Wikileaks, the TSA, and Ninth Graders: Want to Participate?

Hey, have you noticed anything in the news lately about some kind of leaking wiki? Or perhaps new and improved procedures at your favorite airport? Have you ever wondered if perhaps you could relate that to literature, and if perhaps high school students might have an opinion about these things?

Well, wonder no more. Anne Smith and Maura Moritz's classes will be discussing safety versus security in the context of Fahrenheit 451, 1984 and Little Brother:

We invite you to participate in a wonderful learning conversation with our ninth grade honors classes on February 3, 2011. After studying the world of dystopian fiction through classics such as Ray Bradbury�s Fahrenheit 451, George Orwell�s 1984 and the modern response, Cory Doctorow�s Little Brother, our students will engage in an intense discussion as their final project. We are inviting you to participate to help our students examine how these works play an enormous part in their world today through such relevant issues as Homeland Security, government censorship, information leaks, and safety versus security, to name just a few.

Our students will participate in a fishbowl discussion with live blogging and we will Ustream out the fishbowl discussion live so that you can hear the in-class discussion while participating in the live blogging.

So, head over to the post to learn more, or head over to the wiki to sign up to participate. We'd love to have you be part of this learning experience for (and with) our students.

This I Believe Goes Global: 2010-11 Edition

Once again Maura Moritz's and Anne Smith's classes will be conducting their This I Believe Goes Global project in their ninth grade English classes. You can read in more detail on Anne's blog, but here are the highlight's:

1. Classes from around the world are matched up, write their This I Believe Essays/record the podcasts, upload them to a wiki, and then students peer edit/respond to essays in the paired class. Read much more on Anne's post or visit the wiki to learn more.
   
   
2. If your class(es) are interested in participating, fill out this Google Form. Then we'll get back to you reasonably soon.
   
   
3. If you're interested in participating as an adult and posting your essay/podcast, go to this page and knock yourself out. (Note: concussions are very serious, please don't actually knock yourself out.)

If you have any questions that aren't answered by Anne's post or the wiki, please contact me.

AWNM: Year 3

Once again this year our students in Anne Smith and Maura Moritz's English 9 Honors classes will be reading Daniel Pink's A Whole New Mind and discussing it with each other, with many of you, and with Daniel Pink himself (read about previous years' experiences). Students will be holding in-class fishbowl discussions and live blogging chapters four through nine (Design, Story, Sympathy, Empathy and Meaning).

We again have a bunch of folks from our PLN's that will be live blogging with them, and Daniel Pink will be Skyping with them to discuss Chapter 6: Symphony. (Unfortunately due to our schedules not synching very well this year, we'll only get Mr. Pink once this year instead of twice. The good news is that he'll be discussing Symphony this time which is a chapter that we haven't been able to discuss with him before.)

You're welcome to check out the wiki to see when we'll be live blogging, and then tune in to the ustream of the in-class discussion and/or the CoverItLive live blogging on Anne's class blog (periods 2 and 5 on that schedule) or Maura's class blog (periods 3 and 4 on that schedule). We're looking forward to another great learning experience for - and with - our students.

Cory Doctorow Discussion Ustream Archive

Well, the technology worked fairly well for our Skype discussion with Cory Doctorow today. The audio on Skype wasn't perfect, but we could hear fairly well. And it froze up a couple of times for about 10 seconds, but then started transmitting again. We also lost the ustream once, which is why I've embedded two ustream archives below.

Part 1 (about 17 minutes) is the first part (amazingly enough) of our discussion. We actually start about 3 minutes into the recording, as I hit record before we actually got started just to make sure I didn't forget. Then Part 2 is obviously the remaining portion (about 41 minutes). We probably lost about a minute in between those two recordings. Given the audio issues on Skype, it's a little hard to hear on the ustream as well, but I think you can make most of it out.

Overall, I think it was a great experience for our students. Thanks, Cory, for being so willing to give your time and talents to help our students.

Discussing Little Brother with Cory Doctorow

Anne Smith and Maura Moritz's ninth graders are currently finishing up reading Cory Doctorow's Little Brother. Previously they read 1984 and their task is to look at both books and answer the questions:

What have we learned - or what have we not learned - over the past 60 years [from Orwell's time to the present]? What does our future hold for us?

This has been a fascinating unit to observe. Anne and Maura have brought in additional folks to speak to different aspects of each novel. They brought in our Western Civilization teachers to help our students understand what was going on in the 1930's - 1950's that Orwell was reacting to and that influenced 1984.

As they moved on to Little Brother, they invited in different social studies teachers to talk to the students about 9/11 and The Patriot Act. They also invited in myself, Mike Porter (our district's Assistant Director of Instructional Technology), and Ben Horblit (a knowledgeable former student of Anne's who's now a senior) to talk about the technology in Little Brother and its ramifications. Then earlier this week Mike Porter, along with Dan Maas (our district CIO) visited to talk about rights and responsibilities surrounding technology use and school law, which was a very interesting discussion.

Now as they are finishing up Little Brother, the students will have the opportunity to question the author, Cory Doctorow, himself. As you may recall, I blogged last spring that some students who had chosen to read Little Brother on their own contacted him with questions, and that they then ended up with an hour long Skype conversation with Cory. He agreed to Skype again this year, this time with students from all four sections gathered together in our Forum to ask questions and listen.

Cory will be joining us for about an hour again via Skype and, if all the tech goes as planned, you are welcome to watch via ustream. We will be broadcasting from approximately 8:25 - 9:25 am MST (UTC/GMT -7) on Tuesday, February 2nd. Some of the students will also live blog over on Anne's class blog. As always, our focus will be on making the learning happen for our students, so if we have any technical difficulties, the ustream will not be our first priority.

A Good Day

Anne Smith�s English Literature class recently discussed Act III of Hamlet with Debi Ohayon�s AP class. Not that unusual, perhaps, except that Anne�s class is here at Arapahoe in Centennial, Colorado, and Debi�s class is at The Lovett School in Atlanta, Georgia.

Anne tweeted out that she was looking for classes that might be interested in interacting with her class around Hamlet, and Laura Deisley � who�s the Director of 21st Century Learning at Lovett (great job title, btw) � responded that she knew a teacher that might be interested. Anne�s students are pretty comfortable using the fishbowl with live blogging method of discussing a book, but we wondered if we could make it work with two inner circles, one in Anne�s classroom and one in Debi�s classroom in Atlanta. As Laura writes:

after some traditional back and forth emailing and a Skype conference call, Anne, Karl, Upper School English Department Chair Debi Ohayon and I settled on a collaboration: two joint classroom Skype and live blog sessions on Hamlet.

So, one inner circle of discussers in Anne�s classroom, and an outer circle of live bloggers. One inner circle of discussers in Debi�s classroom, and an outer circle of live bloggers. One Skype connection so the two classes could see (sort of) and hear (most of the time) each other and have an oral discussion. One CoverItLive blog so that the outer circles could discuss via live blogging. While the technology wasn�t perfect (pretty wide shot with the webcams and at times the audio broke up a little, but the students just asked each other to repeat what they said), it worked pretty well (see Anne's post for pictures from her classroom). As Anne writes:

Debi�s students rose to the challenge that the technology and new discussion method presented, and my students didn�t back down when discussing Hamlet with an advanced placement class. Both sides walked away commenting about how great it was to hear different points of view than from the students in their own class.

And, on Laura�s blog, Debi reflects that:

Boy, am I glad my curiosity or sense of duty or both propelled me forward, as it has been a thrill to watch this pilot project become reality, despite the time commitment, logistical challenges, and alterations of my syllabus. The excitement that both my students and I have felt being pioneers as well as participants in a joint classroom experience across the country has been enormous. As Laura suggested, just the concept of kids in the 21st century talking in different time zones about an early 17th century text is intriguing. It's certainly not just about the fun (though it is really fun); the students agree that the Skype/LiveBlog shared classroom has enriched their learning experience. Meredith captured this sentiment today in class during our feedback session when she said, "We got to branch out beyond our own classroom and discuss similar ideas as well as gain insight about other ideas from students we didn't know." Furthermore, Mark said, "It was not only a blast, but a highly intellectual experience that I will always remember." I know many educators fear technology being pushed for the wrong reasons, but I'm quite convinced this was an example of technology enhancing pedagogical goals.

We�re going to do this again on December 9th (over the entire play) and it will be interesting to see if it goes even better. I expect it will, as we�ll probably position the microphones a little better and certainly the students will have more experience under their belts and should be more comfortable with the format.

I think this was not only a valuable experience in terms of students learning about Hamlet, but also because of the sense of community that it engenders. As Debi said:

I'm pretty certain that the something special was a uniquely communal learning environment. Since I also have a personal invested interest in character education, I would be remiss not to note as a bonus what a delight it was to see teenagers from different parts of the country, representing both public and private schools, using literature to discuss timeless, universal moral issues.

Yeah, it was a good day.

This I Believe Goes Global - We Want You!

(This post is written by Anne Smith and cross-posted on Learning and Laptops. So the "I" in this post is referring to Anne.)

For the past three years, I have had my classes write their versions of National Public Radio�s �This I Believe� segment. I was introduced to this idea by a colleague and have been always impressed by what my students hold as their personal values and beliefs. Writing these essays has allowed for them to do something they don�t get to do all that often at school - express their heartfelt beliefs. After writing the essays the first year, we submitted them to NPR, but we also decided to podcast them ourselves � no need to wait to see if NPR might choose to broadcast them. The writing was good at expressing their values, but once their voice was added to their written expression, WOW, it simply transformed that personal essay. Instead of the words simply being words, the words conveyed deeply held emotions. Now, this is the standard.

Previous class examples:
Period 2 06-07
Period 5 06-07
Period 3 06-07
Period 2 07-08
Period 5 07-08
Period 3 07-08
Wiki 09-10

We are approaching that time of year, when I am going to start the kids on this writing adventure, but this year I wanted to invite you in the blog-o-sphere to join us again. I want �This I Believe� to go global. I want my students to benefit not only from knowing what their peers believe, or what the other AHS classes believe, but to hear and see what the world values. What do kids elsewhere in the U.S. believe in? What do kids elsewhere in the world believe in? What do some of the learned professionals that I know believe in? I want my students to walk away from this experience realizing the power they have as professional writers as well as connecting to other teenagers and adults from around the world. I want to see them exchange ideas, foster relationships, and appreciate the variety of perspectives. Maybe you can challenge your principal, your school board members, your local politicians, heck, maybe your entire school. Maybe we can even get our President to write his own �This I Believe.�

So, how do we accomplish this? Karl Fisch, of course, is willing to be my master facilitator. He has set up a wiki (still a work in progress) that will provide the guidelines for the classes to follow. I am making Maura Moritz�s classes join us again, so there will be four classes (ninth grade, 14 and 15 years old) from AHS writing and podcasting their essays: Moritz 3, Moritz 4, Smith 2, and Smith 5. We are hoping to attract at least three other classes from around the world, one each to pair up with each of our four classes. If we get more than four classes that are interested, then we will try to pair up any additional classes with another class somewhere in the world. If your class(es) are interested, please complete this Google Form with some basic information (your name, your email address, school name, location, grade level(s)/ages, how many classes, number of students in each class, and time frame that you�d like to do this) so we can setup those partnerships. (Our thinking is that pairing one class with one class will keep this from becoming too overwhelming for the students, although of course anyone can read/listen/comment to any of the essays on any of the wiki pages). We will create a wiki page for each set of paired classes and each student will upload their written essay as well as their podcast (the podcast can either be uploaded directly to the wiki, or you can use a variety of other services for that and then link to them). Each pair of classes will be in charge of their own wiki page and we�ll use the discussion tabs on each page to give feedback to the students. If you are an adult interested in writing a piece yourself, simply add them to the �adults� page on the wiki. I am hoping to get some notable edubloggers as well as my superintendent, CIO, and others to participate. It would also be helpful to include a brief bio so the kids can know who they are reading about. Obviously you don�t have to do this with us or on our wiki, you can create your own. But we thought it might be interesting and helpful to have one wiki that aggregated all these essays/podcasts, one place that students (and others) could visit to learn about beliefs all over the world.

Wondering where to start? NPR has a number of education friendly links to help you along the process:
For Educators
For Students
Essay writing tips
How to contribute an essay to NPR

Timeline: For our classes we are going to start writing our essays, November 6th with a final due date of November 13th for their essay. The following week they will begin podcasting their essays. The paired classes don�t have to match this timeline exactly (although that would be great), but we�re hoping they can have theirs completed by Thanksgiving so that the students can start commenting on each other�s essays/podcasts.But for other pairings you can set whatever time frame works best for you � that�s the beauty of the wiki, it�s a living document with no �end� to the assignment (although that�s why we need you to include your time frame when you email us so that we can try to match folks up). We would really appreciate any feedback (now or as this progresses) to make this an experience that is truly relevant and meaningful for these kids.

Anne Smith - One of 20 to Watch

Congratulations to Arapahoe's very own Anne Smith for being named one of the National School Board Association's "20 to Watch" for 2009.

The National School Boards Association�s Technology Leadership Network (TLN) has named its annual list of �20 to Watch� emerging leaders in education technology. These individuals are recognized by the organization for championing technology initiatives that make a difference for students, teachers, school districts, and the greater education technology community.

Anne is a remarkable Language Arts teacher in my building. Here's an excerpt from her nomination letter.

All [Anne's] students not only have the opportunity to demonstrate their thinking, but the expectation that they do so. I think that this is perhaps what is most striking: Anne's use of technology has created higher expectations for her students and herself. And those high expectations are indicative of her leadership.

Congrats, Anne, you deserve it.

On another note, Chris Moore, a fabulous 5th grade teacher in my district, was also named as one of "20 to Watch". As far as we know, this is the first time that NSBA has named two folks from the same district in the same year. And that makes three from our district in the last three years. It seems to me that these are the kinds of things schools and districts should really "brag" about (especially given the tough budget climate we have in Colorado). Because I think all of our communities should know that, despite the difficult budget situation, we have many educators who are worth "watching."

Is the Pen Mightier than the Keyboard?

The National School Board Association has a companion blog to their Board Buzz specifically for their Technology and Learning Conference coming up in October in Denver. A recent post pointed to research comparing students� writing with a pen versus with a keyboard. Board Buzz said:

Virginia Berninger, a University of Washington Professor of Educational Psychology, discovered that children write better and longer essays at a faster pace when using a pen.

When I read the article it referenced, though, it actually stated:

"Children consistently did better writing with a pen when they wrote essays. They wrote more and they wrote faster." said Berninger.

I would first point out that writing �more and faster� is not necessarily the same as writing better, so I think NSBA might want to update their verbiage in that post. (The article did state that the students wrote more complete sentences in that portion of the study which might be considered �better,� but that wasn�t the essay portion.)

The study also left me with more questions than answers (which is not necessarily a bad thing). The study looked at second, fourth and six graders, and they had to complete a variety of tasks on paper using a pen and on a computer using a keyboard. But nowhere in the article (not sure about in the research itself as there�s no link) did it mention what kind of keyboarding skills the kids had or how much experience with computers they had - that seems like a pretty major thing to leave out. If the research actually didn�t take that into account, that seems to be a major oversight in the methodology.

After all, I think we can assume that the students have had plenty of practice writing with paper and pen, but how about on a computer? Did they have keyboarding skills or were they hunting and pecking? With the common wisdom of the moment being we shouldn�t start keyboarding practice until about the fourth grade, that really makes you wonder about the keyboarding ability the students had. Had they received instruction on composing on a computer, or was it just a test-taking tool? Since the article states that ,"We need to learn more about the process of writing with a computer, and even though schools have computers they haven't integrated them in teaching at the early grades,� that seems to indicate they have not received much instruction. Both of those factors � if they were not addressed in the actual research � would seem to suggest the results really don�t tell us very much at all. The students should do better with paper and pen if they don�t have keyboarding skills and haven�t practiced writing on the computer.

Now, having said that, I don�t necessarily disagree that young students should be writing by hand first. While I can�t find the link at the moment, I do recall some research connecting the physical movement of writing with helping students learn their letters and then to read and write. And I do think that around third or fourth grade is probably not a bad time to wait to start keyboarding in earnest based on developmental factors (although I know there are folks that start it earlier and it seems to work out fine). So the line that states, �We need to help children become bilingual writers so they can write by both the pen and the computer. So don�t throw away your pen or your keyboard. We need them both� is not bad advice, at least at the elementary level when students are learning to write.

So the article itself, and the NSBA blog post based on it, appear to be a little misleading. I also think that their definition of writing is too narrow. As the chair of the English Department at Rutgers states, writing/composing in the 21st century is a very different endeavor, and the power of the keyboard is not simply to process words, but also images, audio and video, and the resulting connections to others and their ideas that you can make. I don�t think we can make a broad statement on pen versus keyboard based simply on typing the alphabet, writing isolated sentences, or writing ten-minute essays on a certain prompt. My concern is that someone just skimming the NSBA blog might assume the research � and the NSBA itself � is saying something it really isn�t, and will apply this to older students as well as younger. That, I think, would be a mistake.

My CIO and a bunch of Anne Smith�s ninth graders have left their comments, so I encourage you to visit the blog and leave your thoughts as well.



Photo Credit: Writing or typing?, originally uploaded by Stefan Koopmanschap.

H1N1, Skype, and a Possible Tipping Point

Anne Smith has a nice post up about how she has students who are home sick Skyping into class in order to stay connected.

What was really impressive was that the students� willingness to be connected back into our class when they are at home feeling crummy. They want to participate, they want to stay in touch, they want to continue to learn and aren�t letting the flu get in their way.

I think this is a nice use of Skype, and I'm sure many other teachers are doing similar things. I know other folks have said this, but I wonder if this outbreak turns even more serious with lots of absences or school closures, if that might accelerate how quickly schools start to move more of their instruction online (in some shape or form). Could H1N1 end up being a tipping point?

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.

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.

Our Seniors' Last Lecture

Anne Smith�s and Lauren Lee's English Literature students are finishing up their last assignment of the semester. Anne writes:

The final semester for seniors (and for teachers, too) is always a challenging one to keep everyone motivated and on task. When I think of some of the activities I have created in order to keep the kids focused on their learning and not on holding down a beach chair, I wonder how effective and meaningful these projects were. This year I decided to start the semester off a little differently and a little more challenging. Rather than focusing on a question that dealt specifically with a thematic topic connecting all the pieces of literature, I challenged my students to answer the question �What�s the Point?� Under that mind blowing question, student needed to consider why we are reading the assigned texts, what relevance do they have towards their own lives, and what messages are the authors trying to send to us all? What�s the point of their final semester of the senior year of high school?

. . . The task was to have our students write his/her own last lectures mimicked after Randy Pausch�s Last Lecture.

. . . We decided on three parts to their speech: reflections on the past, lasting legacy to Arapahoe High School, and looking forward (what do you want in the next year, five years, ten years).

As they give their last lecture in Anne's classes, we�ll videotape them and then post them to their class blog so that their fellow students can give them feedback on both their delivery and their message. In addition, we�ll be ustreaming them out live so that parents (and interested educators) can watch as well. If you�re interested, tune in to our ustream channel on May 6th, 8th, 11th, 13th or 15th, from 10:35 � 11:34 am Mountain Daylight Time, UTC/GMT -6, then check back later on their class blog to leave them comments (it might be a few days after each set of students goes before the posts and embedded videos are up, although you could leave an immediate comment on Anne's post if you didn't want to wait).

As Anne says,

Hopefully, as they have done before, the kids will rise to the challenge realizing what an incredible opportunity this is to leave a lasting impression on their peers, teachers, and world to let everyone know what is important, meaningful, and relevant to each and every one of these kids.

Looking for Virtual School Board Members - Are You Interested?

Anne Smith and Maura Moritz are having their ninth graders choose a book, read it, and then discuss it in small groups. That�s not all that different than what has been going on in Language Arts classrooms for quite a while, but they�re extending the idea just a little bit. The students chose books that are somewhat controversial (1984, The Fountainhead, I Robot, Little Brother, Anthem, I Am the Cheese) and have either been challenged or banned by school districts around the country (to be clear, not necessarily our school district). The students will read and discuss the books and then have to prepare a presentation for the school board arguing either in favor of approving the book for use or defending blocking its use. They�ll follow our district�s process for book approvals (pdf). In Anne�s case they are also using a Google Site with integrated Google Groups to help organize their thinking and collaboratively plan their presentations.

When the presentations are ready, the students � for their final exam � will actually make the presentation to selected members of our own school board that we�ve invited to hear the presentations. The school board members will listen to the presentation, ask questions, make them defend their positions, and generally be � well, school board members.

There�s only one problem with this plan. Some of our school board members already have commitments during our final exam times (pesky little things like graduation ceremonies for our sister high schools, for example). Hmm, what to do? I know, invite other folks in to be �school board members.� What other folks, you ask? Well, you, for example. Anyone who�s interested and is available at the times the students will be presenting (more on that in a minute) would serve as a �virtual school board member,� watching and listening to the presentation via ustream (or MeBeam, or Skype, or . . . tool to be determined based on participants) and then providing feedback/asking questions via Skype/MeBeam/whatever (again, tool to be determined based on participants access). (As a side benefit, parents can tune in to watch their student's final exam live.)

Just as regular school board members have not always read the book in question, you do not have to have read the book (although if you have, or if you�re willing to try to read one or more before then, that would be excellent). You would be responsible for generally being prepared to participate as a �serious� school board member (review these two (pdf) documents) to get a feel for our process).

So, if you�re interested in participating, we�d love to have you. You need to send an email to me (karlfisch {at} gmail {dot} com) as soon as possible with the following information: name, location, position, digital footprint information (blog, wiki, twitter, etc.), skype name, and the time(s) you are available (chosen from the list below). Please keep in mind we do have limited spots so � if we happen to get a ton of responses (unlikely this time of year, but you never know) � we may not be able to accept everybody.

Here is the list of times (all times Mountain Daylight Time, UTC/GMT -6) and the books that will be presented during those times (please keep in mind that times are estimates, some groups may go over and some may end early � you�ve done this type of things with students, right?). It would be great if you could sign up for an entire class period, but if you only have time for a partial period, we�ll try to work it out.

Friday, May 15th - Need Participants (last day of classes, 59 minute periods)

Period 2: 8:25-9:24 am
Anthem / I Am the Cheese (approx. 8:25 � 8:45)
I Robot (~8:45 � 9:05)
1984 (~9:05 � 9:24)

Period 3: 9:29-10:30 am
Little Brother (~9:30 � 9:50)
1984 (~ 9:50 � 10:10)
I Robot (~10:10 � 10:30)

Period 4: 10:35- 11:34 am
Little Brother (~10:35 � 10:55)
1984 (~10:55 � 11:15)
I Robot (~11:15 � 11:34)

Period 5: 12:14-1:12 pm
Anthem/ I Am the Cheese (~12:14 � 12:34)
I Robot (~12:34 � 12:53)
Little Brother (~12:53 � 1:12)

Monday, May 18th - Do Not Need Participants, but will ustream 10:35 am � 12:00 pm

Tuesday, May 19th - Do Not Need Participants, but will ustream from 9:00 am � 10:25 am

Wednesday, May 20th - Need Participants (Final Exams, 85 minute exams)

Period 4: 7:25- 8:50 am
1984 (~7:30 � 7:50)
Little Brother (~7:50 � 8:10)
Anthem/I Am the Cheese (~8:10 � 8:30)
I Robot (~8:30 � 8:50)

Period 5: 10:35 am - 12:00 pm
Anthem/I Am the Cheese (~10:40 � 11:00)
Fountainhead (~11:00 � 11:20)
I Robot (~11:20 � 11:40)
1984 (~11:40 � 12:00)

Thanks in advance to those that are willing to participate. Even if you don�t want to formally participate, you�re welcome to watch the ustream if you have time. And, even if we end up with no virtual participants, I still think Anne and Maura have a great activity here.

AWNM Video Conference: Tech Setup, Ustream Archive and Pictures

I just wanted to share the tech setup as well as the Ustream archive and some pictures of our video conference on Friday with Daniel Pink. (You can also view the two archived CoverItLive live blogs on my previous post.)

For those that are interested, here was the tech setup. To Skype (and then eventually MeBeam, more on that in a moment) with Daniel Pink, we had a Dell computer with a logitech webcam and snowball microphone connected to it. This was connected to a projector in our Forum that rear projects onto a large screen (we were in the forum because we had four classes with a total of 110 kids or so) so that all the students could see and hear him. Earlier in the week students had submitted their questions on a blog and then Maura Moritz and Anne Smith selected sixteen of them to be asked today (due to time constraints). Each student would come down to the snowball microphone and ask the question of Mr. Pink, and then ask a follow-up or respond to Mr. Pink's questions if he asked them.

Then over on the side we had an iMac connected to a second snowball microphone and a DV camcorder which we used to Ustream the event. The Ustream audience (folks who read about it on my blog or on twitter, plus we emailed all the parents of the students in the classes) could see the student asking the question, a decent shot of the projected screen with Mr. Pink on it, and then hear both of them pretty well.

Next to that we had two Dell laptops, each one moderating the two CoverItLive blogs we had setup. We had two setup because we had so many students live blogging we felt it would be overwhelming to have them all on one live blog. The ninety or so students that weren't asking the questions had the capability of hopping on the live blog (or they could choose just to listen) - we probably had around 50 to 60 or so laptops spread throughout those 90 students, and the students could hand the laptop to the student sitting next to them if they wanted to comment.

Overall, it went well, although for the first time in two years we had some technical difficulties. We've always used Skype for this and it worked well for a while, but then suddenly dropped the call. We reconnected once for a little while, then it dropped again and then wouldn't connect. After trying for a few minutes, we switched over to MeBeam which thankfully worked for us. MeBeam doesn't have quite the same quality as Skype (a little bit of a delay and the video isn't quite as crisp), but it still worked well.

We really appreciate how flexible Daniel Pink was. When we did this last year, we had talked about using MeBeam as a backup to Skype, but we really hadn't talked about any contingencies this year (my fault). When it became obvious that Skype maybe wasn't going to reconnect, I Skype-chatted to Mr. Pink that we should try switching to MeBeam, and then gave him the URL and the room name. He Skyped back that he would, and by the time I switched over and loaded it up, he was there. We had a brief moment when his audio wasn't on (by default when you enter a MeBeam room your audio is off and it's not completely intuitive where to turn it on), but we told him where to enable his audio and then we were good to go (well, after he put some headphones on as we were getting echo). Now, none of that is rocket science, but in my experience that's more than enough to throw a lot of folks, especially when we hadn't talked about it in advance. So I was very thankful that he handled it with aplomb and didn't get flustered with the tech stuff.

Unfortunately, I'd been sick all week and had to visit the doctor later that day so I didn't get to listen to the students reflect about the experience later that day. From my perspective, I thought it went well, and I thought the students did a nice job of asking thoughtful questions. As one person noted in the Ustream chat, they were polite and respectful but not overly deferential to Daniel Pink. And, as has been the case for the two years we've done this (so four times he's interacted with our students), Daniel Pink has been very generous with his time and tries to thoughtfully address their questions.

Here is the archived Ustream (it starts about 2:45 into the archive, I hit record a little too early because I didn't want to forget!) and some pictures that should give you an idea of what the room looked like.

Join Us for the Daniel Pink Video Conference and Live Blog

Tomorrow (Friday, February 20th) our students will conduct their culminating discussion of Daniel Pink's A Whole New Mind. This will begin at about 8:25 am MST and end at around 9:25 am MST. This will be similar to last year, but we've made a few adjustments.

First, since we only have him for one hour this year instead of two, we'll just have selected students ask him their question and then perhaps a follow-up (last year we tried to have a mini-fishbowl discussion as well, but we don't think that will work so well with our limited time).

Second, with that many students in the live blog, it goes a little too fast and furious, so we're going to create two this year. Mrs. Smith's 2nd period and Mrs. Moritz's 3rd period will be on one live blog, and Mrs. Moritz's 4th period and Mrs. Smith's 5th period will be on a second live blog. You can either follow those links or I'll embed both CoverItLive's in this post (not sure how well that will work in practice, so jump to the links if it doesn't work having them both embedded here).

We will also be ustreaming the event - basically you'll hear the questions the students ask and Mr. Pink's responses, and probably see a really badly angled shot of the projected screen with Mr. Pink on Skype and perhaps the students actually asking the questions (it's going to be a tough angle, so we'll see).

You are welcome to observe and/or participate in the CoverItLive blogs if you wish, but with a few caveats. First, this is the students' discussion, so please don't drive the conversation. Second, please make sure you enter your real name in the appropriate spot in CoverItLive so we know who you are. Third, the CoverItLive is a place for discussing A Whole New Mind, if you wish to discuss the pedagogy or the technical aspects of this, please do that with the other adults in the ustream chat.

As always, our priority is to make this work for the students, so if we have technical issues with the ustream or anything else, we will do our best to fix them, but our focus will remain on making this work in the room, anything else is gravy.

Here's the attempt to embed both live blogs in this post.

CoverItLive Smith 2 and Moritz 3

CoverItLive Moritz 4 and Smith 5

Twitter Me This

Anne Smith recently blogged about a student who was having trouble completing an assignment. She had asked her students to pick a profession they were interested in and interview 2-3 people about it, post their interviews and other information on their wiki, then write a summary response paper about what they learned. But one student wasn�t having any luck connecting with professionals in her area of interest, so Anne tweeted out a request on Twitter.

Once I found out that my student wanted to move into the FBI or secret service, I went to my computer and got on Twitter putting out a tweet looking for connections to these professions. From my tweet, two other friends (cgfaulkner and karlfisch) retweeted my request putting this student�s interest out into a much wider audience. Before I knew it, tweets were coming in from all over, emails were being fed to her and I by all sorts of people willing to help her in her quest for knowledge. I can�t tell you what that meant to me other than to say, it is good to know that all of you are out there. Thanks for showing me and my students the power of the web. Rather than walking away from a learning struggle, I hope she learns that the web can make learning possible- the web connects us.

So, how are you using your Personal Learning Network and real-time conversation/connection tools like Twitter to help your students? And how are you helping your students use the tools � and the network - to help themselves?

Design Discussion with Daniel Pink: Setup, Pictures, Screenshots and Ustreams

In case anyone is interested, I thought I would embed the two Ustream recordings from today, as well as share a few pictures and screenshots. Since someone asked in the Ustream chat, I'll share the setup as well.

• Since Daniel Pink graciously shared two hours with us, we combined four classes down into two. Because that meant we had about 55-60 students each time, we needed a larger area than their usual classroom, so we setup in our library. In the "front" we had a computer running Windows XP and we used Skype to connect with Mr. Pink. That computer was then projected so that all the students could see him, as well as the live blog (although they pretty much read the live blog on their laptop screens). We used a logitech webcam for the video for Skype, and a Blue Snowball microphone (with a USB extension cable to get it into the group of students asking questions) for the audio. We then had logitech speakers to broadcast Mr. Pink's audio out to the room. (We did not have any feedback issues, although we did have him wear headphones on his end to help with that.)
  
  
  
  
• We also ustreamed the event. For the ustream, we used a DV camcorder connected to an iMac (for better video quality than a typical webcam, although I don't know how much difference it really makes) and a second Blue Snowball microphone (again with USB extension cable) for the ustream audio.
  
  
  
  
• We used a laptop to approve the CoverItLive comments, although that could've been done on either of the other computers if we wanted to (we brought in some extra help just in case, so we put them to work!).
  
  
  
• The students who were live blogging were mostly using our Dell laptop computers running Windows XP, connecting wirelessly to our network, although some students brought in their own laptops.

Amazingly enough, we pretty much had zero technical issues.

Here are some additional photos, screenshots and the two ustream embeds. If anyone has any feedback - technological or pedagogical - please leave a comment. And, of course, if you have any questions, leave those as well.













Anne Smith's Period 2 and 5 Ustream (and CoverItLive live blog archive):

Streaming Video by Ustream.TV

Maura Moritz's Period 3 and 4 Ustream (and CoverItLive live blog archive):

Streaming live video by Ustream

AWNM: Chapter 4 Live Blog and Ustream

As I wrote a week ago, some of our ninth graders are currently involved in a project based on Daniel Pink's A Whole New Mind. On Thursday, January 15th, our students will be discussing Chapter 4 (Design) of A Whole New Mind with Daniel Pink (see the wiki for the schedule of the discussions over the other chapters). Mr. Pink is graciously giving us two hours of his time, so Anne Smith�s two classes will be discussing with him during second period (8:25 � 9:24 am, MST) and Maura Moritz�s two classes will be discussing during third period (9:29 � 10:30 am, MST). During each period, the two classes of students will gather in the library, and an "inner circle" of students will ask questions of and interact with Daniel Pink via Skype. The students in the "outer circle" will be watching that as well as live blogging on their respective class blogs (Anne Smith's class blog, Maura Moritz's class blog).

In addition, we will try to stream video and audio of the live discussion out via ustream. If everything is working, you can go to our ustream channel and watch and listen live to the students interacting with Mr. Pink. Please keep in mind, however, that the ustream is a bonus, we will be focusing on making sure Skype and the live blogging is working, so if there are any technical issues with the ustream we won�t be spending very much time trying to troubleshoot those. (Please also know that the ustream chat does not always make it through our firewall, so we probably won�t be reading or monitoring that.) Anyone who's interested is invited to watch the live blogs and/or the ustream.

It will be interesting to see how this first discussion goes. Last year the students didn't interact with Daniel Pink until Chapter 7, so they were very much into the book, the discussions, and had experience interacting with remote live bloggers. Since they are just beginning their study of the book and its concepts at this point, we'll see if that affects their level of engagement and the quality of their discussions. In any event, we're looking forward to an engaging and rewarding learning experience for our students.

Fifty-Nine Minutes: A Student Teacher Blog

I blogged previously about Randon Ruggles, a student teacher that�s working with Anne Smith and Kristin Leclaire this semester. Well, Randon has started a blog, Fifty-Nine Minutes (great name, btw) to document his experiences as a student teacher. As he told me, �I thought that it would be a great way to reflect on my student teaching. Besides, if I�m asking the students to do it, why shouldn�t I?�

Here are a few excerpts of what he�s written so far. From his first post, back in early December:

Wow, let's just say that after meeting with my teachers I know that this will be a great experience, but on the same side of the coin I am a little nervous. This is an awesome school and yes, I do have some experience, but I am still just that - a student teacher. Nothing else, and nothing more. I have written lesson plans, taught before, and I love interacting with students. This is going to be amazing, but at the same time I don't know what I am going to do.

Each day I will see my students in fifty-nine minute blocks. I will be teaching four periods and be seeing probably around 120 students I am responsible for daily (the real number is still TBD). I can't wait, this is going to be amazing. I actually get to plan, teach, and lead the class.

When I look at it though, it comes down to is this:

I have fifty-nine minutes
...to teach.
...to connect with my students.
...to engage my students.
...to make a difference.

Fifty-nine minutes starting January 5th, 2009.

No more, no less...fifty-nine minutes.

While I would quibble with the statement that he only has fifty-nine minutes with them (we aren�t restrained as much these days by the bell ringing, learning can continue after the bell, plus of course how much interaction he can have with them outside of class), I think it�s a timely (pun intended) reminder for all of us that we need to make those minutes count for our students.

From First Day at AHS!:

All in all though, the highlight of my day (besides the principal coming and talking to me at the end of the first day) was when Anne told me that a student sitting next to her commented to her during the lesson - "Where did you get this guy, I like him." That just about did it for me, I'm hooked, sign me up to a life of teaching.

It will get harder, Randon, but keep that enthusiasm, our students deserve it.

From Day Two:

The whole point for these students, and really any students that we teach at AHS, is for them to go change the world. Yes, at first it sounds a little cheesy, your 9th graders are going to go change the world, but no they really are going to. That is the challenge ever 59 minutes that I am in that period, in that classroom, I want to change them, challenge them, and encourage them to go out and change the world into a better place. So today we did this activity from The Last Lecture called "The Crayon Activity." I had each of the students take a crayon and then put their heads down and contemplate life as a child, when it was simpler, and when they had childish dreams. I encouraged them that even now, they are 9th graders, that they can still accomplish those dreams. Don't let anyone stop you and continue to push forward. Anne, my cooperating teacher was pretty impressed I guess. I think I even inspired her. The highlight was when she told me one of the lines I told the students - "When we stop dreaming, we stop changing the world." It was another good day of teaching 9th graders. Tomorrow I get to challenge them to actually put their words where their mouths are and really start to change the world with their position paper.

Nothing wrong with cheesy. I think sometimes as educators we shy away from things because others might judge them �cheesy� or �touchy-feely.� Students are people. Teachers are people. And school should have a purpose beyond simply scoring well on the CSAPs. (Of course, I might be a tad bit biased here.)

From Day Three!:

How Anne teaches this class makes me want to return to high school and take my senior level English class again. I can't wait to take over this class in a few weeks. They will probably push me the hardest to be the teacher that I always hope that I can be. The 9th graders can and do push me, but I feel some sort of pressure from these seniors. A good pressure to perform, to teach them, to challenge them, and to not let them down their last semester of their senior year. It will be a challenge that I can't wait to reach head on.

Last semester seniors can be a challenge, and I think senior year is one that many schools � including mine � need to rethink a little. (Randon does have the advantage that I believe he only student teaches for twelve weeks, so he won�t have seniors those last few weeks after spring break/prom.) But I'd like to see my school look at what other schools have done to make senior year more meaningful and relevant for students, there are a lot of good ideas out there.

From Day Four!:

There was one point today where I did not give clear directions on how to break up into groups. The students thought it was a little silly, but in the end I apologized and took the fall for it. It's always a learning experience, right?

For good teachers, I think every day is a learning experience. It never stops as long as you keep teaching (or at least it shouldn�t).

From Day Five!:

After class I really considered my fifty-nine minutes with them. Was it effective? Did they really learn the material? Are they actually prepared to start this essay? I honestly did not think so, and I voiced this concern with Anne . . . Tomorrow I will evaluate and look at how can I break down the steps and really get these students from their really large topics down to something small that they can actually research and write about. I need to take them from a topic the size of the world and bring it down to something the size of Denver - hey, that's a great analogy, I just might use that on Monday! Then from there I need to model, model, and model some more. They need to see what a true example looks like. I need to stop talking through examples and start physically writing them down for the students. Randon, don't be afraid of the blackboard - just because it's not a whiteboard or electronic doesn't mean that it will hurt you!

Think. Plan. Teach. Reflect. Learn. Adjust. Improve. Repeat.

Considering heading on over to Fifty-Nine Minutes and leaving some comments for Randon. Based on his early work, I think this might be a blog you should subscribe to. Of course, Randon, that means you�ll need to continue blogging after you finish your student teaching . . .