21st Century Learning

Powerful Learning Practice- Powerful Indeed

This post may be premature as I have only seen 2/3s of the PLP Independent Schools' team presentations of their impact journey through PLP and team projects- but I must say, Will and I were more than impressed. It was more on the level of WOW.

From extensive summer institutes with a Web 2.0 registration process for other schools to attend (all taught by the team members) to an 8th grade project that will utilize the best that Web 2.0 has to offer in a project based format implemented by all 8th grade teachers next year to a creative Lunch 2.0 project or school-based wikis with all digital curriculum shared and more, we found ourselves renewed in the faith that schools can make principled changes in the way we "do" school as a way to remain relevant in the lives of the students we teach. Independent school culture is such that teachers need to make certain they build on the rich heritage of what works and yet make room to rethink delivery of AP courses and such so that these kids not only get into some of the most prestigious colleges around, but they are fluent in the new literacies when they arrive.

All the project plans will be shared on the Independent School wiki after the remaining 1/3 of the teams present next week.

Cohorts are forming for next year's Powerful Learning Practice opportunity. If you are interested in learning more visit http://plpnetwork.com

So Much to Say-- So Little Time

There is a price to be paid for community driven learning- TIME. There are only so many hours in a day to invest in reading, learning, writing, and all that goes with being part of a community of learners. The benefits far outweigh the cost, so I am not complaining, however, it is beginning to impact the time I had previously devoted to blogging.

I was reading a post on Our Virtual Class Blog called 2.0 Riptide. He quotes Konrad Glogowski who after finishing his dissertation establishes research questions that  he hopes to be able to work on in the near future:

1. How do we prepare teachers to teach 21st century learners whose lives are based on rich interactions in multiple online environments?
2. How do we help new teachers move away from what Marshall McLuhan once called the “imposing of stencils” and adopt a practice of probing and exploration?
3. How do we help new teachers acquire the courage to transform their classrooms into communities of learners and transform themselves into participants who can embed themselves in those communities?

These questions are near and dear to my heart because they are the very questions I have found myself grappling with for the last four years. As I have shared before, years of experience working in several large projects that look directly at these very  issues (ENDAPT, TLN, ABPC 21st Century Learners, ASSETOnline and now Powerful Learning Practice) it seems I keep coming full circle to networking, community of practice, true collaboration and what my friend John Norton terms "mutual accountability" among teachers.

MUTUAL ACCOUNTABILITY
John asked recently on TLN, "What's the difference between "negative competitiveness" and a willingness to trade narrow accountability measures from the outside for collaborative accountability -- where teachers hold one another accountable for teaching quality? He suggests that until teachers seize that ground, they will always be on the defensive and easy targets for top-down reform.

One teacher's response caught my attention-

Teachers need to be seen as professional leaders in their districts and communities, leaders able to work together to improve student learning...  Teachers are either working as silos, not interested in collaboration, or scared to show their areas of vulnerability for fear of ridicule or reprisal.

To "[seize] that ground", convincing administrators, public opinion, media, etc. that collaborative accountability is the best method for improvement, I believe we must expand our playing field.  We need to seize the grounds of media and public opinion regarding education, testing, school and community partnerships, and the nature of improvement and change.  This requires organization.  Where is the teacher voice?

Then it hit me, this is exactly where participatory media can make its biggest impact. Allowing teachers to network together online first - forming personal learning networks around areas of passion and interest and gaining comfort and trust in the nonthreatening use of the medium helps to give teachers the confidence they need to use these tools to hold each other accountable for learning.  Using tools like Twitter, Tapped In, NING, Blogs, wikis, Ustream, Diigo, Elluminate, etc, teachers who understand how to "seize the ground" can apprentice teachers who are emergent in their understanding of such concepts. Conversing and working at it together in spaces that are somewhat separate from the local context, educators can learn within the safety net of the community and develop the self-efficacy skills and boldness needed to generalize what they are learning to their local context.

WHY IS IT EASIER TO COLLABORATE TOGETHER ONLINE THAN IN OUR SCHOOLS?
One of my consulting projects this year has been CTQ's ASSETOnline project. I have had the wonderful experience of working with Anne Jolly, a professional learning community expert. In a recent conversation online she asked teachers if they liked collaboration and if not, why not. In her true researcher form she compiled the results.

Frustrations that lead to a preference for working alone in some cases.
These include . . .

1.  Not knowing what collaboration really means
2.  Not knowing what is actually expected from those collaborating
3.  Insufficient implementation support
4.  Not finding real value in collaboration
5.  Different teaching philosophies among participants/ little to share
6.  Doesn't spring from teacher's needs
7.  Dictates and limits from administrators about content for collaborative meetings
8.  Teachers left out of decision-making
9.  Lack of modeling/understanding of collaboration by administrators
10. Need space to be creative - tricky to do this in teams
11. Lack of training for collaboration
12. Lack of trust and comfort in sharing with other teachers - feeling threatened
13.  Not enough time
14.  Getting everyone on the team on the same page is hard
15.  "I don't like meetings!"  :-) - a waste of time that could be spent grading and preparing
16.  Need more time for self-reflection rather than group reflection
17.  Others on the team pass off other's work as their own
18.  Too much talk and not enough action
19.  Not enough clout - except in the classroom
20.  One person does all the work
21.  Merit pay breeds competitiveness rather than sharing
22.  The education system is designed for isolation - and the status quo is strong
23.  The atmosphere can be punitive
24.  The school setting doesn't support collaboration
25.  Teachers are overwhelmed and trying to survive difficult situations
26.  Lack of communication about changes and the reason for changes

Feeling that collaboration works at times too, such as when  . . .
1.  Teachers see value in the collaboration
2.  Teachers have similar teaching philosophies and complementary skills
3.  Collaboration is more natural and spontaneous than structured
4.  Collaboration springs from teachers' needs
5.  Collaboration is not mandated
6.  Teachers make decisions about what they collaborate on
7.  Administrators practice what they preach
8.  The atmosphere is trusting, respectful, and comforting
9.  The school is successful at supporting collaboration
10. Teachers have time to think through together what they want for their kids
11. There is time for introspection as well as collaboration

I am curious-
How do you feel about collaboration?  Do you feel safe enough in your school to "seize the ground" or do you hesitate to share for fear of ridicule or reprisal. Do you feel collaboration online is easier than it is locally in your own schools or organizations? Or do you feel the same hesitancy to publish and as a result become "clickable?" Do walled gardens (private online communities of practice)  make you feel safer in terms of being transparent enough to hold each other accountable for what kids are learning in our schools?

What is your take?

 

Living Under the Rainbow

I have finally surfaced from my doctoral COMPS preparation. On Tuesday, after I had penned the last words and hit submit on the prompts that serve as the gateway to demonstrating if I have what it takes to be a researcher and academic, I came home to this beautiful rainbow. I immediately went out searching for the pot of gold! <smile>
Then I realize- I have it already.

Lately, I find myself living under the rainbow. There have been so many really exciting things happening. My brain stays constantly challenged, which is just the way I prefer it.

Shanghai and Learning 2.0
The travel was amazing coming to China. Sure- it was long flights, layovers, and cramped- but still, it was amazing. Why? Several reasons:

First, I am traveling with my 21 yr old son Noah. I am more pumped about that then coming to China and presenting.
Noah is the most interesting young man. Our house is a very busy one. All of us work and attend school. We always have. In addition, all of us have passions and hobbies, so as a result, there isn't a lot of time to talk and share. So the flight was spent with the two of us sharing ideas about the books we were reading on the plane. Noah was reading "The Code Book" which is about the history of cryptography. It was fascinating listening to him describe his insights as he was gaining them. I came to the realization that he had grown into the kind of person I would actually choose to hang out with-

even if he wasn't family.

Second,  I am traveling with Wes and Shelly Fryer, and Will Richardson. On the plane, Will and I kept knocking ideas around in between jokes, sharing passages from the books we were reading with each other and sharing small nuances of life we feel are important. Then it hit me, relationships are the beginning of wisdom. I realized while talking with Will, that vision starts with relationships; whether it is relationship with kids, colleagues, or our communities- vision begins with connecting ideas. None of us could get over the surrealness of actually flying around the world and landing in a communist country. I have had the good fortune of having traveled many places around the world, but never to Asia.   

To show you the difference between where I am now and where I live. We get a notice under our door- Dear Guests- We have received notice from our government: The People's Government will deploy a test of aerial defense in the Pudong New Area. Do not be alarmed.

On another note--Check out these cool tunnel pics I took at the Detroit airport.

 

Finally-- a pic not to be missed. We land in Tokyo and this is on the TV in the waiting room. Classic!

Senior Year: A Teenage Wasteland

My brilliant friend Mary Tedrow posted this piece over on Teacher Magazine. It is a must read.

Senior Year: A Teenage Wasteland
In 2001, the U.S. Secretary of Education Richard W. Riley called the high school senior year a "wasteland." In 2005, researchers concluded that the majority of high school students were not challenged during their senior year in reading, writing, or math. To many teachers who work with high school seniors, these findings ring true. They best apply to the wide swath of "average" students who travel the featureless landscape called senior year. Teacher Magazine, 8/1/07 (free registration required)

To give you a taste of why the free registration is worth it, here is a piece from the article as Mary describes what the senior year *could* be...

I would go a large step further and treat the senior year as a unique capstone experience. By eliminating strict scheduling, a team of teachers and counselors could shepherd seniors through a meaningful transition. Students could work with teachers to design a schedule that would include coursework, apprenticeships, and community activities. Seniors could also accept ownership in the school community by participating in tutoring, student courts, in-house television and radio programs, designing and writing school publications, maintaining websites, or even helping interview prospective teachers. In short, let kids test the waters. Let them make decisions in close mentorship with adults.

I say-- YES. And let's take it a step further. Let's imagine the entire school experience being that meaningful. Why stop at one year?

Mary Tedrow, a National Board-certified teacher, has taught high school English and Journalism for 17 years. In the fall she will begin teaching juniors at John Handley High School in Winchester, VA.

Learning 2.0

The slow one now
Will later be fast
As the present now
Will later be past
The order is
Rapidly fadin'.
And the first one now
Will later be last
For the times they are a-changin'.

Bob Dylan 

When the World Wide Web first emerged as a global phenomenon, most of us defined it in 20^th Century terms. Many Web users, including educators, still think about the Web primarily as an information repository--even though there is ample evidence it has evolved into something more. Today, as we surf the Internet, we see endless examples of the Web’s ability not just to serve up content, but to empower us to share our imaginations, insights and opinions. If we're "a mind to," we can add to the world's understanding and advocate for positive change.

Web 2.0 – and ultimately School 2.0 -- is all about this two-way or group communication. The Web is no longer just a place to search for resources. It’s a place to find people, to exchange ideas, to demonstrate our creativity before an audience. The Internet has become not only a great curriculum resource but a great learning resource. The second generation Web is in fact, laying the foundation for ideas such as Classroom 2.0, Teacher 2.0 and Learning 2.0.

Personally, I still struggle when trying to explain concepts that simply have out paced the educational jargon we have available to describe them. 

"If you want to project a cool, web-savvy persona, just tack 2.0 on the end of something." - Anonymous

Twitter Takes

I threw the question to my Twitter community to see if they too struggled with the concept or term Learning 2.0. Here are their responses:

Jane Nicholls, " I can understand Web 2.0 and School 2.0 but learning 2.0 is taking it a bit far."
Christian Long, " I am not sure 'learning 2.0' exists if we're sincere about universal act of 'learning'. Tools are another thing entirely.
Paul Harrington, "In my case it is the term learning, as Learning is the pedagogy of School 2.0. I would call myself a lifelong learner - how I achieve it may vary along the way.
Ewan McIntosh, "   Learning 2.0? No such thing. Learning 2.0 is mostly tried and tested pedagogy made more possible with tools that fit the bit: assessment for learning, x-curric, mixmedia."

I think Brain Crosby came closest to how I would spin it. " Learning 2.0 is shared knowledge, constructed through Inquiry based, networked, digitally enabled collaborative conversation, using Web 2.0 applications."

Goodbye, Seats and Rows

Web 2.0, or what others have called "the read-write web" (and most recently called "participatory media"), is transforming the traditional structures of many of our most important institutions, including (very slowly) our schools. 

We have to ask ourselves: What happens to traditional concepts of classrooms, teaching and most importantly learning when we can now learn anything, anywhere, anytime?  How and will Web 2.0 shape the way we learn- Is there such a thing as Learning 2.0?

Roger Schank's thinking suggests that, "technology is not additive, in that it doesn't change some things, it changes everything." If that is true, and I believe it is, then learning has to be impacted when we begin to use different methods and cognitive structures for processing information. As the evolutionary process of the technologies and learning strategies we use in the classroom change and seek to improve pedagogy in an exponential fashion, we are going to realize that the innovation (the mash-up of 20th Century teaching ideas) will begin to build upon itself and continue to accelerate to the point where what takes place in terms of learning in the 21st Century is very different, not just a variation of times past.

Schank's  Law

Because people understand by finding in their memories the closest possible match to what they are hearing and use that match as the basis of comprehension, any new idea will be treated as a variant of something the listener has already thought of or heard. Agreement with a new idea means a listener has already had a similar thought and well appreciates that the speaker has recognized his idea. Disagreement means the opposite. Really new ideas are incomprehensible. The good news is that for some people, failure to comprehend is the beginning of understanding.For most, of course, it is the beginning of dismissal.

Learning is about making schematic connections. Where we attach new knowledge to our existing understandings.  The a-ha moment.  Piaget calls it moving from disequilibrium to assimilation of the new ideas. Learning 2.0 for me is the jumping off place where we not only have attached the new ideas to the old and assimilated, but we have made peace with the fact that we might have to unlearn much of the knowledge with which we started. It is by developing an adaptive expertise that we begin to innovate in such a way where the innovation becomes multiplicative, not additive and that in my opinion is Learning 2.0. It is also the uncomfortable place where we find ourselves as educators- having to unlearn and adapt. Teaching today puts the teacher in the role of chief learner, who ideally is modeling these lifelong adaptive learning strategies for her students.

What's a Teacher To Do?

Think about it. The media rich generation of school-aged kids today have visually pleasing information at their fingertips – "input" that is constantly popping, sparking and competing for their attention. They bring the world into their brains via cell phones, handheld gaming devices, PDAs, and laptops that they take everywhere. They are truly mobile. And at home they "mainline" electronic media in the form of computers, TV, and collaborative video games they play with users from around the world. If they choose, they can go and live a Second Life online, creating an avatar to explore the virtual terrain of a complete world, with its own economy, real estate, entertainment activities and, yes, even schools.

Everywhere the Digital Generation goes in society, technology beacons. The future is rushing at them full speed ahead. Until, that is, they enter the learning zone (cue Rod Serling). When they cross the threshold of most of our public schools, it's like stepping back in time. As one high school freshman said to a national pollster: "When I go to school, I have to power down.” When many of our students are already building networks far beyond our classroom walls, forming communities around their passions and their talents, it's not hard to understand why rows of desks and time-constrained schedules and standardized tests are feeling more and more limiting and ineffective. We can almost hear the our students humming along with Pink Floyd, "Teachers, leave those kids alone."

Learning 2.0 is about these core components:

Knowledge: Realizing, that with knowledge increasing at its current rate "none of us is as good as all of us." No one can master all the content that comprises a particular discipline.  Our job is to help students and ourselves become producers of knowledge and to help each other understand the transformative potential of Web 2.0 tools in a global perspective and context. Learning 2.0 is about reversed mentorship and transforming our classrooms into learning ecologies. 

Pedagogy: Creating an understanding of the shifting learning literacies that the 21 Century demands and how those literacies translate to classroom practice. Ultimately, 21^st Century teaching is constructivist teaching, using digital technologies and the Internet; John Dewey revisited or Alan Levine's Rip Mix Learn.

Connections: Modeling for students (and in some cases them modeling for us) the creation of sustained professional learning networks where we can all begin experimenting and sharing with online colleagues from around the world. Learning 2.0 is about making connections to content experts and using the new tools for 21st Century scholarship.

Capacity: Today’s web technologies make it possible to build formal and informal human networks -- using tools like blogs, wikis, and social networking software -- to build human capital in our students in such a way that they become the visionaries for giving back to society in an effort to end human suffering.

Emergent Understanding

Times are a-changin' - this is not business as usual, but business as unusual. But together we can begin to get our minds around these concepts. We can ask ourselves and each other the tough questions. We can let all the stakeholders, even students, use their voices in finding our way in this new learning landscape as we grasp for new syntax to describe 21st Century learning phenomena.