No One Right Way

(I apologize in advance if this comes off as more rant-y than usual � if that�s even possible. This is very much thinking out loud, so take it for what it�s worth. It's certainly not intended to be directed at anyone, the people I mention are all helping me think through this. And, of course, I very well may be completely wrong. On to the post.)

As happens every so often, I was involved in a briefly intense Twitter discussion yesterday where I followed my usual habit of pushing (provoking?) hard just to explore my own (and others�) thinking. This one, however, I felt sort of deserved a follow-up, so here�s my attempt to summarize my current draft thinking.

The genesis of the discussion was a tweet by Will Richardson:

 I pushed back a little with:

And away we went with lots of other folks chiming in along the way.

I understand the basic criticisms of calling these 21st century skills, namely that we�re ten plus years into the 21st century already and that many (most? all?) of these skills were important before the 21st century. And I also understand Will�s basic premise that, as crucial skills, these shouldn�t be taught in isolation in a separate course, but should be embedded � and modeled � in all of our classrooms.

But here�s the thing. I think there�s no one right way. I think in our passionate desire to effect the changes we think our students need, we sometimes fall into the same trap as many of the so-called reformers that we daily deride. Would it be so horrible to have a 55-minute-(or whatever)-a-day course called �21st Century Literacy Skills� taught by someone who�s pretty immersed in this arena? (For those of you who have heard Will passionately speak about these literacies, would you be averse if he was available to teach that to your students?). And, yes, these ideas should be talked about, explored, and modeled in all classrooms in addition to that one course, but if a school decided to dedicate time for that course, would it be so bad? (As Chris Lehmann has often said, if you value something let me see where it lives in your schedule. I think a case could be made that having a course in every kid�s schedule dedicated to this would show that you very much value it. Although it�s not the only way.)

But I also think it�s okay if a school decides that, no, these should be embedded in all of our courses and we�re not going to teach a separate, pull-out course specifically about these skills. There�s not one right way to do this and, if we insist there is, then we take away something I think is vital to making this whole school thing work: flexibility and personalization. (I think perhaps the only good thing I said at EduCon was that all education is global, but it�s also local.) The teachers in the classrooms with their kids, with their very individual students, with specific backgrounds and learning conditions, and very specific wants, needs and passions, need to be able to address those needs as they see fit, without folks criticizing that that's "so 2005." (And, yes, I�m as guilty of that as anyone. Mea culpa.)

I also think that much of the angst over the �21st Century Skills� label is misplaced. While I agree with folks who say that many of these skills were important pre-21st century, I disagree with some of their conclusions. First, I think that while many of these skills (collaboration and communication immediately come to mind) were very nice to have in the 20th century, I think you could often get by without them. I would suggest that for most of the professional jobs that many folks aspire to these are now necessary and prerequisite skills, not just �nice-to-have� skills.

Moving beyond employment, I also think they are necessary skills to be effective citizens in the 21st century. As the Twitter discussion unfolded, Zac Chase, Laura Deisley and I broke off into a side discussion around being an informed voter in the 21st century. Zac pushed back suggesting that really today isn�t all that different in terms of being a voter, saying that sure there are a lot more people talking about stuff, but in the end are they really saying anything that�s changing the process? (More from Zac around these ideas). Laura and I, representing the � ahem � older crowd, suggested that based on our experience, we feel it really is different. That the wealth of information available about candidates and issues, the various forms of media used to convey that information, and the ability to interact socially and at a distance around them makes being a voter/citizen much, much different today.

This is different, and it requires different skills.

And while I understand and partially agree with the argument that �Hey, we�re eleven years into the 21st century, shouldn�t we already be teaching these skills and let�s just get on with it instead of talking about them like they�re new,� I also think that some are overlooking one pretty important point: we still have eighty-nine more years left in the 21st century. I think too many folks hear �21st Century Skills� and think of a fixed, standard set of skills that are settled and clearly defined. But I think they�re still evolving, and will continue to evolve (transform?) in ways that are really hard to imagine at this point. Is it so bad to use a label that forces us to look forward? (Did educators in 1911 know what the next eight-nine years were going to bring? Would it have been bad for them to be talking about 20th Century Skills?)

That was one of the essential ideas of the presentation that shall not be named � that we live in exponential times. If Kurzweil is right in his prediction that by mid-century a $1000 computer will exceed the computational capability of the human race, then life is going to be radically different, and our brains have literally not evolved in such a way for us to truly understand that. Our brains do a pretty good job of projecting things out linearly, but we suck at exponential (which is a really important point that Kurzweil makes several times).

Here�s the example that I use with my Algebra class to demonstrate this. Take a standard piece of Xerox paper and fold it in half. Then fold it in half again. And again. And again. How many times do you have to fold it in half until the thickness equals the distance from the Earth to the Moon? (Yes, understanding you couldn�t physically fold it in half that many times, but assuming you could.) Go ahead, take a gut-level, intuitive guess of how many times. Answer below.

Richard Miller, chair of the English Department at Rutgers, says that

We're living in the time of the most significant change in human expression in human history

 and that

We are no longer grounded in the printing press; what you see before us is the networked world.

The networked world is different than the world in the previous centuries. Yes, we�ve always had networks. The cavemen had learning networks. They knew who to go to learn about hunting, and who was the expert on gathering, and who to learn from about how to defend the tribe. And our networks evolved and expanded over time, and include our extended families, and our neighborhoods, and our places of employment, and often a professional community. And they includes books, and 20th century media like radio and television. But I still don�t think that compares to the potential (realized by some, not by others) of our learning networks today. I have teachers on six continents that I learn from every day. Many of whom I�ve never met face-to-face.

This is different, and it requires different skills.

Miller goes on to say,

To compose, and compose successfully in the 21st century, you have to not only excel at verbal expression, at written expression, you have to also excel in the use and manipulation of images. That's what it means to compose . . . All of our students, regardless of discipline, regardless of major, can come together and work on this central activity of multimedia composition. That�s writing in the 21st century. It�s multiply authored, it�s multiply produced.

I think that if you agree that multimedia composition is a �central activity� of communication in our current time, then that requires some things to change.He also says,

We do not have a pedagogy on hand to teach the kind of writing [composing?] I'm describing. It needs to be invented.

Invented certainly suggests there�s something new here.

Jason Ohler defines literacy as �being able to consume and produce in the media forms of the day.� Is anyone going to argue that the �media forms� of today are not significantly different than media forms previously? Or that our ability to not only consume, but produce them, is not significantly different? Different not only in form, but in ubiquity, presence, function, and impact? As the National Council for the Social Studies says,

We live in a multimedia age where the majority of information people receive comes less often from print sources and more typically from highly constructed visual images, complex sound arrangements, and multiple media formats.

This is different, and it requires different skills.

The National Council of Teachers of English says,

Because technology has increased the intensity and complexity of literate environments, the twenty-first century demands that a literate person possess a wide range of abilities and competencies, many literacies. These literacies are . . . multiple, dynamic and malleable.

21st Century Skills, however you define them, are not static. They are �multiple, dynamic and malleable.� If folks want to use "21st Century Skills" as a catch-all label, I think that�s fine. If folks don�t want to use that label as a catch-all, then that�s fine as well. I think we need to move beyond arguing about the label, beyond saying there�s one right way to do this. If �literacies� is an accurate description, then it�s a core set of skills that all students (people) need to have, and I suspect having a course dedicated to it and/or embedding it in all classrooms are both better approaches than dismissing them because of the label.

Today is different, and it does require different skills. So what�s so wrong with having different approaches to help students learn those skills? There's no one right way.

Oh yeah. 42. Forty-two folds for the thickness of the paper to equal the distance from the Earth to the Moon. Most folks� intuitive guesses are five or more orders of magnitude off. We suck at exponential. If we�re so bad at imagining that, then what else do we lack the capacity to imagine?

Take Me to Your Leader(s)

I recently had the opportunity to help Will Richardson with a breakout session at the CASE Winter Leadership Conference. CASE is our statewide school administrator organization, with membership including superintendents, central office administrators and building level administrators. While Will�s keynote was the following day, our goal with the breakout was to hopefully initiate some conversations that administrators would take back and continue in their schools and/or districts.

We used Mark Pesce�s Fluid Learning blog post to spur discussion, and created some essential questions and a graphic organizer to go along with it (thanks Ben Wilkoff, Bud Hunt and Mike Porter for help with all that). We also created a wiki page with some additional readings and essential questions, to hopefully spur even more conversations among administrators, teachers, and all stakeholders about the �shifts.�

Hopefully the fifty or so folks in the room felt it was worthwhile, and with a little luck many of them will use what we did � or the additional readings and questions on the wiki � to help continue the conversations in their schools and districts. But I also got to thinking that perhaps I should share out that work here, since it�s unlikely folks would stumble upon that page on the Learning 2.0 wiki by chance.

So, in case anyone can use it, here is both what we used in the session, and the additional eleven sets of readings paired with essential questions. Please consider taking some or all of these to an administrator near you.

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Read Mark Pesce's blog post.

Essential Questions

• Capture Everything: What's worth capturing in my classrooms? My building? My district? Audio? Video? Text-based assignments? Student work? Writing?
  .
  
• Share Everything: Where can I share it? With whom? What audiences is our organization working to serve? How will they benefit from these shared items? Who needs to see what�s going on?
  .
• Open Everything: What are the closed silos of information in our schools that shouldn't be? What things outside of our schools have we closed (blocked)? What can we do to open both of those up?
  .
• Only Connect: How can I help my students and teachers connect with content, with each other, and with others outside the classroom (students, teachers, experts, mentors, the community, etc.) in a meaningful way?
  .
• What questions do I have for my administrators/curriculum staff? Teaching Staff? IT Staff? Students?

Graphic Organizer for this activity (Word, PDF). Feel free to download and use.

Online, editable pages for each of the questions above: (Capture Everything, Share Everything, Open Everything, Only Connect, What Questions Do I Have). As you have these discussions at CASE, at CoLearning, in your schools, and in your communities, please share out the results on the appropriate wiki page. It might take a few minutes to get the hang of editing a wiki, but you'll figure it out - give it a shot. And, don't worry, there's a history page so if you accidentally delete something, you can get it back.

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Here are some additional resources and recommended activities for administrators to continue their learning about - and sharing of - network literacy.

Additional Recommended Readings and Questions

The following is a long list of thought-provoking blog posts, articles and videos that can help administrators start or continue conversations in their school districts, schools, and communities. Each one is accompanied by a set of essential questions that can guide you as you read the article and can help further spur discussion.

1. Essential Questions
   What literacies must educators master before we can help students make the most of these powerful potentials? What�s one thing you are going to do in the next six weeks to help you begin to master these literacies? How does "authentic" assessment change when the student's audience is the world?
   
   Read Will Richardson's Footprints in the Digital Age from the November 2008 issue of Educational Leadership.
   .
   
2. Essential Questions
   We know that good teachers existed before the current wave of technology, but can a teacher today be the best teacher they can be and truly meet the needs of their students without using technology? What implications does this have for professional development and teacher evaluation? What implications does this have for the technological literacy levels of administrators?
   
   Read Karl Fisch's Is it Okay to be a Technologically Illiterate Teacher? blog post (including comment thread) and National Educational Technology Standards for Teachers (NETS-T).
   .
3. Essential Questions
   What does it mean to be literate in the 21st century? Are we as educators currently literate? If not, what implications does that have for our students, and what proposals can we put in place to get all educators to a basic level of 21st century literacy in a reasonable amount of time?
   
   Read NCTE's definition of 21c literacy along with The Partnership for 21st Century Skills English Skills Map.
   .
4. Essential Questions
   Do you believe schools foster inquiry and passion in students? If so, are your schools currently structured to do that? Are students regularly asked to research, collaborate, create, present and network in your schools? If not, what can you do to change that?
   
   Read Chris Lehmann's blog post Talking to 49 Superintendents along with his Ignite Philly 5 minute presentation.
   .
5. Essential Question
   Of the 10 things the author thinks we should unlearn, pick the three that most resonate with you. Now, how are you going to foster �unlearning� those things for you, other administrators, and teachers in your school/district?
   
   Read Will Richardson�s Steep Unlearning Curve blog post.
   .
6. Essential Questions
   In a rapidly changing, information abundant world, what should students know and be able to do? What should �school� or �learning� look like in a world where almost all factual information is literally a click away? How do we help students create their own Personal Learning Networks? What steps are you going to make to create your own PLN? Which of the suggestions in Shift Happens � Now What? resonates with you, and how can you go about implementing them?
   
   Read Stephanie Sandifer's blog post Shift Happens � Now What? and watch this version of Did You Know?/Shift Happens (Vision Remix, Fall 2007). Also explore the Shift Happens wiki for more information.
   .
7. Essential Questions
   Do you agree that the culture of most educational institutions today is insulated, that it actively tries to block out the �outside� world? If so, do you believe that educational institutions can survive (and thrive) with that culture? If not, what are some steps you can take to open up the culture in your school/district?
   
   Read Bill Farren's Insulat-Ed blog post and we also highly recommend reading Here Comes Everybody by Clay Shirky.
   .
8. Essential Questions
   Where do you rank yourself in terms of competency on the NETS for Administrators? What do leaders really need to know about this? What are you (your school, your district) doing to help your leaders grow in this area?
   
   Read the National Educational Technology Standards for Administrators (NETS-A) along with Scott McLeod�s An Absence of Leadership (pdf) article from ISTE's Learning and Leading with Technology magazine.
   .
9. Essential Questions
   What kind of collaborative partnerships - physical or virtual - can you develop with folks outside of your school(s)? (universities, corporations, other schools, etc.) What steps can you take to engage with these collaborative technologies yourself, both to learn and to model for our students?
   
   Read Will Richardson's article World Without Walls - Learning Well with Others from Edutopia.
   .
10. Essential Questions
    Take a look at the seven survival skills that Wagner postulates through the lens of a typical classroom in your school (or, if you�re at the district level, a typical elementary, middle, and high school classroom). How�s that classroom do on those seven skills? Pick three of the skills and brainstorm ways to work with teachers in your building to strengthen their presence in the typical classroom.
    
    Read Tony Wagner's article Rigor Redefined from the October 2008 issue of Educational Leadership, along with this post on the Google Blog.
    .
11. Essential Questions
    Is it important to bring meaning and significance into the classroom? Do you think the way students portrayed themselves in these videos is fairly accurate for today�s student? How can we leverage the �networked� student, and the technological tools we have at our disposal, to empower our students to pursue real, relevant, and rigorous questions?
    
    Read Kansas State Professor Michael Wesch's blog post and watch some of his videos (A Vision of Students Today, The Machine is Using Us, and Information Revolution). Also watch Wendy Drexler's Networked Student.

Start Reading Blogs

The only way to truly begin to understand the literacy of networking is to participate. We would recommend subscribing to 3 to 5 blogs to begin with (ask your tech folks for help if you don't know how to subscribe). We would highly recommend that you subscribe to Will Richardson's Weblogg-ed and to LeaderTalk. Then find one to three more blogs that interest you, either by asking people you know, following links in Weblogg-ed and LeaderTalk, or by doing a Google Blog Search.

Read those blogs for two to three months, commenting when you're ready and have something to say. Then consider starting your own blog, either an individual blog or a group of educators in your school/district, to continue the conversations you're having about teaching and learning in the twenty-first century.

Consider attending Learning 2.0: A Colorado Conversation on February 21, 2009.

Let�s Stop Preparing Kids for College

(Note: I�ve been sitting on this post for about two weeks because it just didn�t quite feel right yet but, with these stories along with this blog post that I ran across yesterday, I figured I should just go ahead and publish it.)

Seriously, let�s stop. Now, since I work at a high school that sends about 92% of our graduates to college, let me try to explain.

There seems to be two main arguments that high schools should be preparing kids for college. First, because a college education provides them greater job opportunities and will result in greatly increased job earnings over their lifetime. Second, that college helps them become well educated, well rounded, thoughtful and involved adults. (Some cynical folks would add two more: it keeps college professors employed and it keeps young folks out of the workforce for several more years.) Let�s look at each of those two primary reasons.

There�s no question that the statistics show that folks with a college education are likely to earn much more than those with just a high school education. According to the U.S. Census bureau, �workers 18 and over with a bachelor�s degree earn an average of $51,206 a year, while those with a high school diploma earn $27,915 .�

But even assuming money is our goal here (and there�s lot of research that supports that money � as long as you have enough to meet basic needs - does not make you happy or feel fulfilled), let�s take a moment and dive a little deeper into that topic. Most likely there are many reasons for the earnings discrepancy. College work can give one the necessary skills and preparation to be able to do certain jobs. And there�s also the very fact of the college degree credential allowing one to get hired (which could very well change). But I think we also need to keep in mind the bias that�s built into those statistics. Students who not only get accepted to college, but are successful at completing college, already have many built-in advantages over those who don�t, advantages that are not dependent on a college education. These include all the socioeconomic advantages (income, parent education level, resources, background knowledge, etc.) and the cognitive advantages (they were successful enough at school to get into and through college). Who�s to say that if you removed college from this equation (perhaps substituting an internship or on-the-job training with on-going professional development) that those students still wouldn�t achieve a higher income?

I also wonder how the percent would break down between college providing you training and college simply providing you the credential. Fifty-fifty? Sixty-forty? Forty-sixty? I�m not sure, but from my conversations with a variety of business folks over the last few years, very few of them felt like the content that students had �covered� in high school or college was really what they were looking for in an employee, or what they felt an employee had to have to be successful in their company (also see Tony Wagner�s work). They all felt they could teach them the specific content they needed to know for their job, but that employees needed other skills to be successful. Now, there are certainly exceptions to this, probably most notably in fields with a need for scientific, engineering, or accounting knowledge as a few examples. But there are certainly other ways for students to get that knowledge that might look very different from the typical college experience, including trade schools, internships/mentorships, and of course burgeoning online options (skill-based or things like MIT Open Courseware).

And let�s look at the financial numbers a little more deeply as well. According to the College Board the average annual tuition at a Private four-year college is $25,143 (up 5.9 percent from last year), and at a Public four-year college it�s $6,585 (up 6.4 percent from last year). (For all colleges it�s up 439% since 1982).

Now, for our hypothetical student that decided to forgo college, let�s invest those four years of tuition (I�m not including room and board here, since our student would still have those expenses outside of college, although they are often higher at college). Given the recent market meltdown, many folks think that once the market bottoms out (sometime in the next 1 � 24 months), we will most likely experience a long period of returns that come close to the market average � so 8-10% a year for perhaps a decade. So, take the $28,978 for four years of public college tuition (four years at the average tuition, factoring in the 6.4% yearly increase) and invest that in a Total Stock Market Index fund and 10 years from now that student will have $71,035 (using 9% return), or over $100,000 if they invest just $100 a month with a 50% match. This number balloons to a rather hefty $269,225 if you use the private college tuition numbers ($109,827 total for four years, based on current average and 5.9% yearly increase). (It would also be interesting to see the average annual salary comparisons between private and public college degree holders and see how that impacts this equation, but I digress.)

And this is not including any additional money they might have invested by entering the work force at least four years earlier, or the fact that they will have at least four years of additional earnings. (And that�s not something to be overlooked, starting to contribute to Social Security or a pension plan at age 18 instead of 22 or later, and investing in 401k�s or IRA�s at 18 instead of 22 or � more likely � much later because they�re paying off student loans.) So, our hypothetical student could be 28 years old with student loan debt, or 28 years old with $269K in the bank plus four additional years of earnings, investments and work experience.

For all of the reasons above, the financial argument � even if money is your sole determining factor � is not so clear cut. But, and this won�t surprise most of you, I don�t really care that much about that argument (and it certainly has some holes in it). But it was fun and I think some of those assumptions we make need to be examined more carefully.

So that takes us to the second argument � that a college education simply makes them a better person. I don�t necessarily disagree with that, but I would suggest that the best way to prepare them for that would be to do that in high school as well, not �prepare them for college.� As Chris Lehmann says:

What happens if school is real life, not preparation for real life?

Let�s make their high school experience meaningful and relevant, so that they rarely feel the need to ask the question, �When are we ever going to use this?� because the answer will be so darn obvious. So often the answer teachers typically give to that question is, �In the next course� � which is a travesty. If we can�t give them a better answer than that, then we shouldn�t be teaching that topic. Let�s follow the words of Seneca that are posted in my school�s cafeteria, �Not for school, but for life, we learn.�

Oh, by the way, I would argue that if we do this � if we stop �preparing them for college� and actually make their education meaningful and relevant right now, a by-product will be they will actually be better prepared for college and the world of work. They won�t be meeting seat-time requirements with no regard for what they actually know and understand, but instead will be placed in relevant situations solving meaningful and important problems that will prepare them for college, the world of work, and to be effective and contributing citizens in a vibrant democracy.

So, like many others I wonder about whether college � in it�s current form � is the best solution for many of our students, and whether perhaps there will be alternative � and perhaps much better � ways to achieve our goals. I also wonder how much longer the credential of a college degree will be as important as it is now � there is a decent chance that may change faster than we think. Am I suggesting that our students shouldn�t be prepared for college? Not at all. But I think we too often confuse the means (college, a good job) with the ends (thoughtful, caring, happy and productive citizens and human beings). And the problem with having those means as your goal is that you too often end up nominally achieving the means, but completely failing to achieve the true ends.

So, should our goal be to prepare our students for college (and work)? Seneca didn�t think so.

Random Thoughts from the NCTE Convention

This will not be any kind of coherent post, just some miscellaneous thoughts from the annual NCTE Convention. (I know, I know, how will you tell the difference?)

Did You Know? Has Jumped the Shark
Gary Stager tweeted a week or so ago that Did You Know? had jumped the shark because his Mom sent him the link (and, the horror, she was proud that he knew me). Then a remix of it played twice on Sunrise, a popular morning show on Australian TV. But I think the culminating piece of evidence is this picture that Bud Hunt made me take.


At the opening celebration for the NCTE Convention, they had it playing in a continuous loop for 60 minutes. But they also had the sound turned down and a mariachi band playing � so picture Did You Know? with mariachi music and light appetizers. Too. Funny. Oh well, Henry Winkler�s done okay since then, hasn�t he?

Greg Mortenson
We went to listen to Greg Mortenson, author of Three Cups of Tea, speak, and we sat in the front row because Anne wants to try to get him to blog with her students about the book. Just before he�s about to begin I start to take a picture of him. But he sees me and immediately walks over, puts his arm around me, and hands the camera to Anne to take a picture of us. After that about fifty people came up to have their picture taken with him. I�m guessing he just knows that�s going to happen so picks somebody out to start the process, I just happened to catch his attention. It was a little awkward, since I wasn�t trying to get my picture taken with him, and I�m still not sure Anne has forgiven me (even though � for the record � it was completely and utterly not my fault).

For folks that liked Three Cups of Tea, you�ll be excited to learn that they�ll be releasing both a children's version and a young reader�s version in January, both of which should be more accessible to younger readers. You might also look at the Pennies for Peace program.

Anne and Kristin
I was part of two presentations at NCTE. Anne and I were the featured presentation on Saturday morning, but it was 8:00 am so sparsely attended. But on Friday Anne Smith and Kristin Leclaire presented and it was fabulous � I predict that NCTE will be inviting them back to do some great things very soon.


Technology
Let�s just say that for a conference that was titled �Shift Happens,�


the wireless access was, ummm, pretty �shifty�. I know it�s expensive, but when is it going to be a given that when anyone gets together for a conference learning, especially educators, wireless is a necessity, not an option? Bud Hunt has more thoughts on this, and so do his commenters.

In addition, every single session I was in, including both of the ones I was associated with, had technical issues with the projectors and/or the microphones. Some of that is to be expected with that many sessions, but 100% with problems? I don�t think so.

Miscellaneous Quotes From My Notes

If we really want students to succeed in the future, we have to allow them to work in a participatory and collaborative way.

They did all this work outside of school because our filters wouldn�t let them find these things.

We invited the superintendent, adminstration, etc. � not one of them took the invitation. That was disappointing.

Teachers will incorporate bits and pieces, but it was still the same basic curriculum � we needed to change the whole thing.

'They�re on a computer, that�s not English' � but they were doing more reading and writing than in their other English classes.

I didn�t feel like our department had a vision � so I changed schools. At my new school, there was a different way of talking about students, a different way of viewing students.

We believe kids can�t look critically at the world until they figure out who they are.

We should think of ourselves [teachers] as the Designer of the Learning Experience.

Every teacher will have to be tech savvy.

They don�t have to be where the information is.

Blogging is reading, with the intent to write. (Quoting Will Richardson).

A New Learning Opportunity

I�m really excited about a new learning opportunity I began this week. I�m helping as a �Community Leader� for the ADVIS Cohort of Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach and Will Richardson�s Powerful Learning Practice initiative.


The PLP cohort model has face-to-face, webinar (Elluminate), and online discussion (private Ning) components, and I�ll be helping mostly with the online discussion component. I�m still figuring out what my role is, but essentially I�m supposed to do two things: help with the technical side of things (wiki questions, Ning questions, etc.) and help contribute and extend the online conversations. In other words, it�s very similar to what I�ve been doing in my own building staff development these last few years. The biggest difference is I won�t be part of the face-to-face meetings and, of course, I haven�t met most of the people in the community face-to-face. (I had the opportunity of presenting to an ADVIS group - along with Anne Smith and Will Richardson - back in January, and a few of the folks in the cohort attended that, so I probably have met some in the cohort face-to-face.)

While I�m really excited to be part of this, I�m also really nervous. (And this is the reason for this and hopefully subsequent posts � to share the process and what I learn as I go along.) Folks who know me in physical space know that I�m not the most social person. I�m certainly not anti-social, but it takes me awhile to join in with a group of people that I don�t know well. So this will be interesting for me as I leave my comfort zone a little bit.

Even so, I�m still really excited about this opportunity and thankful to Sheryl, Will and the ADVISPLP Cohort for allowing me to participate. I look forward to learning along with the cohort � and hopefully sharing on this blog what I discover about this type of online professional development.

Welcome CASE Convention Attendees

I'm guessing that a few folks may be visiting the blog for the first time as a result of Anne Smith's and my presentation today at CASE. Here's the web page that we referenced with examples from our classrooms. Again, please remember that these are not all fantastic examples - we share our successes and our "works in progress" so that we - and hopefully other folks - can learn from them.

To learn more about this blog and our staff development efforts, you might read About This Blog and The Beginning. To get a feel for some of the discussions that happen on this blog, you might look through some of the Best(?) Posts of 2006 or Best(?) Posts of 2007. If you're interested in presentations like the Did You Know? presentation, visit the Fischbowl Presentations page. You can also learn more than you ever wanted to know about the presentation at the Shift Happens wiki. That won't include the version we used today, but you can download that as well (without the music, unfortunately, due to copyright reasons). You can also download the PowerPoint we used for the "rant and rave" portion of the presentation.

And even though he was stuck in Newark and left Anne and me holding the bag :-), you really should start reading Will Richardson's blog - he's a very smart guy with a lot to offer you and your students. Rest assured, Will, you still have lots of friends in Colorado - including the two below.

NCTE - "Shifting" Toward a New Literacy

A post by Will Richardson led me to this from The National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) Executive Committee (quoted in its entirety for your convenience):

Literacy has always been a collection of cultural and communicative practices shared among members of particular groups. As society and technology change, so does literacy. Because technology has increased the intensity and complexity of literate environments, the twenty-first century demands that a literate person possess a wide range of abilities and competencies, many literacies. These literacies�from reading online newspapers to participating in virtual classrooms�are multiple, dynamic, and malleable. As in the past, they are inextricably linked with particular histories, life possibilities and social trajectories of individuals and groups. Twenty-first century readers and writers need to

� Develop proficiency with the tools of technology
� Build relationships with others to pose and solve problems collaboratively and cross-culturally
� Design and share information for global communities to meet a variety of purposes
� Manage, analyze and synthesize multiple streams of simultaneous information
� Create, critique, analyze, and evaluate multi-media texts
� Attend to the ethical responsibilities required by these complex environments

Let me highlight a few phrases:

• "Malleable" literacies
  
• Build relationships with others . . . collaboratively and cross-culturally


• Global communities
  
• Multiple streams
  
• Multi-media texts
  
• Ethical responsibilities . . . complex environments

Now some folks have argued that these aren't really new literacies and, in one sense, I suppose they're right, but it seems to me they're missing the point. Previously most folks haven't included these ideas when they talk about literacy, it's new to them, so I agree with Will (I'm sure he's breathing a sigh of relief) - these are some significant "shifts" in thinking about what it means to be literate.

Due to a comment on Will's post and a subsequent email to me, I discovered that NCTE's Annual Convention coming up in November has the tagline:

Because Shift Happens: Teaching in the Twenty-First Century

NCTE President-Elect Kylene Beers has an article explaining the choice of that tagline. Now, I realize that she mentions me, so this link could be seen as self-promotional on my part, but that's really not my intent here - please ignore that part of it and read the rest of what she wrote, including this part:

Yet, in relation to our hurtle through change, our schools seem to be moving more slowly. We still move large groups of students from class to class with a shrill bell (reminiscent of the factory whistle during the Industrial Age). We still group kids by age and label them with As or Bs, though few can articulate what differentiates them. We�ve added technology�but it�s in a lab down the hall where only certain websites can be accessed. We�ve said we want kids, the kids of the only nation that has put a man on the moon, to use technology in the classroom, but for students in a remedial class, that might be only an electronic workbook, and for those in a gifted class, a PowerPoint presentation instead of a poster.

. . . We�re teaching the Millennium generation, that group of kids who arrived at school as �digital natives� who have a new set of 3 Rs in mind: Relevance, Relationships, and Responsiveness.

. . . At NCTE 2007, we explored the topic of diverse literacies in the twenty-first century literacy; now, for the 2008 convention, we invite you to push this thinking even further by joining the national conversation about how to juggle those diverse literacies while addressing current technological, political, social, and cultural shifts . Do this by explaining how you�re effectively working with English language learners, coping with political pressure to pass high-stakes tests, addressing the ever more diverse student populations, and teaching with and through technology to all levels of students across all the language arts. Explain how you use technology to enhance your own learning and how you use it to communicate not only with colleagues, but with parents, politicians, and administrators. Share how technology has affected assessment of students and of yourself.

And her last sentence:

Join us there, where together we�ll discuss all that it means to teach toward tomorrow�something we must do, because, after all, shift happens.

Let me pick out some phrases again:

• Our schools seem to be moving more slowly


• Relevance, Relationships and Responsiveness


• Explain how you use technology to enhance your own learning
  
• Share how technology has affected assessment of students and of yourself
  
• Teach toward tomorrow . . . something we must do

Now, I know some folks will cheer when they read these, and others will vehemently protest. I think it's important to remember that they aren't throwing away the "old" literacies, they are just expanding what it means to be literate. But what I think is most important about this is the fact that NCTE is apparently basing their convention around these ideas. I think this is a major shift. This is not ISTE promoting NETS, or a coalition of folks from corporations wanting better prepared employees, this is NCTE - perhaps fundamentally redefining literacy and how we teach our children. Perhaps I'm reading (pun intended) too much into this, but I think this is huge.

My Personal Learning Network in Action

This article was originally published in the March/April 2008 issue of ISTE�s Learning & Leading with Technology. I�m cross-posting it here because it�s much more meaningful with links, plus it�s more likely I�ll read a comment here than if you write it in the margins of the magazine. As a side note, I found it very difficult to write a column for Bloggers Caf� with a due date that was two months before publication. And, of course, I found it very hard to write something that was only 500 words or so!



We�ve spent a lot of time at my school thinking about the concept of Personal Learning Networks (PLNs). We live in an age of information abundance. Our students need to learn how to find, evaluate, organize, synthesize, remix and re-purpose information in order to understand and solve complex problems.

A PLN isn�t a particularly new idea; learning networks have existed for a long time. What�s new is the reach and extent that�s now possible for a PLN, with technology and global interconnectedness providing the opportunity for a much wider, richer and more diverse PLN than ever before. This is a complex topic that can�t be fully addressed in a short article, but let me provide an example of my own learning that resulted from my PLN.

I�ve been a big proponent of publishing student work on the web, of using Web 2.0 tools to provide our students with a wider, often more authentic audience. But I�ve struggled with the quality of that work and question whether publishing student work that at times is pretty mediocre is such a good thing after all. My PLN helped me think more deeply about this.

Christian Long posted, �are we really prepared to drown in a sea of "just good enough" presentations.� That led me to several posts by Dan Meyer, �But if they and their teachers aren't immersing themselves constantly in better, clearer work than their own . . . work which for the first time in history is available freely and quickly, how in that vacuum can they rise to any greater occasion?� Dan led me to read Cult of the Amateur by Andrew Keen (books are still part of my PLN). Both Dan and Carolyn Foote led me to a post by Garr Reynolds, �Perhaps if all of us smart experts, with our massive intellects, tried to approach problems with �the beginner's mind� we could get much better at solving problems.� A couple of posts by Vicki Davis got me thinking again about how it takes a �special kind of individual to make connections to be able to see things that specialists on their own cannot see. How do we teach that?�

I had multiple conversations with teachers in my school to further refine my thinking (direct conversation is still part of my PLN). Finally, I came upon a post and a Technology, Entertainment, Design talk by Larry Lessig, who suggested that the �read/write culture� is �a literacy for this generation.�

My thinking has evolved; I have a more refined, nuanced viewpoint on students publishing their work on the web. I believe even more strongly this is something we need to do with students, but I�m also thinking more critically about how to nurture the quality of that work.

As I envision the future, I think it�s critical for our students to create, nurture and expand their PLNs. It�s also critical to include varied viewpoints in our PLNs, to make sure we don�t continually reinforce our already held beliefs. I thank the members of my PLN for all they�ve taught me and encourage all of you to help your students � and yourselves � develop powerful, meaningful and effective PLNs.


Due to space limitations, I couldn�t include this portion with a very long quote from Howard Rheingold that I think is relevant.

A post by Will Richardson led me to an article by Howard Rheingold writing about the importance of developing critical and analytic skills:

Loss of certainty about authority and credibility is one of the prices we pay for the freedom of democratized publishing. We can no longer trust the author to guarantee the veracity of work; today�s media navigators must develop critical skills in order to find their way through the oceans of information, misinformation, and disinformation now available. The ability to analyze, investigate, and argue about what we read, see, and hear is an essential survival skill. Some bloggers can and do spread the most outrageously inaccurate and fallaciously argued information; it is up to the readers and, most significantly, other bloggers to actively question the questionable. Democratizing publishing creates a quality problem, the answer to which is�democratizing criticism. Critical thinking is not something that philosophers do, but a necessary skill in a mediasphere where anybody can publish and the veracity of what you read can never be assumed.

I would also highly recommend that anyone interested in learning more about Personal Learning Networks regularly read both Will Richardson�s and Clarence Fisher�s blogs, as well as the work of George Siemens on Connectivism.

How It All Ends: YouTube, Climate Change, and Inquiry

Thanks to Chris Lehmann and Will Richardson, I came across this video (well, actually, multiple videos). As Chris said, "This is one science teacher's attempt to influence the way we talk about the issue of climate change. Pass it on."



I find this worth blogging about for two reasons. First, full disclosure, I am concerned about climate change. But second, even if I wasn't, I find this approach very interesting and would like to explore the educational possibilities.

This teacher has taken an important, controversial topic, and attempted to start a global conversation. He started out with an earlier video titled, "The Most Terrifying Video You'll Ever See!" It got a lot of views, and also a ton of criticism (hmmm, sounds vaguely familiar). He then acknowledges that he had a giant hole in the original video, and then created a series of videos attempting to address every criticism of the original, with the How It All Ends video being the jumping off point.

He provides an index of all the videos and a suggested order of viewing in the "About This Video" section next to each of the videos on YouTube, but easier access can be found on this site. He provides some links at that site as well.

I think this is a very interesting approach, even if the topic wasn't so huge or as controversial as climate change. Lay out an argument, address and attempt to refute all the criticism, put it all out there on YouTube to be freely distributed, commented on, criticized, discussed, and generally put through the wringer, and then also provide some next steps for those interested in doing something about the issue.

I think this holds a lot of promise as an example of an inquiry approach to learning about climate change. I could see a science class taking this on, watching and discussing all the videos and investigating the related links. And then investigate the other side of the argument thoroughly, generate a list of links and resources, and then presenting them in one, unified "space." This would involve looking deeply at the science - as well as the related social issues - and I think would offer many possibilities for learning and doing science along the way. The students would learn a whole lot of science concepts in context - in relation to the bigger picture issue of climate change. Then each student (or perhaps group of students) would have to take a stand and make a persuasive argument using all the evidence collected, and present that argument both digitally in some form and in person to their peers and/or their wider community. Invite others in to critique (including Greg, the creator of How It All Ends.)

For me, this big picture approach would not only be more engaging for students and would be more likely to lead to more enduring learning of science concepts, but it would also immerse them in the scientific process itself. Not just the scientific process as applied to science - which I think most folks would agree is pretty significant in and of itself, but also the larger scientific process as it relates to politics and policy. As we've seen with so many issues (AIDS, evolution, stem cell research, climate change, etc.), you really can't separate the science from the politics and the policy when it comes to actually addressing the issues and attempting to solve the problem. What better way to show the relevance, the social impact, and the sheer beauty of science?

ADVIS Presentation Questions and Feedback

Anne Smith and I had the pleasure of presenting alongside Will Richardson today to the good folks at the Association of Delaware Valley Independent Schools. This post is a place to leave questions or feedback for Anne and me. I apologize for the delay in posting this, but we didn�t anticipate that Blogger would be blocked at a Country Club (note to self: always ask about the filter ahead of time, even in non-school venues).

Here�s the wiki that the network built in response to a tweet by Will. In addition, several folks asked about some classroom examples from our school, so here are some we�ve demoed previously (the top part is about our staff development efforts, scroll down to see the examples). (As always, these are a work in progress and not necessarily "exemplary" work � we feel it�s important to share what we�ve tried even when the results weren�t all we hoped for.) Feel free to leave a comment and/or contact Anne or me if you have further questions.

Thank you to Barbara and the other folks at ADVIS that invited us out and treated us so nicely. Thank you also to Will � �twas a privilege.

Thought for the Day 1-4-08

This quote was read at my School Accountability Committee meeting at my daughter's school. It's from the book The Backdoor to Enlightenment: Eight Steps to Living Your Dreams and Changing Your World and was apparently featured in Oprah's magazine.

For every nine people who denounce innovation, only one will encourage it. For every nine people who do things the way they have always been done, only one will ever wonder if there is a better way. For every nine people who stand in line in front of a locked building, only one will ever come around and check the back door. Our progress as a species rests squarely on the shoulders of that tenth person. The nine are satisfied with things they are told are valuable. Person 10 determines for himself what has value.

Makes me think of Will. I think he's peering in my back door right now . . .

The Most Successful PLC

So, Will pointed me to this New York Times article An Internet Jihad Aims at U.S. Viewers:

Unlike Mr. bin Laden, the blogger was not operating from a remote location. It turns out he is a 21-year-old American named Samir Khan who produces his blog from his parents� home in North Carolina, where he serves as a kind of Western relay station for the multimedia productions of violent Islamic groups.

I think there�s a lot to think about there (a whole lot), but it also reminded me of something someone said at a recent convening I attended. I don�t mean to offend anyone with the following statement, but I think it�s also worth thinking about. They made the statement that the most successful Professional Learning Community they knew of was Al Qaeda. They have a passion for their subject, are trying to meet a perceived need, have individual cells that are operating both independently and in conjunction to try to achieve their goals, make effective use of technology, and have a strong belief they can change the world.

The point this person was making was two-fold (I think). First, that PLC�s aren�t necessarily a good thing in and of themselves - even if they�re successful - it depends on their purpose and goals. So as we utilize PLC�s in our schools, we need to keep in mind that the goal is not successful PLC�s, the goal is student learning and growth.

And second, that a small group of people with passion, commitment, and a belief they can make a difference can change the world. If our PLC�s operate with those same attributes and beliefs, then why can�t we change our schools � and the world - for the better? This brings to mind two of my favorite quotes,

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed people can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.
� Margaret Mead

Some men see things as they are and ask "Why?"
I dream things that never were and ask, "Why not?"
� Robert Kennedy

I think as we work on our school's vision and implementing PLC's, we need to continue to ask, "Why not?"