21st Century Learning

Planning for 21st Century Instruction

In his book, Shirky describes a "ladder of activities that are enabled or improved by social tools" in which "The rungs on the ladder, in order of difficulty, are sharing, cooperation, and collective action." (Here Comes Everybody, p.49).

While I am sure Shirky never intended for anyone to use these steps as a planning tool for scaling lessons and helping students own their own learning and build their own networks, I do think the four verbs work nicely for 21st Centuryizing (if you will) what we could be doing in the classroom.

I suggest that these constructs should be used, if used at all, as a scaffolding or spiraling framework. Online we can be sharing-connecting & collaborating at the same time and at different levels.

Basically, my current thinking is you can take any of the current 21st Century skills lists-- for example Wagner's "7 Survival Skills" or Linda Darling Hammond's "Changing Expectations for Learning" and you still get individuals publishing and sharing at best.

The ideas I am playing with now take the highest level of the new Bloom's Create and move it out from there to community. Living in a participatory culture (Jenkins, 2007) suggests that we need to move from a traditional classroom framework to a community framework and that in doing so the focus moves from the individual creating and publishing to the community collaborating and taking action.

It isn't enough for my colleagues or my students to be engaged and sharing with each other in the isolation of the classroom. Instead we need to understand how to publish our work and ideas to an authentic audience (teachers first and then model, once they own it, for students).

But it shouldn't stop there- because once we share our thinking online, others will find it and begin to connect to us via the medium. And from those connections we will find others with passionate interests similar to ours. We will begin to build a professional network of learners. And from that network we may decide to collaborate around a shared interest or passion as a means to learn and grow. And who knows-- from there we may find a project that will address the common good and bring even more caring individuals into a situated learning community which is starting to develop around our shared interest.

What I am trying to do is find a way teachers and students can think about/explore their passions and take them beyond the walls of a classroom to the community. A place where kids can learn what they need, when they need to learn it- rather than learning according to some artificial curriculum plan (Papert, 2004). And from those connections begin to understand how to build and leverage the potential of their PLNs and CoPs in ways that will take them through life.

Currently, I am trying to place these ideas in a grounded context while at the same time conducting some action research to see how they play out as a planning tool for teachers in "21st Centuryizing" their instruction.

http://abpc.wikispaces.com/21st+Centurizing+Lessons

Australia- ELH Conference in Lorne

I met Bruce through Will and I have to tell you from Day 1 I was impressed. Bruce Dixon is the founder and president of the Anywhere, Anytime Learning Foundation and consults to schools, school districts, education departments, Ministries of Education as well as technology companies such as Microsoft, hp-Compaq, Apple, Bertelsmann and Toshiba on 1-to-1 and technology in education. Bruce has more than 25 years experience working with schools and technology and besides that he and his staff really know how to put on a first rate conference. 

It was a joy to meet  Bernajean Porter and Mary Burns, other keynoters at the conference and very smart women who understand the importance of 21st Century educational reform.

I left John's home and started the trek toward Lorne where the conference would be held taking in the beauty and history of the Great Ocean Road.

 

  

 

We all met for lunch at a place along the way called "At the Heads" and then on to the conference hotel in Lorne called the Mantra Erskine Beach Resort.

One of the most amazing things to us in Australia was the variety of animals and plants. Here at the resort cockatoos from the wild congregated on our porch. They would eat right out of your hand.

The beach was right out our hotel room back door and was so beautiful.

Some of you may remember this famous Indian.

 The conference itself was excellent. I got to meet so many smart people, some of whom I knew online and some I met for the first time.

The secret here is that even though I looked calm and collective my zipper broke on these pants minutes before I went on stage and I had to use the AV guy's duck tape to tape them to me so they wouldn't fall down. Hahahaha!

Another highlight of the conference was the critical conversations around broad themes. I learned so much during these sessions. I wish these were a key part of all f2f conferences.

    

The social events at the conference were just as educational as the sessions. Lots of networking and deep dialog.

Here I am talking to one of the other keynoters, Mary Burns. The gentleman is Mike Valentine who is a leader at Hale School where I presented in Perth. He was amazing and did a wonderful presentation on passion-based learning at the conference.

We ended our time in Lorne by celebrating Bernajean's significant birthday. Can't think of a more perfect place to celebrate a milestone than with Bruce and gang in Australia. Thanks for the memories.

 
The next post will be the last of the Australia posts and will cover my time in Perth!

Good Day Mate

Sheryl's excellent adventure started in Australia! I was invited to keynote the ELH conference in Victoria, Australia.  As I was preparing to go an amazing thing happened that shows the power of the network. I had announced on Twitter I was going and lo and behold the most wonderful direct message came through, "Hi Sheryl are you interested in staying over at our place in Portarlington during your visit http://snurl.com/3hdn0?" John Pearce / mrpbps. John is an amazing author, presenter, and scientist. His wisdom about flora and fauna just blew me away and made my trip so much more valuable on a personal level.

Well if you clicked on the link you can see John's place is just north of heaven. We had such a wonderful time with John and his wife. He took us to the zoo and gave us the grand tour around Melbourne. It turns out his wife was also a bike enthusiast so we got to see the bike shops and David (David and his daughter Maegan went with me as a surprise for her 18th birthday and high school grad gift) even went for a ride. Their home was simply lovely and they were the most gracious of hosts.

The highlight of the evening was attending a blogger's dinner and meeting so many people I had come to respect through their writing. The Melbourne part of my journey started with meeting Jenny Luca f2f. I got off the plane and Jenny picked me up at my hotel and whisked me away to present at her beautiful school. I swear it was like being in Harry Potter. It was a pleasure meeting Jenny as she is an important part of the work I am doing with Will through PLP. Jenny is the Australian host school leader.

Take a look at the pictures and I will describe the next leg of the adventure in the next post.

John Pearce and I meet and tour the zoo.

Maegan, John Pearce, Sheryl and David at the zoo in Melbourne, Australia

 

 

 

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This guy's rear end was like cotton candy!

Melbourne at night.

Vicki and John Pearce with Lauren O Grady http://ogrady.globalteacher.org.au/

It was fun seeing Sue Tapp again. We met the first time at NECC. http://andanotherthing-sue.blogspot.com/

John telling the story about the one that got away!

Pam Arvanitakis http://pamelarvo.blogspot.com/

Lauren and Jo McLeay http://theopenclassroom.blogspot.com/

The Melbourne Bloggers- Darren Murphy, Sue Tapp, Me, Lauren OGrady, Pam and Jenny Luca

Biking with Vicky near her home.

 

Sitting at John's home surfing the Web.

Learning to Learn

My life has been a whirlwind of activity since NECC and I have found it hard to keep up with blogging. I don't know why, but I feel guilty blogging when I have other deadlines looming. Do any of you experience that? Is it illogical? Should I blog anyway, much like we still get the day to day things done at work or home, even when we have extra tasks on our "to do" lists. Or should I put 100% of my attention toward the deadlines and follow Grandmas' rule of "work before play"?

I'd love to hear your take.

Disclaimer: Blogging is like play for me- sheer enjoyment. Not necessarily the writing, as for me the writing doesn't come easy, but the thrill of the hits and conversation that follows does.

Community Driven System
The purpose of stealing moments away from my already full agenda this morning though to share my experiences of the last week. I came to realized more than ever that I am a community driven woman. I believe in the power of the community, the wisdom of the crowd, that the network is more powerful than the node and that none of us are as good as all of us. I believe that School 2.0 means moving from a classroom system to a community system. And now more than ever I also believe that about PD and I mean all PD- conferences(e.g. K12Online08), workshops (e.g. most recently CABOCES Summer Instititue), ongoing, job embedded sync and asysn (e.g. PLP) and as a result I am going to change my keynotes even more to flow from a community model as well. As I reflected over the last week, I realized even my family operates as a community. I am no loan wolf.

CABOCES Summer Institute
One week ago I landed in Buffalo and was greeted by Rick Weinberg who took me to Selemanca where I would be spending the next week working with educators from the surrounding area. When the day drew closer to the conference Rick shared that unexpectedly numbers were down. I gave him the opportunity to cancel rather than bring me out for just a few people, (I am knee deep in buying my first home in Va and could have used the time) but Rick was firm that they wanted to move forward. I am so glad he made that decision because this week was an incredible week of learning for me personally.

Here are my take aways...

1. When you are focused on educational reform from a community perspective- more is not always better.

 Monday- I had 10 administrators who were with me for one day. The small number enabled me to spend time personally getting to know each attendee. I invited Karen Richardson, Chris Lehmann, and Jon Becker to attend a panel discussion answering their concerns and questions. You can listen to the panel discussion here. The strength of intimacy because of such a small number of participants in the room made me realize that relationship is a more powerful tool when trying to leverage change than having large numbers of people in a room who are passively listening to you talk.

John Norton's wine glass metaphor rings true here- (He was drinking a glass of wine when it occurred to him- hence the name) that it is better to have small numbers of highly engaged people when influencing school reform than hundreds of folks who show up but walk away unchanged by the experience.

Also, on Friday when we knew our numbers would be minimal and we had such brilliant panel members coming from the community (Darren Kuropatwa, Kevin Honeycutt, Allanah King, and Mark Clemente) we made it a teachable moment. We spontaneously opened the Elluminate session up to the world (and the world indeed showed up) and we used Ustream and a chat channel as well to show if you offer quality the community will come to you- no matter how rural or small you are.

2. My belief was reinforced that for most newbies, teaching tools in isolation is too overwhelming and a waste of time.

Tuesday I tried to lay the foundation and set the context. I also wanted to help attendees understand today's digital learner. Wes Fryer (Oklahoma), Laura Deisley (Atlanta), Meg Ormiston (Illinois), and Sue Waters (Australia) talked about personal learning networks and the tools that support them (listen in here) on Wednesday. On Thursday my plan was to look more closely at tools and their pedagogy and how they best relate to various instructional activities and then on Friday to create inquiry based instruction with an interactive model of building a PBL mini-unit. For the most part things went according to plan, but Thursday's tools, tools, and more tools left me feeling overwhelmed and tense. I know if I had been a newbie in that audience not having been given the opportunity to use the tools in a meaningful application, I would have been frustrated. The idea was to create an awareness of the tools, not mastery, so that on Friday when we created lessons using the TPCK model we would have a web 2.0 list of applications from which to choose. The result though was painful, at least for me.

I brainstormed with Rick Weinberg and Tim Clarke afterward and what we felt would have worked better was to have four tables- with one of us at each table presenting a tool. Our presentations would include the tool, an activity using the tool, and a chance to reflect on best uses of the tool. Then after 45 minutes we would break for 15 and then could present another tool. We would do that three times (12 tools) and participants could choose which tools they wanted to learn.

I really believe that the best examples of tool instruction are within the context of what you are learning. Like our heating and cooling system they should be invisible. The only time we focus on our heating and cooling is when they aren't working properly. Then we have to focus on the tool itself and decide why it isn't working.

Even Bill Fitzgerald (Funny Monkey) after his discussion on Open Source tools left the attendees with the idea of forgetting the tool- focusing instead on what you want kids to know and be able to do- then figuring out the right task and tool for the job to help kids achieve their goal.

3. What is most important to 21st Century educational reform is to listen to kids.

On Tuesday, I decided to create a panel of kids from 11th grade to college juniors and talk to them about their reflections on technology. It was the most inspiring part of my week long work. I am still learning from all they taught me during that hour. Meet Gracie, Maegan, Ryan, Jay, Danny, Christian, Thomas, Will and Jesse. You won't be sorry you did.

4. Teachers need time to reflect, explore, and build in the safety net of your workshop.

Teachers, like kids, need you to model and then let them explore authentic use with you there to help. They need to understand how to create lesson plans that use the tools in meaningful ways, but then they need to actually collaborate together to build activities that they can use in school; activities that leverage the potential of these new mediums for connecting and collaborating.

Typically, in my workshops I only have time to present the shift and the tools- never to actually jump to the most important step of helping teachers contextualize what they are learning. I walked away from this week realizing that this step is what is missing in school reform and is why in my opinion, that change is happening so slowly.

The most exciting time of the conference for me personally was to watch the groups choose a topic- create a concept web, a curriculum web, choose appropriate standards, an essential pedagogy, an appropriate tool and develop several lessons that all integrated not only core disciplines but fell together under a theme, project or problem. The creative juices really began to flow as we constructed together a killer initiating activity that would usher in our year long project and the lessons we would use to teach state mandated content from a passion-based perspective. The tools made sense because they were merely a means to an end- helping students learn about things that interested them from the perspective of a scientist, historian or author.

I am thankful to CABOCES for being willing to invest the time that allowed their educators to not only gain an awareness but to deeply reflect, discuss, and wrestle with the concepts- while facilitators and their newly formed PLN stood by to help them make informed choices about change.

Powerful Learning Practice-Creating Online Communities for Professional Development

Spotlight NECC08 Session with Will Richardson
This session will describe the work done by the presenters in creating a sustainable model for ongoing professional development using 21st Century technologies.

I have to admit that we were nervous about this presentation. Not the presentation part (Will and I do this "on stage" thing together a lot) but rather the what exactly do we share part. Will and I agreed that what we didn't want was a commercial or a presentation that smacked of "hey look at us-- we are the experts" or something that tried to imply we had *the*answer. What we wanted to convey was that we are all in this together. Here is what *we* know about using community for PD from our varied experiences- now share with us what *you* know and together-- we can get this thing figured out.

The session went well (if you do not count the room being 100 degrees) in that I think we helped folks think about how they could use virtual PLCs in their schools/districts to implement change. Some folks approached us about modeling the techniques and helping to lay the framework to get them started. Others were excited to have a place to start developing their own models.

I'd be interested in your thoughts on using community as a PD methodology and a way to implement sustainable change. Ideas?

Here is a Ustream and Live blog of part of the session. If you have a recording of this session to share please link here in comments.

ABPC 21st Century Learners Quarterly Meeting

While I obviously haven't been blogging- I have been fast at it. I would say I have been busy, but Dean Shareski (our new convener for K12Online)  has taught me we are all busy and I am not suppose to talk about how busy I am, but rather just talk about what I have been up to lately.

I keep a running "to-do" board above my desk. Lately, there have been too many "to-do" items to fit them all. My life is full of meaning, exciting and that word I am not suppose to say (whispering ...busy). So busy in fact that I forgot to share about one of my most passionate interests.

ABPC 21st Century Learners- Year 3 Culminating
Anyone who has followed me knows that one true passion I have is the incredible work I am helping to deliver in Alabama around 21st Century literacies. On May 1 we had our culminating celebration for this year's 21st Century Learners journey.

What Was Different in Year 3?
In a word-- students. ABPC's leader, Cathy Gassenheimer felt this year's project with schools needed to have an clear connection to student achievement.  We wanted to developmentally move teachers along the continuum of use and understanding of the transformative potential of 21st Century teaching and learning strategies to actually applying them in the classroom.

We created a student strand and added students as members of the team. Together we looked at how to change teaching to a self-directed process tied to student passion and rigor, as well are core curriculum standards.

During the culminating event students and other team members were led in a fishbowl exercise that turned out to be the most enlightening experience I have had so far in working towards 21st Century educational reform. Students were asked hard questions about how they learn best and evidence of those strategies used by teachers in classrooms. They were asked what do teachers need to change to be the kind of teachers that would help you learn best? Their answers were profound and I realized for the first time I think-- if we would just ask kids what they need, they know and would tell us. Wow. What a concept.

Here are some of the projects from Alabama this year:

WinterboroSchool
Our theme is:  Taking Technology to the next level- The competitive level. Our teachers have worked in harmony to help our students take their individual projects to the competitive level.  We decided to encourage and help our students to compete on the local and state level using 21st century skills we have introduced and use in the classroom throughout the year. Winning at this level helped validate that we can compete in the local and state arena using these newly acquired skills.  The publicity has also been great for the entire county.  It has been a great success.  We will display our students’ medal winning projects along with the bling bling they have won in the process. 

West Blocton
For our student project, we created a wiki. On this wiki, the students would choose a book to read that they wanted to carry on a conversation about in the wiki. Then, they would rate the book. Next, they would write why they rated the book the way they did. The next few sentences had to include a comprehension strategy that they used while reading the book. Whichever strategy they used, they had to support it with text and tell what detail from the story made them use that strategy. Then, they would write a sentence to try to encourage others to read the book, even if they gave it a low rating.

Finally, they would look at other responses other students had made and carry on a conversation about their book.

Hewitt-Trussville Middle School
Our team created a wiki as a resource for the teachers.  The wiki contains descriptions, examples, and uses for 21^st tools in the classroom.  The wiki also contains information about project based learning. 
You can find out wiki at http://21centurylearners.wikispaces.com .

Challenger Middle School
Challenger 21^st Century Team Group project:
Our professional development project is called "iTeach 2.0" and we invited the middle schools in our district to become a part of iTeach 2.0. Each school sent two teachers to a workshop we sponsored to learn about 21st century tools. We established a wiki for our team and participants to use to share ideas. Our April face to face meeting was a type of fair where each school shared a tool or project that they successfully used this semester. Our computer will display screen shots from our wiki and our display board will define data collected and cool tools explored during this year’s iTeach workshops. Our wiki is http://iteach2-0.wikispaces.com .

Student Project:
We invited 18 students to commit their own time to work on a project they would select. Twelve saw the project to completion. We gave three basic guidelines: the students must develop their project around an issue that affects teens, the project must help someone, and the project must be communicated using technology tools.  Our students brainstormed on their own private wiki and were very passionate about teen issues! They decided that they wanted to work on a project related to poverty. The students then researched and decided that they wanted to adopt an impoverished school in another country, which led them to Uganda. They formed an Invisible Children Club to raise money.

The students created posters, a website and a multi-media embedded PowerPoint to present to the student body. They learned so much about war torn

Uganda and the suffering of the children there. They have a basic knowledge of how this war started. The amazing part is that we have not taught this information to our students. They have taken a project with very few guidelines and have learned so much! For this year, the project culminated in a fund-raiser, which raised $1778 in 3 days! This has become a project that encompasses many of the 21st century skills. Our students are learning about society, geography/history, communication, discernment, teamwork and many other skills.  We will display a computer with a timeline/info about their project work and their presentation.  We will have an additional computer with screen shots of their webpage. Their website is http://www.freewebs.com/guluschoolproject/

George Hall Elementary
Collaboration is the main thesis for our project. This year collaboration projects includes Skype interview with Janis Kearney, diarist for Bill Clinton and author of "Cotton Fields of Dreams",  Elluminate session with children from the Dominican Republic and a weekly Skype collaboration with 5th grade students in West Blocton Al. We continued the wiki field trip project using Scaling where the students were proactive in the production of the projects to go online.

Blossomwood
Blossomwood Elementary's team project for 2007-2008 has been to obtain more technology resources for classrooms and adequately train teachers on how to use these resources.  Promethean ACTIV boards have been purchased for all classroom units and teachers have attended both training at school and online training from Promethean.  Today, Blossomwood is displaying some sample classroom flipcharts, as well as flipcharts that were used to train the faculty.

Clay-Chalkville High School
We will be presenting a Power Point presentation that highlights some of the work that our teachers have created with their classes to enhance student learning, as well as to promote communication between the classroom and the home.

For instance, we have teachers that have created wikis with the main purpose to keep the students and parents updated on assignments and projects that are coming up. At the same time, other teachers use blogs to allow the students become more involved in the learning process.

Discovery Middle School

Middle School will showcase our journey from local to global connections through a photostory.  We will highlight our challenges and how we have overcome them.  We will also share our current projects that will lead us to district wide integration of Web 2.0 tools.

Mt. Laurel Elementary
Sharing Web 2.0 Tools
Mt Laurel Elementary School is a K-3 school right outside of Birmingham. We are in our second year with the 21st Century Learning Team.

Our team's focus project was sharing Web 2.0 tools with our faculty. We conducted a survey to determine awareness and use of Web 2.0 tools and found that very few were aware of Web 2.0 tools, and even fewer were using them.

As a team we compiled a resource list of Web 2.0 tools. We held a meeting with our teachers and presented an awareness training to share the uses of each tool. We shared examples of how we had been using these tools and how students could benefit from using Web 2.0. We also encouraged them to let us help them set-up any of the tools they would think they would like to use in their classroom.

As of today, the number of teachers that are using Web 2.0 tools has changed by 60%, compared to when we initially took our survey. We now have grade levels participating in projects and teachers using these tools to create works with their students. We have teachers participating in book studies using Wiki’s, classes and parents blogging, podcasting galore, but most of all the awareness of the many tools that are available to each of them to enhance their class lessons and projects.

Cullman Middle School
Collaborative project-based teaching aligned to state content standards, reviewed by students. That is our lofty goal with this wiki. For 2008, we have selected 4 courses to focus on: Social Studies, grades 7 and 8 AND Computer Applications, grades 7 and 8

This project is designed in conjunction with the Alabama Best Practices Center's 21st Century Schools professional development. The project will be developed by a team of teachers and students from Cullman Middle School.

We hope that this will be a treasured resource for educators across the state, the country, and the world. Depending upon the success of the site, we hope to add additional areas of study in the future. We recognize the level of learning and retention of learning that project-based lessons hold for students, as well as the interest it adds to classes. On the outset, this seems like a project designed to aid teachers, and it will do that, but more importantly, this project will aid students in fostering a deeper interest in learning. With the Computer Applications courses, we are fortunate to be embarking upon new territory. At this time there are not specific standards for grade levels, only grade bands. This project will assist us in focusing on learning objectives and organizing those objectives in a sensible format. The student team will be comprised of students involved in

Cullman Middle School's SWAT (students willing to assist with technology) team. The teacher team will select a student team leader that will serve as a liaison to the teacher team.

Dean Road Elementary School
Our team sought to showcase the various ways we use the Smart Board to communicate more effectively among staff members and students. An immense part of our daily communication begins each day with our morning broadcast, WDRE, which features fourth and fifth grade students as broadcasters. Other grade levels are involved by reciting the pledge of allegiance and sharing the daily weather. All parts of the broadcast are viewed through the use of the Smart Board.

Not only do we begin our day with the Smart Board we also use this valuable learning tool in many other ways throughout the day. We display our morning messages, share interactive websites embedded in our daily lessons, and research an endless amount of information that can be easily displayed for all to see. This beneficial tool as helped foster communication through shared lessons created on the Smart Board software that assists teachers in planning and presenting the curriculum in a way that increases the students’ motivation to learn. The Smart Board, found in all classrooms, has become an irreplaceable learning tool that teachers and students just can’t seem to live without.

Fayetteville High School
The Fayetteville High School team has led a 21st Century Learners initiative for 10 schools throughout Talladega County. Modeled after the training sponsored by the ABPC, the FHS team, along with other teachers from Winterboro School, have served as mentors to over 20 teachers in their school system.  The team will display the materials used for this project as well as evaluations from some of the participants in the program.

Wrights Mill Road Elementary
Tech-Know Expo
5th grade students brainstormed topics related to technology that interest them.  Then, they volunteered to teach those topics they felt they were “Tech-sperts” in.  The students prepared presentations for the younger grades and invited parents and members of the community to attend.  Topics ranged from “Lights, Camera, Pinnacle in Action,” to iPod 101 and “How to Convince Your Parents to Let You Get A Cell Phone.”  Students taught about blogging, making avatars, using Blabber, and the latest and greatest in text messaging.

What Adds Community Value?

Today, new and emerging Web technologies are connecting our children in ways never before possible. Through blogs, social networking sites, multimedia and other 'Web 2.0' tools, their worlds are becoming more and more networked and engaging, creating environments for learning and collaborating that look little like our traditional classroom spaces. And they are not alone in these changes. Businesses, journalists, politicians and others are struggling to find new models that take full advantage of the opportunities these technologies and shifts afford (Richardson, 2006). 

Conversely, schools have by and large been resistant to these shifts. Yet, this networked landscape of learning challenges us to re-envision what we do in our schools and classrooms or risk a growing irrelevance in our students’ lives. And at the core of this challenge is how well educators realize the potentials of these technologies for collaboration in their own professional and personal learn­ing practice. How do we best begin to help teachers leverage these connec­tions in their own learning in order to better understand the pedagogies and literacies that are required to help students embrace them in effec­tive, ethical and safe ways? Unfortunately, many teachers have seen a constant revolving door of the latest and greatest strategies come and go and efforts to implement mandated change have been superficial at best. Teachers argue that they simply do not have the time to master the needed strategies. Attempts to gain the knowledge needed through workshops are often fragmented and unable to provide the ongoing daily guidance needed as teachers attempt to modernize their teaching methods.

One form of professional development that has increased in popularity for improving teaching and learning is teacher led communities of practice. The idea behind communities of practice is that by encouraging teachers to share and exchange knowledge through collaborating around common objectives, using a common language, and developing a culture of professional learning, the desired educational improvements that communities of practice are intended to support can occur (Riel and Polin, 2004).

Timing and Tools
Emerging technologies such as social networking and other Web-based tools have the potential to offer opportunities for new kinds of communities of practice for teachers and students. These tools bring enormous leverage to teachers at relatively little cost — intellectual leverage, social leverage, media leverage. Virtual learning communities use technology to established connections across barriers of time and space (Johnson, 2001). Teachers can participate in discussions at their convenience- anytime, anyplace.

A burgeoning body of opinion and research suggests that virtual learning communities are becoming the venue through which agents for change operate (Palloff & Pratt, 1999: Johnson, 2001; Barab & Duffy, 1998; Dede, 2003). The potential is enormous, as knowledge capital is collected and the community becomes a sort of an online brain trust, representing a highly varied accumulation of expertise.

According to Dede (2003) the most important challenge for educational leaders today is fostering 21^st Century skills and knowledge in today's students so they will be prepared to participate in our global economy. This challenge requires that teachers understand what types of knowledge and skills are required in leading edge workplaces and future careers. Teachers will also need to become adept at higher order cognitive, affective, and social skills such as systems thinking, creativity, and collaboration. This will require transformational strategies for developing deeper core content, new models of pedagogy, and development of personal learning networks (Dede, 1998). Virtual learning communities are one way to provide the intellectual, emotional, and social support needed for teachers to unlearn and relearn contextually in an effort to bring about the needed behavior changes necessary to make way for the next generation of classroom practices (Dede, 1999).

Attributes of successful communities

• A shared vision of what constitutes the mission or niche of the community

• Having a core group who is willing to chime in on a variety of topics, keep the conversation rolling, and self-monitor the conversations is critical. This can be a formal group "appointed" to the role or just a group who steps forward organically to assume that role.

• Opportunities for content creation such as book reviews, book chats, PD opportunities, lesson sharing, etc.

• Regular posting of relevant provocative issues, topics which draw in a variety of participants from different angles to give new perspectives.
  

Twitter Community's Response to Value Added in CoP

As I pondered these and other ideas in my research, I decided to ask my Twitter community what they found valuable in the communities to which they belong. What keeps them coming back?

plugusin: Like-minded people, instant communication, diverse opinions.
 
mikeparent: membership #s first (need more minds in the action), 2nd - number of discussions going on, 3rd - timely discussion and posts

ehelfant: needs to bring efficiency of idea generation/modification(twitter,bkmarks filter internet) and needs to bring an element of fun.   

AngelaStockman: Just thinking of someone who others are naturally "following" now in a local community group, simply because he has this skill and he is knowledgeable too, but is able to keep everyone at the table by navigating these different personalities. There are individuals who do this well within communities, + I love it when these people gravitate toward positions of leadership.

ehelfant: need community to have potential to push my thinking in interesting ways including challenge my thinking/ expanding my 'horizons'

AngelaStockman: in the community. It isn't usually intentional, in my experience. Those who can help others rise above their ego are invaluable

jennyluca: You can't measure in the beginning. Like you say, if it doesn't pan out, you no longer contribute. Not enough hours in the day!!

iteachcomputers: Info exchange, back and forth. Text, voice, posting, responding, like a virtual conversation.

Ginger Lewman: Also, I prefer using wikis over creating websites. Shared control = less for me to manage alone. We can share the work!

Ginger Lewman: Twitter = perfect. Parts of Diigo are TOO much! Time to implement and ease of use is priority for this busy teacher!

trossman1: people with similar job descriptions, willingness of those people to share, opportunity for personal growth

AngelaStockman: transparency, willingness to share/collaborate, ego management (usually ego makes transparency and willingness to share impossible)

jennyluca: people who welcome you and value what you say, ease of use, benefit it is going to bring you for your purposes.

PareidoliAc: The Top 3 things I look for in online communities are - 1. Quality people producing 2. Quality content within a 3. well designed interface

plugusin: Perhaps "the willingness to express diverse opinions?" Absence of "group think."@djakes describes it as the failure of the "echochamber."

iteachcomputers: People who have the same interests (not necessarily the same beliefs), lots of people, ways to share. Probably why I like twitter

Ginger:Similar interests, New-to-me ideas/tools, Uncomplicated environmental design for use

plugusins: Like-minded people = those with shared interests/motivations.

technolibrary: Ease of use--notifications can "come to you" -- Fun and nice layout-- real value of conversations going on   

ehelfant -welcoming=inclusive -supports lots of ideas,respects differences of opinion and divergence of application/refinement of the idea

dogtrax: Welcoming: someone to greet you, to ask your opinion, to invite you into conversation ... so you aren't watching from afar.

nlowell: for Me is : Why/If come *back*

trossman 1: My ability to use new ideas and bring them back to district to change traditional ed thinking

Nlowell: "look for before joining?" - not meaningful since I can't tell much about a community before becoming part of it.

PareidoliA/C: well how to measure online presence in a social network - regularity of activity (daily users are pretty obvious compared to the lurkers. Good conversations are productive and ideally inspiring in their effect

Lisa Paris: Do I know anyone using it already? Is it easy to use? Is it easy to connect with others or does something else take precedence?

ehelfant -its also best if community is two way - learned more from twitter and blogs and bookmarks when I started contributing too -

PareidoliA/C:as for 'quality people' I just go by profiles that show an investment in developing a presence in that community...

dogtrax: Three things I look for: sense of welcoming environment; ability to share and learn from others; and personal connections.

AngelaStockman: I struggle when "those who know" in grp judge "those who don't know" but r unwilling 2 share bcause they r protecting status.

Ginger Lewis: If I was geekier (or had more time to implement) the mashup creates perfect utility. Will sacrifice perfection for utilization.

PareidoliA/C: When I join a community, I look at profiles to see Quality of interactions with others 

Ginger Lewman: I prefer the ning-like atmosphere. Not perfect, but good enough for now and ease of implementation is awesome!

trossman1: personal growth: exposing me to new ideas & new ways of thinking through collaboration with others

kmulford: Community that supports and encourages self-reflection from all members. No one's perfect. When respected members self-eval... wow   

kmulford: Late reply. Integrity is important to me. Have joined communities that were more about self-promotion, less about collaboration.

cbell619: i think lurking is OK in general, but believe the community at large loses out when people lurk

wsigele: 1. Community of like minded ppl who willingly share their trials and tribulations in a give and take way 2. ease of use & time available to connect is variable. 3.Desire 2 lurk rarely exists 'cause desire to collaborate & share is great

jennyluca: I don't think lurking is a problem -not everyone feels confident in expressing their voice but want understand new things. Hate the word lurking for that matter -yucky connatations 

dogtrax : I might lurk for some time, to get a sense of community. But if I didn't feel part of conversation, my lurking would be short.

montgorp: Your answer to @LParisi answered me. My Interest? Looking at PhD on learning communities when I can drag myself away from teaching

tom_hemingway: 1. do members do what I do? 2. can I make a meaningful contribution? 3. have to think some more

GingerTPLC: I know you didn't ask me, but lurking beyond the initial "getting to know" isn't community-building behavior. Gets on my nerves.

nlowell: I'm with @GingerTPLC - at some point "lurker" becomes "leech" - too many of those and it's not a "community"

ehelfant: Our 1-to-1plan much more refined, maybe more ambitious because network/community- http://tinyurl.com/3kwykk twitter pushed my ideas

montgorp:Hello. Your intense conversation within my twitter network has aroused my curiosity. Why this conversation? What's your interest?

ehelfant: related question -How many communities can you sustain - twitter has decreased my blogging interaction if you call that community

LParisi: But it doesn't mean I will stay if I know people there. For me, quality has as much to do with ease and purpose than friends.

LParisi: I tried early on but never built a comm. My friends lead me to comm. I build through them.Kinda like it that way. More welcoming.

pareidoliac: not sure about ranking tools... in the learning communities I am in, these don't seem to be used effectively or frequently

plivings: My personal hot button is condescension so if that becomes an element I stop participating

plivings: interesting discussion late however but 4 me a community needs to be supportive, respectful, forward-thinking non-judgemental

dianeh: 1. Need to "know" some members from other situations. 2. Needs focus I'm interested in. 3. Needs to be engaging and welcoming.

AngelaStockman: when people are willing to listen+learn from everyone regardless of status w/in the comm., there is growth.
   
AngelaStockman:  teachers vs. kids, admins vs. teachers, experts vs. novices and I think that the fear of giving up "status" prevents growth

traymur: value in community - encourages collaboration, respect for uniqueness, open to change

I would love it if you would add your take on what *you* find valuable in a community online. What keeps you coming back?

References

Barab,S.A., & Duffy, T. (in press). From practice fields to communities of practice. To  appear in J. Jonassen & S. Land (Eds.), Theoretical foundations of learning  environments. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Dede, C. (2006). (Ed.). Online professional development for teachers: Emerging modes  and methods. (p. 1). Cambridge, MA: Harvard Education Press.

Johnson, C. M. (2001). A survey of current research on online communities of practice.  The Internet and Higher Education, 4(1):45-60.

Payloff, R. & Pratt, K. (2001). Lessons from the cyberspace classroom: the realities of online teaching.
San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Richardson, W. (2006). Blogs, wikis, podcasts and other powerful web tools for  classrooms. Thousand Oaks, California: Corwin Press

Riel, M. & Polin, L., (2004). Online learning communities: Common ground and critical  differences in designing environments. Design for virtual learning communities. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press.

Twitter Takes- 6 word memoir

John Norton on TLN threw out an interesting challenge around a six-word memoir. Someone on the list called this game a limited-word writing   activity "American haiku". I found the activity so interesting I tossed it to my Twitter community. The results were delightful!

I Tweeted: On TLN we are playing a game- Six-Word Memoirs- if you were writing a mini-memoir of your teaching life, what would your six words be?

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snbeach- Mine is- "A Networked learner: learning never stops" What's yours?"

Stephieand - mind often moved faster than time.   

robletcher - "Meet kids where they are...here."

henrythiele - Made the world a better place

robletcher - Mine is "Truth and hope: they always work."

jennyluca- public to private kids great everywhere

LParisi - Someday I'll get there. Still learning.

scottmerrick -  hmmmmm, "blessed to be amongst young minds"

mcleod - Began clueless. Starting to catch on.

jonbecker - "Still learning; still finding my voice."

paulrwood - Another day to make a difference

montgorp - "lets get rid of the walls"

alicebarr - Always flexible while learning, "Semper Gumby"!

featheredflower - Constant Collaborative Creative Cooperative Collective Change

smeech - Techology Isn't Future, It is Present!

csessums - Went native. Discovered meaning with others.

mrscienceteach - Get them laughing, keep them learning

samandjt - 6-word memoir: "No such thing as too challenging"

Stuart Ciske - When learning stops, minds stop expanding.

beil - "Thirty-four years long, still going strong!"

SheilaT - "Inspired students to achieve and believe"

BarbGoldammer - students first, mentors, mentoring, love math

BarbGoldammer - "Teacher believed in me...pay forward"

CPence - Smarter and wiser but remain optimistic.

gmudge - Taught heart, body, mind and soul.

traymur - "teach for tomorrows not for yesterdays"

traymur - "learn to teach teach to learn"

wsigele - Life's too short to spend angry

tabor330 - Needed an excuse to read books

coordinatortwo -   Sit back and hold on tight

Please add yours below!

 

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?