Sentiments On Common Sense

Success can measured in all sorts of things.  One class has done a great job sharing their 100′s day project. Check it out here!!

One as to reflect on the memories that we create for children and what fun numbers really can be in projects like this one.

Scroll down the 1AH blog and see the wonderful content and news this wonderful teacher shares!

100 days of school, 1st grade

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This entry will be cross posted to the Leadertalk Blog

My colleagues and I got in an animated conversation the other day about the actual demonstrable skills teachers and administrators must have to be successful members of our school community.  Beyond the basics understandings that teachers must have of the new uses of the read/write web, what exactly do we expect our educational professionals to be able to use to enhance teaching and build better learners?

I’ve been pounding my fist of late in these meetings, demanding a well developed professional development plan that is clear, concise and has reasonable accountability build into it- with a sharp eye on the short term and a vision for what will be in year 2 and year 3 of the plan.  I personally feel it seems like a reasonable and common sense request, and as I have said over and over, I could probably sit down and write a draft myself, but that would not help us address what really needs to drive our school’s technology training strategy.  Then…out of the blue… it came out of one of the participants mouth. Their words (paraphrased and combined) were:

When are the school administration going to start holding teachers accountable and make them use technology and follow the technology plan?  We have NETS for Teachers in our performance evaluation program. We are working hard to ensure that training is in place for our teachers, but it will all be a huge waste of time if teachers are not held accountable.

Interesting thoughts indeed!  I didn’t say it but I wanted to hold someone else accountable.  Nonetheless, the conversation continued and what followed was a significant discussion about the frustrations of the technology specialists.  These folks are working long hours to prepare lessons for their peers in addition to preparing lessons for the students.  As we are all aware, adults are a lot more demanding than children and thus the time investment has been significant.  A typical PD session that is voluntary results in just a few “interested” teachers showing up, and the technology use being enhanced in classrooms where there is already integration already going on.  It is certainly not a loss, but it is not the gain we’re hoping for either.

So the question held in the air around us and we all were responsible for the answer.  Ultimately, we are talking about professional responsiblity and instructional excellence.  Ultimately, I feel it comes to making the standards and embedded skills in the standards managable and understandable for all members of the instructional community in a school.  One of the resources we are using to build from is a resource called “23 Things”. This group of educators has put together a great list of resources and concepts that they feel best addresses the current needs of a practicing teacher in a classroom. We took that list, analyzed it, and then added to it and adapted it in ways that will best meet our needs at our school.  What I think the 23 things and our additions and modifications does in this Professional Development Mashup is make the whole mess of what would seem to be disjointed applications, resources and skills into chunks of possibilities.  I would share it here, but it is not quite done. When it is, I will do so. But, the creation and formation of this structure does not answer the key question posed.  Are the administrators going to hold the teachers accountable?  If they are, do they have the will- the guts – the understanding of the technology to say “You must meet these standards or go find another school or another job?”

It is a tough call.  In 2000 the Center for Research on Information Technology and Organizations published a report called School Technology Leadership: Incidence and Impact.  In the report it states:

For technology to become an integral part of a school, it not only is necessary to help teachers use the technology but administrators must be involved in it, too. The importance of training for developing teachers in technology has long been recognized in the educational community. These findings indicate that administrative leadership and decision-making are equal, if not more important than spending on infrastructure to maintaining a successful technology program.

…Charismatic people may contribute to technology integration as well, but it is even more essential for a school to distribute leadership and become a “technology learning organization,” where administrators, teachers, students, and parents together work on how best to adapt new technologies to improve learning. (p. 17)

(Thank you Drape’s Takes for drawing my attention to this quote!)

After it is all said and done, I have to continue to believe that until we hold the ADMINISTRATORS accountable for understanding technology and exploiting the power of the web, we cannot and will not be able to hold our instructional staff accountable.  As was stated almost 9 years ago, it is the leaders who must build a “technology learning organization”.

What do you think?

Posted by Andrew Torris

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Reference:

• Anderson, R. & Dexter, S. (December 1, 2000). School Technology Leadership: Incidence and Impact. Center for research on information technology and organizations. I.T. in education, paper 98. Retrieved December 26, 2008 from
  http://repositories.cdlib.org/crito/education/98

Related articles…

• The Role of Leadership in Technology Integration
• Teachers that are Difference Makers
• Hacking the Curriculum
• Text Messaging Tips for Parents & Educators

I don’t often write about the technology work that is going on in my school as it feels a bit inappropriate to me to do so here, but I could not resist it this time. Amanda DeCardy, my wife is a technology integration specialist and the 8th grade team at her school just completed a wonderful integrated unit called “Heritage Project”.

Amanda writes on her school blog “From the Outside Looking in…” that

Over and over again, students made connections that ran deep into their heritage.  They were insightful young adults and definitely are making their first steps towards becoming high school students.  It always seems to happen around January and this project is proof of their growth throughout this unit of study.

This video struck me as such a wonderful integration of reading, writing, listening, speaking, research, as well as recognizing the human component that makes such a project so engaging for early adolescents.  Congratulations to this team and please go and check out this school’s blogs! They are doing great things!

I dream of the day when kids have full access to network services an usable computers to make this type of creativity available!

Heritage Project, Outside Looking In…, Amanda DeCardy, SAS, Shanghai American School, Pudong Middle School

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What is great about the new read/write/share web?  This kind of resource from an intelligent person I would probably never have a chance to learn from if it wasn’t for the internet. Check this video out!

Building Your Own Personal Learning Network from Carl Anderson on Vimeo.

Carl Anderson, Building Your Own Personal Learning Network

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Seems simple enough!  I read a lot of stuff. I write a fair amount.  I study things that interest me.  Can I be better at learning?

According to Kendra Van Wagner, I can with 10 simple tips that will bring me to a new level of learning!

For me, the key is number 2 on her list, which is to “keep learning and practicing new things”.  The old use-it-or-lose-it rule does apply here!

Kendra states in her article in psychology today that….

One sure-fire way to become a more effective learner is to simply keep learning. A 2004 Nature article reported that people who learned how to juggle increased the amount of gray matter in their occipital lobes, the area of the brain is associated with visual memory.¹ When these individuals stopped practicing their new skill, this gray matter vanished.

I don’t know about you, but I want to keep my gray matter around as long as possible!

Check out the article!

image courtesy of Cc: http://static.flickr.com/181/374910126_672cdaa6bc_t.jpg

learning, brain, psychology today

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I’ve been writing a lot about the importance of my own reflections recently.  One of my favorite blogs is written by a wonderful author and practicing school principal is Yardsticks, by Chip Wood a veteran educator and author of thirty-five years. He’s worked with and for children from pre-school through eighth grade as a classroom teacher, teaching principal, and teacher educator.  ALL elementary school teachers and administrators should read this blog!  What a great resource!

In his most recent post, A Most Important Time in the Classroom he writes:

I want to identify for teachers what I consider the most
significant time-related strategy to use with children in the classroom
in these days of the “hurried curriculum.” We’re so busy doing one
thing after another to accomplish all the lessons and assessments that
must fit in the academic day that we often feel we don’t have time for
this critical activity. What is it? Allowing time at the end of
instructional periods, but most especially at the end of the school
day, to teach and practice with our students the skill of reflecting
about their learning on their own, with each other, and with the
teacher.

Imagine what would happen if a school could institutionalize this sort of activity for all of it’s community members. Would be not be enhancing and embedding a life-long learning skill that would enhance not only retention of skills and concepts but also build a mentally healthy approach to our lives?

Something to think about.  Please go read Chip’s blog!

Yardsticks, Chip Wood, Reflections, A most important time in the classroom this year

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Many people often say to me that the onslaught of new media is complicating. For me it saves me loads of time.

One of the many, many things I do on a weekly basis is lead meetings, and after running 25-30 committee meetings over the last two years, my library of warmup activities is getting depleted.

I stumbled upon a link to Teampedia-Tools for Teams Wiki today.  This is a great resource that will make my life easier!

Teampedia is a collaborative encyclopedia of free team building
activities, free icebreakers, teamwork resources, and tools for teams
that anyone can edit! This site is designed for a wide
audience including: team leaders, trainers, teachers, managers, camp
directors, counselors, and youth groups.

The mission of Teampedia is to become the largets collection of resources to facilitate teambuilding, teamwork and community. On the wiki you will find resources for warmups, icebreakers, group facilitation and training activities.

I am going to make it a point to add to the resources and share what I do to get my meetings started and to keep them focused on success. I am by no means an expert, but I have had my successes (and MANY failures) of which I can share! I encourage you to do the same thing!

teambuilding, warmup activities, Teampedia

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I am beginning to think that the older and wiser of my colleagues may be actually right! (smile)

You know the old song….

“Slow down, you move to fast. You gotta make the mornin’ last….”  Feelin’ Groovy would be far from what I am feeling these days.  Heck.  I am at this moment feeling like the jet lag truck ran over my head and having just completed a bit of a journey downtown for a meeting via the subway (which was unusually empty today).

Anyway, I have found that the world is moving a bit too fast for me.  One of my key directives this year was to narrow my scope and manage my priorities. Not that I could not manage them before, but I had identified for myself that too much, too fast for too many people does not succeed for anyone.  Collectively, I believe a little more of a plodding pace will in fact create a more reflective and effective workspace for all of us.  Thus when I stumbled upon this bulletin board a couple of weeks ago in the hallway, I had to snap a picture of it.  The bulletin board was the responsibility of Mr. Jonathan Chambers who directed me to the Slow Blog Manifesto.

Huh??? Is this like short blogging?   No.. Todd Sieling writes that:

Slow Blogging is a rejection of immediacy. It is an affirmation that
not all things worth reading are written quickly, and that many
thoughts are best served after being fully baked and worded in an even
temperament. 

Why do I address this?  Frankly, I am now getting pretty tired of people out there creating content and NOT really thinking it through.  This paragraph that Todd writes really gets to it is….

Slow Blogging is speaking like it matters, like the pixels that give your words form are precious and rare. It is a willingness to let current events pass without comment. It is deliberate in its pace, breaking its unhurried stride for nothing short of true emergency. And perhaps not even then, for slow is not the speed of most emergencies, and places where beloved, reassuring speed rules the day will serve us best at those times.

So… slow down. Don’t move so fast.  Reflect and write.  Make your own slog blog manifesto.

Image from CC: http://static.flickr.com/166/346911307_e346eb9e17.jpg

slow blogging manifesto, reflections

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It was a good holiday for me this year. My lovely wife got me a new camera, so that means more of my photos on this blog this year and less from others. Probably more photos of my kids, and of a few of my trips here and there. I am back on the road at the end of this month to go recruiting again, and for those of you who are going to be in Iowa for the UNI fair or the Search Fair in Cambridge, please come up and say hi. After returning to Shanghai after being at the clear, clean and cold Pacific Northwest, Shanghai feels exceptionally gray, cold and… well… HUGE! My car ride to the Puxi campus felt as if it took forever and now on the way home, even longer.

Last week I was reading about how the new President’s stimulus package had money earmarked for educational technology support for schools in the US. My colleagues in the US seem to be optimistic about hopes for building better, more technologically “ready” schools. I have worked through a rather long process of organizing, designing and now building a new network infrastructure at my school this past year and a half.

It is not as easy as it sounds, and the pitfalls and processes that are involved are staggering, but I feel the time, energy and money expended will all be worth it. After all, you can’t have the kids use the superhighway of information in the classrooms without high speed on-ramps.

Things to consider:

• Quality consultations. My advice is don’t rely on resellers and industry “leaders” to provide you with solutions. Allow yourself the luxury of a person you can trust that can lead you through the process.
• Community support. Until the community, from the top to the bottom believe it is needed, you will not find your way to building this infrastructure. They must see the results in the way they source their information.
• Look at “add-ons” in a different way. Most schools don’t consider what a strong network solution can do for them in other ways. We are also adding a new phone system, security system and intercom system, all using the network system as the backbone. New technology solutions allow so much more to be driven over by power-over-ethernet (POE). The four for one deal seemed to good to be true for my community.
• Build your sandbox first. With the help of your technology leaders, build sandboxes for the students and staff to play in—such as video sharing installations, blogging installations, social media installations – all within our network. As you sell the idea of the network, demonstrate that you and your team are doing all you can to exploit what you have and connecting it all to curricular objectives.
• Don’t be afraid to demonstrate how slow your network really is for the kids. There is nothing like a failed network or a sssslllloooowwww network to show how painful waiting for information is for the kids. Pull up a webpage in front of a 100 people in an audience and then talk through what that is like for a teacher with 20+ kids in a classroom.
• Focus on expandable wireless options. Push your providers to SHOW you the options for the future and make them demonstrate it for your community. You will need to expand your network in the short term and I am guessing that wires will be the last way most of us will consider networking in the future. If Moore’s Law continues, then we may be looking at low cost expansions using plug and play wireless access points in the future.
• Allow your parents to have access to the old network. Promise them continued access to the “new” network. Hold open network mornings for Moms and Dads so they can see what can and cannot be done.

After you are done with the installation, focus your efforts on the use of your network and SHOW results. If you don’t, you won’t get anything else you ever ask for in the future.

Photo courtesy of CC: http://www.flickr.com/photos/8816624@N08/2899553904

technology infrastructure, wireless networks, educational technology, digital leadership

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