Tire Swing

On the (fifteen minute) commute to work this morning, I was listening to a BBC World Service programme called Global Business, on which they had an interview with Allan Moore the author of No Straight Lines.  (Check out his website here)

In the course of the interview, Allan Moore discussed how companies, like Kodak, that were so entrenched in the marketplace, could miss the boat on how technology is transforming the world, and end up essentially going under.  He concluded that Kodak could not correctly answer the fundamental question – “What is it that we do?”   Kodak got stuck in the grove of answering – “We make film.”  Kodak’s focus became too narrow, as they became bigger – and they could not see the bigger picture.  Instead of the narrow, “We make film,” Kodak’s answer should have been – “We are in the business of helping the customer create quality images that they can share with others.”  If Kodak has had been able to see the broader picture, they would have been in a much better position to capitalize on the world of digital photography, storage, photo sharing, etc.

It was a interesting perspective, and one I reflected on during the commute home for lunch. I thought of newspapers, like the Rocky Mountain News from my home region, that have gone out of business.  Did their focus become too narrow?  ”We make newspapers.”  When it could have been “We do quality, in-depth journalism and tell fascinating stories.”  Would this perspective have helped them adjust to the new world of journalism that the internet and a hyper-connected world have created?  If they had not clung so tightly to the traditional idea of what is a newspaper…

And that brought me to education.  Do we have the same narrow, tradition-based, focus on what it is that we do?  Is the answer to that question for me personally – “I teach sixth grade geography,”  when it should be something more like “I help prepare my kids for their future.”  Is that a broad perspective that will serve me and my students well?  Or is it just a nifty, contrite saying that sounds new age-y?  I guess my hope is that I use the first (sixth grade geography) to reach the second (preparing my kids for their future).

And I am coming to the idea that this is a place where technology plugs in.  I came to this first COETAIL class knowing that I was missing out on something with regard to technology.  I was missing the boat – like Kodak.  I could not put my finger on what exactly, or how.

I thought COETAIL would help me find some tools that I could use to teach my class better.  The digital tools I would uncover here would help me more “future-oriented” somehow – and somehow help my students, through me.  That is an pretty good summary my thinking, I guess.  I thought it was about the tools.

I have certainly been exposed to a TON of news tools.  (I have a staggering number of things to investigate during the upcoming spring break, which is exciting and daunting all at the same time.  But I think the most important thing I will come away from this first course with is – in one word – connected.

I see better now how my kids are connected – in what ways, why, and how.  And I see myself as a part – a small part – of a learning network. It is still uncomfortable to post my thoughts on a blog, and I am more of an observer than a contributor.   But I have in place a foundation for learning network.  It is something I have to tend to and make grow – by contributing, communicating, creating, collaborating.  That is what makes learning happen.  I have a basic, beginning sense of the idea of connectivism, for myself both as a learner and a teacher.  It is a new perspective.

It has helped me to realize that COETAIL is not going to just show me a bunch of new tools to use.  It is going to help me to see how technology is changing education and how I can see the broader perspective.  I will never master all the tools, or know all the information.  If I try, I may still end up like Kodak, or a out-of-print newspaper (or print edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica) – focused on the wrong thing.  It is about the learning power in the connected-ness that technology makes possible.

In answer to the question “What is it that I do?”  My answer is not (anymore) – “I teach sixth grade geography.”  It is something like – “My students and I are connected learners.  We do learning by creating, communicating, and collaborating.”

Something like that anyway…  If I had all the answers I could write my own book and be on the BBC World Service too…

Sidenote:

In this article, Allan Moore suggests six things companies and organizations can do to avoid their own “last Kodak moment.”  I thought #3 and #5 were particularly instructive for education:

#3.  Learn how living and working in an open culture / economy can be hugely beneficial.

#5.  Become comfortable with the idea of craftsmanship as a personal and internal culture: the craftsman is always in beta, consistently using “play” as a process for discovery, the development of new insight, technique and creativity.

Summary of the Final Project

This project is a part of a unit I am currently doing with my sixth grade geography students here in Dhahran.  The Essential Questions here  – we call them the “Big Ideas” – are the same throughout all of the unit.  A large part of the summative assessment at the end of this unit asks to students to write a reflection about what they learned around these two Big Ideas:

• Why do people migrate?
• What impact does migration have on people and places?

The Lead Up

Leading up to the activity described in this final project, we read different news articles about migration trends and issues currently happening around the globe.  We also watch video clips via You Tube, and other sources.  This allows us to hopefully stay “current” from year-to-year and adjust to world events.

This year, we decided to focus on migrants from Central America who board freight trains in Mexico bound for the border with the United States.  This was the subject of a recent National Geographic article.  The Nat Geo website also includes a photo gallery, extensive map gallery, and a videos clip.  National Public Radio, BBC News, and the Washington Post also did a series of articles and reports about this migration story.  The number and variety of articles and resources allows us to differentiate for reading level and learning style, which is great.  The NPR article even allows students to listen to the story that was broadcast on their radio and web service while they read long.

We use these articles as the basis for introducing key words used in the unit – such as migrate, migrants, emigrate, immigrate, refugee.  We also begin to discuss push-pull factors – and why people migrate?   Grouping students who each read from different sources allows for lively, interactive group discussions.  Taking these ideas further, we ask them to discuss and annotate their sources for questions such as – Is this migration permanent or temporary?  Voluntary or forced?  Why do you believe that is true?  What evidence do you see in your article/source?  Students are then asked to write a reflection on how the concepts being studied apply to this specific migration story.  This affords us a formative assessment of their learning thus far.

We then point the kids to a different migration story – the migration of people from sub-Saharan Africa in fishing boats to the Canary Islands, a Spanish territory off the west coast of Africa.  These migrants are hoping for entrance into the countries of the EU.    Once again, there are many resources available on the internet, including video (such as this one from Al Jazeera English on You Tube) and  series of recent articles on the BBC News website.

Here we review the Big Idea – why do people migrate? – and also shift the focus to the second – how does migration impact people and places?  The process is much the same as with the Central American migration story, including allowing for differentiation, annotation, note making, and group discussions around leading questions such as – how do the people living in the Canary Islands feel about these migrants?  and why is there a diversity of opinion?

This Project

With a more solid understanding of the issues related to migration attained through looking at two current, global migration trends, we now want the kids to look at their own migration story.  They are all migrants.  Someone in their family has migrated in the past as well.  Why did they migrate?  What impact did that have on their personal history?  On the places they left, and the places they went to?  And were they a part of a larger migration story like these migrants from Central America and Africa?

We begin by asking them to interview an adult in their family about a migration story.  We ask that this be a different migration story from their move to Saudi Arabia – because we have been using that as an example and a point of comparison throughout the unit.  We want a “fresh” story.  With the help of the language arts teachers on our team – who are concurrently doing mini-lessons on reading nonfiction text and writing news stories – we work with the kids to develop a set of questions to ask during the interview that will get at the heart of the migration issues (going back to the Big Ideas) we have been studying.

This year, for the first time, we suggested that the kids could use digital tools to conduct their interviews.  Skype with grandma.  Instant message with your uncle.  I don’t know why we did think of this before.  (Perhaps it is COETAIL!)  This year, the kids are coming back with tons of stories like – “I skyped with my aunt for an hour last night! “  Really cool.  And we are getting better stories as a result.  Instead of just talking to their parents at home, which is great too, we are reaching beyond just the walls (literally) of our community.

The next step is writing their migration story as a news story – again with the assistance of the language arts team.  When they are ready for publication, we are posting their stories on the class wiki under the title “My Migration Story.”  We actually began doing this last year, taking over from the past practice of just word processing.  This has allowed us to push the learning in new directions.

New Directions

As the kids are writing their migration stories, they are able, on the wiki page, to link to Google Maps (or perhaps more static maps) of places in their stories.  Some students are creating their own Tripline maps with maps, pictures, and music, and then linking that to their migration wiki page.  We also ask them to link to historical maps (if applicable), pictures on the web (of their own on Picasa or another photo-sharing site).  They also link to other news stories on the web about similar migration stories – trying to tie-in their story to global stories and trends.  These links also, sometimes, lead to video clips.  It is very cool when those connections start to happen!

Reflection Piece

When the publication phase draws to a close, we have the kids read others’ stories and do two things.  First, link something in another student’s story to your own story.  Literally link a word, phrase, etc. in their story to your own wiki page.  This should be a “meaningful” link between the two stories that shows a connection to the Big Ideas.  Second, we ask the kids to post a comment on another student’s wiki page.  Again, this should be a “meaningful” post that demonstrates your reflection on the Big Ideas you see in their story.

This Teachers’ Reflection on This Project

The digital tools used in this project, both those discovered by teachers initially (the articles, photo galleries, and videos) and those used by the students in creating their stories, make this project much alive and personal for the kids.  Again, I am thrilled with the kids’ use of social tools to conduct interviews this year.  The wiki page is key to the sharing of stories, and the comments makes the audience much more real to the kids.  They also love the ability to share their stories with relatives and friends “back home” via the wiki page.  But, I am often the most impressed with learning that is demonstrated by the simple (task-wise) act of creating the links.  The kids take seriously the links that they create.  It is so neat to see them think critically about how and why that particular map, picture, or video will help the reader to understand the migration story they are telling.  And the linking to other students’ wiki pages helps them see how migration stories are human stories that we all share.

The UbD Template

Here is the UbD template for this My Migration Story activity.

Drinking from a Fire Hose

It has been a crazy busy week – in all facets of life.  But…I have done my reading for this class, kept up (mostly) with readings from my RSS reader, read and commented on a couple of blogs, and composed half-replies in my head to others.  My RSS also has a folder for another personal learning goal (beside COETAIL), and I likewise have kept up (mostly) with those readings as well.

Still, I am finding it difficult to truly reflect and to construct some knowledge and understanding, to be honest.  It feels a bit like I am drinking from the proverbial fire hose as they say.  And yet I know that it is not the overwhelming amount of information that is making me feel this way.  It is the time issue.  Time to reflect and construct which, I equate, at least in my thinking right now.

This led me to think about my students.  They have eight classes a day.  They are “connected”, and most are more social than this introverted teacher.   Do I provide opportunities for them to reflect and to construct?  I know that I do (mostly) within my classroom teaching.  Rarely do I “talk at them” for longer than 5-7 minutes without providing an opportunity for a quick partner discussion, think-pair-share, or similar.

But all of their learning activities do not take place within the four walls of our classrooms.  The Horizon Report noted this in their Critical Challenges section (#5).  Am I doing what I can to encourage them to pause, reflect, discuss, create, and construct meaning – aside from my “lecture breaks” that occur in my classroom?

I am coming to realize this is the value of blogs as reflection pieces – and wikis – and tweets – and other digital tools.   I am a slow-learner apparently…

Solutions?

So this feeling of a lack of time to reflect led me to hit on some items in my RSS.  One was Silvia Rosenthal Tolisano’s The Magic of Learning blog called Langwitches.  I read a different post, but linked to an intriguing infographic called The Digital Learning Farm, which, according to the blog post, is based on some of Alan November’s work.  Perusing the Digital Learning Farm infographic and blog post really helped me to bring together some thoughts about the digital taxonomy and some tools that my students (and me too!) can use to slow down the fire hose and bit and give ourselves some time to reflect and construct.

First I discovered Read It Later.  Saves me from having to bookmark to my delicious account. Great.  But that just puts me, or my students at the “contributor” or “researcher” level on the Digital Learning Farm.  What about reflecting and building some knowledge?

Langwitches blog also led me to some articles about annotexting tools. This one at ASCD Edge includes links to video tutorials on how some of the tools work.  More information and resources can be found in this Livebinder. (Come to think of it – LiveBinder is a cool “contributor” and “researcher” tool too.)

I explored iAnnotate, and NoteShelf, and PaperPort, and I came away impressed by the ability to allow students to easily submit their annotated text, so that we all can see the kids critical thinking process and

And finally, I was led to some articles, including this one at Edudemic, another blog on my RSS, about mind mapping tools.  I was particularly intrigued by the potential uses of MindMeister and Mindomo because of their ability to allow for collaborative building of mind maps.  Has anyone used either of these tools with their students?  Or other mind mapping tools?

The Irony

I am really excited about some these digital tools that to be honest, I am discovering for the first time.  Perhaps I am a bit late to the party. But better late than never.

I am also aware of a bit of irony in the learning process (if you can call it that) that I went through this week.  My feelings of being over whelmed by information, and a lack of time, led me to look for digital tools for help – for me and my students.  In other words, I sought – and found and found and found – even more information to digest.  And reflect upon.  And begin to “mess around with.”  And construct my own knowledge.

I finished reading Marc Prensky’s Edutopia article, Shaping Tech for the Classroom, last week, and I have been continually reflecting on his main ideas about technology adoption in education.  And I mean continually.   I like lists and timelines and frameworks (I guess I am a linear thinker), so Prensky’s four-step process really helped me to put into focus where my school is relative to technology adoption, and where I am as a teacher.

Old Things in Old Ways – Teacher Edition

I believe that my school, my colleagues here, and I have been using technology mainly to do “old things in old ways“, as Prensky described them.  We use technology to communicate and exchange information via email and PowerSchool, but as he said, this is just “passing stuff around.”

Upon reflection, I would also include in doing “old things in old ways, teachers using our fancy new Promethean digital whiteboards to project PowerPoint presentations and video clips from YouTube and BrainPop.   Because…

Old Things in Old Ways – Student Edition

We (teachers and staff) are the main (perhaps, only) users of the technology.  We are the ones writing, creating, and sharing the information.  I am not even sure if this teaching practice falls on Bloom’s digital taxonomy, but it seems like the same level of technology adoption – just “passing on information,” which is simply an “old thing.”  And there is nothing truly innovative going on there technology-wise, because teachers are the users and creators.  That is the same “old way.”

 I use a wiki with my students in my Grade 6 social studies class.  But again – I am the most frequent contributor and creator of the information.   I embed video, add pictures, political cartoons, and digital demonstrations.  Prensky puts this in stage 3 – doing old things in new ways.  But I am concerned that if I am the producer and the students are merely the consumer – is that really doing something in a “new way?”

New Things in New Ways

And this is the point where I began to be challenged and conflicted.  I recognize the need to get my students more involved in creating and collaborating via the wiki.  (That is what they are made for..!)  Don’t I have to change the both the what and how I am teaching to really do “new things in new ways?”  To quote Prensky:

“If we really offered our children some great future-oriented content…and they could develop their skills in programming, knowledge filtering, using their connectivity, and maximizing their hardware, and they could do so with cutting-edge, powerful, miniaturized, customizable, and one-to-one technology…”

At this point in the week, I read a fellow COETAILers blog, and I followed the link to this article in EdWeek Teacher by Jennie Magiere.  She was reflecting on the implementation on iPads in her (elementary?) classroom, and she concluded that initially she was really just doing old things in new ways – though she put it in different words.  To really make a change, she needed a “technology-based redefinition of my practice.”  She goes on to describe five lessons she learned in that first year, and the first of which hit home with me.

Jennie Magiere called this first lesson – Break down to rebuild.  She describes this process as review all that she (the what and the how) with the power of these technology tools in mind.  About everything she asked – “What can I do with these devices that would be impossible to do without them?”  Instead of using the technology to play math flashcard games (which you could do “low-tech”), she has kids creating their own math videos, writing math blogs to demonstrate understanding and to share their insights, and conducting challenged-based-learning math projects.

Reading and reflecting on this article took me back to the ideas around “playing to learn,” messing around,” and “geeking out” that we have read about in this course.  And I was struck by how she was using technology to move up the digital taxonomy.

The key – again – for me is students creating.  That is doing new things in new ways.  That is where I am aiming to be.  I need to break it down in order to rebuild.

Other Reflections

Two other ideas in Prensky’s article resonated with me as well.  They both were inthe section about barriers to technology implementation.

First – the Social Barrier:  Digital Immigrants.  Prensky noted that many teachers are afraid to experiment  and to trust their kids with technology that they themselves have not mastered.  I see this in my school – and in my own practice.  As Prensky says, we want training before we adopt and implement.  And I instantly thought of our kids “messing around.”  They jump in with both feet and learn as they go, making mistakes, and collaborating to overcome obstacles.

Second – the Big Tech Barrier: One-to-One.  This has been widely debated in my school, as has been “bring your own technology.”  I have served on committees examining both – and have grown frustrated at, quite frankly, the lack of administrative leadership in this regard.  One-to-one remains a dream that I am afraid I will not see anytime soon.

But I digress…my connection to this part of Prensky’s article was in his advice to have each student with a device that is “personal to each learner.“  At first, I went to like stickers and background and fonts…?  Then I came to the conclusion that is perhaps more so about what we all do to set-up and organize our devices, etc.  We organize (and share) our bookmarks and widgets and calendars in certain ways that speak to us and make access, and learning, more user-friendly.  In the same way we teach middle school kids to organize their locker and backpack and study areas (dare I say “old things“), one-to-one affords us a chance to do “new things in new ways.”  Namely, allow students to create a digital presence that works for them.