I first wrote about Andy Hargreaves and the 4th Way back in October, (with an important update added to the bottom of the post in early November). The pyramid below is updated from that post, taking feedback from Hargreaves himself.
Administrators from our district met and discussed The 4th Way last Thursday and we were guided through some activities to encourage us to explore the text and to examine which of Hargreaves’ principles we are doing well, and which ones we need to focus on.
I like the recommendation of putting ‘Teaching and Learning’ at the top of the pyramid. I think that puts the role of both educators, (as a teacher and a learner), and students where they belong at the focal point of what is both important in education and meaningful in educational change.
We need to have a common, clear, inclusive and inspiring vision.
We need to collaborate at all levels of community… it really does take a village to raise a child.
We need to be active learners taking part in lively learning communities, networked with effective role models.
We need to be responsible and effective teaching professionals, lead learners fostering meaningful learning.
During our session, we got to see some exclusive video interviews that Hargreaves gave, and I realized that embedded, but not explicitly mentioned, in my pyramid is the idea of professionalism… This is where ‘Responsibility’ comes from. To me Hargreaves’ notion of “Responsibility before Accountability” is key to the 4th Way. The following was completed on a little reflection card we filled out and handed in, (I’m glad I took a photo of it first).
I wrote:
We need to be unified and collaborative.
Not unions, but professional organizations.
Not corporations, but community leaders.
Not top-down, but shared leadership.
Not teachers, but co-learners.
Not standardization, but a process of inquiry.
Looking at this list, it unintentionally follows the patter of: Not accountability, but responsibility.
The key here it to recognize that there is a coexistence between the two and that this isn’t a dichotomy, but rather a priority: “Responsibility before Accountability”. This is where schools and school districts have the greatest opportunity to change.
In The 4th Way, Hargreaves says,
“Unions have missed an opportunity to raise professional standards among all their members and increase their credibility and transparency among the public. Government, meanwhile, has kept an iron grip on defining and controlling professional standards. This is professionalism without power—and teachers know it.”
Professionalism, and the ensuing responsibility that comes with it, empowers educators at all levels. In the end, we need to be accountable, but not to governments, or unions, or corporations. We need to be accountable to ourselves as professionals and educators, and we need to be accountable to the student in our schools.
Professionals acting responsibly and holding themselves, and others, accountable in the interest of teaching and learning.
Sometimes that means that we let corporations into our schools but we dictate the conditions and we expect them to be there as community leaders, not advertisers, (and we hold them accountable to this if they don’t do it responsibly). Sometimes we need to let parents and community members share their expertise and not worry that they are doing something that is defined as a union job. Sometimes, (dare I say often), we need to let students dictate what they want to learn, because they are passionate about an area of interest, and let go of the curriculum.
Maureen Dockendorf said at the end of the session about Hargreaves’ 4th Way, “It’s not a program, it is a set of principles”.
This is a great point, as The 4th Way is not prescriptive. Expanding on this idea in a discussion with Dave Sands later he said, “It’s not steps or even a set of principles, it is a philosophy or a way of being.”
Dave continued, “This is how an organization, a society, and a world moves to a greater state of consciousness. This is how we take responsibility and ultimately move to accountability.”
On a final note look at what I highlighted above:
Professionals acting responsibly and holding themselves, and others, accountable in the interest of teaching and learning.
Do you notice where the power lies is in that statement?
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This wordle was created by our administrators putting one word on a Post-it note to reflect on what they thought of our session together and/or of Hargreaves 4th Way.
Some people say ‘kids will be kids’… Some adults have never forgotten what it felt like to be a victim.
What happens when adults are not present?
Sometimes kids do things they shouldn’t do. Sometimes kids make choices based on what their friends do rather than on what they know is the right thing to do.
Sometimes the bully wins:
It happens on playgrounds, in cafeterias, and friend’s basements, at parties & school dances, and yes, it happens online too.
Parents supervise their kids on playgrounds, and teachers supervise students in our schools…
Who supervises these kids online? Whose responsibility is it?
Whether it is a responsibility to be present online or not, what right do we as educators have to be online? Should our role change what we do on sites like Facebook? On a more personal note: Who are my online ‘friends’? Should I be ‘friends’ with my students online?
Here’s what I think:
When facing the issue of Facebook,
our students are there,
and we should be there too!
I am not advocating for necessary presence, and I am not advocating for us taking on a burden of responsibility. I am saying that we should have the choice to be there and we should have the choice to interact with students on social networking sites such as Facebook.
Some educators will choose to be on Facebook, some will choose to interact there with students, some won’t. My concern is that I’m hearing instances of student teacher faculty advisors, teachers and principals, and even districts telling educators that they should remove their Facebook profiles.
This really happened:
Student A created an “I hate Teacher X” group on Facebook. The students in the group start saying really nasty things about Teacher X. Student B joins this group, however this student is ‘friends’ on Facebook with another teacher, Teacher Y. So, when Teacher Y goes onto Facebook she sees an update informing her that Student B has joined this “I hate Teacher X” group and she reports it to her Administration. Teacher Y also gets the group shut down. How far could this have gone?
Student C decides to create a “Student D is a Fag” group. Student D has no idea this exists. Teacher Z finds the site and shuts it down when it only has 3 students in it and 34 unanswered invitations to join the group. How far could this have gone? How many students were taught a lesson when they clicked ‘Join this group’ only to find that the group was shut down?
Teacher W sees that Student E has joined the “National Skip Day” group. In the hall the next day Teacher W says to Student E, “I hope you aren’t planning to skip my class on that day”. Guess who shows up to school on National Skip Day! How many of Student E’s friends were influenced by this decision?
Mr. Truss gets a video with inappropriate language put on his Funwall by a former student who is still in High School. He sends a private message politely asking the student why she thought that video would be appropriate to send to him. The former student replies very apologetically, and although she has not sent any other videos, she also did not ‘unfriend’ Mr. Truss. Do you think that she is now ‘more aware’ of who her audience is on Facebook?
I wrote this in the reflection section of a previous post:
If we (educators and parents) don’t participate with students online, then we run the risk of having misguided or inexperienced friends, or worse yet bullies, becoming greater influences than us in their lives. Gordon Neufeld calls it ‘peer orientation’ in his book: Hold On to Your Kids: Why Parents Need to Matter More Than Peers. This does not mean that we get ‘chummy’ with our students online… we are simply a significant adult presence, modeling appropriate behavior, and connecting with them in a meaningful, respectful way. The internet is no place for an unsupervised playground!
That said, as educators we are professionals and we have the need to be professional in our interactions with students… everywhere.
Principal Bruce Carabine and Technology and Curriculum Coordinator James McConville worked on some advice for educators who use Facebook. Here is what they came up with:
Be sure your profile is set-up in such a way that it is private.Only those you invite to be your friends should be allowed to view the content of your profile.
Make a decision about who is going to be in your friend’s group.If you are including current and former students, it’s a good idea take a conservative approach to the content of your page.Imagine the parents of one of your student’s were looking through it.Would they be comfortable with what they saw?
Perception is everything.You may want all of your students to be your friends on Facebook.Don’t be the one to invite them.Wait until they invite you to join their Facebook as a friend. Also, when they invite you, send them a ‘thank you for inviting me message’ so that you have a record of who invited whom.
Don’t download pictures of current and former students onto your hard drive.
Monitor regularly what others write on your wall.If there is anything that is inappropriate, remove it promptly.Be sure you deal with those who put questionable content on your site. Repeat offenders should be removed from your friend’s list.
We are thoughtful and intentional in our engagement with students in our schools and our classrooms… and we should be thoughtful and intentional in our engagement with students online.
The one thing that I’ve avoided so far is the idea of responsibility. Who is ultimately responsible for student behavior online? First and foremost I believe the answer to be the students themselves. Next in line should we want to take the ‘blame’ approach would be their parents. But I’m not interested in blame. I’m interested in students being respectful citizens in all of my communities, on and offline. I also choose to accept some responsibility and care for what goes on in my communities.
The presentation delivers a number of key ideas: Technology feeds student needs. Technology isn’t going away. Parents need to figure out what they value, and they need to understand and engage with the technology their kids are using. If parents want influence with their children, they are far more likely to get it engaging from the inside rather than policing from the outside.
Take note educators… we too are far more likely to engage students from the inside rather than policing from the outside!
The irony of it all is that I don’t really like Facebook, and I don’t really use it that much. I choose to show students a limited, and rather boring profile on Facebook. So the reality is that since I have a large digital footprint, students can find out a lot more about me in many other places besides Facebook.
What I do like about Facebook is that it has allowed me to have some really amazing interactions that I may never have had otherwise: Students sharing something they have learned with me; A former student that I was really worried about reconnecting with me, and thus I’m able to see him doing well for himself; A former student telling me that as a teacher I made ‘ the biggest difference in her life’.
…And I’ve been able to teach some impromptu lessons about appropriate online behavior along the way. So far, every time that I’ve mentioned something that I thought was inappropriate in my Facebook community, I have received an apology or removal of the inappropriate content, and not once have I been removed as a friend as a result.
So I ask you… should we be told ‘as educators’ that we should remove our Facebook profiles? Is this something we should fear? Should we engage with our students online? Or should we just police the bullies and support the victims after the fact?
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*Update: I followed up on some of these ideas in my post Facebook Revisited which was inspired by a teacher asking me “How do you feel about adding students as friends on Facebook?”.
Well the concept of neighbourhood has really changed for me. I showed this movie in Powerpoint format at one of my presentations at BLC08 this summer. Afterwards, I think it was one of 3 people, (Liz Davis, Laura Deisley, or Maria Knee), that asked me how many people from my network did I think were in the presentation? I had no idea? Tonight I thought I’d start the search.
See the video on this blip.tv link or click below for it to open in a new window.
That’s 30 people, some appearing more than once. Other than intentionally using items from Alec and Jeff, each one of these ’sightings’ are incidental… but significant. Beyond these connections I also have Jabiz Raisdana, Dave Matheson (one of just 3 local connections from my district), Sue Waters, Karen Janowski, and Claudia Ceraso commenting on my post introducing the video.
Claudia didn’t just comment on my post, she wrote a response post that has challenged my thinking. When I’m done here I’m going to her blog to respond… to continue the conversation, and the learning. Claudia may live and work in Argentina, but she has influence over me. Geography and physical proximity no longer matter. (Case-in-point: Sue’s comment offers me advice from Austrialia.)
My digital neighbourhood spans the globe! But this is more than an issue of geography, it is also about influence and significance. Some of these connections are ‘loose’, like the local bus driver on Sesame Street, but others have greater meaning to me.
I may never meet some of these people, but they are my teachers, mentors and friends. This is my network, not my neighbourhood… and networks are fundamentally different than groups/(neighbours). It truly is a brave new world-wide-web, and if we aren’t engaging in the opportunities it provides us then we are missing out… and the same could be said for our students.
A year ago I went to see my friends Dave Sands and Brian Kuhn presenting to parents that were part of a 1-1 (one laptop per child) pilot program at a Middle School. Little did I know that I’d be moved to that same school as the Vice Principal in February, and that I’d be co-presenting with Brian, to the parents in the program, one year later.
Brian did a great job preparing the presentation and with similar philosophies it was very easy to contribute meaningfully to what he had prepared.
The key messages we brought up sounded eerily like my 3rd presentation at BLC08 in Boston, but I’ll have more on that later.
As we were giving the presentation it occurred to me that 1-to-1 is about exposing teachers (and parents) to possibilities as much as it is about doing the same for students. The fact is that not long from now we won’t need 1-1 classrooms because students will be bringing their own computers/movie cameras/mp3 players/web browsers/instant messengers/calculators/agendas to school with them:
I predict that in about 5 short years almost every Middle School student will own an iPhone or its’ equivalent, and they will be connecting to our wireless network via bluetooth for absolutely free. Students will be ready, willing and able to use these tools in our classroom… will teachers be ready enough to maximize the opportunities and learning experiences these tools (coming to our classrooms for free) will provide?
I’ve been hearing a message from a lot from technology-using teachers recently… “I can’t go back”! Teachers are beginning to see that technology in the classroom is more of a necessity than an opportunity.
One-to-one is not a program that can be sustained across an entire district, it would be too expensive. However this program is ideal to pilot with willing teachers… teachers who recognize that the classroom of the future will give every learner access to tools that would have costed a fortune just a few years ago… tools that some students are already bringing to our classrooms… tools that students will bring to our classrooms of the not-so-distant-future in abundance!
It is now a month after BLC08 and a recent comment has stirred up some thoughts that sent me back to a blog draft I wrote months ago. On Defragging my brain after BLC08, Angela Kerns mentioned that of my nine ‘take-aways’, #3 and #4 resonated with her:
3. Face-to-face meetings with your network are powerful… very powerful.
What is most amazing about BLC08 is that these two points are still resonating with me. Liz B. Davis, Lisa Thumann, and Laura Deisley adopted Dave Sands and I, and took us under their wings. Many of the discussions we had were of a quality that left me wishing that I had recorded them! Thanks to these ladies, I connected with many people that were in my network, but had never met, and I also met amazing people who are now part of my network.
But these learning conversations didn’t happen in the presentations at the conference. It was the conversations we had outside of the sessions that were really incredible.
Liz lived very near our hotel and so a car ride, or a chat walking her home would become an in depth conversation about strategies to promote technology integration or a debate about comfort levels with having students as social networking friends. (O.K., I’ll admit an embarrassing story here just for a laugh… as Dave and I walked Liz home on the second night, I walked into a pole while texting my wife… the rim of my baseball cap saved me from potential head trauma. Mental note: don’t walk and text in the dark!)
The conversations were not all heavy, Lisa and I razzed each other on the issue of ‘to Plurk or not to Plurk’, and Joyce Valenza always made sure everyone was having fun even when sharing our thoughts on education. But it seemed that very often the conversations, whether light, frivolous or funny, always went back to education.
Even at the dinner cruise social, (that Dave, Donna DesRoches and I almost missed after an ‘Amazing Race’ style route), it seemed that the learning continued:
On the boat:Clarence Fisher wanted to know the name of a fort we cruised by, but no-one could help him until Alice Barr handed over her iphone. Clarence used this experience in his presentation the following day to exemplify how information is abundant now and we need to go beyond rote memorization in what we teach.
On the bus ride back to the hotel: I had an in-depth conversation with Pegggy Sheehy about avatar gender. I never considered that I would ever choose a female avatar for myself until this conversation… biases I didn’t even know I had were challenged!
At the hotel restaurant:Darren Kuropatwa, Laura and I took a little idea I had about a Twitter version of 366 Photos and developed it into what would be a great project. Hopefully we will expand on it in the fall and maybe launch for the month of February.
Everywhere we turned we were having learning conversations. This seems to happen when you surround yourself with amazing people… people who are catalysts and agents of change.
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With each person I mentioned above, I linked to their blogs. Each of those blogs are in their own way agents of change… they are inspired by teachers and learners wanting more out of ‘institutional’ education. They are not the works of dreamers dreaming, but rather the work of catalysts reflecting, experimenting, learning, questioning, designing, succeeding and failing, and yes dreaming too.
What makes this so meaningful though, is the connections we make to each other, and the learning we gain from linking, meeting, and creating opportunities for learning conversations to happen.
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Are you an agent of change? Are you a catalyst that makes things happen? Do you create opportunities for collaboration? Do you initiate and inspire learning conversations?
Keeping education meaningful and relevant is an ongoing process of evolution or emergence. The process requires us to learn and to change too. We need to evolve. We need to learn, encourage learning, and allow learning to emerge.
In Science change occurs through hybridization or mutation… ideas go through this too. Institutional education doesn’t do this on its’ own.
In Science catalysts are often used in tandem. Different agents combine to make a chemical reaction happen faster. Catalysts of change work well together too. We learn from each other and interact more meaningfully from the learning of others. Often we need feedback loops to help us make sure we are making the right things happen… after all, change can be both for the better or the worse.
But if there is one thing I can be certain of, change needs to happen. Students today are interacting and engaging with the world in ways that would have seemed like science fiction to us.
If we are not agents of change then we are agents of boredom and mediocrity, the keepers of the status quo…. static… in stasis.
We are influenced by so many things in our lives. Identifying what has a significant influence on us can be difficult. Here are two things that I believe can be categorized as most influential… and they both happened Monday.
1. Fifteen year old Kristine wrote a very influential blog post last May. It coincided with a lesson I was doing in my class for our school’s Renaissance Fair. The post, “How to Prevent Another Leonardo da Vinci“, has made the finals for the Edublog Awards ‘Most Influential Post ‘. She is the only student to make the finals in this category. Furthermore, the post has had an impact on me, and many teachers that I have shared it with. Thinking back now, as I write this, I realize that Kris has influenced my blog posts, time and again. (The student as teacher, or at least as an influential node in my learning network:-)
As I told Kris in my comment months ago: “You are, and always will be, a lifelong learner who engages in a quest to meaningfully exploring your world, (dare I say like da Vinci)… I guess one would argue despite your education rather than because of it… so there is hope, and there is potential for us to find our next da Vinci… perhaps SHE is within our midst today:-)”
As edubloggers I think that it is great to recognize students like Kris who deserve more recognition than they usually get at school. We should also recognize that although we strive to give students the best possible experience in our classrooms, Kris’ message holds more truths than most would like to admit. May her blog influence many learning discussions in the months to come.
2. Two good friends, Dave Sands and Gary Kern came to my school Monday night and did a presentation with me on: Technology, Your Child, and You. Twenty seven parents braved the threat of the first snowfall of the year to participate in the presentation. On a personal note, I felt a little like a rookie called up to the majors to help out with this presentation. Dave and Gary have given it many times, and they had a ‘flow’ about them that I lacked. Overall I think it was great to be part of the presentation and it was fun to see my Batman/Borg metaphor being used (though they use the more recognized Terminator rather than the Borg).
Dave was very impressed with the parent’s involvement and interest. The most vocal of them wanted answers about what to do about Facebook and all the screen time kids have. This presentation however was much more about asking questions than giving answers.
The presentation delivers a number of key ideas: Technology feeds student needs. Technology isn’t going away. Parents need to figure out what they value, and they need to understand and engage with the technology their kids are using. If parents want influence with their children, they are far more likely to get it engaging from the inside rather than policing from the outside.
A simple example: a kid that won’t phone a parent from a friend’s house to say they are changing locations, might not think twice about texting a parent while in the back seat of a car heading to the new location… if text is a mode of communication that the kid already uses with their parent.
The presentation is very well designed and parent feedback was overwhelmingly positive, with several of them wishing more parents showed up, “Parents need to hear this!”
It was a most influential Monday!
Originally posted: November 29th, 2007
Reflection upon re-reading and re-posting:
A look at some amazing students and teachers.
Kris is now my blog-hosting techie, I provide her with free hosting (Bluehost gives me more space than I’ll ever use), and I get step-by-step help with things like upgrading to the newest Wordpress version. She has also been invited to post on Students 2oh, although she hasn’t done so yet.
Mr. Mak was the second of two teachers at our school to get the computers for his 1-1 class, so he had to wait until late February to have them passed on to his students. I arrived at the school in February, showed Mr. Mak Wikispaces and gave him some suggestions about how he could use it. Since then he has blown me away with his fearlessness.
Check out Mr. Mak’s Class Novel or his ToonDoo Anti-Bullying cartoons (note that Raj helped with the instructions), or his Career Research assignment (where 1 person from each of 3 different classes shares a page). Discussions get posted by students late at night, and I see students in the computer room at lunch working on their wikipages. This isn’t a wiki, it is a learning hub!
Also, our computer teacher, Mr. Yuen, jumped onto wikispaces too! His students aren’t just using wiki’s, they are also using tools like: Slideshare, Screencast-o-matic, Dvolver, Jing, Flickr and Audacity, (links to these are on his wiki’s navigation bar). This is a teacher who asked me “What is a wiki?” when I got to the school! Since then he has leaped into the world of web2.0 and has not looked back. I’ve had skype conversations with him well past midnight: I suggest some tools and links and then he shows me some fantastic things he has tried out.
Next year Mr. Yuen will be our afternoon librarian and we are revamping the Library’s outdated computer lab. I can’t wait to see how influential this amazing teacher will be when he starts collaborating with teachers coming to the library to do projects!
So there you have it: Two amazing students and two amazing teachers that are lifelong learners. Four ‘most influential’ people that inspire me with their passion for learning and sharing with others.
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Comment from the original post:
David, what a way to start the week! I just finished reading Kristine’s post, and I absolutely agree! I think every educator needs to read and talk about this post. We have young DaVinci’s sitting in our classrooms ready to be developed. Let’s hope her well deserved recognition for this post will influence many!
Angela Maiers on Thursday, 29 November 2007, 23:58 CET
For a few years now I have taken a group of Grade 7 and 8 students to our feeder schools to teach the incoming Grade 5’s the “Seven Secrets of Leadership”, but really it is about so much more than that!
This is from the e-mail I send to our feeder schools:
What you get: 12-15 of our Leadership Students and a teacher running sessions on “The 7 Secrets to Leadership”. An opportunity for your grade 5 teachers to meet and/or work with the grade 4 students in their classes. (Your teachers do not need to be in the gym, although they are invited to see what we are doing, and stay as they wish.)
A reflective journal written by all the students to use as a discussion starter or as feedback for what the students have learned.
A positive experience to help make transition to grade 6 less stressful for your Grade 5’s.
What your students get: A carousel of 5 activity based lessons run by our Leadership students. -In one activity students all Grade 5’s learn to open combination locks. A few group activities that teach students about leadership. A reflective journal to keep after the session is done. A chance to see grade 7 and 8 students as positive role models. A positive experience the helps students with the transition to Middle School.
What we get: An authentic leadership experience for our grade 7 and 8 students. Grade 6 students entering the school next year with positive expectations about what Middles School students are like. (Also, no tears from the stress of opening a combination lock as well as the stress of dealing with everything else that can overwhelm a new student on their first few days of Middle School).
We require the use of your gym for 2 to 2.5 hours.
All grade 5 students are invited, even if they will be going to another Middle School- the program is not specific to our school.
The Agenda looks like this:
12:30 Arrive at feeder school and set up
1:00 Grade 5 Teachers brings students to gym.
-introductions
Truss -Journal, ‘Secrets’ intro.
Journal Entry – “What makes a good leader?” -Truss
Ice Breaker 2- Leadership Games – 1 or 2 groups
- Alphabetical by name – Tyler
- Birthday – Sarah
Continue games but no talking anymore
- Height – Deighton
- Hair Colour – Callie
- Shoe Size – (optional)
Journal Entry –Truss SECRET #1 – TREAT OTHERS WELL
12:20 Split into 5 groups and move them to the stations
Truss “Get a secret – keep a secret” – Don’t talk about the stations.
‘Don’t you hate it when someone tells you how a movie ends?’
5 Sessions run 5 times by our student leaders:
12:30 Session 1 :: 12:45 Session 2 :: 1:00 Session 3
1:15 -Break from the rotation–
Read ‘The Butterfly Story‘ – Sara
SECRET #2 – THINK BEFORE YOU ACT
Journal Entry, then rotate to next station
1:30 Session 4 :: 1:45 Session 5
Station # A – Balloon Challenge SECRET #3 WORK TOGETHER
Station # B – Maze SECRET #4 BE POSITIVE (Cooperation)
Station # C – Blanket Fold SECRET #5 EVERYONE MATTERS
Station # D – Locks SECRET #6 ACCEPT NEW CHALLENGES
Station # E – Human Knot SECRET #7 LISTEN FIRST, THEN TALK
1:55 QUICK Synthesis: What Secret to Leading by Example did we learn from…
The final secret
SECRET TO SUCCESS IN GRADE 6 (A bonus secret) -Truss
When you can’t solve a problem by yourself… ASK FOR HELP
-Homework (3 questions in the middle of the journal)
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10 min. Debrief for our Crew
I will be building a resource package to explain the events soon (with the help of my students).
If things work out with funding, I will be helping to implement this program with a number of Middle School Student Leadership teams in our district next near. [Update: I did a Pro-D session in January, though I am not aware of any additional schools doing this to end off '08. I think there was enough interest from a teacher here at my new school, (even before I got here), that these sessions will happen in the '08-'09 school year.]
One important note is that the lessons, ‘the secrets’, are decided upon by my students. This year students continued on with 4 of the 5 activities that we did last year, but one (the Balloon Challenge) is new, and one of the older activities has a different lesson, as was decided by the group that is running that activity this year. Two years ago, one of the Leadership Lessons was “Take a Risk”. I wasn’t a fan of this initially, but the group did a fantastic job of running a related activity and explaining how leaders take smart risks rather than poor chances. I am glad I trusted them and didn’t try to change their idea because of my bias.
For me, the best part of the retreat is seeing my students improve their ability to communicate their instructions clearly and lead a group of students with enthusiasm and intent.
An excellent learning experience happened this year when students running the blanket fold were over-explaining/demonstrating their activity. The blanket fold instructions were given such that not only did Grade 5 participants understand that the blanket was to be folded, as small as possible, while everyone stood on it (no one can step off or touch the ground), but they also got a demonstration on how to fold the blanket. I told my students, “you are cutting open their cocoons”, in reference to The Butterfly Story and my students fully understood my message… let them figure out how to fold the blanket on their own – don’t do it for them!
Last week Monday I took a few of my leaders and we ran our activities with some Grade 3’s & 4’s at a Peer Helper retreat organized by two great principals, Dave Sands and Mark Clay. Their combined effort involved students from two very different Elementary Schools, one that could be classified as ‘Inner City’ and the other from a very upper-middle class neighbourhood, both out of my school’s catchment area.
When we arrived at 5pm the Peer Helpers had already had a full day of training so we took the distinct ‘lessons’ out of our activities and made the activities much more focussed on fun. We started out with a game of Rock-Paper-Scissors for candy, with my students making sure that everyone always had candy to participate, (a chance for them to lead by example). Then my students ran their activities at 5 stations around the gym. Next, I did an activity for the Grade 3’s and 4’s to ‘put together the pieces’ and relate what we did to their Peer Helper programs. But in the end it was these Grade 3’s and 4’s who help me put some ideas together and taught me something…
We should be teaching Grade 5’s at the start of the year to help them become leaders in their school, rather than just at the end of the year to help them transition to Middle School. Later in the week, in talking with two other Elementary Principals when we did the Seven Secrets Retreat at their school, they too thought this would be a great idea. One of them, Perry, suggested that we train Grade 4’s at the end of the year and come back and do more with them at the start of the next year. The challenge for us would be getting our program up and running at the start of the year. A lot to think about!
The simple fact is that students of all ages have the capacity to lead… they just need to be provided with the opportunity, along with a little training and support.
Originally posted: June 11th, 2007
Reflection upon re-reading and re-posting:
I can list a number of reasons why things didn’t move ahead as planned: I moved to a busy high school job that involved developing another program; My goal was to get some collaboration time with Student Leadership Teacher Leaders and their students, but I only got a single afternoon Pro-d introduction to the teachers; I was promoted to VP just weeks after the presentation to the Middle School Student Leadership Teacher Leaders… these all amount to nothing more than excuses!
That said, I need to make things work in my own new school before expanding the program. My school is embarking on a WEB program that has many similar goals to my program AND it has built in sustainability by the building of relationships beyond a single-day event. It will be my job to promote this only in as much as it will add value to what will already be happening thanks to a number of teacher leaders that are taking a great leadership role in connecting to our incoming Grade 5’s.
Collaboration is key… on the level of all the adults working together in the building AND also in our ability to collaborate and empower our students… as I said, ’students of all ages have the capacity to lead’.
After an incident delayed getting feedback from my students until last Monday, things got extremely busy with preparation for the Renaissance Fair and my Grade 5 Transition Retreats [the subject of a future post]. All this included 3 afternoons out of my classroom at other functions… I blinked and it was Friday afternoon. And only now have I noticed that not everyone has given me feedback yet. What I do see there is very encouraging.
I have just given my students the opportunity to study any topic they choose in Science for their wiki pages we just started. Short of one pair of overachievers (that I mentioned in my blog), the group seems very apathetic.
However I think “choose your own topic” can be very difficult for students who have spent years being fed criteria checklist style assignments. I am constructing a post now (in my mind- & hopefully on my blog this long weekend) that looks at the pedagogy involved in such assignments. As Carolyn says (above), “it’s easier if the content comes first and then they are using the technology to communicate the content.” …But I think it is more than that, it is setting clear objectives, ‘ownership’ of the criteria, and clear expectations around expected outcomes… So much to consider!
I think that I am guilty of seeing the value of using technology in guiding learning, but not effectively guiding learning in my technology use.
Carolyn Foote, mentioned above also added this comment after mine:
These situations are ones I see frequently as a librarian as I mentioned.
But I think most of us, if told we can research anything we want, might be stumped for a little while if it was that open ended. I think that you’re right about setting clear objectives.
And I think it is more than just the fact that kids are used to having defined assignments. Even the assignment to “do whatever you want” is still an assignment–it’s not their own motivation driving them, it’s ours.
I think somewhere in there, we all know what we’d like to know more about, but it’s hard to start that “cold”. I think any kind of prompts, strategies, and discussion we can use to help students start thinking about their own interests is helpful.
Having them clip newspaper or magazine articles on some topics ahead of time—having them bookmark three websites that interest them ahead of time–brainstorming with the whole class–all these are strategies that help them get started on realizing they do have interests.
Carol Kuhlthau has some interesting work on the research process, and part of what she talks about are the emotional stages students/all of us go through during the research process. The anxiety at the beginning of a project and inability to think of something is one of the normal stages she defines. We all get more confident as we catch on to an idea and then start researching it, and our motivation gets stronger to do more. I think her work is really helpful in helping understand how students feel and why they don’t perform the way we might expect, especially in the beginning stages, and why they need some scaffolding to internalize the process.
This is brilliant feedback. It isn’t rocket science for a seasoned teacher that really should know this, but scaffolding that is student directed is something we should all be reminded of from time-to-time. I think that in my excitement to get things started, and my desire to have students choose their own topic, I let technology supersede pedagogy.
Reading the Science Alive feedback now I realize that the comments above are fuel to make a good project great. The students loved Science Alive, and choosing their own topic was a huge highlight. Add a healthy dose of scaffolding, a little better structure with respect to time lines and expectations, and a few experts to help us out along the way, and we have a delicious recipe for one heck-of-a project pie.
I intended to put some student feedback highlights here, but I won’t. If you are interested, READ THEIR WORDS.
Here is a very short summary:
• Students really liked this project. Some of them considered it the best ever!
• They loved that they got to choose their own topics.
• They felt challenged.
• They hated the issues we had dealing with crappy computers, and yet they were willing work through the frustration.
• They thought this was a valuable experience… so much so that many of them wanted to do another similar project and/or suggested that I should do this again next year.
• And finally, using their words: They enjoyed being able to share their ideas, “What I am most proud of the most from the page is when I was how I typed out information to let others read it and learn from what I learned,” and being able to see what others did, “I thought this was a great project because it was always fun, and when you needed inspiration, it was easy to just click on someone else’s page, and see all the neat stuff that they’ve done, and then it makes you want to make your page just as good (or, it did for me).” Also another student commented about how a different group’s project touched him, “I learned a lot of stuff over the period of time that was given. I especially enjoyed learning about the diabetes because my aunt has diabetes so it was interesting to see what she goes through and how she’s affected”.
I’m proud of my students and I am very happy with our first attempt at creating wikis. I believe that for many of my students we truly did bring Science Alive!
What I will focus on now are the comments that can give me perspective on my teaching, and on doing a project such as this in the future. Three key things come to mind, the first of which has already been discussed.
1. Scaffolding
Here are some comments: [Their words/spelling/grammar, no editing on my part. Students can't edit a Discussion topic like they can their wiki page.]
“Next time I would give us students not necessarily more time, but more of a guideline of what you want our final project to be. Rather then it being ‘we become experts’, a guideline that would help us in seeing our destination of a final product.”
“For some groups, I don’t think they knew what to do first and how, so maybe there could be more guidence on the Scientific Method.”
“The advice I would give you to improve this project would probably be to have more criteria and guidelines and really help people on what experiment they have chosen.”
“Next time it’ll be a bit better if you gave us an idea of how the “final product” should be like”
“I would suggest doing a little less conferencing, but just maybe asking people how they’re doing informally, and maybe narrowing the topic you can choose just a little (there are so many options that it’s a little overwhelming, in my opinion).”
“The only thing that I would change about this project is as much as I did love the freedom I would have helped a little bit if you had givin us a brief overview of what you wanted to finished product to be. I think this would be good because some people did not even know what to start with on there page. Other than that I thoroughly enjoyed this project.”
Since Carolyn made some great topic development suggestions above, I will look more at some other ideas.
I realize now that I didn’t really give them enough of an outline. This is a challenge for topics like this… especially in a middle school where the students are still young. So many times in my teaching career I have shown a creative exemplar to students and then had a dozen photocopy-like replicas handed in. Also, in all honesty, I didn’t really know what to expect from my students and so it was hard to tell them what it was I expecting! I think that if I spent more time getting them involved with their topic and exploring possibilities early on, some of this stress would have been alleviated.
I did a lot of conferencing with groups and discussing ideas, but often I didn’t relate this back to specific things I wanted to see on their page. [Notice the control-freak teacher in me said "specific things I wanted to see" rather than suggestions that would enhance their learning. This is a learning curve for me as well as them.]
One frustration for me was that I taught Science for just 40 min. classes (a first for me this year having taught 80 min. classes in previous years). Take away login and log out times and sometimes it seemed that I would have just 2 or 3 really good conversations about projects and the class would be over.
Here is a very interesting comment:
“We faced a few challenges like the one that really affected us mentally, this was when we found out that Mr. Truss didn’t like our ideas but it turned out that; that comment fueled our fire to prove him wrong. It was rather difficult figuring out what exactly Mr. Truss wanted out of us for this project but in the same way it made us interested even more in the project because he left us hanging he let us figure most of it out on our own. “
The specific thing that I didn’t like in this case was that the experiment that they wanted to do had way too much variability and opportunity for chance to influence their results… this group did the experiment they wanted to do it anyway. Although I don’t think it was a great decision, I am glad they realized that I really did give them a choice.
The task at hand is to offer support to those that need it, and challenge those that don’t – not much different than any other project. The difference from other projects is that criteria is very hard to offer when you open up a project and allow everyone to demonstrate their learning in different ways. (Note Gabriela Sellart’s and Claudia Ceraso’s comments on my Some Assembly Required post- found in the reflection section.)
More from my students:
“Another thing that I really liked about this project was that there were very few guid lines and know that we have finished the project it feels like we did everything with almost no help at all.”
“This one has definitely been different from the other projects I have done because, the other projects I have done in the past were ‘assigned’, and very directed, you had a topic chosen by the teacher and that’s what you did. This one had more choice and a sense of freedom, even if you chose the topic, you were still responsible for completion. But having chosen something you’re interested in, it makes the project more fun to do.”
Scaffolding not instructions and criteria lists.
2. Time Line
“I think we should have gotten a due date, so we know when to get the project done in time.”
“I would tell the classes the timeline for the experiment, if they have a rough timeline, maybe they’d know how to space out their experiments and project idea’s making everything more even.”
I had no idea how long this project would take. It went longer than it should, but I wanted to give ample notice when I finally did choose a date. Looking back, I gave the students notice on a Monday that it was due the following week Friday, then gave them until the following Monday… a lot of time! Yet, the lack of a stated completion date really seemed to bother students. I would love to see students keep updating their projects even now- why can’t they continue to pursue their interests? However, in the future I will start with a specific due date. Will this light the fire under students’ seats and get many of them on task, and/or more focussed, sooner? I don’t really know?
3. Experts
“I think it was better to have a chance to meet experts really, so we can learn more and be interested in things we are researching.”
I had students research who were experts in their fields and intended to have them contact some of these people. Reality sunk in when I realized that I didn’t know these adults and I would have Grade 8 students contacting strangers directly. In the future, I would want to create a specific contact page for field experts to use to contact us. Then I could route initial contact through me. I would also notify parents that this would be happening well in advance of doing it. I think that this could happen in a safe way if it is well thought out, not flying by the seat of my pants as I was doing in this first attempt.
I could also have used some experts of my own. I’ll point again to Brian Crosby’s Learning is Messy post, Working, Breathing, Reproducible, Intriguing Models and once again beg for a Web2.0 service like Fieldfindr. (I created this mock site in February and it has had over 1,200 visits since the middle of March… who can make this a reality?
Grades
So being neglectful and completely guilty of not creating any rubric or marking scheme for this project, you might wonder how will I mark this project?
I plan on sitting down with each group over the next little while and coming to an agreed upon mark with them. I will ask them, “How have you shown me higher order thinking skills?” and then we will have a discussion. Their written feedback (or lack of it) will play into this as well. In the end, I am starting to believe more and more that we should abolish marks altogether.
Imagine giving a ‘C’ to a student who writes:
“What I enjoyed right away was the fact that we could pick virtually what ever topic that we wanted to. This to me put a whole new spin on things. All of the sudden you are interested in what you are researching and you are excited to start your experiment and find out what your results are going to be. Another thing that I really liked about this project was that there were very few guid lines and know that we have finished the project it feels like we did everything with almost no help at all.”
Is a ‘C’ meaningful feedback? What are you telling that student about lifelong learning? What does the mark accomplish?
A Sad Note
The Renaissance Fair starts this week. Early last year I saw an Alan November webcast and decided to take the plunge with my Renaissance project… I had the students blogging! I spent hours learning how to set everything up, and more hours again developing blogging rules and lessons on using tools such as del.icio.us. The experience was wonderful! It opened my eyes to the potential of web2.0. To start off this school year I went to the computer lab and couldn’t get things going again with our out-dated computers, (Mac OS9 and web browsers that need OSX). I resorted to this wiki project after two blogging experiences failed with my students due to our lack of tools. And so, after yet another success with my wiki, here I am about to abandon the blogging aspect of my project… sad indeed
…And a Happy Note
I can’t get myself to end this post on a sad note, so I will end with a very positive observation:
This year has been cathartic for me.
• I have fully embraced using this blog as a learning tool since about November.
• I have read more and thought more about education in the last 6 months than in any given 5 years of my life.
• I am embracing technology like never before.
• I am engaging students in their learning like never before.
• I believe that we will see some (very exciting) fundamental shifts in education over the next few years.
…And Back to the Science Alive Wiki
If you have any observations that I may have missed, then feel free to be my teacher. Thanks!
Originally posted: Mary 14th, 2007
Reflection upon re-reading and re-posting:
I did get to blog with my students again for the Renaissance Fair! I negotiated with the other project teachers getting them to use the horrible computer lab for research, along with a trolley of books from the library, and I got to use the PC computer lab in the library. You will see some more reflections on this in my next post.
This post evolved into a short presentation that I did with 1-1 laptop teachers at a pro-d session recently. It is evolving into what will be the 2nd half of my 2nd presentation at BLC08, titled ‘Learning Conversations’ (named after this post).
Part 2. It is the questions we ask ourselves and our students that help make Project 2.0h’s great. This take-it-with-you powerpoint presentation will help you provide the scaffolding for engaging digital projects.
The thoughtful/reflective effort it took to write this has made this one of the most powerful things I’ve done for professional development as a teacher.
Comments on the original post:
Observations? Being your teacher? Sorry, not right now. Too busy learning from you.Thank you so much for sharing these reflections on your experiences. I am still amazed -perhaps I should not be by now- to see how similar our issues can be when integrating technology in spite of teaching different subjects with different objectives.
Your reflection goes beyond teaching science, no doubt. Perhaps that is a result from blogging to an audience of teachers at large. You have learnt how to spot the core edu-issues to be discussed.
Perhaps this happens to you as well. I find that when I am thinking, reflecting, my inner voice is talking to someone other than myself. Blog readers and commenters become part of the network of your thoughts. They help us to refine ideas, express them in a precise manner and direct them to the people who may continue developing them.
Enough. I’m afraid I am going a bit away from the post with my comment. Or perhaps we could consider this another bullet in your final Happy Note.
Wow, what an incredibly reflective post, and how lucky your students are to have you as a teacher. Thanks for sharing your thoughts on what did and didn’t work well. Your mindfulness about trying to approach this project differently and trying not to “steer” students too much was fascinating. Glad to have helped in some small way!
Dave, I really enjoyed your authentic reflection and willingness to share your learning with all of us. It is this that is probably your greatest success with this project.In terms of student learning, I agree with your conclusion around scaffolding student learning to a greater degree. you may consider presenting or exposing students to a specific concept in science like “gravity” and then encourage them to “connect” gravity with something meaningful to them (which probably will not be hard, e.g. skateboarding). This way, they will be able to narrow their focus much easier and their Wikis and/or Blogs will have a common element for which they can interact and build knowledge around the concept (gravity) across topics. Just a thought
I think you make some obvious comments around timelines, expectations and grading that are often overlooked when utilizing a new process – “I let technology supersede pedagogy”. Remember it only takes a conversation and a someone taking notes:)
Overall, from the students comments, it appeared that you made a great leap and had a very successful start to facilitating some “authentic learning” for students.
BTW, do we really need to give a grade – why can’t we just comment and question so the learning never stops!
Until now I have been adding my reflection at the end of these re-posts. However, I thought with this post it should come first. Why? Because it is important that I share the date of the original post before quoting other bloggers who were expressing views/moods they may not currently hold.
Of all my posts, this one really seems forward thinking and, well, prophetic. We truly are ‘heading map-less into new, and uncharted territory’. And we really can ‘be the change we want to see in the world’. This can be an exciting time to be an educator… we must remember that even when things are challenging!
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It has been eerie. Unsettling.
I’ve been restless. Dissatisfied.
… and I don’t think that I am alone.
“Shock and awe” may not be the best formula for conversations and learning. Maybe I need to craft and share a more basic, simple message, and avoid overwhelming people with too many scary statistics and ideas.”
“There’s nothing new here, really. I know. What’s new for me at least is that if feels like my lens for all of this is changing. And that’s why I’m stuck as to what to write about here. My learning and classroom learning look very different. I will never enter another physical classroom as a “student” again, and that’s by choice. That physical space just doesn’t cut it. And schools are all about physical space. And control. And content.”
“Really, we, as educators, live in a world of dichotomy – where one part of our world is moving so quickly it takes our breath away while the other side hardly seems to move at all. There we are, stuck in the middle trying to somehow bring these two together. Some people are doing a fantastic job while others are so overwhelmed that they stick with what they know, which, we are finding, doesn’t fit with our present students which is causing some serious problems.”
“Let’s Rethink It Order and discipline in a time of tremendous social change in the 19th Century. Well, It is the 21st Century and once again it is time for social reformers to rethink the reasons and ways we are educating our young.”
Tangled in the web I find Stephanie Sandifer, who thinks ActionPlans are Overdue. She points me back to Sheryl and Will (whom I had already read), as well as Miguel Guhlin, who in turn writes about Sheryl’s post.
Miguel’s post (overall) is more upbeat… yet this paragraph sticks with me,
“At the risk of sounding cynical, here’s a quick response on Saturday morning: Schools fail miserably about instilling democracy in our children…voting, democracy education are distractions from the REAL curriculum schools teach from and about. Democratic values are also antithetical to our schools since they are restrictive, controlled environments…they are top-down controlled, in the “strict father frame” that George Lakoff describes that tolerates no back-talk, no discussion, no questioning. Socrates would not only be drinking Hemlock, he’d be…well, you can only execute someone once.”
Miguel’s optimism comes later when he says, “…let their voices, that of the learners, ring throughout our schools, voices that speak of relevance, authenticity, and human connections…in ways that cannot be denied.”
This sounds like my friend Dave Sands who says ‘it is students who will change education’. But it isn’t coming fast enough, there are too many ‘walls’ denying our students, too many flame snuffers.
This isn’t new. I’ve been here before.
From my first post:
“In a hundred years or so, everyone now alive in the whole earth will be dead – is this not so?”… “It would therefore be possible for the human race to run its affairs quite differently, in a wise and benevolent fashion, in a relatively short time.”
…”And so?”
“The purpose of education,” said Wizard Prang, “is to make sure this doesn’t happen.” …”The purpose of a system is what it does.”
To my first collection of other posts, where I found so many people writing and talking about how schools don’t fit kids: Square Peg, Round Hole… Time and again I am finding myself in these lulls of impatience, frustration and dissatisfaction.
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But it is all making sense to me now.
Well, that might be overstating things… but I have found some clarity.
What spurred this comparison on? My thinking can jump around quite a bit, it went something like this: We are reaching a group consciousness around ‘where we are’ compared to ‘where we should be’ with the use of technology and schools… ‘reaching a group consciousness’ reminds me of the 100th Monkey Effect… actually, this is like a web version of the Age of Aquarius… which reminds me… what were the ‘9 Ideas’ or ‘Agreements’ I read about in The Celestine Prophecy about 10-12 years ago?… No wait, they weren’t Ideas or Agreements, they were… (Google search the book)… ‘Insights’! …(reading) …Wow, I can really see some parallels here!
So, here is my comparison. I will box in the text about the Celestine Prophecy Insights from Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Celestine_Prophecy, Monday Dec. 12, 2007 – I’m just realizing that a date is essential when quoting a changeable text). I will then put my slant on how ‘”WE” are progressing through the insights in relation to the ‘WEb’
The Web2.0 Prophecy
THE FIRST INSIGHT . . . A CRITICAL MASS A new spiritual awakening is occurring in human culture, an awakening brought about by a critical mass of individuals who experience their lives as a spiritual unfolding, a journey in which we are led forward by mysterious coincidences.
THE SECOND INSIGHT . . . THE LONGER NOW This awakening represents the creation of a new, more complete world view, which replaces a five-hundred-year-old preoccupation with secular survival and comfort. While this technological preoccupation was an important step, our awakening to life’s coincidences is opening us up to the real purpose of human life on this planet, and the real nature of our universe.
and Karl Fisch added his multimedia presentations.
(2020 Vision – A thought provoking look at the future – 15:45)
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THE THIRD INSIGHT . . . A MATTER OF ENERGY We now experience that we live not in a material universe, but in a universe of dynamic energy. Everything extant is a field of sacred energy that we can sense and intuit. Moreover, we humans can project our energy by focusing our attention in the desired direction…where attention goes, energy flows…influencing other energy systems and increasing the pace of coincidences in our lives.
Professor Michael Wesch shows US that WE are the power of the web.
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THE FOURTH INSIGHT . . . THE STRUGGLE FOR POWER Too often humans cut themselves off from the greater source of this energy and so feel weak and insecure. To gain energy we tend to manipulate or force others to give us attention and thus energy. When we successfully dominate others in this way, we feel more powerful, but they are left weakened and often fight back. Competition for scarce, human energy is the cause of all conflict between people.
THE FIFTH INSIGHT . . . THE MESSAGE OF THE MYSTICS Insecurity and violence ends when we experience an inner connection with divine energy within, a connection described by mystics of all traditions. A sense of lightness–buoyancy–along with the constant sensation of love are measures of this connection. If these measures are present, the connection is real. If not, it is only pretended.
THE SIXTH INSIGHT . . . CLEARING THE PAST The more we stay connected, the more we are acutely aware of those times when we lose connection, usually when we are under stress. In these times, we can see our own particular way of stealing energy from others. Once our manipulations are brought to personal awareness, our connection becomes more constant and we can discover our own growth path in life, and our spiritual mission–the personal way we can contribute to the world.
We are Connected
Personal (public) blogs (with others commenting) rather than personal (private) diaries.
MySpace, FaceBook, LinkedIn, Explode.us, Flickr, YouTube, and personal
THE SEVENTH INSIGHT . . . ENGAGING THE FLOW Knowing our personal mission further enhances the flow of mysterious coincidences as we are guided toward our destinies. First we have a question; then dreams, daydreams, and intuitions lead us towards the answers, which usually are synchronistically provided by the wisdom of another human being.
All the quotes at the start of this post belong here… they are symptomatic of how (not why) we are not collectively moving forward. This isn’t about blame or excuses, rather it is about recognizing that things are not necessarily FLOWing as well as they could.
- – -
THE EIGHTH INSIGHT . . . THE INTERPERSONAL ETHIC We can increase the frequency of guiding coincidences by uplifting every person that comes into our lives. Care must be taken not to lose our inner connection in romantic relationships. Uplifting others is especially effective in groups where each member can feel energy of all the others. With children it is extremely important for their early security and growth. By seeing the beauty in every face, we lift others into their wisest self, and increase the chances of hearing a synchronistic message.
THIS IS WHERE WE NEED TO BE NOW!
We need our ‘guiding coincidences’ to be ones that are nurturing and powerful.
We need to collaborate, empower one another, and see potential rather than roadblocks. This is important for our children/our students, but it is equally important for us. Our ’synchronistic message’ can’t be “impatience, frustration and dissatisfaction” as I mentioned earlier.
Our message must be uplifting. But an uplifting message isn’t enough!
We need financial support, visionary leaders, moral compasses, inspiring role models, enriching professional development, and meaningful collaboration. We also need minimally restricted content and unlimited access… these are all building blocks that ‘increase the frequency of guiding coincidences’… these are the things that inspire us, fuel us, connect us, and allow us to see the potential in ourselves and each other. We truly can ‘Be the change we want to see in the world.’
- – -
THE NINTH INSIGHT . . . THE EMERGING CULTURE As we all evolve toward the best completion of our spiritual missions, the technological means of survival will be fully automated as humans focus instead on synchronistic growth. Such growth will move humans into higher energy states, ultimately transforming our bodies into spiritual form and uniting this dimension of existence with the after-life dimension, ending the cycle of birth and death.
Web3.0 or Web3D
Gary Hayes has some ideas about where are we going next.
This is both a scary and an exciting time… but mostly it’s exciting
Reading what I have said regarding the Seventh and Eighth Insights, I am keenly aware that some of us are not ’stuck’, and that some of us are experiencing those ‘guiding coincidences’ where everything is coming together. However, I think currently this is the exception rather than the norm
My question to you is this: When we are stuck, when things aren’t coming together, when our universe is not unfolding as it should, how do we make things FLOW?
I ask this since we are heading map-less into new, and uncharted territory.
What has this dominant paradigm actually done for public education except manufacture a crisis?
Not only does it list initiatives and consequences of this paradigm (read the post!), it also suggests a paradigm shift with the following perspective:
• Human freedom and empowerment are more critical than accountability and punishment.
• Life is about relationships, not acquisition.
• School is a democratic experience.
• Caring and trust for each person is the center of any truly professional activity.
• Schools are to improve society as a whole, not providing competitive advantage to the elite.
• Curriculum is best derived from the needs and interests of the learners.
• Developmental appropriateness should supersede national assessment.
• School failure is the result of a variety of political and economic causes.
“Supporters of this alternate perspective maintain that education is a process based on trust, not doubt and suspicion (Bryk & Schneider 2002). The crucial elements that will sustain school improvement is not high-stakes testing, standards, or reactionary accountability programs – “it is simple human trust… that rests on four supports: respect, competency, integrity, and personal regard for others” (George 2006).
“Real education is built on meaningful relationships. We do not learn things in isolation from each other. The core components of education are based on learner-centered values, a respect for diversity and complexity, tolerance, and empowerment. The developmental needs for learners are widespread and cannot be easily or meaningfully reduced to a pencil-based exam.”
This fits so well with where my thinking has been of late. To add to Christopher’s idea that the shift will come from the grassroots/bottom up, I am reminded of Dave Sands comment that, “Students will change education.”
Originally posted: May 1st, 2006
Reflection upon re-reading and re-posting:
Sessums was a great influence to my writing when I started blogging. He was the first blogger that I followed… before knowing anything about RSS feeds. After somehow finding this post, I added him as a friend on elgg and I would periodically check the ‘friend’s blogs’ tab that the blogging software offered.
Standardized tests do NOT measure a school’s success. As Wesley Fryer says, Reject Rigor: Embrace Differentiation, Flexibility, and High Expectations. How do you reduce success to a percentage, when in your classrooms a ‘B’ can be an utter embarrassment for one student and a glorious success for another?
In our district, we put special needs students on IEP’s – Individual Education Plans. Doesn’t every student deserve an individual plan? Gary Kern, when he was my Vice Principal, asked me, “Why is it that we teach in groups and manage behavior of individuals, when behavior is a group thing and learning is an individual thing?” Something worth thinking about!
Two Wolves Which wolf will you feed? A Remembrance Day Post
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Warning! We filter websites at school. Filters filter learning!
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My blog is my PhD I have given myself a Blogtorate of Philosophy.
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Bubble Wrap What we are doing is creating a facade of security, nothing more than an illusion of bubble wrap.
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Who are the People in Your Neighbourhood? My (digital) neighbourhood spans the globe.
. This does not mean that we get ‘chummy’ with our students online… we are simply a significant adult presence, modeling appropriate behavior, and connecting with them in a meaningful, respectful way. The internet is no place for an unsupervised playground!
The Agenda looks like this:
SECRET #1 – TREAT OTHERS WELL
The final secret
I will be building a resource package to explain the events soon (with the help of my students).
Background
Angela Maiers on Thursday, 29 November 2007, 23:58 CET