 21st Century Journalism, which has allowed me the freedom to try different approaches with the students. There's no set content requirements. Instead I've turned things around, focusing on the digital tools that may help students find content rather than using classroom content (the assigned reading books for example) to experiment with digital tools. So while my English 10 classes read a series of short stories and created a wiki resource about them, my 21st Century journalism students signed up for a Google reader account and have begun reading blogs tailored to their interest. As I watch them work, I continue to think about the challenges they face when they encounter a broad variety of digital content.

It's a challenge that Bud the Teacher seems to working with on a recent project about generating research questions for a class studying digital literacy. Having kids explore the issues and contexts of digital literacy would be a valuable activity, if for nothing else to help them make the connections between what they already do online with other valuable productivity tools available. Right now, I think there's a disconnect in kids about that. They may spend several hours on facebook or myspace, but never consider the other applications and implications of the technology they use. I guess that's a teacher's job, to help forge those connections and help trigger that learning.

At the moment, where I'm at is using blogs in the class for students to practice the skills of reading and writing. The more I think about Bud's project, it seems to make sense to include a reflective piece, maybe even borrowing some guiding questions from his project. Do we read websites differently than we do books? Does literacy only mean reading and writing? Or, has the meaning of literacy expanded to include how we understand digital content?

As I ponder those questions and how best to integrate them in class, here are some examples of where so far student blogging has reached outside classroom.

One of the students has begun reading about some local issues, but I've been trying to encourage her to expand her reach and read more about statewide and regional stories. I directed her to a blog by a Connecticut attorney, and she mentioned it in one of her posts. Within a few days, he had left her a comment and, in turn, gave her kudos on his own blog. It was awesome to see the reaction of all the students in the class when they huddled around her computer to read the blog entry where she was mentioned. Sometimes it's the small things that have the biggest impact - even though they all laughed because of the name of her blog.

Another student has begun reading numerous different blogs and now maintains two of them, one for the class and the other a little less schoolish. However, there are times when her personal interests and school do mix. She discovered the postsecret blog and absolutely loved it. She decided to bring that idea to the school. And guess what? That's what she did. Read about it here.

I hope the students keep going, and they don't stop here. There's just too much more to learn.

Irony in the 21st Century classroom

2008-10-20T22:53:00.013-04:00

Here's another taste of an authentic 21st Century English classroom, sprinkled with a healthy dose of the latest and greatest technology, and finished off with a hint of irony to keep it real.

It started when I figured out a way to incorporate text messaging into the lesson - something I've been trying to attain for over a year. Anne posted about how she used Polleverywhere to set up an in-class poll that took text message votes. What I did was ask the kids which of the five stories we read in class they liked the best. Simple enough. Just five minutes at the beginning of class to try out the service, get a quick feel from the kids what they thought, and then use that to plan the next step.

It went smoothly, and I recommend Polleverywhere to everyone who's willing to experiment. It's free and easy to use. (Go ahead and respond via text to the one on this page and you'll see what I mean) What I did in class was project the live poll on the SmartBoard, and the kids got a kick watching it move with every vote.

Several of the kids were genuinely enthusiastic about whipping out their cell phones and sending a text. A few kids thought it was a joke, and I think they were legitimately amazed that a text message and a lesson could ever find common ground. That's great. One student even suggested that I do this again, but set it up so kids could text in a discussion question or idea as we walk into class. I plan to take him up on his idea at some time.

So the rest of the class is spent doing a "Take A Stand" activity to discuss upcoming themes in the novel A Separate Peace. To do so, I was using the SmartBoard, projecting a Google presentation of the discussion questions which was embedded in my classroom wiki. What's more 21st Century than that? After the discussion, which covered topics such as jealousy, friendship, and honesty, the kids spent the last 10 minutes of class writing about one of the ideas from the discussion they felt the strongest about.

So where's the irony? Well, during the writing portion of the lesson, I confiscated a kid's cell phone because he was texting during class.

Classic.

Meme: Passion Quilt

2008-03-01T15:25:00.002-05:00

Patrick tagged me with this meme a few days ago. And I'll be honest. It was pretty difficult to come up with something visually appealing that captures what I am passionate about for kids to learn. I'll be honest, there are days I don't even know if I'm passionate about anything. Could it be a sympton of the state's standardized tests which are looming on the horizon next week? Could be...

What I came up with, however, is something I'd like all students - and people - to be passionate about: the world, their vision of the world, and their role in creating that vision.

As for the meme, here are the rules:
Post a picture or make/take/create your own that captures what YOU are most passionate about for kids to learn about…and give your picture a short title.
Title your blog post “Meme: Passion Quilt” and link back to this blog entry.
Include links to 5 folks in your professional learning network
I’ll tag the next five people:

Clay

photo credits:

Open your eyes to the world by Olivia Bee on Flickr

World Trade Center, Underground Mosaic Eye, New York by "M" Pearl on Flickr

Its Future is in our Hands - Live Earth by aussiegall on Flickr

Just how much do our kids know? Do we even know?

2008-02-12T20:31:00.016-05:00

Last year in class, we were talking about A Midsummer Night's Dream and I showed my students a few clips of some high school and college productions of Shakespeare's play that I had found on YouTube. I had downloaded them and saved them on a thumb drive because our school blocks YouTube.

The kids got a kick out of seeing the humor and emotion from the scenes, something that is difficult to convey with a high school English class reading of the bard. One of the kids asked where I got the clips, and I told them I found them on YouTube.

"You go on YouTube?" one of them asked, apparently flabbergasted.

Although a little surprised that the student would think me technologically behind the times, I brushed it off as another example of the adolescent mindset - the world revolves around teenagers and adults are merely taking up space. However, I am again thinking of this exchange after seeing the results of a student technology survey by Barry that I saw, thanks to a post by Patrick. Essentially, the results seemed to reinforce some ideas I had been having an inkling about in the last several months: our students - for all the talk of digital immigrants, 21st century skills, and the wired generation - are not as digitally literate as we may think they are. Or probably more accurately, not enough has been done in schools to show students the power and potential of the Internet as a real learning tool.

Here is a highlight from Barry's survey:

Barry surveyed the students in his school. He asked them if they do any of the following on a regular basis.
Read a blog (21%)
Post comments to a blog (13%)
Write a blog (7%)
Post to a wiki ( 1%)
Listen to a Podcast (9%)
Create a podcast (2%)
Download Music (70%)
Upload music (33%)
Download photos or
video (35%)
Upload photos or video (38%)
Create videos, but don't upload
them (11%)
Text message (71%)
Send photos or videos I take with my phone (29%)

Conclusion: They text and download music. They entertain themselves with technology. I'm not sure how much content they are creating beyond their messages. Certainly the vast majority of high school students do not know how to use the Office suite for full academic potential, cite sources correctly, or access scholarly sources."

What makes this relevant is that we, as educators, assume that when we use computer technology in the class - whether it's via a spiffy PowerPoint presentation or assignments on a classroom blog - that we will suddenly flip the "on" switch for student learning. Maybe it's because that many of these web 2.0 applications come with such promise that we mistakenly assume too much.

This kind of disconnect - between student engagement and teacher technology use - can be especially sharp for teachers just getting their feet wet in the use of web 2.0 applications. The question I have for teachers, is assuming that Barry's results a generally true, what are the implications for the classroom? What do we need to do as teachers to make sure we are utilizing the proper tools and promoting the important skills? What do we have to do bridge that student technology gap? The gap between viewing and using technology as an entertainment tool and utilizing it as a learning tool? Maybe the first step is for teachers to take that same survey and see what the results would be.One final thought. I was surprised when my student had not considered any educational potential in something like YouTube. How many of the teachers in your building are likewise unaware of such educational potential? What do we need to do to fix that?

Liveblogging - something else to try

2008-02-06T20:08:00.000-05:00

Here's another great idea and innovative use of blogs in a classroom - liveblogging. Two teachers in Colorado - Mrs. Moritz and Mrs. Smith - are reading A Whole New Mind by Daniel Pink and are facilitating several liveblogging discussions in their classes of the ideas raised in the novel. Check out some examples of the discussions (in the comments) here and here and here. In addition to reading the book, taking part in online and live classroom discussions, students are also writing a persuasive essay and using a classroom wiki to do some of the writing. Both teachers work at Arapahoe High School in Colorado, home of Karl Fisch. As usual, Karl provides an excellent overview of the project and their efforts. That deserved mention here and in my del.icio.us bookmarks.

What's also awesome that as part of the liveblogging, these teachers brought in the author and other professionals into the conversation with the students.

Never heard of Pink's novel before. Now I want to read it.

This is just another example of the numerous ways to "play with" a valuable learning tool by constantly stretching its limits and applying it in other ways. Years ago, when I first began experimenting with Literature Circles I began requiring students to use Post-it notes to mark the text as they read. Even something as simple as that expanded with some creativity from myself and my colleagues - students swapped Post-its and responded to one another; students recorded their best Post-its on a harvesting sheet as a way for me to monitor their thinking; students categorized their Post-its as a class discussion activity.

Sometimes I feel like there's too many awesome ideas and innovative web 2.0 learning applications out there. Add liveblogging to that growing list.

Three questions to ask anyone thinking about using blogs in a classroom

2008-02-04T19:57:00.000-05:00

My first electronic writing implement was an electric Smith Corona typewriter. I took typing in high school and, thankfully, I could quickly transcribe my rough draft (scribbled on line paper in which I skipped every other line) onto the final draft. That's how I started writing. As computers became more prevalent, I followed much the same process, eventually learning to write my first draft directly on the screen, saving it, and coming back for revisions. My years as a daily newspaper reporter honed my skills at deadline writing.

So here I am looking back at that as I think about about Thursday's two-hour professional development session on using blogs and wikis in the classroom. Whether I wrote on my Smith Corona or tapped away on a PC, my writing was still confined in the same way. Print it and hand it in. My teachers didn't spend anytime teaching me how to type or how to press ctrl-s to save (in the pre-mouse days). Today, students still write and still "hand it in." Thursday's PD session, I hope, will help spread the word to other teachers that we have many more options these days, more than they might know.

Teachers might come in to the session with a vague idea that some kind of new technology is available to broaden students' writing experiences. And like the promise of all new technological advancements, this one has come with some promises to improve student writing and reading. It's also possible that teachers may come into Thursday with nary an inkling about just how a blog fits into an English - or any other - classroom.

Here are the questions I need to ask of any teacher who wants to use blogs as part of their classroom repertoire.

What do you expect to get out of using a blog? First of all, it's not going to cure the ills of the English classroom. That is, students aren't likely to start magically devouring the written word as if recovering from a lifetime of literary starvation. Throwing their words up into the realm of the blogosphere is probably not going to make them instantly better writers. However, it's reasonable to expect that using a blog can be another tool to promote student reading and writing. And a quite powerful one at that. It doesn't have to be the cure-all, for it to simply be of help. Think about it. A blog offers a student a venue for "publishing" work in the real world; a tool for a reader to respond to what is read; a way for a writer to link to others with his or her writing. Exploit those characteristics. Beyond posting their own writing, use blogs to require students to read others. To leave comments on others. To write posts in response to what they've read and hyperlink to that source. To read comments you leave them about their work. Teach them all those things and more.

How do you want students to use these digital tools? We still must tease out the important concepts and skills embedded in anything we ask the kids to do. Whether it's on a blog, a wiki, or ripped from an electric typewriter, good writing is good writing. One of the biggest realizations I made last year was that just because it's on the internet and requires some up to date technology, doesn't mean students are going to embrace it. For most adolescents, it's probably still a lot cooler to log onto Facebook or Myspace than it is to respond to the ideas of 1984 through a classroom blog. Don't compete with those sites, but rather use a blog or wiki to meaningfully engage your students in their work. They'll respond to that. Exploit the characteristics of a blog for those purposes. (See previous paragraph)

How are you, as a teacher, going to use them? This is quite possibly the trickiest of the three questions. If students are expected to use them, then so are we. Be ready when they have technical questions. They might ask: How do I change the settings for who can leave a comment? How can I import a picture? What's the proper way to hyperlink to something I've read? Make sure you know the answer. The best way to figure it out is to experiment yourself. Look to see what other teachers are doing and borrow their ideas. Tweak it to make it your own. Then try something else.

The thing is, when I handed my papers in way back when in my high school days, that was the end. I waited for the teacher to "correct" it before I got any return on my investment of time and thinking. There are some many more valuable opportunities these days for student writers. It's up to us to take full advantage.

Baseball, blogs, and teachers, in no particular order of importance

2008-02-03T09:36:00.000-05:00

I know today is Super Bowl Sunday, but baseball is on my mind. That and a two-hour teacher professional development I'm scheduled to give next week. As I sit here thinking about how to do it, I keep thinking of my son, CJ, and his love for America's pastime. He's always liked to play, but lately he's shown a growing interest in the history of the sport.

What does this have to do with web 2.0 tools in the classroom?

Last year, I gave a professional development class to fellow teachers about web 2.0 and using blogs and other collaborative tools to help instruction. The hour-long session, which focused on the blog I use in my English 10 class, went over well. It lasted longer than an hour, which means teachers stayed well beyond the 3:30 pm requirement to talk about the topic. Many teachers expressed interest in doing something similar.

Unfortunately, few actually followed through as far as I can tell.

Anyone who is reading this probably knows the same - or more likely more - about the most effective use of these read/write tools in the classroom. Or at least, if you are reading this blog, you have a fundamental grasp of the medium. It seems to me that understanding the blog as a medium, as opposed to, say, a newspaper article or non fiction book, is crucial to effectively employing it in a classroom. That idea has to be a basic step in anything I do with teachers.

Often, the word blog conjures up images of partisan political hitmen spreading gossip and innuendo about their opponents. And a wiki, well, that's equal to wikipedia, that hell-spawned repository of false information that's clawing at the very fabric of our culture.

If teachers are going to use blogs and wikis in classes, then those impressions need to be modified. And the place to start is helping teachers understand just what a blog is. How it comes to be. I can worry about the specifics of what to teach them, but for now I'm thinking through the pedagogical foundation of why and how it needs to be taught.

That's where my son, age 7, comes in. We've been reading books together lately on the history of baseball. He has taken a real liking to it and enjoys thumbing through some of the coffee table size books that contain numerous pictures and some lengthy descriptions of old time players and teams. He can read and occasionally reads the text to me. However, there were several times he'd come to a page and look at the picture and ask me: "Who's that daddy?" or "What are they doing?" I would point out to him that there is a caption underneath that explained the picture. Read it, I told him, and he could learn about the photo. He didn't really know to do that. Simple lesson.

It took him a while, and he's still learning. Then it got me thinking. All the books he's read up to now had pictures, but not captions. He regularly reads story books, where any pictures natually complement, or illustrate, the story. A book of baseball history, on the other hand, is non fiction. Both the pictures and the text work together to provide information, and often the photos (with the help of the captions) help tell some piece of the story. To get the most out of the big books we thumb through, he needed to better understand how to read a nonfiction text, figure out the characteristics of that medium. Of course to him, he was simply learning about all the great ballplayers of the past - Ted Williams, Christy Mathewson, and Walter "Big Train" Johnson, which happen to be two of his favorites. (Me, I also like the guy pictured at the top of this space.)

Anyway, that's what I'm thinking about as I work to try and help my colleagues discover the benefits of using things such as blogs and wikis in class. The first step is differentiating what a blog is from what a website is. Based on anecdotal evidence from conversations I've had with teachers, I'm under the impression that posting student writing on a blog is viewed the same way as the idea of creating a class website was 10 years ago. It's a finite undertaking, with a final, concrete product put together at a specific point in the process. That's not a blog. Blogs are more dynamic. They change as the content gets added. They grow as more information and/or ideas are added, both from the writer and readers. Hyperlinks help enhance the reading and writing process. Both teachers and students can - and must - participate in that process of creating content or writing on a blog. There's a not so subtle difference there that is fundamental to understanding the best way to use a blog in a classroom.

Of course that means that reading and comprehensions skills play a prominent role. Anyone reading this blog, for example, would need to know something about me when making a determination about my credibility. That can only be gleaned by reading old posts, viewing information I choose to share on the site. But if I write that Babe Ruth is the greatest player of all time, followed distantly by Ted Williams and then Willie Mays, well you'd have to determine how much to value that in comparison to, say, a columnist from the Sporting News who may hold a contrary view.

But the extension of that idea in a class is that the technology that makes a blog a blog, is what makes it so useful in a class. The same for a wiki. Instantly posting ideas and writing. Leaving comments. Having an easy to access menu of drafts for a piece of writing. Accessibility from almost anywhere. But before you use it in a classroom, you need to better understand it.

This week will be another step in hopefully spreading that word in my school.

Looking for some help from Big Brother

2008-01-10T22:21:00.000-05:00

I'm standing in my classroom today, observing my sophomores in their groups discussing 1984 or Fahrenheit 451. Part one of each book was due today. Off to the corner, leaning on a lectern, I spent half the class scanning the room, listening to snippets of conversations...

"...but how can the "thought police" know what their thinking..."

"...and he never thought about his job before and Clarisse made him think about what he was doing for the first time..."

"...I think it means that the government wants to control everything and..."

As I listen, I also try to watch the different groups scattered around the room. Who has their head down? Who doesn't have a book? Who seems to be doing the most talking in their group? What are they writing down? Is it the homework that was due at the beginning of class? Should I walk over their and gently remind them to keep talking? Is everyone listening to each other?

During my numerous scans, I happened to catch the poster displayed prominently - and dare I say ironically? - above the laptop cart - "Big Brother is Watching You." Oh yeah, he is watching. Today, during 4th and 6th periods, he was me. I just wish I had ubiquitous two-way telescreens and mysterious thought police at my disposal. Until then, I'll just have to rely on my own eyes and ears to assess their daily efforts, and I'll continue to scribble down notes to myself, do my best to assess their efforts at discussion, and record letter grades in my planner. It's the best I can do.

A funny thing happened on the way to the 21st century classroom

2008-01-06T20:27:00.000-05:00

As I plod along into the 21st century, there are two little creatures on either side of me. On one side, one creature - I'll call him "Thing 20" - keeps tugging at my sleeve, while "Thing 21" rolls his eyes and shakes his head. Just hurry up, he seems to be saying in an exasperated tone. 20, it seems, spends all his time asking questions about where we're going. Why, why, why? he constantly asks. Both 20 and 21 annoy me in their own way.

Anyway, right now, the students in my Writing the Essay class are the only ones who have set up blogs to supplement their in class learning. It's not like my other students are left scrawling on the backs of shovels with chalk. My sophomores put together multi-media presentations and used a wiki to compile their research and my public speaking class recorded podcasts. Not too shabby.

It's just that, with my Writing the Essay students beginning to use their blogs more (of course as the semester winds down, rather than gears up), I am again struck by all the small bits of teaching and learning that cannot be neglected as I meander my way to the 21st century classroom. Along the same vein, I have been struck once again by the inseparable nature of reading and writing. The class lagged at times this year, and I'm convinced it's because I didn't do enough to stimulate their thinking with reading. It happens so naturally in a typical English class, I must have assumed it would here too.

It began when I assigned them to select a topic and then use their blogs to keep track of their research, posting hyperlinks to their sources and reflecting on their findings. Of course I assumed too much and I think I lost sight of what has become a roadmap for my trek towards the 21st century school house. It dates back to a post by Will Richardson a year ago, where he talks about the idea of blogging as a means to achieve a synthesis of ideas. That's what I wanted - and still want - my kids to do. All the time. Richardson says, "if you’re reading and writing regularly about something that you are truly passionate about, that synthesis becomes almost second nature. You are always making connections and writing your own narrative." In a recent Clay Burrell post, he hits on another component of writing and, by extension blogging, when he puts out the call for collaboration with his upcoming writing class. As usual, Clay reminds me of the great potential for these digital learning tools and a comment on his post reminded me of Richardson's words. Sean writes, "Students must write for keeps. In addition, for the writing course, form must follow function… Because writing is an iterative, intrinsically valuable practice, I believe a writing class does best when it rewards reflection on the process, a dialectical engagement with all texts." Again the reading and writing link is vital. That's where the blog must come in.

So back to my Writing the Essay students. I asked them to start doing it. Simple as that. But not really.

And slowly, they have kind have begun to, a little. Well, not exactly. But what do I expect? How much time did I spend to analyze and evaluate the genre of blogging? It's like I asked them to write a short story without reading a bunch of examples and even studying Poe's theory of composition. But, in the last week or so, as they have begun reading more, their blogging has improved. I'd still like them to more fully explore the potential of hyperlinking their ideas to broaden their connections, and to develop more creative titles for their blogs, and to write with a more purposeful self-reflection, and to ... you get the point. I'm still trying and we'll see how it works out with less than two weeks left in the semester.

And to get back to Richardson's ideas about synthesis, it's apparent that time is needed to steer students to quality blog selections, both so they can see the style in action, but also as a way to stimulate their own thinking. Synthesis like this must evolve, more than it happens. And therein lies the rub. Today's education is about product (results) than it is about process. And like the students in my Writing the Essay class, I'm just getting started.

I feel a little better. I can tell "Thing 20" to back off a little bit and let "Thing 21" know that I'm getting there. Be patient.

Sketching out some thoughts about my next unit

2007-12-30T21:10:00.000-05:00

Been thinking a lot about my next unit, which involves the novels 1984 and Fahrenheit 451. It seems like the two novels present golden opportunities to examine some of the critical issues facing us today. And like I did last year, I'm thinking of using this unit to introduce students to individual blogging. Not sure if it's my tendency to stick with what I am familiar with or if there is something intrinsic about this unit that lends itself to such endeavors. What is it about a pair of books - both over 50 years old - that would steer me to naturally pair them with use of the latest 21st Century digital learning tools?

Ok, I admit that I am focusing my planning around a digital tool (a blog) rather than deeper deeper critical thinking skills, but it's a start...

Both novels were written as warnings. Warnings about the dangers that the authors envisioned for our societies. In both novels, questions concerning individual privacy, government power, use of propaganda, and social interactions are all raised. Orwell's 1984 focuses on the dangers of a totalitarian, omnipotent government that seeks to control every aspect of its citizens' lives, even their thoughts. Fahrenheit 451, on the other hand, takes a little more indirect approach in its attack on the perils of government power. Bradbury's warning seems to be more focused on what happens when the citizenry loses its desire - and ability - to think for themselves.

For this unit, I'm interested in places I can find common ground. I've taught both novels before, and usually as a tandem: students have a choice of either novel, and we use a Literature Circles model for classroom discussions. Students are grouped according to their novel choice. This year, things are a bit different. The English 10 classes now have an honors option element. The class is still heterogeneously grouped, but students can opt to demonstrate more breadth and depth of understanding to earn an honors distinction on their transcripts. As a result, the students taking the honors option are required to read both novels, while the other students only need to select one. A different challenge for me, but one that I think has helped prod me to focus on tightening the connections.

Then I got to thinking of what I'd like students - both honors and non-honors - to get out of this unit at the end. I, of course, want them to be awed by the powerful style in which Orwell tells his disturbing story, and I want them to appreciate the symbolism and figurative language Bradbury uses in his tale. That's typical high school English class fare, which is fine, but I need to push them (and me) to frame these issues and ideas in our world. I narrowed down their messages to four common threads, or issues:

The threats to individual privacy

The dangers of governmental power

The power of information, propaganda, and language distortion

The potential for mindless entertainment to stifle individual thinking (this one is more tilted towards Fahrenheit 451, than 1984, but...)

All four of those common threads/issues seemed to open a doorway between the societies in the novels and ours today. Aren't we still grappling with these issues almost every day? Or if we are not - as maybe is the case with the students - then maybe we should be, right? These ideas will serve as a focus for when the students start reading and researching relevant issues in our world today. The blog, as mentioned before, will help them achieve that purpose.

I'm still fine-tuning the details, but it's beginning to come into clearer focus...

Learning, laptops, and promises

2007-12-19T21:59:00.000-05:00

There's something magical about a laptop computer. The ubiquitous image of a small powerful computer embodies the vision of 21st century portable computing. And the news has been dotted with stories of laptops in schools, an image that has been both positively and negatively portrayed. There's also the wonderful efforts to put inexpensive laptops in the hands of students in undeveloped countries around the world.

We need to be careful as we broaden our use and reliance on technology. For me, the only thing worse than not having access to adequate technological tools is having access to technological tools that are unreliable or malfunctioning. That's kind of what I was saying in my last post - you know, it was there buried beneath all that the griping and teeth-gnashing. Anyway, the frustration came when the technology didn't deliver on its promise to completely transform our world and radically change learning as we know it. Admittedly, I share some blame for this problem. Maybe it wasn't a promise made by the technology, but an unrealistic expectation I had for it. Either way, the only way to get teachers embracing these powerful digital tools is make them work and keep them working: troubleshoot the glitches, fix the occasional broken keyboard, and keep the network up and running.

It's also time for me to make better on my promises earlier this year to do more in my own classroom. I am fortunate enough to have access to 25 laptops. Now it's time to grow beyond posting comments on the class blog and get the students collaborating with one another, or better yet, with another class somewhere.

Here's one thing I've done so far to keep moving forward. The students in my essay writing class each have blogs, and they are working on an end of semester research paper. Their blogs are serving as a center for their research, something they are having difficulty embracing. This week I told them to find at least three good sources and use it as a jumping off point to write a blog entry about it - summarize relevant information from the source, synthesize the ideas with their own, and ask questions that could lead to further research. Here's a model blog post I wrote to show them some of the basics. In hindsight, I should have spent more time discussing and analyzing the characteristics of a good blog entry, such as embedding the hyperlink and connecting their ideas to what they read.

Well, that's what I have the laptops for, right?

Examining my anxiety over the frustrating excitement of learning new things

2007-12-17T20:43:00.000-05:00

I can't say I'm not disappointed with myself. Yet, I am having trouble putting my finger on it. What's most disturbing is feeling like I'm not moving forward, or worse, I'm actually regressing. Am I doing enough? Am I trying to do too much? Is it possible to be both?

Looking back, I have begun to narrow down the source of my angst. (disclaimer: I turned 40 this summer, so forgive this angst, or even the use of the word here) Last school year was eye opening for me. A year ago at this time, my biggest revelation was discovering the use of a classroom blog in which the students posted responses to prompts in the comments section. From there, my learning grew exponentially as I dove further into the use of blogs, wikis, and all those other web 2.0 applications that I conveniently lump together. A big part of that learning was my own personal blog. The excitement I felt last year in my own professional growth was like nothing I had ever experienced. To summarize, I discovered THE shift. THE shift.

And now, here it is December 2007, and I'm back on the blog, posting similar prompts for students to respond to about The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds. Somehow it feels like I should be beyond that. That the kids would be enthusiastically posting to their own blogs, swapping thoughts, synthesizing ideas they'd gleaned from one another.

Coming into this school year, I thought I was ready for it to continue to bloom. David Warlick facilitated a workshop during the two days before school started. However, that's where the cracks began to show. My excitement evolved into apprehension. In a school filled with teachers who consider themselves technically proficient, hardly any of them knew what an RSS feed was and many consider a blog to be an Internet taboo, akin to those "dangerous" chat rooms of the 1990s. As a result, Warlick's presentation was lost on too many of them who do not have the time to "do all that stuff." I can understand those teachers' frustration, but because I am in a different place.

Embracing these web 2.0 tools is - and should - not be an alternative to some tried and true teaching method, like Literature Circles would be to traditional classroom discussions. We're talking about a new model for learning, one of collaboration and providing new venues for writing. (I know this is no revelation, but my brain takes a while to kick in after I grapple with something for a little while) I know how important "that stuff" is, yet there is still inside me a nagging sense that I don't do enough. Despite having a classroom full of laptops, I still struggle to create meaningful lessons and learning for my students. It would almost be better if I didn't know what I do know. It's that frustration - with myself - that has been the biggest struggle so far.

Here's what I'm talking about. After we read A Separate Peace, I asked the students to create a multi-media presentation on what it means to grow up. In the past, this might have been a poster or a collage followed by a 2-3 minute presentation to the class explaining it. Not this year. This year it was creating a multi-media presentation with Microsoft Movie Maker. Finding powerful photos at Flickr or through Creative Commons. Selecting a song. Putting it all together and saving it as a Windows media file. Of course it took longer than if we spent a few days cutting pictures out of a magazine. If they were going to find pictures on the Internet, they had to include the source. So I set up a wiki page for students to compile and share their work. And then between the movie maker software and the laptops, I had to add almost another week to the whole thing. And still not everyone finished on time. Frustrating.

Why was it so frustrating? Was it because it took longer than I ~~wanted~~ expected? Was it because the students didn't gush with enthusiasm over using the wiki? Was it because it didn't solve all those problems that typically vex every thing we do in the classroom - student apathy, procrastination, struggles to understand, difficulties planning time?

If we add it up, we doubled the time set aside for the project - from one to two weeks. We probably added more frustration and anxiety to the students as they struggled with the technology and the complexities of the assignment. I'm not saying that a little bit of anxiety is a bad thing. And I'll admit, we got much better products than cluttered posters destined to stick to the classroom walls before unceremoniously falling to the floor one by one. Am I not giving myself enough credit? It's taken me a few months to figure out that I have work harder to fight through this frustration and not let it generate even more frustration, which leads to inertia.

Is that the problem? Because I have seen the awesome potential of these web 2.0 tools, am I expecting too much? I have to remain realistic and understand that these new ideas about collaboration and writing are not magic potions to cure what ails education. Sure they can help if they are put in the right hands for the right reasons. Is it that easy? Am I going too slow?

That shift. It's made things a lot more complicated. Frustrating and exciting, too. But still complicated.

Coming out of my hole

2007-09-25T22:32:00.000-04:00

Ok, so school started almost a month ago. That's not really an excuse anymore. And I just finished grading a batch of essays from my new essay writing class. So much for that as a handy excuse. And I'm no busier than most other professionals who take their jobs seriously.

So why haven't I posted anything since June 18? First I needed a break, then I felt overwhelmed, then I didn't know where to start again. It just kept getting harder and harder to resume. I've even ignored my bloglines blogroll, which swelled to 3267 unread entries as of 10:50 pm Tuesday, thereby neglecting all those wonderful professionals who helped me grow so tremendously last year. (And Patrick, I'm apologize for never completing your meme.) It's almost like there's too much now for me to get started on.

Then how do I get started again? In the spirit of trying to ease back into this thing, let me start listing some of what it is I'm doing this year. I can't promise much insight, but it's a start...

I have continued to use my English 10 blog in class and started with it right away. This year, we received a laptop cart and 25 laptops, so I put the students to work the first week reading about Liverpool's failed experiment with laptops and this thoughtful response. Then I asked the students to weigh in on what they thought we should do in F14. I even helped prod the teacher I share the class with to do the same.

I set up a blog for my writing the essay class and began posting assignments, including one that required they post a comment. Each time I update my blog or think of how to incorporate it into my lessons, I think about that great thread from last year about vampires and student blogging. As part of the writing the essay blog, I also set up a feed to the page for all del.icio.us bookmarks with a wte tag. They show up on the blog and are geared for the students.

I use a SmartBoard almost everyday. As part of the online writing grant, our school purchased 100 accounts in the MyAccess writing program, where students submit their writing to be scored via a computer. We'll see how that goes.

I still use my Google calendar like it's my job. I just like everything Google.

Because of time constraints, I scrapped a plan to start a class wiki to compile literary information on the short stories we are reading - conflicts, symbolism, characterization, themes etc... It's not worth forcing it unless I can adequately support the students with instruction.

I hope to get back more fully into the conversation again. I miss it.

It may be over, but it doesn't end

2007-06-18T21:38:00.000-04:00

School years are about traditions, either breaking them or honoring them. Tomorrow night the class of 2007 graduates on the steps of town hall, overlooking the town Green. It's a special tradition that helps link school and community. Another annual rite is the year-end reflective essay intended to detail our personal thoughts on how we believe we achieved our goals and/or grew professionally. This year's version, like the last seven, covered several of the same topics - evaluating my overall effectiveness in class, grappling with authentic assessments, learning new things.

Learning new things.

When I got to that point in the essay - as I'm typing it out with Microsoft Word - I stopped to think just how much I had learned this school year. First of all, my goals did not include anything even in the same neighborhood as using 21st Century tools. I hadn't a clue what they were in September. But there I was in front of my computer screen, sifting through a public record of my professional growth from October on. How could I jam all that into a reflective essay that I didn't want to be much more than three or so pages? Should I just repeat some of the public thinking that occurred in this space? Maybe this is one tradition that needs to evolve or - dare I say - shift?

The idea of writing a reflective essay seemed a bit contrived. Haven't I been reflecting here for the last seven months? Afterall, it was this blog that helped me discover the potential and possibilities for blogging and using wikis in the classroom. It was here that I connected with some outstanding educational leaders who assisted in my professional growth. And it is here that there is a record of that learning journey.

We talk about teachers modeling learning for their students. Well here it is. And I want my students to experience that same feeling of finding and learning something new and valuable. I know blogs can play a part in that. I caught a glimpse of it this year. So did the students. In fact, the students, much like me, were also asked to write a reflective say about what they learned using the blogs. They did a wonderful job, and you can read all about it here. I, too, hope to be able to say more on this experience, maybe as I get closer to fully synthesizing it in my brain and I begin to apply it to next year's instructional planning. The next logical step for me is setting up a collaborative venture with some other teachers out there. Maybe this could be the start of a new tradition in the high school. I intend to use this space to help me think out loud as I plan for next year. Whenever that is.

Anyway, graduation night is tomorrow and our last day is Wednesday. Because of the finals schedule, I haven't had kids since last Friday. This week is about getting my grades in and putting some things in order at work. One thing I've neglected is this blog, which does bother me. It's not like there's nothing to share. My brain is just a little fried.

So thanks to everyone who has helped me this year. I think I'm ready to graduate into year two of web 2.0 teaching.

It's still above the water

2007-05-30T21:31:00.000-04:00

Can't say I've gone completely under yet, but I did take quite a break from blogging, at least here. However, I've spent the last two weeks immersed (drowning?) in my student blogging experiment. Much of my time has been spent reading student postings via Google Reader and leaving comments to them. Meanwhile, my bloglines blogroll, which was malfunctioning the last few weeks, is chock full of unread postings. Today there were 756. I'm still afraid to clear it for fear that I will miss some nugget of learning previously undisclosed and containing the answers to all my web 2.0 questions. I need to get over that.

Normally at this time of the year, I'd be drowning in last minute essays and stuffing paper into my briefcase to carry home, ignore, and then lug back to school. At least with the blogging, my briefcase isn't as full.

However, that's not the reason I'm sitting in front of a laptop trying to piece together a blog entry. The real reason is that I've felt yet another noticeable shift. I have witnessed students talking to one another - sometimes naturally, sometimes a bit contrived, but talking nonetheless, on their blogs. I'd like to see more, but it's amazing when I consider where I was just 9 months ago. This end of the year blog experiment has provided me some wonderful insight and fodder for next year. There are two weeks left in this year, and students will spend a bulk of that completing their final portfolio project. In past years, I've kept class writing assignments in a folder in class and divided them into formal and informal writing assignments, essentially those typed and assigned long term, and those completed in class or impromptu. This year, much of the student's work can also be found online - as comments on the English 10 blog, as pieces of a wiki entries, and lately as their own blog postings about 1984 or Fahrenheit 451. Thanks to Google, I've also been able to share highlights of some of the more interesting entries.

Eventually, I should probably sift through their work and render some kind of timeless and essential learnings, which I can then pass on to the rest of the edublogosphere. Don't know if I quite have it in my right now, but I'm going to start with a list of "What did I do & What should I do next?"

What did I do?

Introduced students to blogs
Showed students how to comment on a blog
Walked students through setting up a blog on blogger
Taught a lesson on blog safety, using the blogs
Assigned students topics to write about
Commented on individual blogs
Assigned students to comment on each other's blogs
Showed students how to label their blog postings
Asked students to link to each other's blogs as part of one posting

What should I do next?

Everything from the above list, but do it during the first quarter
Spend more time giving an overview of what a blog is earlier in the year
Research if Blogger or another service (Edublogs?) offers better options for classroom blogs, complete with more oversight capabilities etc...
Require students to revise some of their entries with specific requirements in mind
Teach more lessons on creating blog posts and comments to one another
Emphasize tagging or labeling and introduce more possibilities there
Get students reading blogs from outside the building
Remain up to date and vigilant in terms of new issues that will invariably arise
Connect with another class somewhere else in the world

That last point is my ultimate goal for next year. If we are serious about 21st Century skills, then we need to embrace the kind of teaching and collaboration that will bring it to our students. It would be great to hook up with another teacher and connect our students, commenting on one another's blogs, collaborating on a joint wiki project, sharing drafts of writing.

As I have discussed before, I am lucky enough to have a new classroom set of laptops for next year. If I do nothing more than plop my students in front of those laptops and ask them to write their papers in Word or whip up a PowerPoint, then I am not doing my job. In fact, with this 1:1 computer opportunity, I have a much greater responsibility to bring those flat world possibilities into F14. What would be worse than if the students left my class thinking that school computers are only good for nothing more than old fashioned writing tasks and finding ways to bypass filters to access their Myspace accounts?

I know I'll have more at some point, but it just can't be right now. Stay tuned.

Photo credit: Head Above Water by Finiky on Flickr

First days of student blogging

2007-05-14T20:52:00.000-04:00

The first few days of blogging have had their ups and downs. The biggest problem I've encountered are the technical issues, and ideally I wish I had more time to help students learn the ins and outs of the blogger interface. That just takes time. I've already made a note for next year.

Another big surprise came when several students found comments on their postings from some of the edubloggers who are readers here. It prompted valuable discussion in class. Honestly, there was some concern by students who did not know who was responding to their ideas and for what purpose. It was also intriguing to many of them that there are actually people out there who read these things. Again, I am forced to consider all this brand new stuff from the eyes of my students (that's a good thing, by the way). For many students, discovering comments from strangers makes them leery. And maybe it should. Most of what they've heard about blogging and the Internet comes from news reports warning of online predators or detailing various dangers. There is a learning curve here, and the students are not as familiar with the etiquette and rules of blogging that I am. And why should they? That's my job: to teach them and to help them be responsible in how they do it.

That was also today's lesson, which resulted in a draft of blogging guidelines. Thank you to Stephen, by the way, for the lesson idea. A big part of the lesson was reviewing the importance of keeping personal information off their blogs. And finally, I suggested to them that when (maybe even if, considering timing at the end of the year) we leave comments on other blogs, that it would be important to provide more information about how they came across the site and for what purpose they are posting. As I've said, it's a learning curve, and for right now I think they would feel more comfortable if any comments left on their blogs explained who was posting and for what purpose. They have a right to know that.

Although we must focus on the positives and potential of this technology, we must not discount the potential pitfalls. I'm right there with my students, learning too.

Off the ground and running - kind of

2007-05-10T21:00:00.000-04:00

Today I brought my period 6 class into the computer lab and walked them through the process of creating a blog. Tomorrow, the same for periods 1 and 4. After that? We'll see.

As I have said before, I'm undertaking this new venture as an experiment, a twist on a Literature Circle unit with the novels Fahrenheit 451 and 1984. I want to see how it works on a class wide scale, what kinds of issues can arise, and what kind of adjustments I may need to make in the way I teach writing. There was a poignant reminder during today's lesson. First the students all set up their blogs pretty easily. No shock there. Yet, after doing that, their next question was: Now what? What am I supposed to write? That's where we as teachers come in. And I need to keep reminding myself that just because the technology allows anyone to instantly create a blog, it takes something a lot more to make the content desirable and worthwhile. For me right now, sudent blogging can be another format for them to compose their traditional school writing assignments. I hope it can become much richer, and to that end I'll mix in a generous portion of reading and commenting on their classmates' work, and I think I'm off to solid start.

I encourage anyone to check out what my students are writing - I linked them all through Google reader here and here and here. And if you think there might be an opportunity to collaborate in some way, please let me know. Maybe it could be as simple as directing your own students to my students' blogs and having them post comments. It's the end of the school year, but never too late to utilize the potential of this web 2.0 tool.

I'll keep you posted.

A burning dilemma

2007-05-08T20:28:00.000-04:00

It's happening again. A compelling idea from a text we're reading in class has tracked me down and found me at work, where I am preparing to start my students blogging more.

The idea escaped from the pages of Fahrenheit 451. There's a memorable episode in Ray Bradbury's classic science fiction novel when the main character, Guy Montag, comes home and discovers his wife has overdosed on sleeping pills. It seems his wife, like many of the population portrayed in Bradbury's dystopian novel, is completely engrossed by the talking walls in her bedroom, which are described as interactive tele-screens which allow viewers to interact with the creators of the "television" programs. It is this reliance on and addiction to such technology that dehumanizes Montag's wife and makes her susceptible to the book-burning tendencies of the government in the novel. It consumes her life.

So let me get this straight. In essence, Bradbury describes a world in which the viewer can alter the message, which in the novel's case is a form of entertainment television. Technology that allows people to become part of a digitally-connected cybercommunity in which they interact and influence one another's ideas... Bradbury published Fahrenheit 451 in 1953.

Do I mention this because of how eerily similar the technology predicted by Bradbury is to some of our current web 2.0 applications? Did Bradbury warn us against what we have come to know and extol as the read/write web? MySpace, Skype, PDAs? I'll be honest, I am not as well versed and knowledgeable in the subtleties of today's latest technology to be able to provide a smartly-drawn answer, but there is a tinge of irony in the fact that Fahrenheit 451 is one of the books I am teaching as I prepare to do a little more experimenting and implementing with student blogging. As one of my colleagues pointed out the other day, it's possible I could have all my sophomores in the same room communicating with each other from in front of a tele-screen and no one is saying a word. Face to face human social interaction replaced by a computer screen.

There's a dilemma in there somewhere.

It's worth mentioning and it can't be discounted as I continue to explore my role in implementing new technologies and tools into my classroom. Allow me to back up a bit and reflect on how it all fits together. First, I've decided, in light of my ongoing reflections over the last months and my pending online writing grant, that I will sign up each and every one of my sophomores with a blog. Simple as that.

We are beginning the aforementioned unit, one in which they can choose to read 1984 or Fahrenheit 451. Unfortunately, the way the end of the year schedule goes, there is less than a month in which to complete this unit. That's not much time, especially if you pile on top of that the fact that I am unveiling a brand spanking new web 2.0 venture. The students, who are used to simply posting comments on prompts I give them, will now be required to post and record their own ongoing thoughts related to their novels.

So what do I hope my experiment will look like inside F14? Here are some random, think aloud type ideas for how I want/need/hope to proceed:

First, walk each student through the set up process for a blog using blogger. It's the one I use and am familiar with. An added bonus is that the students can use their Google sign in, which many of them may already have if they have a g-mail address.
The first posting they will be required to do will be: reflect on the beginning of your novel. How is it fit the definition of a dystopian society we discussed in class? I know, it sounds more like online journaling at this point, but it's a start.
Some future topics could include posting a significant passage. Finding a link to a current event and posting it up with a brief summary. Giving advice to a character. Asking the author some questions about his novel.
I'm thinking that a majority of the writing and posting will need to take place in school. In fact, the process will likely eat up a good chunk of class time from now until the end of the year. As a result, I need to embed into my blogging assignments some of the reacting-responding-connecting-evaluating skills I strive for in the classroom. Dilemma alert.
It may seem like a bit of a chore to the students at times. Oh well. What isn't?
I will link all their blogs on my English 10 homework blog so they will be able to easily access and read each other's writing.
Some of the classroom activities will involve actively commenting on each other's work, whether it's through the use of sentence starters or other guidelines to spur appropriate commenting.
Their culminating activity will involve gathering and compiling their writing into a final product of some sort, along the lines of a portfolio to showcase their work.
The bottom line is that this venture is made with the future in mind. There's an opportunity to experiment and implement, which means the next time I do it I'm that much more familiar and comfortable with the pitfalls and benefits.

Here's where the dilemma returns. Practically speaking, I need to spend class time teaching students the use of these valuable digital tools. I know that, ideally, these kinds of digital conversations and connections should occur more often out of the classroom than inside. After all, I know that the underlying purpose of all these technologies is to break down the classroom walls and provide our students with richer, extended opportunities to share ideas, beyond just what we offer between the bells of a school day. That's where I want to be, and that's where I hope I'm going.

It's either one of those delightful little ironies of life, or something a bit more sinister and foreboding. I wonder what Ray Bradbury would think?

photo credit: Frozen Fire / Fuego Congelado by Don_Gato on Flickr

The teacher workshop: reflections and FAQ

2007-05-05T07:06:00.000-04:00

If there's nothing else I've discovered this year during my web 2.0 journey it's that we, as teachers, have to be just as willing to learn as we expect our students to be. How can we promote 21st Century learning if we don't model it? What I've seemed to discover is that there's limitless possibilities on how these digital tools can be used. We need to experiment and implement.

Like most things in education, it needs to be done deliberately. My recent professional development venture went over well. I spent about an hour with 20 or so teachers; first we viewed Karl Fisch's Did You Know video and then discussed some possibilities for student writing using web 2.0 tools. At first, the conversation in the room was a little defensive and a tad negative. During and after the video, there was the typical teacher fear factor of "Oh no, more scare tactics about how things are changing so fast" and even a few "Oh my gosh, I'm so far behind when it comes to computers." Both I expected. However, what surprised me was that many teachers thought the video had a nationalistic bent, as if its purpose was to lament America's fall from premier position in the world, and how we need to regain it in the face of the surging populations of China and India. Some of my students made similar comments when I showed it to them.

The mood began to change when they saw my homework blog, where my sophomores had posted responses to Fisch's video. Using the SMARTBoard, I scrolled down through the student responses in the comments section (maybe some teachers were surprised to see so much writing) and read the teachers what Fisch had posted to my students in response. It was a powerful moment. Many teachers caught a glimpse of some of the possibilities out there.

That's when the workshop got more interesting and the teachers more enthused. I focused on my homework blog, where my sophomores were in the midst of posting comments about A Midsummer Night's Dream. I know it's not an ideal use of the blogging technology, but as I've come to realize it is a great entry point for newbie teachers. So I showed them what the students were writing. It prompted an interesting discussion on technology and student writing, and more important it got me thinking about how this might play out, or the best way to handle it in a 21st Century classroom.

After some initial discussion on the logistics, some interesting conversation emerged during the workshop. It went something like this:

What about grammatical and spelling mistakes? The kids still make them, just like they do on old fashioned paper. However, I haven't seen too much "text-speak" in their writing, using u for you and other common abbreviations. The reality is that the students know everyone is reading (theoretically). Just like any student writing, there are endless possibilities for mini-lessons. What's great is that the student writing is easy to access for use in a future lesson, whether it's cutting and pasting it into another form or simply sending the students back to the postings with a task that requires them to re-read, revise or re-think what they or their classmates wrote.
What about commenting on student work? As far as I know, there's not a way to do it like we are used to the old-fashioned way, the way many teachers envision it: taking out the red pen. Maybe that's a good thing. Maybe it will open some of the teachers up to looking at the student's writing more holistically at first, instead of instinctively tracking down errors. Maybe it will encourage students to write more, eliminating the fear that whatever they do will just come back marked up and looking like Sonny Corleone at a Long Island tollbooth.
But how can we as teachers provide constructive feedback so they can learn and improve? I agree that having students post comments on a blog limits what the teacher can do when you compare it to traditional in-class essay writing. For me, it has meant I've looked at the comment writing as more of a place to "deposit" homework. It is by no means the only place students write. In fact, it has forced me to constantly rethink what I ask the students to do so that they are reinforced that what they write is not simply being checked off and ignored. I take their ideas and incorporate them into class discussions. I've projected their words onto the SMARTBoard as part of class lessons. From a teacher's perspective, I think I've done a better job at that most basic of pedagogical requirements: making learning relevant to the students and connecting new knowledge to prior knowledge. There's limitless possibilities in how the technology is useful in this area. Konrad Glogowski, for example, offers an innovative way to "comment on" and assess his students' work on their blogs. What he describes is more like conversations with the student writers as a way to encourage their growth. Isn't that where we should be striving as teachers?
Aren't the questions supposed to be asked in bold face? Sorry. I just got carried away.
How do students revise their writing? They can't change their comments. However, there's nothing says they can't take their comments and use them as part of another, longer, more formal writing assignment. This is where the limit of using the comment section lies. And this is where more discussion and experimentation needs to take place in the classroom. Discussions about providing students the means in the class to set up their own blog, link to one another, post regularly as part of class. Use the comment section to respond directly to a student's writing. This might address some of the feedback issues raised in an earlier post. Again, there's limitless possibilities on how to move in this direction.
But how do we tackle the larger issue of using blogging to improve student writing? That's the big question. And that's where many edubloggers spent a lot of time discussing and exploring. It takes time. It takes initiative. Ideally, it should not be done in isolation.
So what's next? That's an important question. Ideally, I'd like to get my students set up with their own blogs. With individual student blogs, some of the questions regarding individual teacher feedback and collaboration can be addressed. It's not easy and it requires some planning ahead thinking. We as teachers need to be experts (of sorts) using this technology or else we run the risk that what we do in the classroom will be nothing more than playing around with cool stuff. Ms. Sigman and Clay Burrell have recently address this issue. (Thank you Clay, for directing me to Ms. Sigman's new blog). In a recent post, Ms. Sigman says "In other words we can teach in a very techno-rich environment, but unless we put the tools in their [the students'] hands and teach them not only how to use them but how to learn the skills themselves what we teach in class will be irrelevant to their lives." I agree. It can't be in isolation and the purpose of blogging, or using wikis, or any other web 2.0 application can't simply be to just use it. Otherwise, we run the risk of making the use of some of these powerful applications seem like nothing more than things that are used only in a classroom, like writing a five-paragraph essay. The skills behind them have to extend beyond the classroom. As with anything in education, that growth and that learning starts with the teachers. It's no secret that we have to be willing to grow and learn along with our students. Here's where I think I'm echoing the general sentiment of what I've been reading these last several months. Patrick Higgins, in discussing virtual schools, says it quite succinctly but right on the nose: "Teaching will be different, and this will happen very soon. Teaching will require that we are risk-takers, savvy, and cavalier. Teaching will be different, or it will be irrelevant."

We need to let that motivate us, not scare us.

A full day and I need some help

2007-04-25T21:16:00.000-04:00

Tomorrow promises to be a full day of heavy thinking and not because I'm getting in a stack of papers. As mentioned earlier, I'm taking on that hour-long workshop after school to introduce some colleagues to the potential of web 2.0. I'm ok there.

However, I'm also scheduled to participate in a release day with two other teachers to begin putting the finishing touches on our school's honor's option for our heterogeneously-grouped 10th grade classes. We've already laid out the skeleton (dates, general overview, some specific content areas) on a wiki I set up in the fall. Now it's down to the details so it can implemented equally by the five sophomore English teachers (me included!). Basically we need to illustrate on Thursday what this thing will look like in the classroom. That's where the call for help comes in.

Philosophically, I believe that offering an honors option will best serve all our students in the non-tracked classes. Too often I think we have neglected the higher achieving students in these classes, typically because they stand out among their peers. We need to do more to challenge them, just as if they were in an honors course. Forget the growing pressure from parents and colleges to pad transcripts with AP and honors courses, I'm talking about pedagogically-sound instruction that reaches as many students as possible. However, just what an honors curriculum should look like is a matter of debate. Can a student receive rigorous instruction and challenging assignments in a class that also contains some lower achieving students? Do the socializing benefits of heterogeneity outweigh the inequity that can arise in such settings? Technology must be part of the equation, but exactly how?

Right now, it's an experiment in planning stages. I have been unable to find too many examples of schools who offer a similar challenge. The details we work out tomorrow, putting the policies and procedures in place for next year, are going to help determine just how successful this can be. We need to be ready for the difficulties that will arise, and be careful not to overtax the teachers in the course to the detriment of other students. It's a vexing challenge. But one I am willing to undertake.

That being said, I'd love to hear from some others in the edublogosphere about this issue and move this discussion beyond my building. The outline for English 10 is all spelled out here for anyone (hint, hint) to peruse. Suggestions for going forward? Thoughts on our approach? ...

Nailing down the professional day

2007-04-25T16:10:00.000-04:00

This week is the one-hour workshop I volunteered way back when to present to my department. Now it seems like I have to move beyond the "here are some things I can do" stage to the "here's what I am going to do."

First, I have lots of good feedback on my original intentions, which Brian suggested may be too much to undertake in one hour. Point well taken. Essentially, I want the teachers in the department who are still unaware of the possibilities of web 2.0 tools to glimpse what is possible without being too overwhelmed. It has to be practical for the classroom, without being forced down anyone's throats. If the teachers leave Thursday's session wanting to experiment more, than I've achieved my objective.

Another thing came up as well when I posted Karl Fisch's Did You Know? video to my students and asked for their reactions. I, too, plan to show the video to the teachers to kick off a discussion of what we as educators are facing in the future. Then, I want to hand out some excerpts of what my students said in response to my posting on the English 10 blog. Two birds with one stone: modeling one possible classroom use of a blog and presenting valuable content to the participants. As one of my students wrote "The only thing is that as of right now, it seems as though people are being taught how to use the technology that we have, but the problem is that the technology keeps on getting even more improved so people have to keep on learning more and new things about new developments in technology. The only thing that I believe that we can do is just stay on top of what is going on in the world with the technology being used and fully understand and be capable of using it when we have to use it."

"...stay on top of what's going on in the world ... and be capable of using it when we have to use it..." He's absolutely right because there will be times when we have to use it, and if now's not the time, I don't know when it will be. For English teachers, playing around with a blog is the most accessible entry point into the read/write web. I can show a few good examples of classroom blogs to show different ways they are used. The more technical stuff, the pedagogy behind blogging, can come later when teachers have a better sense of exactly what a blog is.

I think that will be enough.

However, I'll keep on deck a Google Earth Lit trip file for Night, which shows Elie Wiesel's journey into the Holocaust. It's a great visual and - just as important - presents another easy entry point into the classroom.

I'll keep you posted.

I have had a most rare vision

2007-04-23T19:01:00.000-04:00

Near the end of A Midsummer Night's Dream, the brilliantly foolish Nick Bottom awakes and finds himself all alone in the woods. Still in the midst of a dream, he calls out for his mates and hears no response. Then it hits him. Something strange and unusual has happened; he has had a "most rare vision."

That's where we were in class today in: "Bottom's Dream."

Most of the period we looked at Bottom's delightfully bumbling soliloquy, another of Shakespeare's little gems tucked away at the end of Act IV, scene 1. In past years, I've spent little time looking at these lines and, instead, glossed over them, maybe mentioning the reference to I Corinthians 2:9 that Bottom screws up so wonderfully. However, today, when the kids walked into F14, they were assigned a bit of updating. Put Bottom's speech into language they could better understand. (I never use the word translate when discussing Shakespeare because it is, of course, still English; it would only need translating to say French or Sanskrit). Since Bottom is having a tough time coming up with the right words, maybe the students could relate. It turned into a nice, simple lesson.

I think every now and then I have to be reminded to slow down, spend some time on shorter pieces of text. Look closely at the writing. In this case, it's a master writer presenting a purposely garbled rendering of his ideas. It takes a little time to muddle through and appreciate. This isn't Shakespeare's crowning moment in the play, like some of the longer poetic speeches by Titania or Oberon. It's worth the time we spent on it today, though. With a deeper understanding of Bottom's take, we can better appreciate Theseus's more rational explanation at the opening of Act V. Once we get that out of the way, we can sit back and enjoy the play-within-a-play that Bottom and his mates perform for Theseus.

Just as important, the assignment allowed the students to get beyond Bottom's initial confusion, which I think is easily understood by any one who's ever woken from a powerful dream. The students wrote in their own words how Bottom wants his buddy Peter Quince to write a ballad of this dream, otherwise no one will believe it. One student said it the best during our discussion when she said that something like Bottom's adventures with fairy queen Titania is so unbelievable that the only way for it to make sense to us (dare I say "mortals"?) is if it is put forth as fiction or literature.

Absolutely. Even Bottom knows that.

Secrets of success meme

2007-04-20T22:38:00.000-04:00

A great thing about blogging and using other web 2.0 technology is the opportunity it offers to connect with people beyond my typical orbit. It happened again this week; Patrick tagged me to participate in my first meme. As a result, I also discovered that he and I have two more things in common: we both attended Syracuse University and have both been tagged for the first time. Anyway, the meme (which as far as I can tell, originated here) is:

"List the top 5 to 10 things that you do almost every day that help you to be
successful. They can be anything at all, but they have to be things that you do
at least 4 or 5 times every week. Anything less than that may be a hobby that
helps you out, but we are after the real day in and day out habits that help you
to be successful."

This is no easy task, and although I am delighted to be included, I still wonder who is to say that I even qualify as a success. And reflecting on what I've consciously done to make that so-called success happen poses even more of a challenge. Where to begin to look for signs of success? Case in point: when I began blogging here, I had the intention of using it as a way to explore reflections and thoughts on teaching with a focus on Literature Circles and like teaching methods. In some ways, I think I may have envisioned my undertaking much like the reflective journals I kept during my teacher prep program. Of course it has become something else entirely. But a success, or more broadly does it make me a successful teacher? Through blogging, I've learned quite a bit about teaching and the use of technology, which possibly could become part of a success equation. However, blogging is only a small part of my life. How about what I do in the classroom? Is that a success? Again, that's not an entire picture of me.

As I thought more about it, it struck me: why do I have to equate success with specific actions or tasks completed, like blogging or teaching? If I rely on such a performance-based criteria, then do I logically have to start thinking about whether there will be a time when I achieve a certain level proficiency that I can retire or be elected to some kind of hall of fame? That doesn't quite work. Looking at success in that vein, gives it more of a competitive flavor, or one that is measured by someone else's yardstick. This is what Patrick seems to be saying when wrote: "External definitions of success place such undue stress on us, but are often what derail us as we move through life."

So I haven't blogged in a while. I also haven't organized my classes in Literature Circle groups lately either. I value both those actions, but I also do not mean to imply that they are somehow the most important or telling criteria for which to judge overall success. I'm not exactly sure if there is a strictly defined set of criteria for success. Instead, this meme gave me an opportunity to simply reflect on what it is I do and how it is that I conduct my life. On some of my things listed there is a blurred line between habits and state of mind, but I think both are important to consider. So without any further rambling, the things I do (in no particular order) on a regular basis are:

make time for what I enjoy to do
think about how my actions, reactions, even impressions given out, are viewed by other people
ask questions of and talk to my colleagues about what they do
use my lunch break to laugh about nothing in particular with people who's company I enjoy
consciously think about how my students see their world, or at least the tiny part of their world of which I'm a part
get up early and have a cup of coffee and a relaxing few moments before starting my day (maybe this is more of a routine, but it is an important part of my day)
spend time to consider the "big picture" and how what I do and what I am asked to do is part of that
sit down for dinner with my family and not start eating until everyone (there's four of us) is at the table

Now that I've shared, I guess I need to tag some other fellow bloggers. Here goes...
Brian Grenier (who has been generous with advice and input on issues with which I'm grappling)
Nancy McKeand
Stephen Lazar
Tamara Eden

The Slowskis

2007-04-19T13:17:00.000-04:00

Feeling a little bit slow and behind lately, which got me thinking...

One of my favorite commericals are those Comcast spots featuring the Slowskis, a pair of turtles struggling to survive in today's super fast world. Some of the spots are pretty funny. Sometimes I know just how those two turtles feel.

[By the way, I have no connection to Comcast except I subscribe to their cable channels and pay too much a month for it. In fact, I use DSL.]

Spring cleaning

2007-04-08T20:22:00.000-04:00

Looks like I can't avoid it. I need to do some spring cleaning...

This week is April vacation. There are no papers to grade - they come in the Friday we get back. I need to plan some of the upcoming lessons, but don't expect that to take too much time. Three weeks away is the mini-workshop I'm planning for the department. Still plenty of time. More on that later.

Looks like I have a perfect opportunity to get my digital house in order. Several months ago I began my blogging experiment. I call it an experiment because it was undertaken with a specific purpose in mind: to expand my knowledge and learning about web 2.0 teaching and productivity tools. At this point, I consider it a success.

However, in that time, as I've come across dozens of nifty tools, I've also found that the resources connected to my learning are scattered to the winds. Much like a typical high school curriculum, little logic or reason binds these valuable ideas together in any meaningful way.

Let me see, first there's that wiki I set up which has a sizeable collection of resources, links, and information, including a few scattered recollections of what I've taught this year. Some of what's there is merely experimental, like incorporating a live feed into the page. Other stuff is under some broad headings. Despite its current random appearance, I'm thinking this may be the best place for a central clearinghouse, only because it provides the most potential for an organized structure. That being said, I need to rethink it's focus so the organization comes a little simpler.

Next, is my Google notebook with a smattering of interesting tidbits I've picked up along the way. Probably best if I simply go through it and move anything valuable over to the wiki. I have my del.icio.us account to keep track of interesting, worthwile sites I come across. Maybe I should incorporate an RSS feed of my del.icio.us findings right into the wiki? This is probably the easiest fix. And I have to remember, I began experimenting with Google notebook with an eye on requiring it as part of a yet-to-be-thought-up future research project for my students.

Ok, then there's my bloglines account. I love trolling through my blogrolls on a regular basis, but what has happened is I've clipped some of the feeds I've found carried meaningful entries worth referring back to in the future. They are in my clippings file which I haven't completely figured out the best use for. I've also marked some entries as "keep new." Now they sit in my blogroll, available whenever I skim the latest feeds. It looks like, they are needed now. Maybe I'll spend the time coming up with a summary of important ideas, and then categorize them on the wiki with links back to the original posts?

Well, that's a start. It just seems kind of overwhelming. Worthwhile, but overwhelming.

I didn't know if I knew...

2007-04-07T19:22:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, my dad and I were chatting on the phone and he asked me if I had checked my e-mail. I hadn't, but called it up while we talked. It seems he had sent me an e-mail with an interesting link. He often sends me e-mails, usually jokes or links to the latest news from my hometown, but yesterday's e-mail contained a video he had received from a friend, and he was passing it along to about a dozen of his regular e-mail cohorts. It took about 10 seconds to log in and call it up while we talked. This was no joke, he said, but something he thought I'd find quite interesting.

It was Karl Fisch's Did You Know? video.

The fact that it came from my dad, who just turned 70 and retired as a teacher in 1999, gave the video a different kind of impact. My dad was, in effect, asking me: Did I know? How great is that? Karl has blogged about the video and how it has become viral. This was a perfect example of that. And thanks to Karl's ubiquitous video, my dad and I had a nice conversation about the changing world we live in, one in which it is still possible to be shocked and surprised about where technology has taken us. [As an aside, the video was linked here, a place I am unfamiliar with.]

I told my dad that I had seen the video before, and I even gave him the background on how it came about, which is something I only know because I started regularly reading The Fischbowl along with about four dozen other edublogs in the last three months. He was interested.

During our talk, I also told him about my most recent posting on the English 10 homework blog, where I asked my students to view the video and reflect on it. So I sent him the link to that post and asked him to read what my 10th graders thought when I asked them, Did you know? I could feel myself getting excited as I recounted the story of the video and explained how I had begun experimenting and implementing many different web 2.0 tools. So he read their thoughts and sent me back an e-mail commenting on the perceptive insights he encountered. The only thing that would have made this flat world tale more tidy, would have been if he posted his comments on the blog, triggering a conversation with one of my students. Still, the entire episode is energizing and another example of the many different sides our flat world can have.

On a personal side, my first year of teaching started the September after he retired. Like me, he too switched careers and took up teaching around age 30. He's retained a strong interest in my career, but yesterday's exchange was the first time he and I have shared such a solid connection related to actually hands-on teaching. Chalk it up to another positive from our ever-growing technology.

I thought I knew before, but now I guess I know even better.

Watching my students think this all through

2007-04-05T19:38:00.000-04:00

Over at the English 10 homework blog, I posted Karl Fisch's Did you know? video. It was a break from the regular posts relating to A Midsummer Night's Dream. Here's what I asked the students:

After viewing this video, consider this: Web technology is transforming how we communicate, and it is opening up countless opportunities for the collaboration, discussion, and sharing of ideas... the potential is almost limitless. Such social networking has powerful potential and will be a major part of the world that you will be living and working in. We need to be ready to survive and thrive in that world. How can educators, like me, better prepare you for such a future? What kinds of skills will you need to be successful in a rapidly changing world like this?

Here's a sampling of what I got - and am still getting:

"It doesn't take skill to press a button to park your car. In my opinion, thats how everything will be in the future;You press a button, and it works.I think we should take environmental classes for the future. We should learn how to save fuel, prevent pollution, and save energy. That is how we can protect and advance our future. That is our best preparation."

"Sometimes it takes a video like this one to clearly put things into perspective, and realize there are billions of people out there who are more advanced than we are. I think that the best thing educators can do is encourage people to open their eyes, and motivate tomorrow’s leaders to want to make a difference. And motivate people to want to learn, and be more tolerant of other cultures."

"Although I think the world is changing so fast that it may be difficult to keep up, I also think that things such as doing blog postings, like these, help for us to learn how to communicate with others, and learn from others without actually seeing and talking to them. It is important for us to learn how to learn without someone saying and feeding us information."

"No one really knows what the new technologies are going to be in the future, I think we are just going that have to wait and see, and then learn about them when the time comes. I feel that maybe if technology gets more advance then people are going to get lazy, but also there may be people that can learn from it and get smarter, because that is what it should be used for."

"How can you teach kids about something that hasn’t happened yet or hasn't even been created yet? Technology has been developing fast but some things are self-learnable. Like Ipods and cell phones, we never had to have a class in school to learn how to use them."

I'm not really sure what I expected from student responses. But one thing that struck me is the nonchalance at which they approached the ever changing world. Should they be more concerned about what those changes will mean 10, 20 years from now? Or maybe they're living in a world so conditioned to continual change, one in which during their short lives they've already witnessed what to them are significant shifts. They can probably remember when not everyone had a cell phone or an Ipod. To me, a digital immigrant, I'm overwhelmed at the numbers that say China has more honors students than we have students. These new digital tools are exciting, especially for someone who was a junior in high school the year the computer mouse was first introduced. While I want to embrace them and look for ways to change what I've been doing, the students are possibly in a better place. They don't have as many comfortable habits to break. Maybe I should have asked the question differently, turned it back on the students. Instead of what we educators can do to get you ready, how about what are you, the student, going to do to be ready?

Are they ready? Am I ready?

Good news: I've been given the chance to experiment

2007-04-05T18:23:00.000-04:00

Some good news across my e-mail inbox this afternoon. Branford High School is one of 13 districts in the state chosen for a computer assisted writing and testing grant. It was also announced here.

Details are still coming in, but the focus revolves around piloting online writing evaluation and feedback software. I helped write Branford's grant application, which means I should have at my disposal - hopefully soon - a set of classroom laptops, a laptop cart, and funding access to other related technological goodies. It's truly a special opportunity for my students, and me, to further experiment with and implement in the classroom the use of numerous web 2.0 tools.

Stay tuned.

Stepping out, putting my money where my blog is

2007-04-04T16:44:00.000-04:00

Ok. So I finally, after weeks of agonizing and reflecting, I took the step. For five months, I've used this forum to write about my discovery of web 2.0 technologies, about what vast potential exists, and about what I can and should be doing next. Well, next is now.

Today I walked into the principal's office and volunteered to present a one-hour after school presentation to the English department on some of these digital tools available to us. Our contract requires we participate in 10 hours of after school professional development, and we were scheduled for round four of our year-long initiative to continually review varied in-class literacy strategies. We've been down that road before and some of my colleagues were growing leery.

The workshop is not for another two weeks, which includes a week of April vacation, but I have begun to brew up some ideas about how to go about it. For months I've been making note of the excellent resources popping up all over the place. Patrick Higgins has a great web 2.0 resource wiki. Brian at Bump on the Blog likewise has a great resource wiki and it seems has even found some success inspiring novice teachers to "implement and experiment." That's encouraging.

I'm going to start pretty basic. For one thing, I don't want to overwhelm anyone in the short hour I have. And second, I'd like this session to lead to further professional development, rather than be an eye-rolling session that shouts out the latest and greatest tech toys. My goal has always been that we teachers need to use these tools to enhance professional growth and to better focus our instruction in a manner that best helps our students learn. One of my biggest fears is that teachers will immediately ask the question: when am I supposed to find time to do this, between grading papers, planning units, dealing with parents, etc...? There's never enough time. This isn't about time for something new, it's about something new to help us better use our time.

With that being said, I have a rough agenda sketched out for the afternoon, but am open to any feedback:

Show Karl Fisch's (now viral) video "What if...?"
Discussion/introduction to 21st Century skills and demands
Comparison of web 1.0 to web 2.0
Demonstrate Google Earth and Sketchup - use Globe Theatre model and London map as example
What is a blog? - introduction to blogger
How can blogs be used in the classroom? - show examples...
What's next?

Am I on the right track? I tend to think many of the teachers who will attend the session have little experience incorporating digital tools into the classroom beyond using e-mail. I chose Google Earth and Sketchup up because it seems to be an accessible entry point to the true power of the Internet. The same for blogger. On the one hand it looks so elementary, but on the other hand it will mostly be new information to many of them.

What is the best entry point for teachers like that? Should I take another tact? Like maybe get everyone in front of a computer and sign them up for a blogger account? It comes back again to that nagging fear: will I somehow turn teachers off from implementing and experimenting with what I truly believe are vital educational tools? I hope not.

photo credit: First Step by roujo on Flickr

This just in: New 'trend' detected in classrooms

2007-04-03T19:52:00.000-04:00

My principal just sent around an interesting article from the Sacramento Bee (free registration required to read) about a teacher, Dylan Holcomb, who is using, among other tools, Google Earth and blogs to enhance his students' learning in English class. It is worth reading, and it strikes me as one of the few news pieces which portrays these web 2.0 tools in a positive, innovative light, rather than as a warning siren of a murky online community, ripe with lurking predators.

I'm wondering, though, is there a bit of a disconnect between the innovators like Dylan and those whose charge it is to lead our school districts into the 21st Century? The article quotes one superintendent who, with a wonderful sense of ironic understatement, categorically declares: "There is definitely a trend in the educational community at large of using the Internet in the classroom." Yes. That's one way to say it. However, is that really what we're talking about here? If we want Boards of Education to fund our efforts in the classroom, we have to spread the word that 21st Century skills means more than just installing a digital projector in every classroom. Otherwise, it just becomes a different way to show a movie.

The bottom line is that the only way for such changes to become truly embedded in the educational system is for teachers, like Dylan, to take on leadership roles. The article states that he taught a packed workshop for his district's teachers, showing them digital tools, including everything "from sites to help generate surveys to free podcasts by professors at UC Berkeley and Massachusetts Institute of Technology." Numerous examples abound about teachers leading the change, including most recently by Dana, who presented to her faculty how to incorporate the use of wikis in the classroom.

I'd like to tell you all about how I, too, have been a guiding force at my school, spreading the message of the web 2.0 shift to the masses. I'd like to. I just can't. And I can't because I still haven't completely grown comfortable fully utilizing these tools in my classroom. Maybe I'm slower or less confident than some other teachers, or maybe I fear too much the overwhelmed effect too many teachers get from sitting in on professional development about the latest "new" thing. The most I can talk about are several meaningful discussions with a handful of other teachers who feel the same way I do, and who have begun to experiment with what I consider the first steps - blogs and wikis.

I'd like to start to do more. I'd like to take the lead of educators like Dylan and Dana (not to mention the rest of the all-stars in my Bloglines blogroll) and share this potential for meaningful change. Stay tuned.

Lover's advice and baby step blogging

2007-03-31T18:03:00.000-04:00

Just got finished reading some of the comments on the English 10 blog, where we are currently sharing some ideas about Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. In this latest assignment, the students wrote advice letters to one of the four lovers in the play - Lysander, Hermia, Helena, or Demetrius. They wrote some great stuff. I can't imagine that if they had written these assignments on paper and handed them in, they'd be as thoughtful or would they have made some of the deep personal connections to the characters that I enjoyed reading on the blog. It makes a difference that they know their classmates are reading each other. The assignment does not rise to the level of a formal essay, so posting them as comments on a blog are perfect. For now.

My next professional step is to begin planning for more embedded and regular blogging in my classroom. The comments on my blog posting are fine, but as I'm coming to discover, another effective way to improve student writing is through the use of regular blogging. I plan to try. My bloglines roll is full of worthy edubloggers to emulate and continue learning from.

Meanwhile, I'm still inching my students along this journey with me. Last week, Bill at Shakespeare Teacher noticed our work. And it got me thinking, what a great opportunity to remind my students about the potential of these web 2.0 tools that we have only just begun to use. These are baby steps, based on what I see other educators doing, but necessary ones. As part of any web 2.0 curriculum, there should be emphasis that what we write and post online can be read - in fact it is being read - by people all over the world. My students this year have only just begun discovering this. Bill's post is a nice reminder of how, even as a 10th grade high school English class, our voices can be heard beyond F14.

I see their knavery: starting A Midsummer Night's Dream...

2007-03-19T20:24:00.000-04:00

So we began our unit on A Midsummer Night's Dream. I decided, this year, to begin by giving the students a summary of the first half of the play - in my words - as their first taste of the thing. They read it and I told them that they probably would be confused, especially seeing several of those names poached from Greek mythology - Theseus, Hippolyta, Demetrius, Hermia, Lysander, even Helena. In past years, I've given them this summary and asked them to write a paper in which they came up with their own creative ending to the complicated love mess. That usually produced some fun writing. As I decided earlier, I'm going to ask students to post their endings as comments on the class blog.

Today, instead, was about introducing the play. This means undertaking what I call advance ops: jotting down notes on background, engaging in general discussion about the play and Shakespeare (the kids get a kick out of the fact that I visited Stratford-upon-Avon during my honeymoon. One memorable comment from the front row: "Wow, I'm surprised your wife still wanted to marry you." But it was said with a smile), and a light walk through of the plot and characters. As expected, the strongest responses from the students came when we went over Nick Bottom, who gets saddled with the head of an ass. For sophomores, just hearing that word is enough to draw some laughter. And why not? It's funny, and I think Shakespeare would agree. It led to quite a lively and energetic discussion, a prelude to what I hope is a lively and energetic experience with the play.

To help frame my instruction, I gave the students the three essential questions of the unit:

How do we act when we are in love? Why?
Which emotions “from the heart” are the strongest? Which reveal our true selves?
How effectively does Shakespeare use humor to make his ideas known about human behavior?

What surprised me about our discussion was the idea about emotions "from the heart." To me, that is one of the most important concepts about Midsummer. Shakespeare creates these characters - especially the lovers - and puts them in situations in which their emotions are exposed. They fluctuate between love, hate, and jealousy with relative ease. Albeit they are under the influence of a magic spell, we can still relate to their inconstancy. This can be a key entry point for teenagers, who live in a world of shifting and mysterious emotions.

For the next lesson, I plan to start with the Act I, scene ii, when the mechanicals first meet to plan their rehearsals. I got this idea from the excellent resource book Shakespeare Set Free, which apparently is useful not just for Midsummer. Todd is using it for Macbeth. Anyway, in an essay in the book, Michael Tolaydo suggests starting a Shakespeare play in the classroom with a large group scene, especially one that contains language more approachable to the students. "This approach," Tolaydo writes in "Three-Dimensional Shakespeare," "generates and puts into play the necessary tools and skills to examine those more difficult and complex portions of the play, while it supplies students with self-esteem and confidence in their own ideas and opinions." (28) I've never taught it this way, but I am eager to try it out. This scene fits the bill Tolaydo describes, and to me is one of the most humorous scenes in the entire play. Bottom's insistence on playing all the parts and his repeated malapropisms set the stage for what's coming, his impending ass-head and the incompetence of the play performance at the end. I hope I can keep the kids with me that long.

photo credit: Bottom with the Faires in a costume sketch from Charles Kean's scrapbook for a production of A Midsummer Night's Dream. Shelfmark ART Vol. d48. from the Folger Shakespeare Library.

Spreading the word, looking for suggestions

2007-03-14T22:03:00.001-04:00

Ok, here I go again...

It seems I'm not the only one grappling with how to start taking some of those next steps and spread the word about the best uses of these web 2.0 tools we all blog about. Dan, a math teacher in California, volunteered himself to research and suggest an educational application to bring to his district that will be easy to use for teachers of all digital proficiency abilities and interest levels. It seems some of those in his department suggested the school invest in some PD time on how to update HTML files and upload them to the school server. To do this, they also suggested buying more server space and some publishing software. That's when Dan rightly stepped in. And now he's taking a day off to put together some web 2.0 solutions. He's looking for some input. The best I could do was suggest he consider some of the ideas about blogging that have been bandied about recently. Based on what I've read of his blog in the last several months, Dan will surely come up with something that is both well thought out AND well-written. Check back to see.

Along a similar vein, Eric is in search of the killer EdApp, and he's gotten quite a bit of feedback from some people who know what they're doing. A lot more than I do, that's for sure. I also like the wiki resource that Patrick Higgins has put together for a workshop along these same lines. I'm glad guys like that are on the job.

All of this has kept me thinking about how these next steps are going to be taken. Finding that killer EdApp is a laudable goal, but I wonder if is reasonable to think there is just one. One of the defining characteristics of web 2.0 is the inter-connectivity between users, a dynamic consumption of information, and the remixing of data from different sources.

That seems to imply that even if there was a killer app, the very nature of our changing digital world is that the tasks and tools that it would provide could and should be reused and remixed as user needs change and evolve. Thus, today's killer app is tomorrows piece of the larger puzzle. I think that's how we need to approach our task of making such instructional tools more widespread in our classrooms. My immediate goal is to bring to F14 a more authentic writing model for my students, and it's looking more and more like it needs to start with some form of class wide blogging.

I'll get on that as soon as I get my Midsummer unit ready and under control.

Starting to think about where to begin with a batch of digitally challenged teachers

2007-03-13T21:22:00.000-04:00

I'm not exactly where this all started, but I've been hashing out the subtleties of using blogs and blogging in the classroom. There's been some good conversation about just what is the best use of blogs by students as part of a class. Clay has smartly drawn a fine distinction in the pedagogy of using blogs in class, separating them into two different types, for two different purposes. Others have pointed to earlier portfolio assessment models as a place to look for further ideas for refinement. Check out Clay's post and ensuing comments) Essentially, it comes down to what we, as teachers, believe will best serve our students. All this talk has prompted me to look back on my short journey of discovery this year. If we are going to ask - expect - demand - other teachers to embrace this new technology and use it to promote 21st century skills, where is the best place to start with a batch of digitally illiterate teachers? Or even those with basic digital skills who are still unaware of the full educational potential of web 2.0. I can't imagine that my path would be the most effective model in which to bring others along.

Let me step back in time a few months...

When school started in August, a fellow English teacher told me about the blog she's starting this year to post a daily record of class assignments and lesson plans, like a resource for herself and her students. It serves the purpose of providing her students a place to get the work they miss if they're absent, and serve as a repository of her lesson plans throughout the year. Cool, I thought. But I have my web page for that.

Then come October, a colleague of mine shows me a blog he set up for his AP Calculus class. On it, he had posted questions and asked students to respond. It was a model he found engaging and new, an assessment he said his students shared. I was familiar with blogs and understood the general idea of what they were, specifically what made them different from web pages, for example. What a great idea, I thought. I could do that, too.

I set up an account in Blogger and created a site for my English 10 class. On the blog, I posted a few open-ended questions related to our readings. I played around with the comments section, figuring out what was required to allow commenting, either from students our others. I spent some time talking to another colleague, a special education teacher who co-teaches one of my English 10 sections with me. I decided to try it out while reading The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man in the Moon Marigolds. I put up a prompt, brought the kids to the computer lab, paired them up, and showed them how to comment. That was the first assignment.

That was October and November. Meanwhile, I set up my own personal blog and began reading some others I came across. I discovered Bloglines and began compiling feeds. I discovered wikis and experimented with a few collaborative writing projects. I continued to blog about it as best I could. It's through the blogging where I've benefited from the knowledge of others farther along this path than me. I've listened to them hash out ideas, or present new uses for the emerging social networking technology.

Which brings me back to the original intent of this post. As we bring others along, where is the best place to start? What is the one or two most important web 2.0 tools or concepts a newbie should be taught? For example, there's no sense teaching someone how to set up a Bloglines account if they have little concept of what kinds of blogs or other feeds are available. The social bookmarking and networking tools are wonderful, but require a deeper understanding of the types of information and ideas out there.

Eric maintains an excellent wiki where he organizes his technology resources under the following categories: one-to-one; one-to-many; many-to-many. Blogs are under one-to-many. I like that categorization. Maybe the best way to spread the word is to use those categories, and start by showing other teachers the potential of one-to-many. I'd love to know how such efforts - these drops of change in otherwise stagnant pools - have gone in other schools, where the ripples of change have begun to spread.

To me, it makes the most sense to show a newbie how to set up a blog. And by extension, the easiest and simplest use of a blog is posting content-based prompts to which students respond. It's simple, straightforward, and most closely matches an instructional model that digitally illiterate teachers are familiar with. We, as teacher-leaders, must understand any distinctions between different types of student blogging. The potential I saw in blogging when I first asked students to post comments to my prompts was powerful. For the first time, they had the opportunity to read each other's ideas. Although it was not truly embedded in that form, it did provide me that glimpse of the power of web 2.0 that has led me here.

photo credit: Disperse by CentralJake on Flickr.

Props to the best web 2.0 tools for educators

2007-03-11T22:26:00.000-04:00

A few weeks back, Steve put out the word asking edublog folks to tell him what their three favorite free web 2.0 tools were. Here he posts the top 10, with del.icio.us leading the way.

Some random thoughts on the list...

My three favorites made it - Bloglines, Google (do I really need to link that?), and Wikispaces. (He actually lists wikispaces and pbwiki which are both great wiki tools.) In fact, I just finished reading my students' posts on the class wiki with Bloglines. It's simple. I set up an RSS feed to pick up all page changes. When I click on a new feed coming into my Bloglines feeds, I get the newest addition on the page in green and the deletions in red. Google reader does not provide the same type of feed.

Flickr came in at number three. So far I've uploaded only a handful of photos there. Only one I made public. Essentially, I've discovered that I'm not the greatest photographer, despite that class I took in high school in which we all used a twin lens reflex camera. Let me play around some more before I have enough confidence. Also, a little faux pas this week reminded me that I'm still learning the rules about photo sharing and the like. Also, check out the thread started with the fifth comment here. Oops.

Hand-wringing and other approaches toward professional growth

2007-03-10T23:15:00.000-05:00

Been reading Clay Burrell's regular thoughts about the evolving nature of blogs in schools. One interesting thread addresses teachers sucking blogs dry by using them for too much "homeworky" stuff, such as simply posting prompts online to replace traditional paper assignments. His original post garnered some interesting comments, including one from yours truly. He says,

"'Blogging is just another way to turn in homework.' That's the sentence that scares me. Because that's how non-blogging teachers, and perhaps those unfamiliar with literacy pedagogy--communication across the curriculum, writing to learn, authentic writing, and more--will probably use blogging in the classroom. And it will become drudgery. And the students (not learners here, because "teacher" can't let go of being "teacher," dominating, squelching, and dictating to students) will bang out the minimum for "blog homework," as in old days, and turn to something authentic. Like their MySpace."

What struck me is that I've spoken - or at least thought - that first sentence. That's had me wringing my hands for the last few days. In fact, my first introduction to blogging was using them in just the way that scares Clay. The kids seemed to like it, better than the "old" paper way of handing out assignments at least, and it provided me with a more dynamic way to keep track of and assess their thinking. I'm not going to use the term homework in this context because what I did was fundamentally different than the "traditional" homework model. The comments on the blog were richer, more open-ended than what I would have expected from the students if I had asked them to write a journal entry or respond to a question on a piece of notebook paper to hand in to me. The very nature of posting their thinking as comments allowed them to see each other's work, an unprecedented opportunity that I think benefited them and improved the level of instruction in class.

However, I understand that I was not fully maximizing the blog's potential. I am still preparing myself to move my students into that next step. It's where I am now, ready to make that jump, but not feeling all that prepared. What am I afraid of?

Clay, as usual, has been thinking through the issue and working out a way to help teachers avoid "ruining" blogging for students, and instead keep it as authentic writing by establishing a school-wide plan. Some of the suggestions: One student, one blog; only writing quality should be assessed;and homework assignments are a no-no. His pedagogically-grounded approach sounds like the multi-literate teacher described by Sheryl (via Vance Stevens), who sees "these technologies as a medium, a canvas, a portal used to connect, collaborate, empower, and a catalyst for deep meaningful change-- both in the profession as a whole and in teachers/students as individuals." Will Richardson spells it out in a similar manner, that if we teachers want to effectively teach reading and writing through blogging, then we must read and write online ourselves.

Well, there you have it. Maybe the hand-wringing comes from a personal enxiety about blogging. Finding time to post regularly. Finding a voice for what I do post. Both of those have been a struggle for me.

I applaud the lofty efforts of Clay, Will, and others in the edublogosphere who are working and thinking hard about the diverse web 2.0 technologies afforded to us. They know a lot more about this stuff than I do. In the last several months, I've listened and tried to learn. I will continue to do so.

If nothing else, I think I know what I need to do, which is a lot better than where I was even just four months ago. I need to continue to use blogging as part of my professional growth plan. I need to help spread the word to other teachers in the building. I need to continue to use these tools in my classroom. It's the only way my students - and I - will benefit.

High stakes testing, high standards, and my sophomores

2007-03-08T20:09:00.001-05:00

Today was Day 3 of our state standardized testing for sophomores. In Connecticut, we call it CAPT. Students wrote a persuasive letter, the second such one they had to write. The test consists of two non-fiction articles, from which the testees must pull information, examples, and quotes to build their case. On Wednesday, their task involved reading a short story and answering four questions based on it. [Disclaimer: I am not an offiical proctor, but I teach 10th graders. When they returned to my class after the tests, they told me the topics.]

Needless to say, it can be dreadful for them. Although I believe that what CAPT is assessing in our students is valid, I still can't get over the high-stakes, high-pressure testing environment it creates in our schools. But how can we get around that? If you're interested in Branford's scores, see the chart above or look closer at the data here.

Essentially, the reading and writing portions of test require students to use evidence to back up their positions, and to read critically for a variety of purposes, and blend their prior knowledge with new learning. That's all great stuff, and I'll be honest, it has helped guide the curriculum in a meaningful way here in Connecticut. Our school has created a series of graduation requirements linked to CAPT standards; for each requirement, a school wide rubric is used to assess student efforts. For English teachers, this includes writing for a variety of purposes, reading non-fiction, and understanding and appreciating literature. None of this is the perfect solution to the issues we have in education. But then again, what or who is perfect? Certainly not me.

Case in point: when the sophomores showed up in F14 this morning - fresh off 3+ hours of testing, all of it essay writing by the way - they were a tad antsy. I started handing out the thinking logs for the day's Literature Circle discussion, and there was a little uproar and groaning that they'd have to do work, and they hadn't done the homework reading for the day. My first reaction: a testy lecture about keeping up with work. That quieted them down. Then I stopped and looked around. And I told them they could have the time to catch up on their reading or to start brainstorming ideas for their papers. And you know what? I feel guilty for scolding them today, and I feel guilty for giving them a break.

Thankfully there's no CAPT again until Tuesday.

I'm ready to hang with that cool dude, Billy Shakes

2007-03-06T20:39:00.000-05:00

I've been enjoying reading about Dana Huff's unit on Romeo & Juliet, but I have to say that I much prefer the happier side of teen romance. That's why A Midsummer Night's Dream is probably my favorite piece of literature to teach. Like Dana, I've memorized many parts, and even play a game with the kids at the end of the unit, in which they read a random line and I guess who said it and in what act. There's something about the play, with it's overwhelmed lovers, clueless actors, and meddling fairies, that makes it, well, magical. It can also be pretty darn funny. And what I think I enjoy the most is when the students, too, appreciate the humor that Shakespeare so obviously intended. Karl Fisch got me thinking about if Shakespeare was one of our students today. Based on some of his choices in Midsummer, I imagine myself pulling him aside after class to discuss his latest antics:

"Now, Will, come on. You're a funny kid, but you can't keep handing in work like this. Don't keep trying to tell me that when you were writing about that Bottom with the head of an ass that you were actually referring to a donkey. Well, you're not fooling me, mister..."

With that in mind, I am eagerly preparing the unit to start in about two weeks. Before the kids can appreciate any of the different kinds of humor in the play, we face a major obstacle right off the bat: the Athenian lovers. Who loves whom? Shakespeare intended it to be muddled, and it is. His point seemed to be that whether it's Lysander or Demetrius or Helena or Hermia, all of us - humans that is, not just ancient Athenians - are pretty much the same when it comes to the power of love. For 10th graders trying to keep track of who Lysander loves as opposed to Demetrius can be downright confusing and typically frustrating.

One effective approach I've found is to provide the students the general plot of the play in a scaled down summary. I tell them the whole thing, from the lovers coming to Duke Theseus right up to the part in the play when Puck has accidentally mixed up all their affections for one another. And, oh yeah, he's put the head of an ass on Nick Bottom. I stop right there and turn the story over to the kids. Fix this whole mess, I tell them, and make sure it has a happy ending. It's a comedy, afterall.

There's a lot of confusion at first. So who does Helena love again? What's up with that Indian boy? That's ok. I'd rather have them struggle with who's who before they're faced with Shakespeare's archaic language - the "thees" and "therefores" that today's audiences have a difficult time getting past. The students' writing on this assignment is typically some of the most enjoyable I read all year. They seem to like the total creative control of such an assignment.

This year, as I continue my journey of discover, I am eager to put a web 2.0 spin on it. Maybe I could set up a wiki and assign the kids to collaborate on an ending with a student from a different class period. Maybe I could use a wiki or blog to create an ongoing story, with kids adding their twists to those posted by classmates.

Or you know what, maybe I don't have to make it any more complicated than it has to be. I'm still wrapping my brain around all this. So, instead of handing out the assignment, I'll post it on the blog. Kids will write their story and post it as a comment. Yeah, I know. That's not true web 2.0 application, but rather a different way to word process. However, it will allow them to read how their classmates tied up the loose ends of the story. That can't be a bad thing.

photo credit: Sleepy Hollow on Flickr

The challenge for our students is now ours

2007-03-02T16:20:00.000-05:00

One of the biggest challenges our high school is undertaking is developing an honors challenge option for our mixed-ability sophomore classes. In other words, we plan to retain our heterogenously grouped English 10 course but add an option for those students wishing to extend higher-level thinking and English skills. If the student successfully completes the option, they would earn an honors designation on his/her transcript.

I've blogged about it before. A draft of the department's proposal is currently being developed on a wikispace wiki. Essentially it will allow a student to independently earn an honors distinction - perfect for padding a transcript or boosting a grade point average. We plan to have guidelines and procedures in place to assist students taking on such a learning challenge. The only way to get the honors distinction is to earn it. For the student to earn it, not just for the parent to want it.

On a philosophical level, I wholeheartedly embrace such an idea. I teach English 10, and one of the most rewarding aspects of the sophomore program at Branford High School is the true broad spectrum of students that come into my class everyday. No levels. No remediation. No distinctions based on anything. Of course there are challenges inherent in that setup. You can imagine the range of writing and reading ability I see between students sitting in the same class. Differentiation is essential.

Put aside philosophy right now. Here's where the rub is. As head of the English department, I am spearheading efforts to develop and implement the honors challenge option so it is consistent across the board. How do we balance the needs to sufficiently challenge high-achieving students, while not demanding too much extra from the teachers in the class? There is fear that such a program will turn into a logistical nightmare for the teachers and lead to essentially another prep. How do we keep our expections clear, firm and simple? Can it be done? Should it be done. There are certainly plenty of teachers who feel true honors means a separate honors class.

Right now I don't have those answers, but I expect to be figuring it out over the next few months. And if anyone has any suggestions or can point me towards some resources, I'd be grateful.

Some snow, a stomach bug and lots of television

2007-02-28T20:54:00.000-05:00

February vacation was no fun. Spent most of the time with a stubborn little stomach bug that left me lethargic and unmotivated. That meant I watched too much TV and little else. A little Connecticut "snowstorm" extended vacation one day, which was nice.

But I was back in F14 this week, ready for another go at it.

Don't blog with students

2007-02-21T09:21:00.000-05:00

Just came across this post on blogging with students - as in don't blog with students. This has hit a chord with me as I've struggled to make sense of the countless Web 2.0 teaching tools available. The biggest challenged I've faced is sorting through everything I'm absorbing and deciding what could best be used in my classroom next week, or next month.

Maybe I was missing something. And Kimberly Moritz put it into a little clearer perspective for me. She says, "Blog for you, for your own learning. Read what everyone out there has to say about education, about students, about NCLB, about techie stuff, about learning. Worry about your own growth first. Look for ideas you can use in your classroom. Learn. When you learn and grow, your students benefit."

That sounds awfully close to what I've been mulling around in my head, but struggled to put into words. Thanks, Kimberly. The process of blogging, in this case reading John Pederson who blogged about Kimberly, has helped me clarify my own thinking.

Digressing from and considering wikis - again

2007-02-21T08:14:00.000-05:00

Craig Ullman's article on wikis in Educators' eZine is a good description and definition of what wikis are. However, that's not why you should read the article. It's his point that wikis represent one of our greatest educational values - individualism. At its heart, isn't that the most important skill we teach students in school? Being an individual? So how do we make that translate into skills students can bring to society?

As a digital tool, wikis provide everyone with equal power to write, edit, revise, even vandalize. It's this concept that's also made sites like Wikipedia a bane for educators. What are we supposed to do with this, now that our students have access to all this unreliable information? I've heard educators ask themselves and each other a variation of that question numerous times. I guess the answer is to teach them. It's no longer relevant to send our students off in search of a research paper and sit back and wait for them to come back with the usual suspect of sources. We, as teachers, need to be more involved in the process. How do we find information? What tools are at our disposal to sort through and filter what's out there? How do we determine what to use? What responsibility do I have as a reader/researcher? Those are tough questions, and for an industry (education) where many teachers are still just dealing with the fact that students can cut and paste from the internet to plagiarize an essay, this has to seem like an about face in what we've taught in the past. I guess it is.

Another good point Ullman makes is that wikis provide an opportunity to assess the whole class, rather than just the individual, a concept that many in education avoid - "In any case, the choice between assessing the individual or assessing the group does not have to be an either/or. We can, and should, look at both levels; we can, and should, think more about how we can leverage the knowledge and interests of each individual student to create a better result for the whole group." This might be where the answer to connecting individualism to the real world. I don't think it means holding each individual group member equally accountable for a group project product. However, the skill our students need to know is how to work in a team, collaborative setting, to create a final product.

There is value in group products in the classroom. However, we mustn't lose sight of the individual in all this. Again, it is no longer relevant to simply assign a group project with an all or nothing stake at the end. Finding ways to "leverage the knowledge and interests of each individual student" is a daunting task. It speaks to the heart of differentiating instruction, both in process and outcome. That means we still need to know our students, what their strengths are, how they learn, and what they are interested in. Web 2.0 tools aren't going to do that for us, but rather provide us better ways to do our job, or to allow for student creativity, or even to encourage previously marginalized students.

So there. Where have I ended up? Where I always seem to. There are no absolutes (except that one, I guess). Like everything we do in education, there is no panacea. Although we are in the middle of a shift, we can't ignore good teaching, and we need to be willing to embrace the technologies of our student's world, not just ours.

Still more interesting videos

2007-02-19T14:20:00.000-05:00

Karen Janowski of the UK has posted a video created by Kristin Hokanson and presented at a Pennsylvania Educational Technology Conference . It was inspired by Karl Fisch's Did You Know? video, which apparently has become viral. Karen is worth adding to your RSS feed if you haven't already. Earlier, she posted a humorous video that takes an amusing look at professional development a long time ago. It might even be worth showing those teachers who are resisting the use of computers, if for nothing else but to share a laugh with them.

Another one making the rounds is a parable that considers what would happen if the animals had a school. It comes compliments of Raisingsmallsouls.com, a parent's advocacy site.

So who uses these things besides us?

2007-02-15T20:32:00.000-05:00

Two kids were talking in my period 4 class today. One of the students had created his own wiki on wikispaces and was using the laptop to show two other members of his group his work: a wiki page for his band.
"Why not just put it on Myspace?" a female student asked him.
"I have one there, too" he said as he continued to scroll through his pages of pictures.
At this point, I was close enough to chime in and jumped at the chance to generate more enthusiasm for embracing these flat world tools, ignoring the fact that they were off task.
"The wiki can be a useful resource for your band, maybe not with all the visual elements of a Myspace, but it's great for sharing information and collaborating with others, especially if more than one person is adding ..." By this time I've exhausted the 15-year-old limit for syllables in a row from an adult, and I see her eyes losing interest.
"It's just kind of funny," she said. "I mean who else is doing this besides us?"

Who else is doing this besides us? What's she talking about? I know who else is doing it. Here is one of my new favorites: Mrs. Caldwell in Alabama who provides comments to students on their drafts with her wiki. What a great use of the tools.

But then again, I know this, but she doesn't. None of my students probably do. It got me thinking about how these tools - wikis especially, but also blogs - are being used in the real world, outside the classroom. An afternoon of mulling her comment triggered in me where I first glimpsed the potential for wikis and blogs in the classroom. It was a New York Times Magazine article from Dec. 3, 2006 (not freely available online, but archived her for subscribers) that described how if American intelligence agencies had effectively used such collaborative tools in 2001, we could have averted 9/11. Pretty heady stuff.

Then I came across this in InformationWeek on the use of wikis by corporations. The article makes the case for wikis as an effective project management tool in the business world. There is an interesting anecdote about how the LA Times put up a wiki soon after the Iraq War with an editorial on it. As a way to spur discussion of the war, the paper asked readers to revise the editorial as they saw fit. However, vandals flooded the page with so much profanity and pornography that the paper took it down in three days. The moral of the story? "Perhaps the Times expected too much; perhaps it misjudged the juvenile capacity of some Web users. But the real problem with the wikitorial was that the Times sent a wiki to do a blog's job.
Wikis are structurally capable of handling conversation, but it is not their forte; instead, wikis excel at collaboration. They are intended to maintain a series of unique documents as their content evolves and to provide an organic means of organizing that information."

Maybe that's where I am now. My frustrations about the wiki stem from its apparent inability to effectively extend the discussion beyond the classroom walls, which is something better handled by a blog. Although I certainly have seen the discussion move beyond the classroom, it has fallen a bit short of my - too lofty? - expectations. It may be time for me to shift a bit. I need to view this wiki as a tool for collaboration and organizing the information students are inputting. That will be where its greatest power will emerge. I have more work to do.

And finally, if I'm going to respond to my students who rightfully want to know who else is doing this, then I have to take advantage of its possibilities. Encourage and promote collaboration through my assignments and class expectations. It sounds so simple. Is it? Who else is doing this?

My latest poll results

2007-02-13T22:37:00.000-05:00

With my Literature Circles wiki project entering it's second week, I'm still not sure if all my students have fully embraced it like I have. Besides an occasional lull in homework rates, I now have some hard data to reinforce these impressions, courtesy of a customizable Polldaddy widget I just discovered.

Polldaddy let me create a simple multiple choice poll. I then embedded it on the front of the wiki page and asked: What are your thoughts about this wiki project?

First of all, only 27 votes were cast, although it's only been up for about two days. It's set to expire Feb. 16. Of those 27 votes, 14 registered a favorable impression of the wiki; 11 registered unfavorable. The rest were in some way undecided. Full and complete results can be seen here. What's a little more telling is that there are about 60 students taking part in this project. I guess it's still higher than most presidential elections.

As I reflect on this venture, I can't say I'm discouraged. I still think it is a valuable tool. Maybe I'm just not using it as effectively as I can. Like I tell the students, there is a learning curve to this. First we get used to posting information on it, then we experiment with the different levels of collaboration possible, and then we can use it as a steppingstone for furthering our own creativity and thinking. One step at a time. My job is to provide students the right tools, opportunity, and encouragement. Keep doing that and the rest should come, right?

How it can and how it should

2007-02-11T12:00:00.000-05:00

Too many things percolating right now. Too often it is easy to view what I am discovering about Web 2.0 and teaching through the perspective of "Hey, look at what you can do..." Instead, I believe we need to frame it more with the perspective of "Hey, here is what you should do..." Where is that cutoff point of can and should? We need to purposefully and repeatedly ask ourselves how we can improve learning inside our classrooms with any - or all - of these new tools. For me, it has so far limited itself to using a blog to encourage more authentic student writing, maintaining a wiki to compile and share student ideas, and even incorporating an online calendar for my planning. Outside the classroom, I've experimented even more, little by little feeling comfortable enough to bring these collaborative, flat world tools into F14 at Branford High School. Will it be something like Skype or RSS feeds or social bookmarking? Or - more likely - will it be utilizing something I don't even know exists? Just forty eight hours ago, that was polldaddy, by the way.

More questions. When a majority of our colleagues get around to discovering the potential of the Web 2.0, what will they find? What is it out there that's truly something we should do? And if we should do it, then what do we need to do as a profession to make sure that it gets done?

I began by creating a blog and having the students post their homework to it in the comments section. In the process of doing that, I began reading more blogs and discovered the accessibility of other tools, specifically wikis, which next showed up in F14. Those two were easy. They have essentially replaced other word processing tools and mixed in some peer collaboration and the context of easily published writing.

This has been a sizable leap, but not seismic like it may seem for other teachers in my building. At the beginning of this school year the extent of my digital literacy was using PowerPoint and posting most of my materials on my website. Few other teachers regularly maintained a website. What I did, for the most part, seemed adequate for my classroom needs. My site consisted mainly of links to my materials, in the form of Word or PDF documents. There was usually a calendar posted regularly, a page of interesting/helpful links, and a resource page for my Literature Circles materials. Occasionally, I'd get an e-mail from a teacher in another state or country, who had stumbled across my site, thanking me expressing appreciation for ideas and supporting materials. To do that, required taking my classroom document from Word or wherever and posting it to the web page through a clunky process involving Microsoft Front Page and an ftp transfer. Other teachers in the building were generally impressed, but intimidated. "I don't know if I could do all that," they'd say, "I just want to have something simple for my class." (I look back now and shake my head, considering how much further along so many other teachers are, especially, for example, those listed to the right on my blogroll.) The problem is, they never took that first step that I did back in 2000. It takes time and has to be built slowly. I just read a post by Dana Huff, and she shares some of the same sentiments about technophobia that leave our profession moving at such a glacial pace when it comes to embracing new concepts and tools and keeping her teaching fresh. She says:

"I know how my classroom has transformed through my use of the SMART board, blogs, and wikis. I know it could transform others. I also know not everyone is patient enough to really learn how to use all of this technology, and that fact makes me sad."

Citing an article in Teacher Magazine (registration required), Dana also writes that teachers who stay fresh are "curious" and "self-propelled." What always vexed me was making my site more interactive for the students, as a place they could visit and need in the course of their work. And right there is the heart of what I think makes many of these new Web 2.0 applications so enticing. I was curious and self-propelled; thus, I've begun to see how it can done, but haven't reached the stage of knowing exactly how it should be done. I think I'm at the point, where as I peruse my ever growing blogroll, I know how important it becomes to have a line between "hey, that's cool" and "hey, let's use that in school." Before I begin making too much headway in my own building, I need more tangible results that will seem attainable for other educators. Clay Burrell, who has been innovated in spearheading great flat world collaboration from his classroom in South Korea, has faced a similar dilemma in bringing colleagues on board.

I've seen plenty of things that are cool. I'm now focusing on what's school.

Who's using whom?

2007-02-11T00:12:00.001-05:00

Recently, that "Web 2.0... Machine is Us/ing Us" video has popped up all over my blogroll recently. It even made it's way here. Well Tom Hoffman wasn't too impressed with it and astutely observed that "This is a video, it isn't XML, and you can't separate its form from its content, and it should be quite clear that its popularity is due to its form rather than its content. If you re-worked this as a textual post, its incoherence would be obvious, and it would be ignored." Well, here's the transcript, courtesy of Tanya Witherspoon at the National Writing Project. See for yourself.

I tend to agree that seeing the so-called script of the video is close to incoherent. And I'll admit, that I still don't think I truly understand what exactly the video is showing me. However, I'm not willing to go as far as Tom and pooh-pooh it. The fact that it's form - as a video presentation - is responsible for its greatest impact doesn't make it less valid. Instead, the video allows us to understand a complex subject in a simpler way. Tom knows a little more about the subject than I do, but we can't lose sight of the fact that if we want educators on board with Web 2.0 tools, then we need to find ways to spread the word.

Where am I supposed to sit in the 21st Century classroom?

2007-02-07T20:06:00.000-05:00

If you walked past F14 today, you would have seen me sitting in the middle of the room, hunched over several sheets of paper. All around me, kids were talking to each other. And that's just how I planned it.

My classroom has looked like that for several years. But now, things have begun to change. Or shift. What does that mean for me? Where do I sit in this new digital classroom? And what am I supposed to do?

Today I sat right in the center for most of the class, but nobody talked to me. It was a Literature Circle discussion day. Translation: students come in having read the first part of their novels (each group broke up their novel into four parts) and spends most of the class in small groups, sharing ideas about the book. I sit in the middle, trying to listen to pieces of as many conversations as possible. Snippets of discussions. Pieces of ideas. All the while, I'm jotting down feedback on an assessment sheet. A few minutes before the bell rings, I distribute the marked up sheets to the student groups. For me, it's kind of a hands-off approach to the lesson. I rarely interject myself into a group's conversation. Too often I find that if I float around the room, my arrival at a group usually means a quick shuffling of papers and comments like, "...so anyway, as we were discussing [insert any out of context reference to a character or literary term meant to sound intelligent] what are your thoughts..." Then it all conveniently tails off as I continue past. Or another dreaded interaction: "Hey, Miller, what does this mean?" Once that happens, I become the crutch. What do students need to think for if they can just ask the teacher for the answers?

From the center, there is no opportunity to show off for me or wait for me to show up. Am I able to hear every snippet of their conversation? No. Do I need to? I don't know. I guess the answer depends on what my role as a teacher is. Is it to guide students to certain pre-determined points in the curriculum (ie the use of similes and figurative language in The House on Mango Street). If so, then I do need to hear almost everything students have to say. After all, if they're discussing Esperanza's feelings of shame about her surroundings, rather than examining the unique use of similes, it's my job to get them back on track. But I don't think that's my role. Who is supposed to decide what the students know and learn?

But toss in something brand new in the form of our 21st century collaborative tools - wikis, blogs, social networking - and I think I'm still confused. Where should I sit? Right now, I'm at my computer, reading some of the ideas posted by my English 10 students on the Literature Circles wiki. Again, I'm trying to keep a respectful distance and let the students do the talking. Just like when we were all in room F14 together this morning, the students are sharing ideas, putting their thoughts out there, and asking questions. Is one more pedagogically sound than the other?

Dozens of edubloggers with a lot more experience and knowledge than me have weighed in on the future of our schools. Will Richardson, in a typical insightful, big picture way, says, "We need to unlearn the premise that we know more than our kids, because in many cases, they can now be our teachers as well. We need to unlearn the idea that learning itself is an event. In this day and age, it is a continual process." Some, like Daniel Kinnaman question whether the need for a traditional classroom is still valid, while Scott Mcleod has pointed to the need to seriously rethink the physical school setting. There is a telling exchange of comments on a post by Clay Burrell that seems to hit on some of the same issues I'm confronting. Stephen Lazer wonders if moving towards a full digital connected model worth it because the "physical space of school is in some cases the only time my students get to exist for themselves (and therefore, get to try out being their selves)." Clay's take is that maybe it's not just about swapping one kind of school setting for another, but rather a rethinking of broader social and community relationships. "Community centers? Public parks? There are many non-schoolbuilding sites that could create getaways from home for learning purposes that are much more real and relevant than a classroom with a bell."

I don't know if I'm there yet. For now, I'll keep showing up at F14. So will the kids. We'll see where it goes from there.

Make room for another inspiring video

2007-02-06T23:01:00.000-05:00

As I test the Web 2.0 waters with my wiki project, it is inspiring to see other teachers maximizing the digital tools for full immersion to make learning truly work. It's a little intimidating, too.

Check out this video about how Brian Crosby's 4th grade class used Skype to bring a homebound classmate with leukemia into the classroom. It's worth the five minutes. What's better is that Brian's kids narrate the whole thing. Awesome.

Another look at Web 2.0

2007-02-05T23:19:00.000-05:00

Earlier I posted about an informative video detailing what Web 2.0 is and what it means. Here's another view: This wonderful graphic comes from Harold Jarche via Steve Dembo. By the way, Steve did an informal poll asking fellow bloggers what their top three Web 2.0 sites. Which one came out on top? You'll have to read his post to find out.

For the record, the three that I find the most useful (as of right now) for what I do as a teacher:

-Wikispaces - free premium site for educators. Great interface, awesome tech support, and easy to incorporate various applications and elements. Don't believe me? See for yourself.
-Google - I can't just pick one, but for direct impact on teaching it's Google calendar, which has student due dates and my planning calendar. I think I've mentioned these guys in the past.
-Bloglines - Just beginning to appreciate it for the way it allows me to read numerous blogs (see blogroll to the right). Plus, I just began using it to easily keep track of what my students are posting in the wiki project (see #1).

Like Frankenstein's monster, the wiki is coming to life

2007-02-05T20:24:00.000-05:00

Now we're about a week into the Literature Circles wiki project, and, although things have gotten off to a slow start, today was my first glimpse at the potential impact of what we're doing. Last week, students had to post on their group's wiki page a response related to an ongoing theme in one of the books - Frankenstein, Black Boy and The Color of Water. For the most part, the responses were very similar to what we were doing on the class blog in a previous unit.

By tomorrow, they are assigned to post a response on another group's wiki page, which means on the page of a group not in their class period. Here's a glimpse of what I'm seeing tonight as I monitor it all on Bloglines, waiting for 24 to start.

Verbatim from the page of one group reading Frankenstein:
"Through reading Dominiques response to what she feels is an appropiate theme so far to the book, I can relate to the ideas she is getting. I also feel as if Dr. Franenstien is too consumed in his to relate to the outside world. He spends so much time in the solittude of his "passion", that he seperates from the simple pleasures that he once enjoyed. Dom did a great job of including the actual text from the book as well as an explanation of hgow she feels it relates to what she is trying to say."

Verbatim from the page of a group reading The Color of Water:
"Your right Richard does believe almost any thing anybody says and most of the time he reacts to it, but i think that is some what not his fault just because of his brutal life style. Also I think thats crazy that he is an acholic and he's sooo young , WOW i can't wait to read the rest of the book ;)"

Verbatim from the page of a group reading Black Boy:
"I agree with Garrett. I think that the theme is about Richard not understanding racism, regardless that they are in the 1900's and racism still occurs. I disagree Garrett that the theme is also family. Yes, family has alot to do with it but, I don’t think that’s what the book is trying to say. It’s about a boy who doesn’t know what’s right from wrong. If I had to pick a second theme it would be money and hunger. Richard in my view doesn’t care much about his family. He wants to live on his own. Hunger and money are big factors because that’s what you need to have in order to survive. I think he would be better of living on his own because he’s not learning anything by getting beaten by his family for everything he does wrong. He would just do it again, just to to get caught this time."

There's still a long way to go. Some kids are still not following through with their homework assignments. Some kids are still struggling to convert ideas into words. Some kids are still apprehensive about it all.

I was too.

Still shifting, trying to keep pace

2007-02-04T08:42:00.000-05:00

Karl Fisch knows something about informative videos that provoke thought about Web 2.0 applications and their impact on the changing educational landscape. Here is one he came across at a digital ethnography workshop. The video, created by Michael Wesch of Kansas State University, explores the changing nature of text, from a linear, pre-digital view, to one showcasing the vast capabilities of hyper and digital text, which is forcing a shift in the way we think about and use the Internet. In other words, it details what Web 2.0 is.

For me, videos like this are helping me wrap my brain around exactly what is happening in our digital world and what it means for my students inside my classroom. What's especially enticing to me is that these Web 2.0 innovations are forcing us to rethink the relationship between one another, between ideas. Folks like Karl and Will Richardson and Wesley Fryer are far ahead of the curve. Here's where I stand. In the last three months, I have been introduced to Web 2.0, unlike many of my colleagues. It's moving now from outside observer to novice user and apprentice. The journey has begun. My students, too, are forced to go along for the ride, first when we began posting homework on the blog to my Literature Circles wiki project. What's next? If I truly want to embed these concepts of flat world collaboration and information sharing in the curriculum, I need to rethink my approach to the content in the class. A similar shift happened a few years back when I began experimenting with a more integrated Literature Circles approach in the classroom, which essentially required that I cede some control of what happens - what to read, what to focus on in discussions, what to write about - to the students. It still needs to happen. In today's classrooms, we can no longer have a stubbornly defined image of what we require students to create. I'm not just talking big picture either, but rather what we expect daily or weekly or monthly. How else can we teach students to be ready to embrace and question what the future will mean to their world if we don't model that same approach in our classrooms?

The students are easy. It's our colleagues that pose a bigger challenge. The first thing I think I'll do is show them that video.

Say it ain't so Google

2007-02-02T22:43:00.000-05:00

Check out this short video presentation about the power of Google. No, not the power of various Googleware applications that I use regularly, but more of a Big Brother take on the search engine giant. The video sounds some serious warnings about the ubiquity of Google. The two producers, doctoral students at a German university, claim that Google may be cooperating with the CIA to compiling a vast dossier of data on everyone, including possibly our genetic maps. Gulp.

But I guess I'd have to see more facts - something the movie provides little of - before I grow too suspicious of Google. I love Google. Maybe I'm just a modern day edublogging Winston Smith in the clutches of the information-gobbling Google...

So how do I love thee, Google? Let me list some ways: I use your calendar to keep track of my lesson plans and to maintain a documents & spreadsheets to post some of our school's school wide rubrics and other materials. I use your handy notebook to make notes to myself about things I read on the web. I play with your Earth a lot. I even have some of your Adsense ads at the bottom of this page.

Thinking back to my former life

2007-02-01T22:50:00.000-05:00

A little taste of deja vu courtesy of Ray Schroeder's post about the decreased use of newspapers in the classroom, which comes courtesy of Reuters. I mixed in my own sour grapes, by the way...

Flashback ten years: It's Year Five as a daily newspaper reporter, most recently at The New Haven (CT) Register. And it's a sorry state of affairs. In between stories about the weather (either too much or too little of it) and stray animals, I occasionally get a chance to write something interesting. But wait, the Lotto jackpot hits $50 million and off I run to the convenience stores to interview would-be winners. Tomorrow I'm assigned to write a feature about line dancing at the senior center.

Back to 2007: It's Year Eight as a teacher, exclusively at Branford (CT) High School. Every day I walk past a stack of Registers piled in the school's mail room, waiting to dirty up the fingers of any takers. So I'm not shocked when I read in the Reuter's article that local papers have fallen behind because they haven't adequately kept pace with the world on which they report, in this case by failing to utilize their online versions for use in the classroom. It seems to me that's why I fled the business in the first place.

Wiki kinks, homework rates, & learning curves

2007-02-01T20:55:00.000-05:00

My sophomores got their first real taste of the wiki this week, and the results were mixed. First of all, I changed things up on them and required that they post their homework on the wiki, instead of the classroom blog, where we've done it since November. That didn't happen so much. About 15% of the students actually did the homework. Gulp. Now what?

I took a deep breath. This isn't the first time kids have skipped homework or failed to keep up with the reading. We as teachers can't expect the new technology or tools to replace our own pedagogy. I have always viewed homework as somewhat of a reflection of how I approach my instruction and overall planning. If the students find value in it, they'll do it. It's up to me to give their work value by responding to it, giving them opportunities to share it in class, and by showing them how and why it fits into the learning. That's where the wiki can help.

An interesting hesitation the kids had, they told me, was their unease at just putting their homework thoughts on their group's wiki page, especially if someone else had already posted. It was like they were infringing on someone else's space. There was no heading or anything for them to easily identify the spot where it should go. I didn't put one there. And the more I think about it, I think it works out better to leave it a little open-ended. I want them in control of their own space and where their thoughts fit into it.

Once we went over the ins and outs of the wiki, many of them felt a little more comfortable. I showed them around the site. It's a learning curve, I told them. Their response? - "So do we get to work on the laptops today?"

The new fear - blogging anonymously

2007-01-31T15:20:00.000-05:00

The Houston Chronicle recently published an interesting article recently on teachers using blogs to get their voices heard, which, according to the article, is basically to anonymously vent their frustration about their jobs. Essentially what we have is a typical journalistic dispatch detailing the latest, scariest new technology. In this case, it's teachers blogging. Little did I know that we teacher/bloggers are encountering a whole new world of potential pitfalls as we use our sites to discuss our poorly-run schools and to lash out at our students - all anonymously of course.

The blogs of two of my favorite and very un-anonymous bloggers, Bud Hunt and Victoria Davis, were both mentioned as examples of teachers hiding behind pseudonyms. In fact, the reporter authoritatively announces, "[i]n the Cyber world, these chatty, often frustrated, teachers pour their thoughts out under screen names like 'Bud the Teacher,' 'Hip Teacher' and 'Cool Cat Teacher.'" Yikes. Bud, always thoughtful and insightful, has posted his thoughts about the issue, including some of his correspondence with the reporter. I agree with Bud about blogging anonymously. It's too easy to be irresponsible, which can undermine all the great ideas that bloggers like Bud bring to the blogosphere.

What gets me about articles like this is how easy it is to spread misinformation, which also subtly undermines what we do. (disclaimer: I do not purport to be on the same level as folks like Bud and Victoria, but I didn't want to use a third person pronoun. Too distant sounding) The general tone seems to be that with these new technologies comes a need for great alarm and pause. I point to a throwaway paragraph near the end: "Most Houston-area districts have remained silent on the issue of what teachers may post on their blogs, although the Katy school district issued a stern warning to employees last fall after some expressed concern about educators and students chatting online." First of all, I would hope that if any school begins to draft guidelines on blogging they consult Bud's excellent wiki resource on the topic. And second, I hope they will learn the difference between "chatting online" and blogging.

Hernando de Soto update

2007-01-30T21:21:00.000-05:00

My daughter took her history test today. She said she felt confident about how she did. She was able to study right before the test.

I couldn't resist, so I asked her: "What important facts did you write down about your explorer? It was de Soto right?"

"I said when he was born, where he died, what he explored..."

"What about those other facts you found as part of your homework?" I asked, trying to play the part of the father full of fatherly interest, with no regards to any past blog postings or ongoing professional conundrums.

"Oh yeah," she finally replied. "I said he brought knowledge about Florida back to Europe."

Maybe Wikipedia is good for something.

What should we be assessing?

2007-01-30T21:01:00.000-05:00

With a heads up from David Warlick, I just posted some thoughts to Rob Darrow's blog. He's a librarian who will be attending the 21st Century Literacies Impact Conference at U.C. Berkley, co-sponsored by the Partnership for 21st Century Skills. He poses an interesting question for us edubloggers: "What is an assessment example in a school or school system that supports 21st century learning?"

That's a hard one. That didn't stop me from taking a shot.

As I was trying to write something halfway intelligent, I got to thinking about how difficult it is going to be to encourage 21st Century learning skills and find the proper, most appropriate ways to assess them if teachers are unwilling themselves to discover ways of using these same digital tools and strategies. How do we as teachers keep up ourselves? And I don't mean those of us on my bloglines or reading this now, but the others in the faculty room who are just now adjusting to e-mail. This is by no means a groundbreaking discovery, but it's part of my learning process.

Check it out yourself and post a comment on his blog. Or mine.

The Wikipedia battlefront comes home

2007-01-29T18:52:00.000-05:00

A little skirmish in the Wikipedia war was fought at home tonight. My 9-year-old daughter used Wikipedia to research her homework. Does that make me a bad parent?

First the background. In the last two weeks, both my children have come home from school with an assignment to find X amount of facts about X topic. For my 6-year-old, CJ, it was five facts about bears. For CJ, I called up MSN Encarta for him through the school's website and helped him navigate the text, images, and sound clips of bears. It was simple and painless.

Today, my daughter, Alla, came home with the assignment to find three facts about the explorer Hernando de Soto, including something "important" about his expeditions. Alla, being older than CJ, got on the computer and typed in "hernando desoto" into Google (that's him above, right). She clicked around and found his dates, (c. 1500 - May 21, 1524) Two of the pages provided little else - either too complex or lacking any more substantive information suitable for a 4th grader. I sensed her difficulty, so I sat down with her and we began scrolling through the results screen. She sees a link for Wikipedia.

"Go there," she said.

I pause, thinking of how much I've heard about Wikipedia recently. At Branford High School, vandals wrote up a fake description of the school, complete with courses on drug use, silly student groups, and comments from clueless parents. At Middlebury College, officials have banned the use of Wikipedia in research. Others in higher education, like Ken Smith, believe educators should be encouraging students to explore how knowledge works, rather than declaring some sources off limits. Victoria Davis found herself in Wikipedia - literally - and hints that maybe we as educators shouldn't keep ignoring Wikipedia, warts and all.

So where does that leave me with my daughter, who is eager to complete her homework before dinner? As far as she's concerned, Wikipedia has been around forever, which is not that far from the truth. Where else is she going to get those three facts about de Soto, including something important about his expeditions? So in we clicked.

Of course the site is well-laid out. I showed her the table of contents and asked her which headings would probably have the information she seeks. She pointed out the one about his expedition to Florida. And there it was under the heading "After Effects" - four paragraphs describing the impact of his 16th Century journey to Florida. Being more comfortably literate, I told her to read the first sentences in each of the middle three paragraphs. Voila, she finds out that the records of his expedition helped contribute geographic knowledge of Florida to those back in Europe. It's that simple.

But is it painless? Does this simply reinforce that Wikipedia is a wholly trusted resource, no questions asked? Did I do all I was supposed to do? We looked at the site together and I showed her a strategy to read for specific information. From her earlier research, she had enough previous knowledge to at least recognize if there were glaring inaccuracies. She used the Wikipedia information as just one of two sources for her assignment. It was a much more careful process than the one I followed with the MSN Encarta entry with CJ.

No one said it is supposed to be easy.

A little old school

2007-01-28T19:29:00.000-05:00

Just put finishing thoughts on what I'm doing this week, starting Monday. How did I do it? Well first I took out my planning sheets (1) which I carry around with in my briefcase. They are a productivity tool that allows me to save and easily retrieve data to show an overview of the unit I'm currently working on. It usually begins as a few rough details (note the sparse squares to the right) and eventually becomes day-to-day lessons. I have found that the best recording device to use is a pencil (2) - in this case one swiped from my daughter's desk. It wasn't fully functional when I grabbed it, so I needed to use a plug-in device to sharpen the point. Finally, I'm able to store all my planning sheets, as well as any files I choose to attach to them, inside my binder (3). The binder can be closed to hold everything efficiently together.

Eventually I'm able to link this work to another handy tool, especially my English 10 at BHS. My 10th graders are going to read several non-fiction articles about juvenile crime and using them as a resource to write a persuasive letter on the topic.

In with the new and stick with the old

2007-01-25T20:33:00.000-05:00

Handed out the books today to start my Literature Circle/Wiki project. Although this is my 2nd venture into a classwide wiki project, I'm still relying on the tried and true in many respects. I'm still giving kids a choice of which books to read for this unit - Black Boy, The Color of Water, and Frankenstein. I've offered choices like this for six years. I still make up a reading calendar using PowerPoint (which all of a sudden feels so limiting as a productivity tool) and converted it to a PDF file. I still put them in their groups and gave them time to work out a reading schedule for themselves. At the end of class, they put their signed reading schedule agreement in a folder, which I deposited into a cupboard in the classroom. This will serve as their space to gather their daily lesson materials.

I also handed out the books, and despite what many people believe, there is still some excitement when it comes to getting a new book in class. Maybe not every kid feels it, but it's out there.

However, the 21st Century twist was that I also distributed a laptop to each of the groups (admittedly, there was a little more excitement when I pulled those out) and walked them through the wiki page setup process. They could follow along on the Smartboard, where I had the page projected. Once they created, the pages, I set up links to them all. Now the real challenge starts. Stay tuned.

Enthusiasm meets reality for a much needed chat

2007-01-23T22:42:00.000-05:00

A necessary conversation today with Kathy, a colleague at BHS who co-teaches one section of English 10 with me. She has spent the last month trying to keep me aligned as I hop around to every new web 2.0 toy I discover. She's got some patience, and I respect her opinion immensely. Well, she looked over my ever-in-revision wiki assignment and suggested that students unfamiliar with this type of work environment might find some of my assumptions about how they will actually do this project a bit difficult to follow. I need people like Kathy to keep me grounded and focused on this question: "What is it I want the students to know and to be able to do?" I modified some of my expectations, again trying not to let the digital dog wag the tail of learning. Believe it or not, with all this talk about 21st Century Skills and digital natives versus digital immigrants, these last two wiki projects are likely the first time my students have encountered such digital tools. That puts me, Kathy, and the students all in the same boat, different seat.

Based on Kathy's input, I decided to put together a PowerPoint slide to briefly explain how to use the page. The tutorials on wikispaces are wonderful, but this was more site-specific. I uploaded the PowerPoint presentation to Slideshare and embedded it in the wiki. Check it out here.

Still digesting the latest feed on NCLB

2007-01-22T22:42:00.000-05:00

Found this in my aggregator today from Dan Meyer, a high school math teacher who makes an impassioned, insightful defense of the educational bogeyman of our time - No Child Left Behind.

I'll admit I haven't had time to fully digest all of his 2,366-word post - that may have to come later. What I'll say is it is a letter to his colleagues about how we spend far too much time complaining about the federal mandates of this law, and too little time working on becoming better teachers. He says, "The accountability measures of NCLB have mobilized the mediocre..." As a result, our loud protests and complaints about NCLB have emboldened mediocre teachers, effectively giving them a convenient whipping boy for why their lessons are stale, their students bored, and their classes dead zones.

The guy can write. Aside from making some strong arguments, Dan writes with an honest, often witty voice that's more Stephen Colbert than Stephen Hawking. It's not too often I read math teachers writing things like:

But teacher to teacher, let’s be honest. Learning is difficult. Learning
runs a tractor through gray matter, plowing beds for neurons to connect. It was
easy for most of us but it isn’t easy for most of our students. It’s typified by
confusion, questions, and frustration.

or:

No, our measure as teachers is defined by how engaging, lucid, and relevant
we can be during the difficult lessons, by how effectively we prepare all our
students for their futures and for mandatory assessment, all while maintaining a
brisk pace through a wide breadth of material. Nothing less. Know this: our
worth as teachers didn’t change on January 8, 2002; our burden of proof just
became greater.

The guy makes sense, too. But rather than use this post to rehash his ideas or put my own twist on them, why don't you read his post and decide for yourself. Then post a comment, either at his site or mine. What do you think? What implications does this law - and our response to it as educators - have for our efforts at embedding 21st Century skills into our teaching and learning?

A blog in its infancy

2007-01-21T20:39:00.000-05:00

It's easy to get caught up in the simplicity of the digital age and lose sight of the underlying complexity it can present. Blogging is no exception. It took me 10 minutes to set up this blog. When I did that, I imagined that I would all of a sudden have a perfect forum to reflect and interact with thousands of like-minded teacher types in our newly flat world. After all, I'm an English teacher, the writing should come easy for me. Not so.

In the short three months since setting up blog shop, I don't know if I began to understand why the difficulty. This weekend I learned a little. On the one hand, the anniversaries of some well-read edubloggers, notably Bud the Teacher and Nancy McKeand. Nancy reflected on her past two years by saying that "it seems like just yesterday that I was trying to figure it all out, trying to believe that I had something to say." Maybe that's where I am now, trying to believe that I have something to say?

Enter Will Richardson, who provided another piece regarding the connection between blogging and reading. He says:

And for me, the biggest reason my reading has changed is because of blogging. I
now read with an intent to write, and my writing (or blogging) is an attempt to
synthesize and connect ideas, not simply summarize or paraphrase what I’ve been
reading (if I even get to that.) I have many memories when I was teaching my
Honors xpository Comp kids of their frustrations not with the writing…they all
could do that pretty well…but the reading and the connecting. They found it so
hard to take information from disparate sources and connect them some way into a
coherent few paragraphs. And I would argue it was because, like so many other things we ask them to do in school, it was a contrived exercise. Pick a topic (abortion) create a thesis (keep it legal), find support, blah, blah, blah.

Only connect... It sounds so simple that even the state of Connecticut requires it as part of its battery of standardized tests in 10th grade to assess student reading and writing. Will concludes that "Teachers should be reading and writing online (blogging)" in order to effectively teach their students the necessary digital literacy skills of the 21st Century . That makes sense, but that doesn't make it easy. Even today, late Sunday, as I stand ready to start a new Literature Circles unit, I recognize those problems of today's schooling he points out. I've spent a lot of time setting up a series of lessons and class time so my sophomores can choose one of three novels, read it, and take part in regular small group discussions. And oh yeah, they'll write a paper at the end, and I'll expect that they will draw on all those insightful reflections and observations from their discussions. Maybe by imposing a regular wiki writing requirement, I can begin to encourage use of these elusive 21st Century skills.

Either way, if I'm going to prepare these students for this century, I have to go along with them.

Poised and ready poolside, wiki and blog in hand

2007-01-20T00:04:00.000-05:00

It may not be summer yet, but I feel like I'm standing at the edge of a pool, a big pool, waiting to build up more nerve to jump in. I'm getting there.

My sophomores responded well to the blogging the first time around. I'll keep incorporating that into my instructional repetoire, expanding it as we grow more and more comfortable. I'm doing my planning and scheduling with Google calendar, and posting documents on Google documents and spreadsheets, which I then link back to my website. I'm taking a second plunge with a wiki. Maybe this time the expectations are a little scaled back. Instead of forcing the wiki into my unit, I realize I need to let the learning drive the use technology. It's really quite basic. First, what do I want the kids to do and learn? Next, how can I can use these new tools to stimulate that and make it easier?

My wiki project will start next week. The most difficult part of putting something like this together is getting past the initial feeling of awe when playing around with different toys, and moving down to the ground-level thinking necessary to make it happen in a classroom. There's some admitted nervousness. The last attempt to "wiki" was not as successful as I'd hoped. Looking back, I probably had unrealistic expectations that once we began the kids would just morph into these spirited, tech-savvy bunch, eager to use their new digital tools to soak up the learning. It wasn't really like that.

I have to say I got myself a bit overwhelmed as I discovered the different toys available for me to play with as a teacher. But just because it's cool for me, doesn't mean my sophomores are going to be just as smitten by the newness of it. I mean these are kids who freak out when I move the tables around in the room.

For now, I'm happy to dip my feet into the swimming pool of web 2.0. I'm getting wet. I'm not drowning. I'm looking forward to a nice swim when I get used to the water.

Is this wiki ready to rumble?

2007-01-19T22:36:00.000-05:00

Putting the finishing touches on the wiki project.

It's going to serve more as additional support our next unit, rather than be a truly collaborative venture. Students are selecting between three titles - Black Boy, The Color of Water, and Frankenstein. Once in their Literature Circle groups, they are required to set up a reading schedule, organize small-group discussions, and generate questions, responses, and connections to the novel. Standard fare for the Miller's English @ BHS experience circa 2005. The 21st century twist now is that each group will be responsible for maintaining a record of their discussions, their questions, their comments to one another, their thoughts on their reading. All of this will be put on the class wiki. In the past, much of the notes, passages, role sheets and other materials were kept in a folder as a reference. It really turned into a folder with lots of different kinds of paper in it. I hope the wiki will encourage further collaboration and help open the students' eyes to the work and ideas of their classmates.

I'll keep you posted.

Disclaimer: My rubric for the project was borrowed heavily from the one at the flatclassroom project. If you haven't checked out that wiki or Vicki Davis' Cool Cat Teacher blog, do it.

Product plug: I decided to use Wikispaces instead of PBwiki. Although I like how PBwiki lets you set up a simple password to allow editing, I think wikispaces offers much more variety and ease of use in its interface. Embedding html and pictures is a lot simpler and more understandable with wikispaces.

I'll take the survey, but I'm not quitting my job

2007-01-06T16:58:00.000-05:00

Starting to feel like a real-life edublogger. I just took this blogging survey at Dangerously Irrelevant. If you haven't heard of it already, it's a completely unscientific survey for all edubloggers, the results of which will be published Jan. 17 at that site. But hurry, only those who take the survey by Jan. 14 will be included in the results.

Some thoughts on the survey. First, I have to give credit to Adventures in Edublogging where I first heard of the survey. Second, I had real difficulty with the first question of the survey. It asked if I could make a living blogging, would I. The problem is, my blogging is all about what I do for a living. Without those 80 teenagers who show up in my class every day, I would have little to share. How else could I explore the use of blogging to promote student thinking? Or struggle with the best way to fully understand and grow comfortable with using a wiki to support student writing? Without a job, could I undertake a professional challenge to create an honors option component of a heterogeneously grouped English class? Using a wiki, no less.

So just in case anyone is thinking of putting together an attractive offer. The answer is: No thanks. I'll stick with my day job.

Do you blog male or female?

2007-01-06T01:46:00.000-05:00

If you want to know what the gender of your blog is, check out the gender genie from bookblog. Saw this over at Adventures in Educational Blogging (a female blog, by the way).

I punched in my last post - 303 words - and, after picking up on certain words in the post (see right), it determined that I was more male than female.

Phew. My wife will be relieved.

It's never too late for New Year's resolutions

2007-01-06T00:16:00.000-05:00

New Year's is a time for resolutions, so here goes...

First, I resolve to continue blogging. And to continue soaking up as much as possible about the challenges and opportunities that exist for a newbie edublogger like myself. I already know a great resource - Bud the Teacher's wiki. It's got links to teachers using wikis and blogs, sample letters to parents, examples of acceptable use policies, and even vignettes with hypothetical scenarios relating to issues about blogging in education. It all comes courtesy of Bud the Teacher.
Next, I resolve to find more time to read as much of The Fischbowl as I can. Even if it means missing a few minutes of 24. Karl at Arapahoe High School has put together collection of blogs that blows my mind - classroom blogs, teacher cohorts, his own powerful insight. I've only scratched the surface of what's there. Just not enough time.
In class, I resolve to find time to incorporate more grammar instruction. I already have some great resources - Graycie has been posting grammar lessons on a regular basis, while The Reflective Teacher has an awesome post that explains how a sentence is a movie.
I also resolve to try another classroom wiki. My first venture, in which students paired off to write an analysis of a poem, was average at best. The next time I use a wiki, I want it to be as good as the one done by this class which was dicussing Life of Pi.
Finally, I resolve to continue learning from all my colleagues who are experimenting and finding creative ways to teach today's students. As I find them, I will link them to the right. If you haven't already, check out what's already there.

Did I miss any? What are your resolutions?

What's another eight minutes? Check these videos out...

2007-01-04T12:53:00.000-05:00

Shift happens. Don't know if everyone has seen these video presentations, but you should. The folks at The Fischbowl have put together a series of presentations about the world we are heading for. They've been making their way around the edublogosphere since the summer, but I first saw them on Beyond School only yesterday. I guess it's never too late.

If you only have time for one, view Did you know... (Windows Media file). It makes a compelling case for why schools need to change and the challenges facing us, and our students.

Coming clean about Wikipedia

2007-01-03T19:18:00.000-05:00

Some interesting thoughts about Wikipedia on Cool Cat Teacher blog. No sense in repeating the thread, but Victoria raises some relevant points about this ever-growing online knowledge source. She says:

3) Whether or not educators like Wikipedia, perhaps its flaws are because so many educators do not like wikipedia and have thus ignored it.
I ask you to join and become an editor who cares about adding fact to the subjects you care about. -- Start by watching the edublog page! (But do not add yourself, only add others that you believe you have enough proof that they are notable.)

What should we as educators do? Ignore it? Embrace it? Fight it?

I, too, am reserving judgement on Wikipedia, but I do like her point that one way to improve it is by becoming more of an active part. Here's my own Wikipedia story, told maybe to get it off my chest or just to share with whoever reads this...

During the planning of a unit on The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds, I begun to further explore the use of the marigold flower as a dominant symbol in the play. After a little research online, I ended up - of course - at Wikipedia. Despite one of the more succinct and user-friendly descriptions, what I noticed from the Wikipedia entry was that it lacked vital information: when marigolds predominatly bloom and how they are hearty flowers that thrive in many different garden conditions. In context of the play, where the flowers symbolize the main character and her exposure to the "radioactive" dysfunctional family environment caused by her mother, I thought this was a crucial piece to know. It also seemed to be lacking the definition provided on Wikipedia. So I edited it in there. There were already several sources cited in the definition, which I too checked out during my research. However, in my revision, I also referenced another web site that included this additional information. My final edit amounted to a handful of sentences interspersed in the existing definition.

Then I directed students to the definition and asked them how the marigolds could serve as a symbol in the play. Not sure why, but I never told them my behind the scenes role. Was I afraid they'd see how easy it was to do, if they didn't already know? Did I think it would - rightly or not - taint their consideration of the source? Was there a tinge of guilt in what I did?

It still has me thinking. Is the role of an educator, to manipulate information or knowledge sources for a particular benefit? Or was I doing nothing different than if I prepared a handout with notes about the flower, which included the information I deemed important?

Still not sure if I've answered all the questions in my mind.

Open thoughts on my next Lit Circles unit...

2007-01-01T12:53:00.000-05:00

Been thinking about how I want to proceed with my next unit, which I'm calling "Alienation & Isolation." Right now it consists of students choosing from one of three novels - Frankenstein, The Color of Water, and Black Boy. The introductory portion is complete, which we'll do before midterms start in mid-January.

Now I want to take a page from Beyond School and do a unit think-aloud. My thoughts are leading me towards again experimenting with a classroom wiki as part of the student writing. It's still sketchy and rough, but as always, I'd love to hear some feedback, comments, suggestions. So here goes...

It begins as an extension of the active reading introductory portion: Each student will choose which title they would like to read, and I'm going to encourage those who are thinking about taking honors English in 11th grade to strongly consider tackling Frankenstein as a way to better acclimate them to a difficult text, which they will face in honors next year. (Sophomore English at Branford High School is completely heterogeneous, but we are developing an honors option for next year.) Despite their obvious differences, the three titles do share thematic elements, most notably a central character who struggles to forge an identity in an often hostile world. In the case of both Black Boy and The Color of Water, that hostility is mostly the result of racial divisions and prejudice. Those two titles are memoirs which relate the life stories of the two author/main characters - James from Color of Water and Richard from Black Boy - who often feel marginalized, or even in extreme cases, like a monster in their world, an outsider in an unaccepting society. That, too, is a dominant theme of Frankenstein. However, there is much more to Frankenstein, and that's not to say the students who chose that will not be able to explore those issues.

The day to day lessons will be organized according to a Literature Circle model. It's the assessment piece that I'm hung up on. As a way to showcase and share their learning, I would like the students to collaborate on a wiki that explores our central theme - Alienation & Isolation. A possibility for guiding or essential questions could be What do humans need to feel connected to their world? How does society help forge our identity? How do individuals figure out who they are?

To build on the skills from a previous wiki writing project, the students could address the themes of alienation and acceptance as they see them in their novels. Each Literature Circle group could be responsible for maintaining a wiki page with information from their in-class discussions, quotes from the novel, and other textual references. It should probably be organized in some manner, possibly under dual headings of alienation and isolation. Students would be responsible for tracing those themes throughout the novel, how they progress and eventually are resolved. Embedded in this would be an analysis of human nature and what the author's ideas are relating to alienation and isolation on the human soul.

Next, each group would research a particular modern day social issue that relates to one or more of the big ideas raised in the novel and represents an issue in today's society. I may suggest possibilities for further research - institutional racism, affirmative action, poverty, cloning, embryonic research... Information on these topics could be incorporated into the wiki on the novel.

I'm starting to feel myself getting hazier and hazier with my ideas. As a relative newcomer to the world of wikis and blogs, I want to experiement with the latest technology, but I don't want to use it for the sake of using it.

I'm stuck.

Maybe this would be a place to assign a good old-fashioned essay? Maybe the wiki is an excellent tool in this case for merely extending their daily discussions - with less imposed structure from me - rather than as a summative assessment of the unit? The wiki would serve as a solid resource for students as they write their papers.

I think I'm going to stop now and mull it over in between grading.

Planning for next year

2006-12-30T01:42:00.000-05:00

Spent the day in New York City with the family today, and now I find myself parked in front of the computer trying to nail down plans for the new year, which is only a weekend + 1 away. I had already planned to start the year by giving the students a choice of three books - Frankenstein, The Color of Water, and Black Boy. The unifying theme will be Alienation & Isolation. To start, each student will read the first chapter of each book and choose one on which to complete a prediction assignment.

Even though I have the general outline in mind, now I'm stuck in front of the computer discovering the possibilities of the Google calendar tool. I decided to use it as a day-to-day lesson planner. Each event in the calendar is the day's lesson. In the event description section, I sketched out a rough lesson plan, so each one looks like this...

This allows me to write up my lessons informally, edit and change them, and also maintain a record of the instruction inside class. I also co-teach with a special education teacher, and she can log in and leave comments/suggestions about the lesson. It goes without saying that everything in the calendar can be searched. Another handy little benefit. You also have the option to share some, all, or none of your calendar contents with the Google universe.

Next, I created another calendar, this one listing all the due dates for my students. This can be linked to my blog or my website, and I can print it out to give to students in class. What makes this function even more handy is that, if I view the two calendars together - planning and due dates - it makes it easier and more visually understandable for me to see my lesson plans alongside the corresponding due dates. Here's what it looks like so far...

As you can see, viewing it in agenda produces an easier on the eyes format, especially for seeing the longer calendar entries. There is, however, an option to toggle back and forth between calendar view and agenda. If you haven't already discovered this tool, I encourage you to check it out.

Thanks for reading and Happy New Year.

A few Christmas words...

2006-12-25T09:27:00.000-05:00

Maybe it's just because A Christmas Story has been on TV too many times in a row, but I'm wondering if my six-year-old son, CJ, is going to grow up with memories like Ralphie about this Christmas.

He woke up at about 3 a.m. this morning with a nasty belly ache and what I think was an unfortunate case of nerves. It seems to me that he's been unusually nervous since last week, when he received a letter from Santa Claus in the mail. He had attended a children's holiday party at the high school where I work, and during one of the craft activities he had written a note to Santa Claus. The annual party is organized and run by students in the child development classes at the school. The letter was in response to that note. Overall, the letter was positive and told him that he had been a good boy all year - just what every kid wants to hear this time of year. What my son picked up on, however, is that Santa's letter also said that he hadn't been as good a listener as he could have been all year, and it suggested that he try hard again next year.

That's what he focused on. Try again next year. Several times in the last week he asked if he was going to get presents or would he just have to try again next year. He said the same thing when he went to bed last night. Each time we tried to reassure him that it was fine, nobody was perfect, and he had been a good boy. Even more important, we told him that we thought he had tried his best all year. We told him again and again during the week, and again when he woke up at 3 a.m. - this time to vomit. As we watched him get sick, we looked at each other - there was nothing my wife and I could have done to reassure him, short of revealing the entire unglamorous adult truth to him about Christmas. We know that CJ is an extremely kind and sweet little boy. None of that seemed to matter in the wee hours of Christmas Day 2006. He had already worked himself into a full panic. And it wasn't until he opened the air hockey table, assorted clothes, electric toothbrush, and Leapster game cartridge that he finally began to settle himself down.

It's obvious that my son was a victim of an incomplete understanding of what he read, caused in part by his elementary reading level skills. If he did the same thing in my high school English class, I might instruct him to go back into the text and re-read it to adjust his comprehension. Maybe I would suggest highlighting relevant passages or recording his thoughts in the margin. It might also have been an appropriate time for a mini-lesson on different active reading strategies. Too bad my class set of yellow highlighters was locked up in room F14 at BHS.

What probably was a throwaway line in the Santa letter - written no doubt to make a generic letter from Santa sound realistic - seemed to have created a real piece of childhood trauma. That and probably a touch of the flu.

When school starts up again, maybe when I'm doing a think-aloud activity in class, I'll probably be reminded of CJ and his case of Christmas anxiety. I hope I can save one of my sophomores from a similar fate. Until then, I'll have to wait a few years until CJ can really be able to laugh about the whole thing.

Thank you for reading and Merry Christmas.

Student blogging

2006-12-22T20:19:00.000-05:00

Am I the last one on the blogging bus?

We just finished up a unit on The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds, a play by Paul Zindel. The play is fairly short, easy to read, and only has three major characters. It's great to read and act out in class. As a result, I struggled to think of ways to encourage my students' thinking beyond the classroom, and to extend the discussions we did have inside it. That is, until I decided to use my new blog.

I put a prompt up every few days and asked the kids to respond in the comments section. Here's what I got. And you know what, I didn't have to waste class time collecting anything hastily scribbled and ripped out of a notebook or watching a kid rifle through a backpack. I read their homework at my leisure, and I even posted some of it on the whiteboard with a digital LCD projector as part of class discussions. The kids loved it, too. What really surprised me is that one of the biggest reasons they mentioned for loving the blogging process is because it made it easier for them to understand the homework assignment. Numerous students told me that if they were confused about the homework question, they looked to see what their classmates had written and it helped them. The best example of this was the posting about good literature. We cut and pasted pieces of their definitions into a Word document to create a graphic organizer/study guide before the test. Better still is their work remains as a future resource for the class.

I think what has made this technology so invigorating for the classroom is its immediacy and transparency. Teachers looking for those authentic situations in which to publish student writing can find it with student blogging.

The Joys of Wiki?

2006-12-15T20:05:00.000-05:00

Just discovered how easy it is to create a wiki. So I did it. And here's what I did:

The English department at Branford High School also happens to be in the process of developing an honors option for our 10th grade heterogeneously-grouped English classes. Right now every sophomore takes English 10. Next year, we hope to offer students in those classes the option of earning an honors distinction for the class. This would mean they would get an honors designation on their transcripts, a nod to those parents and students who feel they are slighted by not being able to take an honors English course until Junior year. Our principal has given us release time to draft a proposal and plan for implementing it in 2007-2008. Here's what we came up with, using wikispaces.

Check it out, and if you have any suggestions or questions, I'd love to hear them.

Just another day of discussion?

2006-11-02T21:58:00.000-05:00

Today with my sophomores, I did a little something different. Like many English teachers out there, I sensed that some of those showing up to my class everyday were not keeping up with the assigned reading. Can you imagine that? We've been reading a series of short stories, and it should be noted that this is a 10th grade completely heterogenously-grouped class. Anyway, before starting the preparation-discussion portion of class, I decided last minute to give a little reading check quiz to smoke the non-readers out. It's amazing how an occassional quiz like that - even only a quick four plot-based questions - can inject a bit of anxiety into the room.

After the quiz, I handed everyone a note-taking sheet that asked them to jot down significant quotes, point out connections to other stories, and pose questions about the text - standard fare as part of my Literature Circle instructional model. As they did that, I circulated through the room and checked their Post-it notes on the stories. But this time, armed with the quiz, I approached a few kids who had obviously not read. And I didn't bother checking their Post-its because they knew they didn't read, and if they had them, they'd obviously be faked.

Instead, I offered the non-readers an option. They couldn't take part in the conversation with their peers, but to earn partial credit for the day, they could answer three of the questions at the end of the stories in the textbook. They shrugged and started to read. The rest of the class I put in their Literature Circles discussion groups.

It got me thinking about about what had happened. Was it right to give those kids who didn't read a second chance for some credit? What kind of message did it send to those who didn't read? Maybe some are figuring they can come to class, read a little, answer a few questions, and shuffle off to their next class. However, the small-group model of discussion seems to genuinely appeal to the students, especially those capable and willing to be more independent. They get to hear each other's opinions, and I stay out of the equation for the most part. With each non-reader, I had a conversation about them being prepared for the discussion and how much more valuable they are contributing to a group. I thought about keeping a tally of how often they come prepared, or participate in a group. Such record-keeping could help me quantify a class participation grade. How about the kids who did read? Are some thinking that they'd rather be reading alone, answering questions. I tend to think not, considering adolescents are such social beasts.

Welcome to the School House Blog

2006-10-30T21:36:00.000-05:00

This, my first venture into the edublogosphere, is an experiment I'm excited about undertaking. I decided to start this blog for two reasons. a) Everyone else seems to be doing it. b) It seems like a logical extension of the work I've done sharing ideas and resources on my school web page. Doing so has allowed me to connect and share ideas with colleagues who are also interested in this method and any other resources/materials I share. Much of my reflection and focus has been on the use of a Literature Circles approach in the classroom. Ultimately, my goal as a teacher is to shift my instructional approach away from me and on to the students.

I'd like this blog to be an extension of the thinking and experience that comes out of teaching high school English. I hope to post regularly about what I've done to prepare for class. What the students are doing. What might work. What doesn't. I also hope to make connections to other professionals undertaking the same journey as I am.

Welcome aboard.