Dear MLA and APA

Two questions.

1. How often (not counting grad school) have you actually followed a written citation, found the source material, and then read it?
   
   Gibaldi, Joseph. MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers, Seventh Edition. New York: Modern Language Association, 2007. Print.
   
   
2. How often have you clicked on a link to learn more?
   

 

Who Ya Gonna Call?

Carolyn Orf is one of our Business teachers and her students are learning about entrepreneurship and starting a business. Carolyn was interested in having an entrepreneur speak to her students about their experiences and remembered that she went to college with a guy that had gone on to start a couple of companies. She saw him at a wedding about three years ago but otherwise really hadn�t kept in touch with him. So, how to find him? Facebook of course.

She made contact through Facebook (from home, naturally, because our filter is �protecting� us) and asked if he�d be interested in Skyping in to share his experiences and do a question and answer session with her students. He said yes, so we�ll be Skyping during her 5th period class on October 6th, from 12:14 � 1:12 pm MDT. Her other classes can attend via an in-school field trip (if they don�t have anything pressing going on in their 5th period class), and a couple of other Business teachers will bring their 5th period classes as well. We�ll also be ustreaming it out so parents can watch (everyone is welcome to drop in but, as always, we�ll focus on making sure the technology works for the students, the ustream is a bonus).

Oh yeah, the guy? Jason Shellen. He�s currently CEO of Thing Labs. Previously he was an employee of Pyra Labs and worked on Blogger as it was acquired by Google, and he was the founding product manager of Google Reader.

Once again, it's great to see teachers and students reaching out to others, and others being kind enough to give some time. It's so darn easy that I'm wondering what everyone is waiting for? Who could you bring into your classroom?

Not Education as Usual on the Skype Blog

I just wanted to quickly point to this post on the Skype blog about our students interviewing Cory Doctorow via Skype:

The ninth grade students were going through a mock exercise to persuade school board members to add Doctorow's controversial 2008 book, Little Brother, to the reading list . . . So what could be better than to have Doctorow himself speak to the class and explain why ninth graders should be able to able to read his book?

The post also includes some nice quotes from AHS students Ashley and Laura, taken from the story in the School Library Journal. An interview of Anne Smith and me by Howard Wolinsky, Skype's U.S. blogger (via Skype, naturally) is embedded below.

Create A Movement

This TED Talk by Seth Godin is worth 17 minutes of your time. After you watch it, some thoughts are below the embed.



Here are a few semi-random thoughts that were generated by this talk. I�m not saying that he�s necessarily right about everything, but he raises some interesting questions that are worth thinking about.

What do I do for a living? Seems like a simple question, but � as Seth Godin points out � perhaps it�s not. I used to answer, �I�m a math teacher� or �I teach math.� Over time that shifted to �I teach students math� and then simply �I teach students.� But I find myself agreeing with him that perhaps that�s too �narrow� of a definition of what we in education try to do: we try to change everything.

Every day we should at least try to step on that light bulb, clearly indicating that there was �before,� and now there�s �after;� that at this moment in time we changed something in our students� lives. If we don�t aspire to that, if we accept a too-narrow definition of what we do for a living, then we relegate ourselves to mediocrity.

Godin says that the way we make change is by leading, and that leading is simply helping to connect people and ideas. And, at this moment in time, we are at a tipping point (dare I say a moment of �shift�), because the technology allows us to connect in ways that previously were unimaginable or impractical (see Shirky�s Here Comes Everybody). And we can find others that are interested in and passionate about the same things, not by forcing them, but because we want to be connected. We need to be connecting as educators and, just as importantly, we need to be helping our students connect.

He goes on to say that we need to find folks that are disconnected, but already have a yearning; people who are just waiting for someone to lead them. (Sound like anyone you know?) We need to be heretics, who look at the status quo and say, �I can�t abide it.� (What�s wrong with the status quo? Unless you don�t see any need in the world, any disaffection, any hurt or disconnectedness, then we must try to improve on the status quo.) Is this in your curriculum? Perhaps not in so many words, but it should be, so I�m asking you to add it. Right now.

Godin then says there are three questions to ask yourself if you�re trying to lead something. If educators are leaders, then we need to ask ourselves these same questions.

1. Who are you upsetting? If you�re not upsetting anyone, then you�re not changing the status quo. (Note that this is not upsetting people just to upset them, but rather with a purpose, with a goal, with an important change in mind that�s necessary to improve things for someone. Editor�s note: I�ve got this one nailed. Unfortunately, I don�t think it stands on its own.)
   
   
2. Who are you connecting? (Think outside your classroom walls for a moment here. Nothing wrong with connecting inside your classroom, but some of those students have yearnings that don�t match up with others in their classroom, so help them find their tribe.)
   
   
3. Who are you leading? (Don�t limit this to the students in your classroom, or the adults in your building/department; leading is not limited by proximity or geography anymore. Also some folks will protest that they don�t want to lead or that�s not in their job description. I say it should be, and I�d ask you to add it now.)

Godin concludes by asking his audience to create a movement, to find their tribe. So, what are you waiting for?

Great Expectations

So, here�s the problem. Once your students find out that we have the capability to blog and/or videoconference with authors and professionals from around the world, they think we should do it all the time. Imagine that.

I blogged earlier about needing virtual school board members, as our students will be making their cases about whether certain controversial books should be approved � or not � by the school board. (Again, to review, this is simulated, they are not actually taking this to the school board, we�ve just invited our school board � and some of you as virtual school board members - in to be an authentic audience, and most of these books are on our approved reading list already.)

One of the books the students chose was Little Brother, by Cory Doctorow (some of you may also know him from Boing Boing). It goes along nicely with other books they read as part of our curriculum (1984, Brave New World, Fahrenheit 451, etc.). Well, one group of Anne Smith�s students promptly emailed him to ask him some questions about aspects of his book that might cause a school board not to approve it (underage drinking, drug use, a sex scene, conflicts between adults and children, etc.). Mr. Doctorow replied with several thoughtful paragraphs about each of their questions. They replied back to him, thanked him, and then said, �Oh, by the way, any chance you�d like to Skype with us?� (Well, okay, they said it more formally � and much better � than that, but you get the point.) As you might suspect, since I�m blogging about it, he said yes.

The only catch was finding a time that worked for everyone (our students� schedules, his schedule, the fact that he�s in London � seven hours ahead of us, our final exams are coming up, etc.). We finally came up with May 18th, at 9:15 am Mountain Daylight Time, UTC/GMT -6. Oh, you�re welcome to join us (assuming all the tech works), as he gave us permission to ustream it as well (primarily for parents to watch if they want, but you can as well on our ustream channel).

I really like this on several levels. First, obviously, the ability for students to converse with an author about his work is powerful. Second, it demonstrates how easy it is to connect with others, no matter where you � or they � live. But third, and perhaps most important in the long run, I love the fact that these students knew a capability existed, assumed it was their prerogative to take advantage of that, and then took the initiative to contact Mr. Doctorow. If we not only enable our students to be connected learners, but also change their mindset so that they expect to be connected learners, we�ve done a good thing.