In his TED Talk, Tony Wagner discusses the seven skills that are critical for students to leave high school with, that will not only help them in college and career, but also help them keep up with the pace of change in our global knowledge economy.
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'Technology Integration' continues to be a high-value catch phrase in Education. Districts have Tech Integrators who do anything from teaching what we might call basic tech skills (using Google Docs, file management) to helping teachers create globally-connected classrooms. Some districts embed technology skills within their curricula, others have technology classrooms that operate in isolation, while still others do some sort of combination of the two. Years ago in my district, there was a minimum requirement of two 'technology infused' lessons per year that teachers were responsible for teaching, supposedly so that teachers would not only teach the students some technology skills, but also learn some themselves. Things have changed since then: today, technology tools are more accessible to teachers and students, they are used to perform everyday functions , and we are doing a better job providing and pursuing professional development opportunities for our educators. Technology is more integrated today than it was years ago, and often is done in a more organic, less contrived manner. The SAMR model shows the progression of 'technology integration' from contrived and isolated to what Puentedura calls 'inconceivable' (see graphic above). In this model, the goal of the teacher is to move beyond simply enhancing the content with technology to transforming instruction with modification and redefinition. The video below gives a 120 second explanation of the SAMR model, as well. It is important to remember that the model is not purely about the use of technology for the sake of using technology, but about mindsets and the support of student-centered learning. In her post, "In Response to 'Redefinition'," Beth Holland outlines the primary concerns of SAMR critics and posits on how to responsibly achieve the 'Redefinition' goal without losing sight of content and necessity. Raj Dhingra makes many provocative observations in his TedX talk, and challenges our thinking where learning is concerned. He busts the myths that big dreams for technology in schools require big budgets and that newer and shinier technology is always better, and encourages us to think about the way "we do school." In collaborative, self-paced, and blended environments, where the teachers are coaches, there is potential for higher student engagement and personalization. In order to facilitate this type of student-centered, high-yield learning, the school environment as well as the classroom environment need to accommodate and be open to changes. Educators must want to focus on student learning and how to best enable it. Success also requires administrative support on the building and district levels in order to happen. District administrators are responsible for establishing a clear vision for students, staff, community, and families; technology implementation must be a part of that. Principals, also, play a lead role as they are often given oversight of the building's schedule, which could dramatically assist technology implementation. Teachers must be willing to collaborate with each other, learn how to manage classrooms of children when technology is being utilized, especially during transitions, and must also be able to analyze student performance data that could be used to justify the changes in programming, scheduling, and learning. Support teams are critical to this process, as is professional development and the establishment of student-centered mindsets among educators. Resources:
"Can Technology Change Education? Yes!: Raj Dhingra at TEDxBend."YouTube. YouTube, 15 June 2012. Web. Holland, Beth. "In Response to "Redefinition"" Beth Holland: Food for Thought. WordPress, 25 Feb. 2014. Web. Means, Barbara. "Technology and Education Change: Focus on Student Learning." Journal of Research on Technology in Education 42.3 (2010): 285-307. Web. Puentedura, Rubem R., PhD. "SAMR: A Brief Introduction." SAMR: A Brief Introduction. Web. ![]() My days are filled with analyzing, predicting, and assessing student learning styles that quite often I do not even think about my own until prompted. The Sixth Year Certificate Program in Instructional Technologies and Digital Media Literacy has provided a medium for me to truly reflect on myself as a learner, both in and out of the classroom. Typically, I enjoy reading and responding to educational articles with my opinion in writing or visual demonstration. I take notes by hand or on my laptop during meetings and classes to retain information. Studying takes the form of highlighting, printing out papers that require deeper reading, and underlining key phrases and passages. I also learn well by asking questions and by doing and creating. I am not afraid to try a new technology; worst case scenario I have to delete something and start all over again. I do not find that off-putting. I have learned, through the IT&DML program, that the Learning Management System we use works well for me as a learner. G+, Drive, Communities, Twitter, Google Groups, etc. are used asynchronously to target instructor and student goals, and allow for seamless communication between students. I am a visual, task-oriented learner. I ask many clarifying questions and complete work in a methodical, systematic manner. Our LMS allows me to communicate at my convenience with my peers and instructors. If I am working on an assignment during a planning period at work or after my kids go to bed, I can post a question on the Community or in a Hangout and am guaranteed an almost immediate response from someone (thank you, night owls!). Feedback is both specific to my work and connected to the work of others. I enjoy the fact that after a reflection is posted, my peers' comments cause me to further think about the discussion points of that week. One of the many reasons why I joined this IT&DML cohort was to further my understanding of contemporary issues in instructional technologies; consistent, thoughtful conversations that occur throughout the week and into the weekend have already made me a better teacher and learner. I love the way the Communities are structured this semester in terms of Week One, Week Two, Questions, etc. If I want clarification on the Week Three assignment, I first think to check in the ED 722 Community and then go to the sidebar and select the appropriate week. Again, my learning style is pretty methodical and thorough. Describe knowledge, skills, dispositions that could make me a successful online or blended educator. My philosophy of education stems from John Dewey, and while his writings date back to the early 20th Century, the themes are universal and can be applied to ‘what it takes’ to make me a successful online or blended educator. Dewey writes, "When we, as educators, draw upon our students' individual and collective experiences, students become more active learners, capable of finding success in all traditional subject matters. John Dewey guides us with the idea that we must, "abandon the notion of subject-matter as something fixed and ready-made in itself, outside the child's experience... It is continuous reconstruction, moving from the child's present experience out into that represented by the organized bodies of truth that we call studies," (The Child and the Curriculum, 1902). Collaborative learning, content creation, using students' experiences to build on learning and integration of 21st century skills will lead to increased student engagement and deeper learning. As an educator, I must have the disposition to make this happen. We must take ownership over scaffolding student experiences so that students can be successful online learners. There are many things we can do to help students in online educational programs; again, they are similar to the skills needed from Dewey’s perspective and can be applied to this approach, as well.
Some common LMS characteristics can be related to elements of teaching practice, and can overlap to be effective in online settings. Some of them are:
To do this, students' prior technology knowledge and backgrounds must be identified. Access to technology and digital texts must be addressed. Above all, the teacher must provide opportunity, be sensitive to students' cultural models and build meaning while at the same time fostering skill fluency. My approach is imperfect - but it seems to be working. Students have structured choices in my classroom as to the technologies they would like to use. PowerPoint can be redundant but often times it's what teachers expect - how wonderful, then, to enable students to use a newer presentation tool like PowToon or refine what they know about iMovie (click here to see some of their projects). Embedded within these projects are universal technology, presentation, and Common Core skills that I am responsible for teaching. A critical component to my teaching is the reflective, or metacognitive component that I address and circle back to with every student. Sixth graders each create blogs at the beginning of their semester with me, and during the course of a project, they blog a reflection about the process they are undergoing. They also communicate ways they might apply what they are learning to other aspects of their lives - both personal and academic (click here to check out Liya's very precocious reflections). What elements of teaching practice would need adjustment in order to work successfully with students in online environment? Group work can be a large component of online courses. In the classroom, I have had to address issues of power in groups in order to make sure that each student is and feels heard. My informal observations ask questions like: Who talks more? Who dominates conversation? Who does the typing? What is body language like? Are students sitting in a semicircle around the computer or is one person off to the side? Each of these observations may or may not need on-the-spot interventions. It is clear to me, now that I am fully immersed in this process, that in order to have children have a successful experience with collaborative work, challenges must be anticipated and teachers must scaffold support. “It is not just the incorporation of technology in pedagogy that facilitates learning, but it is instead the design of the environment and the interactions and types of connections that the technology affords.” (Ally, 2015) When learners engage in real-life applications of technology and meaningful activities, they learn, retain and internalize both content and technology skills, as well as gain the ability to become problem-solvers and global thinkers. Isolated technological instruction is flat and stagnant. The democratization and virality of what some call Web 2.0 cannot be minimized, and we as educators must apply these changing mindsets and expectations to our students. Whether or not we subscribe to the idea of our students as 'digital natives,' we must allow for the multidimensional way consumers and producers lines are blurred and intersect. Just as the rules and the norms - the 'Ethos Stuff' (Lankshear & Knobel, 2007) of New Literacies - are participatory, collaborative and distributed, so must our teaching be. Lankshear & Knobel (2007) posit that the New Literacies are 'new' because of the mindset of users. Web 2.0 tools redefine these New Literacies to have four elements: socially recognized ways, meaningful content, encoded texts and Discourses. These definitions "mobilize very different kinds of values and priorities and sensibilities." Mindsets about our contemporary world change information from being a commodity to being a relationship. What supports will I need as a teacher? Professional development and exemplars will be critical to me, as a teacher, as I develop my skills and dispositions as an online learning instructor. Collaborating with colleagues, developing my Personal Learning Network, and continuing to upload to my Hub will be critical to this learning. It will also be essential for me to evaluate and research exemplars in the field of online instruction. Throughout my IT&DML journey, I have continued to show evidence of personal and professional growth through artifact curation. My Hub has evolved from a skeleton of blog responses to links containing tutorials, how-to videos, unit and lesson plans, and assessment tools. I presented at our district’s Tech Camp in November and added the page of resources and links to my Hub so that my colleagues could access them during our Professional Development day. Those resources can be found here. My Professional Learning Network has grown exponentially through my use of Twitter and TweetDeck. I do not measure growth simply by the number of followers I have or accounts I follow, but by the content that I am exposed to, and continue to publish, via these tools. Current articles in education via Edutopia and retweets from colleagues come to me when I want, where I want. Continuing down the path of curating the content that I publish as well as the content that I use for support is critical to my development as an online learning instructor. Trying, erring, questioning, and collaborating will sustain growth. Link to Hub: www.digitalfluencyed.com Twitter: @TechTina Storify: https://storify.com/TechTina Resources:
Ally, Mohamed. "Foundations of Educational Theory for Online Learning."Theory and Practice of Online Learning. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Jan. 2015 Lankshear, C. & Knobel, M. (2007). Researching New Literacies: Web 2.0 Practices and Insider Perspectives. E-Learning, 4(3), 224-240. "The Skills Both Online Students And Teachers Must Have." The Skills Both Online Students And Teachers Must Have. Edudemic. Web. 27 Mar. 2013. What do you thnk about iNACOL's New Learning Models Vision? Are there limitations or disadvantages to such an approach? Is it feasible? Do you find that there are advantages for you as you create your own environments? The International Association of K-12 Online Learning describes its vision of personalized learning as using "competency-based approaches, supported by blended and online learning modalities and environments...All students are responsible for their own learning and work at their own pace by demonstrating mastery of required concepts, resulting in higher achievement and ensuring all students are prepared for both college and career" (iNACOL, 2013). While the student is at the center of the TPAC framework, the elements of Technology, online courses, pedagogy, and assessment support their learning. The models shift the paradigm and mindset around "leadership, pedagogy, and staffing roles for all educators" (iNACOL, 2013).
My reaction to reading about iNACOL's New Learning Models Vision is one of optimistic skepticism. My philosophy of education is in direct agreement with the theory on which this vision is based. When we, as educators, draw upon our students' individual and collective experiences, students become more active learners, capable of finding success in all traditional subject matters. John Dewey guides us with the idea that we must, "abandon the notion of subject-matter as something fixed and ready-made in itself, outside the child's experience... It is continuous reconstruction, moving from the child's present experience out into that represented by the organized bodies of truth that we call studies," (The Child and the Curriculum, 1902). The skeptical part of me questions the buy-in needed by both administrators, Boards of Education and teachers, as well as the perceived costs and underlying motives of the vision. Will teachers just assume this is 'one more thing' they need to master? Some of the Technology platforms in the 'T' part of 'TPAC' seem expensive and harken a moneymaker for some educational corporation out there. Clearly the computing and online content and courses are critical for our 21st century learners; will a company hit the jackpot when they design learning management systems, enterprise architecture, broadband infrastructure and new models, similar to what Pearson has done through the implementation of Common Core Standards and SBAC testing? Another bit of skepticism that crept to the forefront while reading about the New Learning Models was related to some of the vocabulary (adjectives, specifically) chosen. Some of it seemed very nebulous and subjective. How does iNACOL define 'valid' and 'reliable' with regard to assessments in the Result in Higher Student Achievement design principal? What do 'frequent' and 'varying forms' of assessments mean? With regard to Flexible Staffing Models design principle, who defines the 'common' understanding of proficiency? What does 'adequate support' look like? There are many ways to implement the New Learning Models that iNACOL puts forth. Student centered, personalized learning is a win-win for educators, districts, students, and families alike. Performance-based assessments like ePortfolios and Project/Inquiry Based Learning are grounded in research and practical application. And the equity and access that this model affords students is excellent and universal. The advantages of iNACOL's New Learning Models, in my opinion, would outweigh any of the challenges or limitations posed. ![]() The readings and videos for this week’s post give evidence to our modern day dilemma of sifting through all of the various forms of information out there - about people, events, beliefs - in order to establish our own positions and opinions. We read and watch television both to be informed and entertained, with the lines between entertainment and information often times crossing. I adore Stephen Colbert - he is an entertainer with opinions, and he also provides some important (true) information in his satirical performances. Would I ever cite a transcript of his show while doing research on Common Core State Standards? No, but I might agree with a lot of what he says about it in this video. To be fair, The Colbert Report is broadcast on Comedy Central. Clearly the name of the station itself is not intended to be that of a news outlet. It is apparent, however, that news outlets do carry weight in helping to form opinion and positions among viewers, listeners and readers. We have people who are drawn to various news giants based on ‘fit’ - there are those who just watch MSNBC, those who only tune into FOX News and others who use CNN as their primary information source. With multimedia tools, these same folks have access to phone apps and are able to set their browser homepages to these stations, accessible at work, at home, or on the go. So often we hear each of these news networks criticize the other for telling only one side of the story. I believe they are all correct in this assertion. Producers and editors are in ‘back rooms’ deciding on content for each show. They are making choices, cutting out pieces, splicing together footage, writing for teleprompters. This is powerful. Who decides who gets to make these edits? If I look at this critically, as a consumer of television journalism, I may ask some pointed questions. Who decided who was going to have the final say in what gets aired? How do I know that that individual will make the right decision? How can I trust that this is the best information for me? How much of this decision is made with the pressure of advertisers and lobbyists? How much of this decision is made purely on the whim and personal narrative of the editor him/herself? I was shocked - though in hindsight I shouldn’t have been - at the way NBC commentators talked ad nauseum about absolutely nothing of importance during the events of the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics. I have two daughters, ages 8 and 11, who were very excited to learn that for the first time (yes, in 2014, folks!) women would have an event in the slopestyle snowboarding competition. They were super excited; we live in Durham and Powder Ridge Mountain Park in Middlefield had just reopened after ten years. My girls had both taken a couple of snowboarding lessons and were cheering the Olympians on. How horrifying to listen to Todd Harris and Todd Richards give a play-by-play on each run down the mountain. My impressionable children, who were watching what they, too, might one day aspire to do, had to listen to the offensive drivel coming out of the Todds’ mouths. At one point, regarding a Pancochova run, “Just five or 10 years ago, that would have been a great men’s run.” What’s that supposed to mean? That it still isn't good enough, ten years later? That women will always be behind? In Jen Chaney’s article on salon.com, she writes, “...Did you see the Czech Republic’s Sarka Pancochova crash-land after an off jump, then start oozing down the mountain like a Raggedy Ann doll with all her stuffing removed? She hit her head so hard that it cracked her thick helmet almost in half….If Pancochova had been a player in the NFL, that moment probably would have led to her being carried off the field on a stretcher, and possibly deemed ineligible for at least an additional game. But this is the Olympics. So what did Pancochova do? She took a few moments to recover, then she got up, ski-surfed the rest of the way down the mountain and waved to the crowd. Come on: Get off your feet. Slow clap a standing O for that. She totally deserves it.” Later in the broadcast, one of the announcers commented, during Torah Bright’s amazing run, “Torah [Bright] knows how to ride a snowboard better than a lot of guys I know, and these are guys that get paid to do it.” And that, my friends, is where I lost it. She made it to the Olympics. Of course she rides better than most of the living population on the planet. She deserves more respect than that. My children agreed - and that maybe we should mute the tv and continue to watch? I’m glad that their perception was not influenced as severely as it could have been, and maybe they internalized the commentary in ways I have yet to discover. (True to form, a Buzzfeed user put together a “7 Worsts” list of NBCs antics. Warning: profanity.) We know that media, in its various forms, influences perception. We know that the media coverage of the events occurring in Ferguson created a whirlwind of hashtags on Twitter. #Ferguson was but one; #iftheygunnedmedown was another (Krawitz, 2014). Krawitz sees this coverage as positive in that it exposed racial divides and tensions, and also informed many as to the police militarization capabilities that many were unaware of. He also states, however, that this coverage blurred the line between news and opinion. The media coverage was constant and pervasive. Twitter feeds, 24-hour streaming coverage, editorials. Curation is important - we have discussed and read and watched numerous pieces on the benefits of curation; we as digital citizens filter what we choose to view and share in numerous ways. We establish Personal Learning Networks, follow Twitter lists, ‘Like’ posts on Facebook, and make our inbound information a platform for what we send outbound, such as our blog posts, our own tweets, or our own posts. Curation, as evidenced by our readings and TED talk this week, whether intentional or not, can limit our perceptions of others and their own experiences. We can intentionally curate by the choices we make; we can unintentionally curate when the choices have already been made for us. In the case of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, her narrative was affected early on by the curation of the books she was given to read. Her perception of story elements and content was guided by the limited perspectives the books contained. We can generalize her experience and apply it to our own. Piaget’s theory of cognitive development states that humans build their knowledge through experience, and that these experiences lead to the creation of schemas (mind maps or models). We experience, when we are children, what we have no choice but to experience and be exposed to. As we get older and we have more control over our actions and interactions, we begin to curate with intention. I believe that teachers can make students aware of bias so they can effectively make their own judgements in two ways: awareness and action. The history textbook assigned to the class tells one story. If students are going to be aware that there are other stories, the teacher must facilitate those experiences. Primary source documents, integration of video, interviews with experts should be considered. A book like City of Orphans, by Avi, which takes place in New York City, could be used as supplemental reading in an American History class learning about the Panic of 1893, or in the language arts classroom. My students enjoy discussing current events - what better platform for discussions of bias and multiple perspectives! I used Tagxedo to summarize my response this week. Tagxedo takes a URL (or tweet, RSS feed, or news search term) and will create a word cloud that sizes different words according the frequency with which they occur. In the ‘News’ Box I typed the word “Ferguson”. I was interested to see what words this type of content curation filtered, as well as what was ‘out there’ online regarding Ferguson. I chose the font, the colors and the shape. This is what came up: Resources:
Chaney, Jen. "Sochi Olympics: Female Snowboarders Survive Crash Landings (and Sexist Comments)." Saloncom RSS. N.p., 10 Feb. 2014. Web. 03 Oct. 2014. Krawitz, Alan. "Grading the Media on Ferguson Coverage." - 10,000 Words. N.p., 29 Aug. 2014. Web. 01 Oct. 2014. "The Danger of a Single Story." Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie:. N.p., July 2009. Web. 03 Oct. 2014. "Cognitive Constructivist Theory." Cognitive Constructivist Theory. Web. 05 Oct. 2014. "Community Post: The 7 Worst Moments In NBC's 2014 Olympic Coverage... So Far." BuzzFeed Community. Web. 3 Oct. 2014. ![]() The two 'buzzwords' that made their presence known in this week's readings were 'mindsets' and 'expectations,' both of which are critical to Researching New Literacies and Handbook of Research on New Literacies. Lankshear & Knobel (2007) posit that the New Literacies are 'new' because of the mindset of users. Web 2.0 tools redefine these New Literacies to have four elements: socially recognized ways, meaningful content, encoded texts and Discources. These definitions "mobilize very different kinds of values and priorities and sensibilities." Mindsets about our contemporary world change information from being a commodity to being a relationship. This made me think of my husband's career at People's United Bank. He's worked there for 17 years and a majority of that time has been spent in the web development/online services division. I asked him to tell me his thoughts on how he has seen customers' mindsets change over the last 17 years and how People's has had to modify the online content they produce. His anecdotal data (which I'm sure analysts at the bank have spreadsheets upon spreadsheets of hard data to back this up) supports the ideas put forth in this week's readings. When he began working for the online division in 1997, the bank's services and information dissemination took place in the branches and purely on the internet, accessed by desktop computers. Publishers sent the content out to customers and customers consumed this information in a 'one-to-many' relationship. As social media, mobility and device availability became more prevalent, expectations of both the 'producer' and 'consumer' changed over time. Now, the consumers are publishers; a two-way conversation exists between the consumers themselves. Consumers expect ease and immediacy; the velocity of information transfer in an unfiltered, decentralized way permanently changed the way People's communicates with its customers. Myriad devices challenge what is now called the "Digital Channels" division to create responsive design, where the site adjusts to whichever device you happen to be using. Social media pushes out information that is more 'soft content' - community programming, local fundraisers, investment in the local people. The democratization and virality of what some call Web 2.0 cannot be minimized, and we as educators must apply these changing mindsets and expectations to our students. Whether or not we subscribe to the idea of our students as 'digital natives,' we must allow for the multidimensional way consumers and producers lines are blurred and intersect. Just as the rules and the norms - the 'Ethos Stuff' (Lankshear & Knobel, 2007) of New Literacies - are participatory, collaborative and distributed, so must our teaching be. Resources: Lankshear, C. & Knobel, M. (2007). Researching New Literacies: Web 2.0 Practices and Insider Perspectives. E-Learning, 4(3), 224-240. Coiro, J., Knobel, M., Lankshear, C., & Leu, D.J. (Eds). (2008). Handbook of research on new literacies. Image Credit: Rorie, Mike. "The 5 Key Mindsets of Effective Managers." Go ITalk. N.p., 23 Aug. 2012. Web. 6 Sept. 2014. |
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