Leadership

The Amazing Thing About Technology

It amazes me that if we sometimes just step out of the way people can do amazing things with technology. I told my daughter (10 years old) about this site that I found besmurfed.com. She went to it and created her own smurf. No help required. To me that is amazing. As teachers if we give the kids a little more ‘play’ time we will be inspired by what they discover.

Lesson’s Learned

I had a couple of students do some research for current events in South America.  They were given 3 class periods (just over one hour) to find a current event and prepare to present it to the rest of the class, to become an expert in that class.  Being kids they went to Google and found a current event about Murder Captured by Google Street View.  While I may not agree with their choice of event, being kids it was something that interested them so I was intrigued on how they were going to present it.

 

 

So they got up in front of the class and began to show their PowerPoint.  We talked about proper font size and how it was not a good idea to read the information to the viewer.  The usual kind of things when first starting to work with students on when they are presenting on powerpoint.

As I was providing feedback to the students and they went to their last slide they brought up how it was a scam and that it was not actually a dead person that they had just staged it.  I quickly read the information that they had on their slide and looked at the images.  (here is the link)

 

Brazil to UK

What they had done is made an assumption that the page that they had found had to do with the same information.  In fact this scam was in the United Kingdom (around 8000 miles away).  The two presenters were so embarrassed.  I on the other hand was quite excited.  This was an opportunity!  We had a discussion about how it is important to check your facts and read your information.  Just because it is on Google doesn’t make it true!  After the class I had a chance to talk to the two students and one student came up to me and apologized for making a mistake and I replied that is sometimes the best way we learn.  She was confused on that statement so we talked about how many times we must have fallen before we could walk.  That is what learning is all about!

So to summarize I had a couple of students fail an assignment, and it was one of the best classes of the year!  As Brian Crosby puts it “Learning is Messy”.  But I love every day of it!

It’s Going to Space!

Louis CK had an interview with Conan (before he got punted by Jay Leno).  That made the rounds about a year or so ago Everything’s Amazing but no one is happy.

I was thinking about it today as I am waiting for a friend to finish their appointment.  Here I am, I have the world at my fingertips.  I have the twitter feed running.  Gmail, school email, going through my rss feeds and writing at the same time, access to so much information.  Then I started thinking of when I first started in education 15 years ago.  There is no way I would have the ability or technology to do this when I began teaching.

So my question to myself is why am I still teaching the same way as I did 15 years ago?  Sure I have adapted to the changing world and added technology to the assignments but don’t feel like I have done anything transformational.  I am hoping that the Canadian PLP cohort will be the catalyst to change all of that.

Powerful Learning Practice (PLP) is a course rather a chance to become a better educator.

PLP is:

“Global, online learning communities offer an unprecedented opportunity for teachers and students to follow and connect around their passions. But they also challenge almost every aspect of traditional schooling as we know it.”

– http://plpnetwork.com/plp-overview/

I am sitting here running through possible scenarios in my mind, thinking about the tough questions Will Richardson will ask that no one really has the answers to.  Knowing that no matter what, my teaching practices will change.  As educator I feel that I have a huge opportunity to become a part of a much larger community.

I am excited about the possibility of PLP and can’t wait for the journey to begin.

More to come, but it has to go to space . . .

Use Your Strengths

Recently attended an elluminate session on Digital Citizenship.   On it it had a panel that discussed the idea of what Digital Citizenship was and what it looked liked in education.  On the panel they had a teacher, an IT director, member of the board of education, school principal, and student.  The student had the most effect on the group and was asked the most questions and I thought he did a very good job.  He spoke with a great voice that I wish more students had, and more teachers could hear.

Towards the end I indicated that the frustration that many teachers feel that change is happening too slow and that the ones that want to create change are in a minority.  I then recieved a tweet from @jbrianshields:

tweet from @jbrianshields

It was for me quite profound.  Here I was preaching to the wrong people, instead of whining about it to other teachers.  I needed to go to my employer, the students themselves.  I need to teach students the importance of #edtech and count on those students to drive change in our schools.  It took a stranger to remind me who we all work for, the kids.  Thanks for the tip Brian, I will hopefully put it to good use.

Waiting for Superman

Waiting for Superman is an upcoming movie that has recently caused a lot of controversy for many teachers. With the recent Oprah episode about the movie, there has been quite a bit of discussion about schools and educators. I can remember when the first trailers came out there were so many people pledging to see the movie (myself included). Now teachers have their defenses up and are very wary about the movie.

I look at this in two ways. First how easy it is for a 2 minute preview to inspire, intrigue and fool people into believing what they want to believe. I saw it as a potential for the world to see that education is broken and that we need to fix it by revamping the whole system. To look at diferentiated learning, scaffolding and project based learning as a requirement for the future of our youth.

Second I look at this controversy and see how protective teachers are of themselves and their profession. Now I agree that Oprah should have gotten both sides of the story instead of just getting the wealthy to talk about education. But also as teachers we must realize that we have fallen behind in this digital age and are still teaching in analog mode. In Canada teachers have one of the most powerful unions around. If we really wanted to create change we could have done it.  Instead many teachers have enjoyed the status quo, doing it the way it has always been done, while the world changes around us.

Myself I am excited to see “Waiting For Superman” I hope it creates good conversations and helps us get out of our ‘kryptonite’ funk of indifference to our changing world around us.

Hello World?

Well this is my first public post in the world of blogging. Have been a lurker and a private blogger for far too long. During that time I have taken advantage of so many fantastic people in the educational technology world, borrowing their ideas and thoughts from sites like twitter and through my rss reader. I figured it is time to give back and try to make a difference. . . we will see how it goes.

It has been a huge change for me with regards to my teaching assignment. I am now 1/2 time at the school that I have been a part of for the past 12 years. While I am sad that I am no longer at a school that I have called my home full time. I am excited to be in a new position with Battle River School Division #31. My 1/2 time position with BRSD#31 is working in the area of technology and special education and have so far had a terrific start to the year. The other 1/2 time I am teaching elementary for the first time in my career and loving it!

Probably the main reason that I am loving teaching elementary (grade 5 to be specific) is that I get to teach my son. I never knew how it was going to be teaching my children. I have coached them in many sports and I have been told by many people that I am too hard on them. For me the reason I was so hard on them is that I never wanted to seem like I was favortizing (is that a word?) them. I believe that the coaches kid needs to be the hardest working smartest one on the team. That same mentality has come up in my son’s classroom but it doesn’t seem to bother him. I am amazed to see him growing right in front of my eyes and how he is developing into a responsible young man.

I am looking forward to the challenges of a new class, new curriculum and a new job. Am hoping to take much of my peers ideas and help change my students way that they learn. So that they can learn without me and I will just be there to help them navigate through the rough parts.