21st Century Learning

Reflection as an Agent of Real Change

As I was reading Jennifer Jones' post on viral PD today I found myself thinking how cool it is that in a community we all have a piece of the puzzle. One of the challenges we face in the 21st Century though is how we collectively connect ideas in such a way that the big picture becomes clear and everyone can benefit.

I know what you are thinking- ever heard of RSS Sheryl? (Actually, I have been thinking about RSS a lot lately in the work we are doing with PLP). But more my concern is around *managing* successful viral PD. With all the feeds, Google Alerts, and other information being pulled to each of us, combined with all the responses from each participant in an active, engaged CoP and the viral spin offs of each community as it grows and becomes more successful through the planned scaling - - how does one manage all the information without missing critical pieces?

I am a community organizer by trade. I spend most of my day reading, writing, thinking, and developing community across the nation and around the world. So how do I decide what to keep and what to toss? As we begin to feel the results of successful viral PD opportunities like what happened in Alabama, how will staff developers keep up with it all? For that matter how will *any * of us keep up with it all- with information doubling every two years now and predicted to double every 72 hours by the year 2010?

As I continue to work within the communities with which I am involved, it is wildly gratifying to see the deep and consequential changes in practice taking place over time with the educators who are participating.  I know the job embedded model works. What I question is how to maintain these changes in practice over substantial periods of time (sustainability) as the viral impact causes diffusion of the innovation to large numbers of users (spread).

Knowing the role of the community organizer is critical in terms of champion building in the beginning when trust and norms are being developed among members, I question how staff developers who oversee multiple communities of practice in addition to maintaining their own learning through their personal learning networks will keep up?

In Alabama, (which is one of the Microsoft mid-tier Partners in Learning projects) the community is strong and participants have taken ownership in ways that deepen and sustain the original work via adaptation (shift) as they are innovating and revising the outcomes of what we (the designers) originally intended. It is exciting to find my thinking continually challenged and to be pushed to reshape and recreate the model in new and different ways. (evolution) However, I am finding less and less time for sharing what I am thinking, doing and the evidence I am collecting that points to what is working.

How do we find/make time for reflection? I do believe it is critically important to reflect and be transparent as possible about the processes we are using. Why? Because it helps us all move away from a place of privacy and isolation to one of collaboration and innovation. But lately, I find myself so busy with design and implementation that I neglect reflection, even as critical as I believe it is to have your comments inform my thinking.

In Schmoker's "Results Now" he says, Isolation -- 'professional privacy' as Little called it -- explains why exemplary practices never take root in more than a small proportion of classrooms and school. Judith Little found that, "When teachers engage regularly in authentic "joint work" focused on explicit learning goals, ...their collaboration pays off in increased teacher confidence and remarkable gains in achievement."

As more and more teachers reject isolation and seek collaboration, teaching will become more transparent with teams of teachers excited and willing to learn from each other. The idea of sharing and reflecting on 21st Century lesson planning in a virtual community where it can be accessed and reviewed on the Web is one way to help schools move more quickly toward a culture of collaboration and improved teaching and learning!

The Reflective Change Agent
Donald Schon suggests that the best professionals know more than they can put into words. To meet the challenges of their work, they rely less on established models and more on improvisation learned in practice. Basically, we test out our theories and ideas via our blogs and through other participatory media and this allows us to collectively develop and design further. Significantly, to do this we do not closely follow established ideas and techniques - textbook schemes. Rather, we draw on what has gone before (shift and evolution mentioned above) and we can link this process of thinking on our feet with reflection-on-action.

I think this way of thinking about reflection and leading is going to become more important as knowledge creation picks up an even faster pace. There simply will not be time to formally test each change idea so others can review the findings and determine value before implementation. Rather reflection in action, transparency in our process via conversations with experts on the Web will enables us to spend time exploring why we acted as we did, what was happening in a group and so on and inform our practice as we move forward. In so doing we develop sets of questions/answers and this informs our ideas about our activities and practice.

Through our blogs, videos and recordings we should engage the network in our process, not having to have a full understanding of things before we act. With communities of global, experienced professionals pushing our thinking along the way, we will be influenced by, and use, what has gone before, what might come, our repertoire, and the repertoire of the community.  As we work collaboratively we will bring collective fragments of memories into play and begin to build theories and responses that fit each new situation. Through this reflective process the change in schools will become more emergent, organic, and viral in nature.

So I invite my readers to continually comment and push my thinking further. I appreciate your voice in my work.

Community: Personal Reflections from Then and Now

I have been reflecting this morning on community and its place in my life and learning.

Communal Living and Community
My first experiences happened as a young woman living on The Farm, the largest successful commune in America. It was there that I first began to see the power of relationships in enabling others toward positive change and the concept of how identity is formed through meaningful social interaction and conversations around practice and reform.

"Utopian thought, as the basis of communal ideology, idealizes social unity and maintains that humanness exists only in intimate and collective life" (Kanter, 1972, p.32). While on the Farm, my thoughts on justice, sincerity, honesty, and humanity really started to take shape.The foundation was laid to rethink the status quo, respectfully question authority, and always stand up against unjust acts towards marginalized populations. The desire to become a voice for the voiceless was birthed.

Christian Community
In my late twenties, I discovered the loving community that comes from belonging to a group of people who are held accountable to one another in relationship under a set of established spiritual beliefs. I came to learn and grow so much as a mother, daughter, and individual through the vertical and horizontal relationships  I developed overtime as a Christian. The molding and shaping of my character and personality through the exercise of being held collectively to a higher standard gave me the tools needed to be self-governed and disciplined. The unconditional love and friendship I received as part of the Christian community, nurtured me through the negative effects of my childhood and the untimely death of my spouse when my daughters were just one and two years old. The relationships I formed taught me through a social learning process how to be a good mother and a woman of integrity. I am still growing into  someone who tries very hard to embrace personal excellence, always holding myself to this high standard, but yet allowing others to have the grace to choose their own path and way.

Virtual Community
In my mid-thirties I got my first computer. I was running a small, innovative K-12 school at the time called Friendship Bridge, as well as teaching preservice teachers at Valdosta State University as an adjunct. Immediately, I discovered bulletin boards and IRC chat and began to establish a network of content experts and friends from around the world who became my personal learning network. We would connect at various times throughout our day sharing what we were learning. There was a solider in Germany who  taught me about networking and hardware, a father and hockey enthusiast in Canada who joined me in experimenting and pushing the new tools to the limit, a brilliant young man in his 20s that was living in Florida who was trapped somewhat by his circumstance and spent his boredom at the public library, sequentially reading every book on the shelf and then sharing with me each author's ideas, and countless others who each left their mark upon my life- some for my betterment and some - well, they were not so positive, but it was community and we were all left changed by the ideas of the other.

It reminds me of Tennyson's poem Ulysses:

I am part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethrough
Gleams that untravelled world, whose margin fades
For ever and for ever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnished, not to shine in use!
As though to breath were life. Life piled on life
Were all too little, and of one to me
Little remains: but every hour is saved
From that eternal silence, something more,
A bringer of new things; and vile it were
For some three suns to store and hoard myself,
And this grey spirit yearning in desire
To follow knowledge like a sinking star,
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.

I continue to be molded and shaped by the relationships I form around the world.

Community of Practice
When I came to Virginia in 1997, I tried to escape education. I worked for awhile as a MCSE trainer helping various network engineers get their industry certifications. I was struck by how competitive the field was and how little community existed. While the money was incredible, I missed children, teachers, and the potential for positive change (both individual and systemic) that I felt when teaching. So I took a position with a high need (many homeless children) elementary school as a computer resource teacher in hopes to give back for all I had been given.

What I observed in terms of community in our large school district was what Richard Elmore (2002) describes as a buffer- a protective barrier that discourages and even punishes close, constructive scrutiny of instruction and the supervision of instruction. Its primary effect is to protect these two—the heart of schooling—“from outside inspection, interference, or disruption” (p. 6).

The buffer prevents true communities of practice from developing and from teachers and educational leaders being able to learn more about what is working within the classroom. It prevents teachers from knowing what or how well they or their colleagues (both local and global) teach. It deprives us all of any meaningful frame of reference and discourages us from learning from each other.

I remember my mentor Greg Anderson, who served as the principal of my school, warning me that I was using technology as a rebel would. That our district  used a culture of equity- all schools were equally as good as the other- even if that perceived equity meant schools simply met and perpetuated the status quo. Greg, in spirit, supported my change efforts (when he felt they were in the best interest of children) although he didn't want a "loose cannon" causing him to lose his job in the process.

I  pushed the teachers at my school to see technology as a communication and collaboration tool. As a way to connect with others and remove the barriers of isolation the four walls of the classroom created. I wanted technology to provide transparency, the same transparency I had experienced on the Farm and in my small school and in the Christian community. I wanted technology to help students and teachers connect with others around the world in an effort to make lasting change in the way we live and learn in schools.

Judith Little (1993) has often talked about the private, protected world of teaching:

In large numbers of schools, and for long periods of time, teachers are colleagues in name only. They work out of sight and hearing of one another, plan and prepare their lessons and materials alone, and struggle on their own to solve most of their instructional, curricular, and management problems.

She and others see this approach of non-interference, privacy, and harmony as part of the problem in that it prevents us from getting to the root of what needs to change in schools. This culture of privacy and non-interference is fertile soil for maintaining status quo. However, she goes on to say,

Against this almost uniform backdrop of isolated work, some schools stand out for the professional relationship they foster among teachers. These schools, more than others, are organized to permit the sort of reflection…that has been largely absent from professional preparation and professional work in schools. For teachers in such schools, work involves colleagueship of a more substantial sort. Recognition and satisfaction stem not only from being a masterful teacher, but also from being a member of a masterful group.

It was this kind of community, this kind of meaningful dialog I so fervently wanted to see happen. I wanted to break through the buffer so that collectively teachers could see the status quo for what it was and through the collective wisdom and strong relationships within the community, make a courageous commitment to challenge and change the status quo.

Teacher Leadership and Community
The first opportunity I had for this to happen was within the Teacher Leaders Network (TLN). Terry Dozier, for whom I was leading the Virginia Teacher Leader Forum, sent me in her stead to a steering committee meeting for the development of a national virtual community of practice for teacher leaders across the country. The Center for Teaching quality had gotten the recommendations for 200 top educators who were not only highly accomplished but were articulate and positioned locally as change agents. What was birthed out of that meeting was TLN and under the nurturing leadership of John Norton (community of practice expert) and CTQ's president Barnett Berry (national edc. policy leader) has grown to become one of the most visible groups of teachers impacting educational policy in the nation. It is through TLN that I am personally shaped and challenged daily. This is my community of practice.

Bielaczyc & Collins (1999) describe a community of practice as:

The defining quality of a learning community is that there is a culture of learning, in which everyone is involved in a collective effort of understanding. There are four characteristics that such a culture must have: (1) diversity of expertise among its members, who are valued for their contributions and given support to develop, (2) a shared objective of continually advancing the collective knowledge and skills, (3) an emphasis on learning and how to learn, and (4) mechanisms for sharing what is learned. If a learning community is presented with a problem, then the learning community can bring its collective knowledge to bear on the problem. It is not necessary that each member assimilate everything the community knows, but each should know who within the community has relevant expertise to address any problem.

This is a radical departure from the traditional view of schooling, with its emphasis on individual knowledge and performance, and the expectation that students/teachers will acquire the same body of knowledge at the same time. Yet this is the model that not only provides systemic change, but holds the potential for a change initiative to push beyond the incremental culture of change expected in schools  to one of exponential reform that produces results now- so that our kids get what they need now, not after they graduate or from their own efforts.

21st Century Community
Through John Norton, I met Cathy Gassenheimer of the Alabama Best Practice Center.  Together we wrote a proposal that was funded by Microsoft that took the best of all of our experiences around using community as a vehicle of change. We created a 21st Century teaching and learning collaborative that used Web 2.0 tools to connect 40 school teams across the state in exploration and understanding of using personal networking literacies to change their practice.  We are currently in the third year of the project and teachers this year are focusing on the needed changes in pedagogy that relate to the new tools and changed paradigm. Working with student teams and other stakeholders, the impact of our efforts is being seen virally in the spread of these ideas throughout schools and across the state. Most recently, the state of Alabama has been in negociations with the Partnership of 21st Century Skills to become a partnership state.

Building Community Online
Communities of practice are clusters of people who share a concern or passion for something they do and as they interact regularly, they improve (Wenger, 1998). A driving force behind a community of practice is community knowledge, in which the sum of the collective knowledge is greater the sum of the individual knowledge (Gherardi & Nicolini, 2002) therefore as the collective knowledge grows stronger, so does the individual's knowledge (Bielaczyc & Collins, 1999). They operate on the premise, "None of us is as good as all of us." Wenger (2004) also suggests that by focusing on the system or the group as a whole, does not imply that the individual should be ignored.

Hall and Hord (1987) emphasized, organizations do not change - individuals do. However, it is through the relationships that learning occurs. McDermott (in Murphy 1999, p.17) describes it this way:

Learning traditionally gets measured on the assumption that it is a possession of individuals that can be found inside their heads…[Here] learning is in the relationships between people. Learning is the conditions that bring people together and organize a point of contact that allows for particular pieces of information to take on relevance; without the points of contact, without the system of relevancies, there is not learning, and there is little memory. Learning does not belong to the individual persons, but to the various conversations of which they are a part.

According to Wenger (1998) not all communities are communities of practice. Three characteristics must be in place: 1) a common commitment to the same sphere of influence (you couldn’t be in someone's community and not know it 2) community- members are engaged in activity and discussions; they help one another, and share information. 3) active practice- members are not just united by interests but by practice.

Is Twitter a Community?
So how does community fit in online? Are the relationships forged in the blogosphere and other social networking sites like Twitter, Delicious, Flickr, NING, Tapped In, and others - true community? Or are they networking or as some suggest a new learning theory all together called connectivism?

According to George Seimens, the principles of connectivism are:

• Learning and knowledge rests in diversity of opinions.
• Learning is a process of connecting specialized nodes or information    sources.
• Learning may reside in non-human appliances.
• Capacity to know more is more critical than what is currently known
• Nurturing and maintaining connections is needed to facilitate continual learning.
• Ability to see connections between fields, ideas, and concepts is          a core skill.
• Currency (accurate, up-to-date knowledge) is the intent of all connectivist learning activities.
• Decision-making is itself a learning process. Choosing what to learn and the meaning of incoming information is seen through the lens of a shifting reality. While there is a right answer now, it may be wrong tomorrow due to alterations in the information climate affecting the decision.

Virtual Learning Communities
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).

Personal Learning Practice
Most  recently, my thoughts around community are playing out in the work I am doing  with Will Richardson  through our new LLC Powerful Learning Practice. Both Will and I believe that a teacher needs personal experience with the new literacies, using them to learn about their own passionate interests before applying them to the classroom. The reason many 21st Century teaching and learning projects have failed to make significant changes in school culture is directly related to both the buffer concept mentioned above and a lack of ownership and nurturing teachers need for these strategies to become pedagogically sound.  Learning, applying, and deepening understanding of the shifts in the changing learning landscape and how to use the new Web tools to break through the buffers of isolation occurs best in communities of practice. 

It is with great excitement that I look to 2008 to see how my understanding of community will grow and the new directions I will take in my own personal learning and the relationships I will develop along the way.

Balance in the Workplace

The Teacher Leaders Network is one of the communities of practice to which I belong and experience meaning as I learn.  Recently, the discussion has been around what roles a teacher should say yes to from a principal. How many requests are true utilizations of a teacher's leadership skills (which are worth the stress and time away from teaching) and which are just management roles that make the administrator's job lighter.

"Can you tell me HOW to do that successfully and effectively? How can we, as teacher leaders, find that balance between holding the torch high and burning it out of control?"

Here is how I approach the above question in my own life. This is not an original strategy, it was birthed after reading Covey's book about families.

I am a goal setter, list maker and pile sorter, always have been. I have a vision and a mission statement for my professional goals. The mission statement stays in a prominent place on my desk as my mantra. My vision is updated yearly so I can change course with where I feel my faith, passions and societal trends are directing me. My professional vision also aligns with our family mission statement. (Each year as a family we revisit our family vision/mission and share our short and long term goals for the year.)

When an opportunity comes along, as many do for all of us, I weigh it. I consider- will this in some way move me closer to meeting my goals? Does this align with my mission? Many worthy opportunities present themselves- but not all of them fit the narrow focus I have for my life journey as I know it now.

Sometimes I say yes because an opportunity fits in with helping to make the world a better place or a random act of kindness. Sometimes I said yes to the manager type requests my principal would ask me to do because a) I wanted to be kind and help him, or b) I didn't have that management skill in my repertoire?  Or it was a skill I had, but I needed a field experience to research a new way of doing it. Sometimes I say yes to something that doesn't align to my goals because I know there will be a networking opportunity that will open up more opportunities that *do* align with my goals.

On the reverse side- Sometimes I say no and later see that was probably a mistake. For example, recently I was honored with a research award. As the date approached for that award presentation another offer, one that strategically aligned perfectly and would have been tremendous in terms of networking and future opportunities, presented itself. I struggled because to accept it meant having to miss the presentation of the award and I felt that might be unethical. I tossed the two around for days, do I do all the extra work and invest the time to be a part of the amazing opportunity or do I honor my university and those who helped earn the recognition as well as have less stress by attending the award presentation? Both were noble, both aligned with my mission and goals. In the end, I chose the wrong one. But that too was a learning experience that will help me in the the future with finding that "balance between holding the torch high and burning it out of control"

For me, the answer to the question lies in balance and begins with having a clear plan for where you are- where you want to be- and then saying yes to the opportunities that will help you to get there. If advocating for teacher leadership and educational reform is your mission- choosing what to say yes to is easy. If changing the world 30 kids at a time is your mission then there you go. The trick is developing a mission statement that clearly reflects your tacit objectives as well as your explicit goals and using it to guide what you say yes to in the multitude of opportunities that arise.

So I am interested-  We all have things in our life we have to do, such as how we earn legal tender. But outside of that, with all the opportunities that present themselves- whether for money - or not- how do you choose what you say yes to? How do you decide what gets your time. How do you find that balance between holding the torch high and burning it out of control?

Photo credit: http://www.susunweed.com/herbal_ezine/images/suzanne_balance.jpg

Teacher Friendly Professional Development

In this day and age of school reform, many are looking to how we train teachers as the key to educational improvement. Research shows that on average school districts spend the equivalent of $200 per pupil on professional development and these learning experiences add both time and effort demands on a teachers already impossible day (Killeen, 2002).

The federal No Child Left Behind Act’s emphasis on results has prompted school system leaders, staff developers, principals, and
teachers to become much more deliberate about the professional-development choices they make.

While our profession more than ever needs to build capacity in its teachers, we also need to be sure that time, energy, and resources are used only on "quality programs that teach with and about best practice" (Dede, 2006, p.1).

The World is Changing
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.

Schools, Not So Much
Conversely, schools have by and large been resistant to these shifts. Teachers complain, maybe rightly so, 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 implement needed change in practice.

The Role of Community to Bring about School Reform
However, the development of professional learning communities (PLCs) across schools districts is one solution experience has shown me really works. Using a combination of face to face, synchronous and asynchronous meetings in a variety of settings (school-based, state-wide, and global) professional learning teams can participate in professional development that is tailored to teachers' busy schedules, while drawing on the valuable resources/experts not available locally, and that provides work-embedded support.

My Contribution to Educational Reform
Using the experience I garnered from the pilot I helped to develop and lead in Alabama, Will Richardson and I have recently teamed together to connect small teams of educators from around the globe in 21st Century learning environments. Our approach is different than the work in Alabama, but the intended outcomes are the same- bring education into the 21st Century.

Will and I are also working with administrators within the participating schools and districts in the development of systemic plans that lay the groundwork for a three and five-year vision for principled change. Our Powerful Learning Practice (PLP) project is currently helping educators to experience the transformative potential of social Web tools to build global learning communities and re-envision their own personal learning practice.

Outcome-Making the World a Better Place
The opportunities for learning thus far have been incredible. But the one that simply rocked my world is a project that one of the teacher leaders involved with our work helped her daughter create.

Laura, a ten-year old girl in upstate New York started a blog Twenty Five Days to Make a Difference that in just a week’s time has caught the interest of a whole bunch of kids from around the world (media too) who want to make a difference as well. Talk about transformative! Laura offers a classroom challenge- as teachers you will want to check it out and get your class involved and there is an opportunity to match funds for the winning "Make a Difference" project too!

Laura on Day 1 of her 25 Days to Make a Difference Project

 

References

Killeen, K. (2002). School district spending on professional development: Insights available from national data. Journal of Educational Finance. 28 (1) pp 25-49.

Dede, C. (2006). Online professional development for teachers: Emerging models and methods. Cambridge, Massachusetts:Harvard Education Press

Art Education Community

Have you ever felt so overwhelmed with what you have to do that you find yourself in deep avoidance? The Web is perfect for moments like that.

I am part of a panel symposium on Blogs, Wikis, and Podcasts in CLTNet. As the lead presenter, I have  been fast at work sharing resources and answering questions.

This morning I followed a link to a Ning community for art educators that one of the participants shared and was so taken with the intellectual  eye candy!

The pic featured here I drew using Kaleidoscope Painter, which was a shared resource in the community.

What first caught my eye though was this animation painter. The animation is done in Flash and it begins with a female skeleton which then is given flesh, underwear, and ends with a designer outfit.

I watched it 2xs and was blown away both times. I could learn to draw like this. I never got to take an art class in school, not one. And yet I come from a family of artists and gave birth to four talented artists. I have taught courses on creativity on the college level and I was known for the creative displays in my classrooms. I wish someone in my K-12 experience had seen the potential and put me in those classes. But typically, poor kids weren't the ones nurtured in the arts, maybe it is different now? Not.

Another cool video piece I found while there was this one on Women in Art.

 

Find more videos like this on Art Education 2.0

Or this video about Gilles Tréhin, a dedicated artist and artistic savant, who began designing an imaginary city, Dumont d'Urville.

Take some time and check out this Ning community, but be prepared to get lost in learning for a few hours!

ABPC 21st Century Learning Showcase

The last two years of my life have been heavily dominated by the work I have been helping to lead in Alabama through the Alabama Best Practices Center. We designed a two-year professional development program that engages educators from participating schools in powerful conversations about 21st  Century Learning.

In 2005, with support from Microsoft, ABPC recruited small teams from 20 forward thinking schools across the state and established a virtual learning community built around an online curriculum I developed called, “Keeping Up with the Net Generation.” Feedback from our first group of schools was very positive. Twenty more schools were selected to participate this year. Schools that had begun working the previous year continued their professional development in an “advanced strand” of the project.

The project is supported by 10 Alabama educators who have been selected and trained to be ABPC’s “21st Century Teacher Fellows.”

The Best Practices Center created a 21st Century Project wiki as a learning resource for schools in the project. The wiki can be accessed by everyone at http://abpc.wikispaces.com. The team projects can be accessed on the book-marking page, Del.icio.us: http://del.icio.us/abpcjohn.

Culminating Event- 21st Century Learning Showcase
We held our final event for year two on May 8. Advanced schools (and a few Beginning schools) prepared learning station presentations to share their Learning 2.0 projects they had been working on all year. In addition to my keynote and Allison Knox's (project manager from Microsoft) presentation, three schools were selected to present their work to the audience of 300 plus attendees.

Teachers from 67 public schools across the state gathered for the event held at Gardendale's First Baptist Church. The showcase is part of the Powerful Conversations Network, a program of ongoing professional development for teachers. View picture set here.

Teams of educators from three schools were chosen for their outstanding work in the arena of 21st Century Learning:

• George Hall Elementary School in Mobile uses digital cameras and online tools to help students retell educational field trips. The project (www.georgehall.wetpaint.com) boosts vocabularies and   communication skills.
• Teachers at Challenger Middle School in Huntsville created a professional development wiki to help the school's faculty learn to use technology for instruction.
• Cullman Middle School students are   co-writing online books in different genres of literature at   www.cullmancollaborativebooks.wikispaces.com.

During the Learning Fair sessions, teachers from 20+ schools demonstrated successful projects. (9 a.m. to 10 a.m., and 12:15 p.m. to 1 p.m.)

• A 4th-grade teacher from West Blocton Elementary in Bibb County treated students to a day without books, using all online resources for lessons aligned with the state course of study.
• Most students at Calcedeaver Elementary in north Mobile County are Native American, and they have produced virtual field trips of Native American cultural resources.
• At Wrights Mill Road Elementary in Auburn, teachers developed a Web quest (an online scavenger hunt) to teach students about Internet safety. The Webquest is available online at the school's homepage.

Complete list of Learning Fair schools

• Athens Middle School, Athens City Schools
• Buckhorn High School, Madison   County Schools
• Calcedeaver Elementary School, Mobile County Schools
• Cedar   Ridge Middle School, Decatur City Schools
• Central Park Elementary School,   Birmingham City Schools
• Challenger Middle School, Huntsville City   Schools
• Chestnut Grove Elementary School, Decatur City Schools
• Cullman   Middle School, Cullman City Schools
• Dean Road Elementary School, Auburn City   Schools
• Fayetteville High School, Talladega County Schools
• George Hall   Elementary School, Mobile County Schools
• Hewitt-Trussville Middle School,   Trussville City Schools
• Hillcrest High School, Tuscaloosa City   Schools
• Liberty Park Elementary School, Vestavia Hills City   Schools
• Mountain Brook High School, Mountain Brook City Schools
• Northridge   High School, Tuscaloosa City Schools
• Oak Mountain High School, Shelby County   Schools
• Ogletree Elementary School, Auburn City Schools
• Terry Heights   Elementary School, Huntsville City Schools
• Vestavia Hills East Elementary   School, Vestavia Hills Schools
• West Blocton Elementary School, Bibb County   Schools
• West Jasper Elementary School, Jasper City Schools
• Winterboro   School, Talladega County Schools
• Wrights Mill Road Elementary School, Auburn   City Schools

A huge thank you goes to Cathy Gassenheimer, ABPC's leader, for her visionary leadership in this work. The Alabama Best  Practices Center receives major support from Microsoft Corp. and the Wachovia   Foundation.

The A+ Education Foundation, home of the Alabama Best Practices Center, has been working since 1991 to advance policies, programs and initiatives that result in high achievement by every child in Alabama's K-12 education system.

Evaluation

Currently, I am fast at work analyzing the results of the evaluation we are doing for this two year project. The evaluation plan has several components including a customized LoTi survey comparing 21st Century Powerful Conversations members and non 21st Century Powerful Conversation members, a content analysis of conversations within the asynchronous Tapped In virtual community, analysis of a representative focus group, and the outcomes from a highly structured facilitated debriefing with 21st Century schools teams where they developed next year's plan for professional development using what they have learned these past two years as the foundation for their plans.

When the evaluation work is complete- I will be sharing the results.   

Teacher 2.0 Blog

Just wanted to let all of you know that I have been asked to contribute to Teacher 2.0 - a new blog on "How the Internet can be used to create learning communities that advance professional development and improve classroom instruction."   The blog is promoted by David Deschryver and Denis Doyle of SchoolNet, with an impressive list of contributors. They invited Barnett Berry to participate and he asked me to be a co-contributor with him. I am quite humbled. There is one other educator on the list of contributors- Dana Huff.

I think this blog is a wonderful opportunity for all of us to engage policy makers and educational reformers around a topic of which we are all very passionate. I hope you will visit the blog often and engage in the conversations and ideas through your comments. Plus, I could use your moral support! Here is my first co-post.

Check the blog out at: http://edustatblog.com/

In addition, School Net is also hosting a conference: EduStat Summit 2007

June 6,7,8 2007
Columbia University
Teachers College, NYC

Teacher 2.0™: Developing the 21st Century Workforce

Teacher 2.0™: What are the core competencies for teachers, administrators and school staff in the twenty-first century?  How will we attract, develop and advance talent?  How will organizational design affect student achievement?  How will technology modernize school administration? As we set higher standards for our children, how will we equip educators for the new challenges they face in 21st century schools?

Geeking Our Way to a Better World

Go out into the world today and love the people you meet. Let your presence light new light in the hearts of people.

-Mother Teresa

Thinking more about the homeless issue and how to make an impact. Steve Hargadon and I have been throwing ideas around for awhile now. I plan to Skype him into my two workshops tomorrow at Preparing for Walking Home Together: Steps to a Practical Approach- NC's Conference on Homelessness to talk about using his Public Web Stations idea for setting up free Public Access computer stations for next to nothing with very minimal upkeep. Wouldn't it be cool to create immediate, affordable, maintenance free access for the homeless. Steve has figured a way to do it. 

Web 2.0 and its Potential for Breaking Generational Poverty
When I speak at conferences about homelessness one of the things I emphasize is the potential of the Web for helping enable those who need it most. There are lots of great examples of the homeless who are starting to realize the potential for using these tools as a way of climbing out. Now we just need to get homeless service providers and those of us interested in helping on board and connected.

The Role of Libraries?
Take a look at this interesting article,

America Gone Wrong: A Slashed Safety Net Turns Libraries into Homeless Shelters, which

Steve shared with me about how librarians fit into the solution. If we can get librarians to offer technology instruction to their homeless clients what doors would that open? I always recommend getting an email address (an address that never changes) by using free computers in the library to the homeless Moms with which I talk.

Maybe we could set up labs of Internet ready machines using Steve's CD in libraries and offer classes for the homeless to improve their job marketability by teaching them a valuable skill set, or offer online mentors (teachers) willing to help homeless kids with homework and nurturing, and possibly help the homeless get connected to services and people that can make a difference in their circumstance. For taking the computer class, libraries could give away a free USB drive to make any files they create portable.

Wouldn't a Craig's List for the homeless be cool?I bet you--like me--have tons of portable technologies to donate that would be perfect for the homeless and others trapped in poverty.

Cell Phones for the Homeless
One of the things that perpetuates the cycle of homelessness is not being contactable. How is someone going to call you back about a job application? How about if we got a grant to provide cell phones and prepaid cards for the homeless? And with the newer 3G cell phones that could even be the answer to connectivity! Because of their mobile nature, the homeless like things that are small and portable. Everything needs to be easily moved around, everything needs to fit into a backpack. With cell phones going for $30-$50 and the way we all upgrade continously there has to be a way to recycle older phones for the homeless. Recharging wouldn't be a problem as there are plenty of places to plug in to recharge.

Invitation to be Creative
I want to invite service users, service providers, grass roots organizations, and other interested stakeholders who work or care about marginalized groups such as the homeless who regard themselves as tech savvy and web 2.0 experts to help me brainstorm Internet/communication based outreach/interventions.

I hope you will take a moment to share your ideas here or on your blogs and then link them to here. If there are enough of us-- maybe we could create a social network community on Ning and start launching some of these ideas? I belong to the DDN but even there it seems to be lots of individuals doing their thing and then sharing what they have done. What if we figured out a thing or two that really worked and did it together? Please leave me a comment here if you are interested in collaborating and please spread the word to see if others would be interested. So-- please share.. what ideas do you have?

BTW...as I was writing this a family member came in and said I have an idea. The military has huge trucks that do laundry. They pull into an area where military are camped without washing facilities and do large amounts of laundry very quickly. Why couldnt they make themselves available to shelters and shanty towns? Or why couldnt laundry mats get tax credits for allowing people experiencing poverty to do their laundry for free?

Other Ideas and Sites

http://www.sparesomechange.com/ is a search engine dedicated to helping homeless find resources created by a former homeless guy.

Austin Free-Net has a cool idea. Austin Free-Net tries to involve computers in the everyday lives of high poverty citizens. Through showing them how to look up bus schedules, use email or even research potential employers, Free-Net integrates the Web into their lives." Austin Free-Net is attempting to arrange classes on using the Web and software while people wait in line each week at the food pantry in hopes that more disadvantaged members of society will get online.

Net Squared a site about remixing the web for social change.

Laptops for the Homeless

Homeless Bloggers
The Homeless Guy
Wandering Scribe
List

Organizations
National Coalition for the Homeless
National Association for the Education of Homeless Children and Youth
Project Hope
National Alliance to End Homelessness

A Multi-Literate Teacher

I found Vance Steven's Moodle course entitled Mulitliteracies for a Digital Age. Vance Stevens is a Lecturer in Computing at Petroleum Institute in Abu Dhabi. I am taken with the resources he has collected and can't wait to absorb all that I am reading.

His Course Description
A multiliterate teacher understands the many ways that technology interacts and intertwines with academic and interpersonal life, and actively   learns how to gain control over those aspects impacting teaching, social, and professional development. Multiliterate individuals are aware of the pitfalls   inherent in technology while striving for empowerment through effective   strategies for first discerning and then taking advantage of those aspects of   changing technologies most appropriate to their situations. These strategies include managing, processing, and interpreting a constant influx of  information, filtering what is useful, and then enhancing the learning   environment with the most appropriate applications. This course

• models effective approaches and strategies for responding to technology issues in the academic environment
• provides opportunities for training in technical skills required for coping with information overload
• utilizes video, web cam, image, voice, and social networking technologies in communicating through communities of practice which in turn model collaborative, constructivist learning settings.

The ideas in that description are so powerful I decided to break them up to allow for deeper reflection.

A Multiliterate Teacher

A multiliterate teacher understands the many ways that technology interacts and intertwines with academic and interpersonal life, and actively learns how to gain control over those aspects impacting teaching, social, and professional development.

As I read this I shouted YES! Something I struggle with in the work I do is helping teachers understand the distinction between using Web 2.0 tools because they are novel and cool and using them in authentic ways that enhance their teaching, professional development and personal connections/collaborations. The 21st Century educator (what Vance calls the multiliterate teacher) not only knows what the tools are (most basic aspect) but has a deep understanding of the pedagogy involved in using them. So many get hung up on the tool itself, and that becomes the focus, rather than seeing these technologies as a medium, a canvas, a portal used to connect, collaborate, empower, and a catalyst for deep meaningful change-- both in the profession as a whole and in  teachers/students as individuals.

This perspective allows the teachers to operate from a thematic schema where connections are illuminated and occur organically. It is obvious, but often overlooked- the interconnectedness of life.
Life is not compartmentalized. Each aspect spills over into the other. I am female, woman, mother, daughter, sister, friend all at the same moment. Even daily functions of life spill over into each other-- I teach, parent, administrate and cook breakfast all at the same time.

Somehow though, when we take it to the classroom we think life should be parceled out in isolated components. We do math and then reading. We separate grade levels as if somehow 8 yr olds are not interested in the same things that 11 year olds are  or secondary students need to be separated in to age specific peer levels to make them more successful. If we are preparing them for life-- show me anywhere in life we segregate learning. It is this "interacting and intertwining" skill set that is most important for the teacher of the 21st Century.

Technology is NOT the answer--It is the strategy

Multiliterate individuals are aware of the pitfalls inherent in technology while striving for empowerment through effective strategies for first discerning and then taking advantage of those aspects of changing technologies most appropriate to their situations.

The optimist in me believes that teachers intuitively know the potential for meaningful educational reform that exists in the diverse connections technology affords and that is the reason they are so willing to start using a web 2.0 tools without thinking through the possible pitfalls and effectiveness of matching the right tool for each learning objective.

Teachers wouldn't dream of giving students power tools without thinking through how they should be used in the safest way possible that still affords the greatest amount of learning and the most powerful outcomes. Likewise, no teacher would set up learning stations throughout the classroom without thinking through how they would embed the curriculum learning objectives in the activity, how they would organize the cooperating learning groups (which students to pair together), where to place which stations (reading stations need to be in a quiet location in the room and not next to the painting easel) and so on. Yet in our excitement of seeing how easily content is created using digital tools we often are so intent on getting students on with creating a web presence, that we do not think through possible pitfalls or most effective ways of connecting the learning to the medium being used. The 21st Century teacher needs to use these tools in her own personal learning before tossing the students the keys. We simply can't give away what we do not own.

Teacher as Information Manager

These strategies include managing, processing, and interpreting a constant influx of  information, filtering what is useful, and then enhancing the learning environment with the most appropriate applications.

21st Century educators need to become skilled at handling the abundance of information available. They need to quit focusing on memorization of content and becomes skilled at synthesis and distribution - making available what is most applicable as pieces for construction and conceptualization of content and ideas. Take the information-- sort, organize, chunk, and provide the thought legos for students to use to build knowledge around the objectives you are trying to teach. Let them build together.

21st Century educators need to make principled changes in the way we think and in the delivery of our content.  21st Century educational leaders need to have a deep understanding of the changing learning framework that living in a digital age dictates. The 21st Century is here-- and these kids can't wait. It is time for teachers to begin using these tools as professionals- for deep engagement with content and building of collaborative networks in the educating of our students and the reforming of our schools.

Photo Credit: http://flickr.com/photos/peteashton/566312

Still thinking about Connectivism

"When connections are weak...not more research, but better connections are needed," according to George Siemens.  I teach a variety of ICT courses to preservice teachers at The College of William and Mary. One of the common projects I have included in each course I have taught for the last three years is an electronic mentorship. The motivation behind this assignment is to help beginning and preservice teachers to build their networks.

Terry Anderson at the recent  Connectivism conference, spoke about design-based research theory and methodology. I walked away from his presentation thinking of what I do through the electronic mentorships as a form of intervention. I had never made that connection before.

MENTORING AS A NON-TRAINING INTERVENTION has grown rapidly in the last twenty years. From teacher education to aerospace, from financial firms to community foundations, mentoring       relationships are increasing in popularity, and have a variety of designs and outcomes. But thinking of mentoring in terms of a networking strategy needs more exploration.

Research has shown mentoring can promote teacher effectiveness. Successful mentoring experiences can lead to beginning teachers’ increased contentment with and proficiency in teaching, and, as a result, the professional development of mentored novices is more noticeable than their non-mentored counterparts (Spuhler & Zetler, 1994, cited in Thomsen & Gustafson, 1997).  Mentoring programs that promote teacher effectiveness recognize that early-career teachers must arrive at a place in their professional growth where practical experience and professional wisdom provide a secure foundation upon which to draw as they make their ongoing pedagogical decisions (Berliner, 1986; Ralph, 1998; Shulman, 1987).

Teacher Prep
One of the strongest attributes of William and Mary's teacher preparation program is that they pair preservice teachers with the same cooperating teachers throughout their field experiences right up to their student teaching. It provides consistency and an opportunity for a seasoned teacher to know their novices needs, strengths, and weaknesses.  However, this relationship can prove to be a challenge in that it doesnt give the students access to a diverse support network: diverse in ideology, pedagogy, and global perspectives.

By  requiring preservice teachers to participate in an online mentorship experience with highly accomplished teachers from around the world they are able to get the diverse perspective they need. In the past, the mentors involved in my project, while top educators in the field, didnt necessarily use technology in instruction. My justification was that the purpose of this experience transends any particular web-based tool.  I also wanted students to use electronic communication tools as a way of networking with highly accomplished educators that could offer "just in time" advice that wouldnt seem evaluative in nature.

Each of the technology experiences are embedded into content students need to learn to be effective in the classroom. This semester, I decided to take a different twist by choosing mentors that are both highly accomplished teachers from around the world but who also understand the importance of using Web 2.0 tools and other technologies in their teaching. My thinking was that the focus would be on both technology and best practice through a global lens, that would also help prepare these students for the changing demographic they will find in their classrooms, while at the same time showing them the value online networks can have on their growth and developing practice.

Mentor Roles and Outcomes
The role of mentors is to to weigh in on the discussion by commenting, clarifying, and asking probing questions of the mentees to stimulate their thinking. They post when they are asked a specific question or something posted by someone else resonates with them. However, many feel free to post much more than that.

In the beginning, the mentors see the opportunity as a way to "give back" to the profession and collaborate with other mentors in improving the profession a few teachers at a time. However, it becomes clear early on that the mentorship experience is as much about moving seasoned teachers along a developmental continuum toward improving teacher leadership, as it is about a one-way communication strategies to impart mentor to novice knowledge. The collaborations fast grow into a learning ecology with as many mentors professionally communicating with other mentors as novices communicating professionally with other novices -in addition to traditional mentor to novice communications.

This semester, a few days into the networking experience, several first time mentors with my project shared how the experience was impacting their ability to reflect upon their own practice.
These two comments occurred in Skype conversations with mentors who teach on the other-side of the world from me.

[2/5/2007 7:00:28 AM] P says: Hi Sheryl - how are you ?? The
conversations going on in the Tapped In room are very interesting - greatly
enjoying contributing  - thanks for inviting us to join.
[2/5/2007 7:03:50 AM] Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach says: I am so appreciative of
your time and effort
[2/5/2007 7:04:52 AM] Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach says: It will be awesome for all
of us I think-- to see how things are done in different places in the world.
[2/5/2007 7:05:03 AM] P says: It's quite good to get time for
us to reflect on practice as well - as you don't get much time when you are
actually doing it!!!
[2/5/2007 7:05:25 AM] Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach says: That is what many mentors
have said.
[2/5/2007 7:05:34 AM] P says: I think the collaborative
aspects of web 2.0 are quite awe inspiring
[2/5/2007 7:06:12 AM] P says: I am off for lunch now following
my morning maths class - take care
------------------------
[2/9/2007 3:29:41 PM] A says: Hey Sheryl- Just a note to say I am loving the debate in Tapped In. One of the first things I do when I get home is check the conversations- as you say- it is helping me think more clearly about things by sorting out what I think about the debate in my own mind. Thanks for the invite- it's great.
[2/9/2007 3:30:12 PM] Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach says: I am so appreciative of the time you are putting in
[2/9/2007 3:30:17 PM] Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach says: You are quite awesome.
[2/9/2007 3:30:36 PM] A says: It's good for me!
----------------------------------------------

This note came in an email from another mentor not living in the US.

Hi Sheryl,
just letting you know that I have already learnt heaps from participating in
this.  The student questions have given me time to reflect on my own
practices, so thanks to the students.  Then reading responses from other
teachers around the world and knowing exactly where they are coming from is
heartening.  Too often, staff have looked at me as if I had rocks in my head
when I made suggestions about using technology, but reading other teachers
uses of mp3 players in Kindegartens is what I have had in mind for quite
some time.

There are many gems here and I look forward to participating as best I can.

Thanks,
J
--------------------------------------------------------

The networking of preservice teachers with accomplished teachers who not only understand good pedagogy, but who are comfortable collaborating in a virtual learning community has positive outcomes for everyone. The learning is universal; each member builds upon the ideas of the other and the ideas grow and change within the community. The amazing thing is that participants are at very different stages in their development and yet everyone is learning something.

Generally, the mentors are encouraged to give reasoned advice that could be applied globally. Obviously, there is much US terminology thrown about as most of these students will be teaching in US schools. However, I think it is important for the students to understand just how flat the world really is in terms of learning and how by making global connections we all grow.

Tapped In
I use Tapped In rather than blogs and wikis (although they do create and use these tools as well for other objectives in the course) so that these students can be candid and not fear anything they say will be used in an evaluative way. Tapped In is a "walled garden" in that what is said in our group is not broadcasted to the search engines. It has been my experience that this aspect creates a feeling of community and trust in our groups.

The Networks Tend to Merge

The most interesting aspect of using online networks is how they feed and inform each other. For example, out of my preservice group mentoring grew ENDAPT, a mentoring project done with William and Mary first year teaching alumni and the Teacher Leaders Network (TLN). TLN is an online group of teacher leaders from around the US and Canada that have been communicating and collaborating for the last four years via a web page and listserv. Amazing things have grown out of that group. So it was a natural for me to include them as mentors both with my preservice teachers and the ENDAPT project.

In helping to lead the ABPC 21st Century teaching and learning project in Alabama, I connected with some excellent teachers who were growing in their ability to use Web 2.0 tools to collaborate online. It was natural for me to invite them to be involved as mentors in my projects.  As one of the conveners for the K12Online Conference, my network grew to include educators from around the world who were beginning to heavily influence my thinking in educational reform. Again, I invited them to join the learning communities in Tapped In and modeled for my students the importance of building on collaborations. Other mentors came from my network connections made from reading blogs and comments.

Viral Effect
Now it is clear to me that as my network has grown a viral effect has been at work. My networks have merged pulling participants from one group to another and back again. A true learning ecology.

Is it not exciting to live in a time such as this?

Photo credit: http://www.ladiesinred.org/images/dec04/connections%20006%20(2).jpg