The Fischbowl

Quotes I'd Like My Future Principal to Ponder: Participatory Media Education and Civic Education Are Inextricable

2012-01-23T18:37:00.000-07:00

From the article titled "Head of State" in the print edition (subscription required, although if you are in a school you most likely have access to it through one of your library subscription services) in the November 7th, 2011 issue of Time magazine:

Whereas US Envoys once filed secret cables to Washington late at night, Clinton has pushed her ambassadors to expand the use of Twitter and Facebook - State now has 192 Twitter feeds and 288 Facebook accounts - and her daughter Chelsea calls her TechnoMom. "We are in the age of participation," Clinton said at her husband's charity even in New York City in September, "and the challenge . . . is to figure out how to be responsive, to help catalyze, unleash, channel the kind of participatory eagerness that is there."

Clinton is trying to ensure these changes are permanent: she requires every diplomat who rotates through the foreign-service institute to get training in social media. (p. 31, emphasis mine).

The United States Secretary of State is requiring every diplomat to get training in social media - sure seems like perhaps we should be doing the same with and for our students. Yet typically social media participation is looked down upon in schools and, in fact, banned outright and blocked by our Internet filters. I'd like my future principal to reflect on the above quote and then lead our faculty in a discussion of whether we are truly preparing our students for their future when we block most if not all social media, much less work with our students to help them unleash the potential power of it.

That reminds me of another quote, this one from the National Council for the Social Studies Position Statement on Media Literacy:

The 21st century world is media saturated, technologically dependent, and globally connected. 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. The multimedia age requires new skills for accessing, analyzing, evaluating, creating, and distributing messages within a digital, global, and democratic society. The acquisition and application of critical analysis and media production skills are part of what constitutes media literacy. The Internet and the everyday use of social networking technologies, together with the expansive growth of corporate entertainment media and the integration of popular culture, also require us as social studies educators to link participatory media literacy with civic education. (Emphasis mine.)

If the majority of information people receive comes less often from print sources, then I'd like to see my future principal engage our faculty in a conversation around whether that is also true of our classrooms. If not, should it be, and what might that look like?

And the money quote cited in that same article, from Howard Rheingold:

“In the twenty-first century, participatory media education and civic education are inextricable” (Rheingold, 2008, p. 103)

So, in other words, if we aren't teaching participatory media, then we aren't teaching civics. Since we're required to teach civics, I'm hopeful that my future principal would help us as a faculty figure out how best to incorporate that into our classes.

Things I Want My Future Principal to Read: 1472 and 2012

2012-01-17T19:04:00.000-07:00

One more post that was at least initially generated from my reading of Jeff Jarvis's Public Parts. This time it was a passage on p. 205 that resonated that I wanted my future principal to read and consider, but it also sounded a bit familiar. Turns out I had already Diigo-ed it when John Naughton's article in the Guardian he references was first published:

So let's conduct what the Germans call a Gedankenexperiment — a thought experiment. Imagine that the net represents a similar kind of transformation in our communications environment to that wrought by printing. What would we learn from such an experiment?

The first printed bibles emerged in 1455 from the press created by Johannes Gutenberg in the German city of Mainz. Now, imagine that the year is 1472 — i.e. 17 years after 1455. Imagine, further, that you're the medieval equivalent of a Mori pollster, standing on the bridge in Mainz with a clipboard in your hand and asking pedestrians a few questions. Here's question four: On a scale of one to five, where one indicates "Not at all likely" and five indicates "Very likely", how likely do you think it is that Herr Gutenberg's invention will:

(a) Undermine the authority of the Catholic church?

(b) Power the Reformation?

(c) Enable the rise of modern science?

(d) Create entirely new social classes and professions?

(e) Change our conceptions of "childhood" as a protected early period in a person's life?

On a scale of one to five! You have only to ask the questions to realise the fatuity of the idea. Printing did indeed have all of these effects, but there was no way that anyone in 1472, in Mainz (or anywhere else for that matter) could have known how profound its impact would be.

I'm writing this in 2010, which is 17 years since the web went mainstream. If I'm right about the net effecting a transformation in our communications environment comparable to that wrought by Gutenberg, then it's patently absurd for me (or anyone else) to pretend to know what its long-term impact will be. The honest answer is that we simply don't know.

Now it's certainly debatable whether the Internet is going to have a similarly large effect as the printing press, but that's a debate I'd like to see my future principal lead and participate in. (After all, part of the debate will surely be whether the Internet is going to have a much larger effect than the printing press.)

I then somewhat serendipitously came across this complementary post by Mark Pesce and Robert Tercek,

Yet there was a humanity before, a Homo sapiens before sapience. We can reach back through prehistory, but our reach extends only as far as language. Before language, our species was like a small child, remembering nothing. After language we have continuous memory – indigenous Australians claim a cultural continuity going back some 60,000 years. Language empowers us to express ourselves and know one another’s minds, but also imprisons us within an unbreakable cage that limits our ability to know anything about our pre-linguistic ancestors. We are so different from them they are incomprehensible to us. Language has so changed us that we understand nothing of those who do not share language.

“We shape our tools, and thereafter our tools shape us.” Language was among the first human tools – along with stone axes and fire – and definitively the first tool that lived entirely within us, a bit of innovation as much cultural as technological. In the moment language arrived on the scene, it became indispensable, and once indispensable, we adopted it as innate, favoring those with the greatest linguistic capability, and thereby subtly affecting the evolution of our species. People who ‘talk pretty’ have broader prospects for success in the world. They and their children will thrive.

Every claim made for the power of language – as an amplifier of human capability – can also be made for the sudden arrival of hyperconnectivity. Connected people are more successful, and those most successful at mastering the techniques of connectivity have the greatest successes. Connection is becoming indispensable, and we have already begun to think of it as an innate capability. The billion seconds from 1995 – 2026 is witness to a transition from a world in which no one is connected, to a world where being connected and being human is seen as synonymous.

Just as we now see being verbal and being human as synonymous, hyperconnectivity is adding another layer of richness and depth to our experience. Where we can observe the sudden explosion of depth in the human record, eighty thousand years ago, so our children’s children’s children’s children will look upon this billion seconds as a second explosion, another sudden quickening, before which the ‘dumb’ and disconnected generations of humanity will seem incomprehensible and inhuman.

I definitely want my future principal - and really all principals current and future - to be discussing hyperconnectivity. Do they agree, or disagree? (Or, more likely, how much of it do they agree with and which parts don't they buy into.) If connected people are more successful, what does that imply for our schools? Is hyperconnectivity really indispensable, an amplifier like no other; is it really changing what it means to be human similar to the way language did?

My next principal will (hopefully) be at my school for the next half billion seconds until 2026. (I know statistically it's unlikely for a principal to stay that long, but since our current one has been here for 27 years I'm hopeful the next one will last for at least half that long.) Isn't this going to be one of the two or three critical questions they (we) are going to have to address during their tenure?

Flickr cc: Dean Shareski

Come Be My Boss

2012-01-16T14:54:00.000-07:00

Wanted: Chief Learner, Arapahoe High School

Qualifications: Desire and ability to change the world.

Timeline: Principal Selection Process (pdf)

More Info: Job Posting (closes 2-10-12)

Drawbacks: One (at least) hard to deal with employee.

Quotes I'd Like My Future Principal to Ponder: This new economy tilts toward publicness.

2012-01-16T10:00:00.002-07:00

Again from Jeff Jarvis's Public Parts, a quote I'd like my future principal to ponder (p. 137):

"Privacy was once free. Publicity was once ridiculously expensive," says entrepreneur Sam Lessin. "Now the opposite is true: You have to pay a mix of cash, time, social capital, etc. if you want privacy." You pay for privacy in the effort and hassle it takes to manage privacy settings. You also pay in the opportunity lost if you choose not to be public and social. On the other side of the ledger, you can be rewarded - with attention, influence, information, deals - if you reveal yourself. This new economy tilts toward publicness. (Emphasis mine.)

What opportunities might schools (students, teachers, administrators, communities) be losing by choosing not to be public and social? How are our fears possibly getting in the way of preparing our students to be successful in an "economy [that] tilts toward publicness?" As my future principal, how are you going to help our staff - and our students - understand the new privacy and the new publicness?

Quotes I'd Like My Future Principal to Ponder: Isolation Costs Too Much

2012-01-12T16:27:00.000-07:00

I'm currently reading Jeff Jarvis's book Public Parts. I'm not that far into it, so I don't know yet if I'd recommend my future principal read the book, but this quote from p. 45 is one that I'd like that person to ponder:

"Businesses used to be hierarchies of business units whose assets were called customers and products." Now "they are changing into networks of business units whose assets are called relationships and capabilities." Turning that perspective into an investment strategy, I'd bet money on start-ups that put relationships at their center so they can disrupt old, closed industries (later we'll look at what social car companies and airlines look like; imagine, too, the social store, restaurant and school). I'd buy the stocks of companies that know me well and play well with others. I'd short the companies that build walls around themselves. In a linked world and a relationship economy, isolation costs too much. (emphasis mine)

I'd like my future principal to ponder, and lead the staff in discussion around, the idea that an isolated school, a non-social school, a "closed" school that isn't actively reaching out to others and building those relationships (including letting students build those relationships as an integral part of their learning), is a school that is ripe for disruption. I think they should also lead a discussion about how well such a school would be preparing their students to live, learn and work in a networked world.

In a time of drastic change it is the learners who inherit the future. The learned usually find themselves equipped to live in a world that no longer exists. - Eric Hoffer

Things I Want My Future Principal to Read: What To Tell Your Twelve-Year-Old

2012-01-10T13:27:00.000-07:00

(This is part two in a possible series. See this post for an explanation of the future principal part of the title of this post.)

I found these two recent articles from the Economic Revolution column in The Denver Post pretty interesting. They're written by Dave Maney who, in his own words, attempts to "connect the dots to our economic future." This sums up the thrust of the two articles:

The prescription for the last few generations has been: Work hard in school, get into a good college, pick a career field with lots of demand, and success will follow. I'm pretty sure that's what my parents told me, and it served me well. But I'm afraid it's largely misguided advice now.

While I don't believe that education is solely about preparing you for future employment, I do believe that's part of our mission. I also believe that many of the current batch of reforms are being made in the name of economic success and competitiveness, yet they seem to fly in the face of what I see happening. (Which, of course, is probably why these two articles caught my eye, since I agree with much of what he says. It's always dangerous to read too much into something that confirms your own bias, but here goes.)

I particularly like how he attempts to state his "ten big ideas," but then also tries to frame them in terms of how he would begin a conversation with a twelve-year-old. For example, one of his points is:

In this tumultuous time, I wouldn't trust anyone's traditional prescriptions for success. (Nor mine for that matter.) It's incumbent on everyone to think for themselves, to observe, to interpret, to plan and to course-correct.

And he frames it for a twelve-year-old as

Starting point for your 12-year-old: "School's important, but being able to think for yourself is more important. We should talk about how people learn to do that."

Perhaps these articles could be part of the basis for a good discussion led by our new principal about our current assumptions about what our students are going to need to be successful in the workforce. As a bonus article, we could add in The Career Of The Future Doesn't Include A 20-Year Plan. It's More Like Four:

The particulars of Hasler's young career can appear exotic and, yes, flighty. But his essential experience--tacking swiftly from job to job and field to field, learning new skills all the while--resembles the pattern that increasingly defines our careers. According to recent statistics, the median number of years a U.S. worker has been in his or her current job is just 4.4, down sharply since the 1970s. This decline in average job tenure is bigger than any economic cycle, bigger than any particular industry, bigger than differences in education levels, and bigger than differences in gender. (Since women are more likely to interrupt their careers for child rearing and caregiving, their average time in a job is even shorter than a man's.)

Hmm, reminds me a bit of this.

Things I Want My Future Principal to Read: Old School or Bold School?

2012-01-05T20:56:00.000-07:00

My longtime principal (more than 25 years at our school) recently announced he'll be retiring at the end of the school year, which means we'll be looking for a new principal. (I'd link to the job posting, but it's not posted yet. (Update: Position is posted.) While I don't have any direct say in the hiring process, I've naturally been thinking a bit about what qualities I would want in a new principal as well as what questions I'd ask in the interview process if I were part of it.

You may have noticed that I haven't been blogging much the past year or so. That's for several reasons, not the least of which is that both my day job and my personal life have been somewhat overwhelming. But it's also because I haven't felt like I've had that much to add to the conversation. I felt like I needed to come up with some original thinking to make it worthwhile to hit the publish button, and I just didn't feel like I had that much original to contribute. Thinking about hiring a new principal, however, has made me want get back to my earlier blogging style which was much more of a link-blogging effort, linking to other interesting items and occasionally adding a thought or two of my own.

I think it might help me crystallize my own thinking in terms of what I'd like to see in a new principal. Now, I'm not naive enough to think that my future principal is likely to be reading my blog, but stranger things have happened and perhaps some other folks out there (either current or future administrators) might find some use in it as well, so here goes.

So the first item I'd like my future principal to read (and think about), is Will Richardson's latest for District Administration: Are You an Old School or a Bold School?

Right now, we need bold schools, not old schools. By that, I mean we need schools to take serious steps to not only reinvent themselves, but to step out and advocate for a new, more meaningful definition of what learning means for our students, one that goes beyond simply “higher student achievement” or “increased student performance.”

Bold schools are places of questions, not answers. When much of what we currently think is important for our students to know is just a few taps on a phone or a Google search away, our central mission can’t be to deliver and test for content mastery. Instead, it must be to develop deep dispositions for learning by supporting sustained inquiry into both the content and context of whatever subject students are tackling.

I would like my future instructional leader to read this short article, and then lead our faculty in a meaningful discussion around some of the issues it raises. This, of course, would need to be in the context of a larger staff discussion surrounding the purpose of school, and the purpose of our school, but I think it would be a good starting point.

In our current age of data-driven, accountability-above-all-else schools, I'm realistic enough to understand that our new principal will need to be able to navigate in those waters. But is it too much to ask that we also get a principal that has a bold vision for what our school can become, that can not only retain what is great about our current school (and there is much that is great), but can also lead us to someplace better, to reinvent ourselves and create, as Will says,

[S]chools [that] are steeped in cultures where everyone, both educators and students, are seen as learners first.

I want both my new principal and my school to be bold. I think our students deserve nothing less.

Let's Put It to the Test

2011-12-05T13:32:00.000-07:00

For years in various forums (blog posts such as this one, professional development sessions, speaking engagements) I've been saying that state and federal legislators should be required to take the standardized tests that they make our students take. They should take them under the same conditions that our students take them and then publicly report their results - and their thoughts after taking the tests and seeing the results. (I've also suggested that high school educators be required to take each others' final exams, but that's another blog post.)

As successful adults and leaders in our society, surely they would be up to the challenge, right? And surely the results would prove their hypothesis, that the skills measured by these tests are both necessary and sufficient to be a successful adult and contributor to society, right?

Well, it looks like one school board member at least had the same idea. This article in the Washington Post is trending in my Twitter stream today:

“I won’t beat around the bush,” he wrote. “The math section had 60 questions. I knew the answers to none of them, but managed to guess ten out of the 60 correctly. On the reading test, I got 62% . In our system, that’s a “D”, and would get me a mandatory assignment to a double block of reading instruction.

He continued, “It seems to me something is seriously wrong. I have a bachelor of science degree, two masters degrees, and 15 credit hours toward a doctorate.

Yep. He goes on to say,

“If I’d been required to take those two tests when I was a 10th grader, my life would almost certainly have been very different. I’d have been told I wasn’t ‘college material,’ would probably have believed it, and looked for work appropriate for the level of ability that the test said I had.

. . . "I can’t escape the conclusion that decisions about the [state test] in particular and standardized tests in general are being made by individuals who lack perspective and aren’t really accountable.”

So, again, I renew my call that all state and federal legislators, as well as all education reformers that use standardized tests as the primary measurement of how successful schools are, to take the mandated state tests in your area and then publish the results. (As a bonus, I think all education reformers should be required to send their children to the same types of schools they are designing for other people's children, but that's also another blog post.)

There's a difference between standardization and high standards; between recall and application; between testing and accountability; between schooling and learning. I fear that many of our so-called leaders have forgotten this. Perhaps it's time for them to walk-the-walk and be held accountable on the same tests they are requiring of our students.

Update: The hashtag for this is #takethetest

Skyping with South Korea

2011-12-05T10:34:00.000-07:00

Anne Smith is at it again, this time having her all boys' class Skype with students in South Korea.

My all boys' class was matched up with Jeff's class in South Korea at the Korea International School. I knew that my all boys' class was going to be writing their "This I Believe" essays on something important to them, something they strongly valued. Jeff let me know early on that his class was going to be writing their essays with a slight twist to the assignment: "I Believe in Evolution...". To help you understand his requirements for their essays, Jeff is a science teacher, thus they were going to be writing about evolution.

The time difference between Colorado and South Korea is a bit of an issue, so the students in South Korea agreed to stay up late and Skyped our students from their homes. Read Anne's post for all the details, but this was another great opportunity for our students to connect and learn from/with other students.

Here's a Picasa slide show that Anne put together to give you an idea of what it looked like on our end.

Year 4: Team Shift Happens on Kiva

2011-11-24T09:13:00.000-07:00

This is the fourth year that I'll be microlending through Kiva. You can read these four previous posts for even more detail, but here is the basic idea:

I lend $25 to an entrepreneur ($25 is the minimum they accept). But I also purchase two $25 gift certificates that I then email to two members of my PLN. I’m asking those folks to then do two things.

First, they can choose which entrepreneur to loan the $25 to. Then I’m asking them to consider doing the same thing – purchasing two $25 gift certificates and emailing them to two members of their PLN (with the same request that those folks continue the cycle, sending two Kiva gift certificates to folks in their network - a Kiva Pay It Forward plan). It would also be great if they blogged about it and left a comment on this post.

Since I’m apparently always going to be connected to the phrase Shift Happens, I thought I’d try to use that to do some good, so I created Team Shift Happens on the Kiva site:
We loan because Shift Happens, and we want to be the change we want to see.
So, those email requests will also ask that when they make those loans they consider adding them to Team Shift Happens so that we can keep track of the total. They still direct where the loan goes, it just gets aggregated under the team. Joining Team Shift Happens is completely optional, and is not the point of all of this, but it's just an interesting way to try to keep track of the lending spurred by the original blog post.

Team Shift Happens has loaned $19,050 so far. You don't have to join the team, but please consider giving. I'll be sending out my gift certificates today (Thanksgiving here in the U.S.), but these obviously make great gifts for many of the holidays coming up.

There are many worthy causes out there, this is obviously not the only one. But, if you're like my family and you already have more than enough "stuff," perhaps you could dedicate some of that disposable income to this cause.

For those of you interested in possibly doing this with your students, Bill Ferriter has compiled some nice classroom resources you can use with students around microlending.

What Should Be the Purpose of School?

2011-11-16T11:29:00.000-07:00

My friend Zac (and his friend Trevor) want to know: What Should Be the Purpose of School?

It started as a question in class. Listening to discussions of actions schools should and should not take, I started to want to know what ideas were inspiring what sounded to be firmly held beliefs in the role of school.

That got me thinking about what people outside our classroom believe should be the purpose of school. My suspicion is that these ideas are not as synchronous as we might believe them to be. I mentioned this to my friend Trevor. From there, the School Purpose Project was born.

So, you have four ways to thoughtfully respond (pick one, don't do all four). You can fill out this google form if you have a lot to say and want to type it, or if you prefer you can leave an audio message, send a text message, or upload a video.

They'll start working with the data right after Thanksgiving, so try to get your responses in before that. Please note that all answers will be made public. I can't wait to read/see/hear what you think.

To Be Honest

2011-11-12T19:04:00.001-07:00

< Prologue >

To be, or not to be, that is the question.

Hamlet, Act III, Scene 1, William Shakespeare (circa 1601)

Honesty is such a lonely word.

Everyone is so untrue.

Honesty, Billy Joel (1979)

< 1 >

I presented at the K20 Innovative Learning Institute held in Norman, Oklahoma on Thursday. During the presentation several folks tweeted out quotes or reactions, including Laura Buxton who tweeted a quote from me about possible future spouses googling our students (in the context of talking about their digital footprint). Ira Socol tweeted back to Laura that he wished we would stop using scare tactics to threaten our students. I didn't see the tweets until the next day, but I replied back to Ira that I hadn't really thought of it as scare tactics, but I would think some more about it.

After thinking a bit I replied and said I still felt like it wasn't scare tactics, but simply being honest with our students. Keep in mind that that quote from my presentation was in the context of both a positive and negative digital footprint. I wasn't just talking about colleges, employers and spouses googling them (looking for something negative), but also about the positive footprint they should be building (so those folks - and others - could find the positive.)

I pretty much align with Ira in my distaste for trying to "scare straight" our students - I think they deserve more respect than that. On the other hand, I also think they are deserving enough of our respect to be honest with them - I think they can handle thinking about the possible negative consequences of their online actions (as well as the positive), without seeing it as a scare tactic. I don't want to threaten my students, but I also don't want to ignore the very possible consequences of a less-than-stellar digital footprint.

I agree with Ira when he suggested that our views of digital footprints are going to have to adapt (i.e., not hold things against young people forever), but I still think - especially for high school students - that they will be held somewhat accountable for their views and actions as teenagers. (In general, I think we underestimate the capabilities - and thoughtfulness - of teenagers, and we should respect them enough to expect good things from them.) If you agree that that's even a possibility, then I think they deserve to hear that from us now.

< 2 >

In my breakout sessions at K20 we talked about a bunch of different topics (resources here) but, as usual, the topic of Internet filtering came up. What was surprising to me this time was how many teachers were basically in favor of pretty strict filtering policies. In pretty much any educational audience there is, of course, a wide range of views on filtering, but in the past the teachers have tended to skew toward a much more open policy and administration and tech support have skewed much more toward a strict policy. While there was a wide variety of opinions present in the room, there seemed to be a much higher level of distrust of students among the teacher participants than what I'm accustomed to.

During one discussion with a high school teacher as we talked about YouTube, he said that if they didn't block it his students would immediately go to the "bad stuff." I asked that since they currently blocked it, how did he know? He replied, "They just would." I then asked exactly what "bad stuff" he thought they would go to on YouTube, and his reply was basically "just bad stuff." I then tried to make the analogy to a newspaper, so I asked if he filtered the newspaper before bringing it into his class. He replied, "Absolutely, I always screen the entire newspaper to make sure it's appropriate before bringing it in to school." (At that point I decided we probably weren't going to agree about YouTube.)

Among a larger than usual proportion of the teachers in the room there seemed to run a general level of distrust of our students. That we needed to control them, and filter the world for them, and make decisions for them. Now, I'm the first one to acknowledge that this is not a black-and-white issue, that as the adults we do sometimes have to make decisions that we feel are in the best interests of our students and that, occasionally, that may mean filtering or blocking - basically censoring - what they are exposed to.

But I see that "occasionally" as being a very rare occurrence. I wonder about the students in that teacher's class who can't be trusted with the newspaper, and how exactly when they turn 18 they suddenly will be able to handle it? I wonder about the students in that teacher's class who walk out into an unfiltered world when they leave the school building and are not having any guidance from the educators in their lives how best to deal with it? I wonder about our willingness to always put our judgment before their's? How exactly will our students become good at making decisions, become good at making judgments, become good at choosing what we would consider the right path if we never give them the opportunity to choose? How will our students become effective citizens in a democracy when they don't get a chance to practice democracy much in K-12?

I wonder how honest it is for us to proclaim that we are educating our students by "protecting" them? Are we protecting them, or ourselves?

< 3 >

I'm really struggling with my Algebra class. (For those not following along, I've picked up one section of Algebra due to budget cuts to go along with my full time technology coordinator job.) In general, I feel like I do a pretty good job of being up front and honest with my students. There are some topics in our Algebra I curriculum that I think aren't particularly necessary at this point (Standard Form of a linear equation comes to mind, as does one and two-variable linear inequalities) and, when those topics come up, I generally let the students know my opinion. I tell them that this is something that I wouldn't choose to teach them at this point, but that it's something that's in the curriculum so that were going to go ahead and learn it. (And, to be clear, I let them know that they are perfectly capable of learning it.)

I also think I'm fairly honest with my students in expressing my belief that while Algebra is probably the most practical of the high school math courses in my school, it still has quite a bit that won't be particularly useful to most of them. That I believe that the habits of mind they develop, that the learning stance they take, that the ability to learn they develop is probably going to more valuable to most of them in the long run then the actual Algebra skills. I try to show them the practical applications of the Algebra where possible, and I try to share some of the elegance of the mathematics where perhaps practical applications are hard to find, but I also freely acknowledge that at least some of what we do is perhaps a waste of their time.

But am I honest enough? I don't tell them that often I'm not sure if what I'm teaching them is in their best interest. I don't tell them that sometimes I don't know why this particular part of Algebra is important. I don't tell them that I often doubt whether this class is the best use of their time. I don't tell them that I struggle with whether I believe students should be taking Algebra in the first place, or whether school as we currently implement it is really designed with their best interests in mind.

But if I tell them all that, will that actually help them? Right now even the students that don't particularly like school or my Algebra class have a basic sense of trust that it's "good for them." Would it be right for me to tell them that I question that assumption, when I really don't have anything to replace it with? Would that harm them more than it would help them?

To be honest . . . I'm not really sure.

< Epilogue >

Primum non nocere (First, do no harm)
Physician and Patient, Worthington Hooker (1847)

Jerry Landers: You know, I'm, I'm liable to lose my job.
God: Lose a job, save a world. Not a bad deal.
Oh, God! (1977)

Upon the People Alone

2011-10-31T16:20:00.002-06:00

(Note: This post departs from the usual education-related content of this blog. Politics alert.)

I don't have enough background knowledge to do this justice, but I wanted to take a moment to recommend that folks who care about democracy read Republic, Lost: How Money Corrupts Congress - and a Plan to Stop It by Lawrence Lessig.

Lessig makes a compelling case for how money - both campaign finance money and the money associated with the revolving door of politicians and staffers becoming high-paid lobbyists - has corrupted our representative democracy. For me, one of his key points is how he defines corruption. Like most folks, when I hear corruption I think of the most base form: bribery (or, perhaps less derogatory, quid pro quo).

While that certainly exists, Lessig articulates what I've always believed which is that "corrupt" politicians in that sense are few and far between. That the vast majority of folks who go into politics - even the ones I vehemently disagree with on policy - are good people, and want to do good by performing public service. But that the current system has fostered a second type of corruption, what Lessig refers to as "type 2 corruption" (p. 228), or "dependence corruption." This corruption is not as obvious, and it is not bad people doing bad things, it's good people not always doing the right thing due to being placed in a bad system.

Again, I can't do this justice, but in a very simplified form Lessig argues that our current system has negated perhaps the most important principle of the founders: that our elected representatives would be dependent "upon the People alone." (p. 231, I believe originally from Federalist #52) That the current system of lobbying, and campaign finance, and the revolving door between Congress (both elected representatives and their staffers) and lucrative jobs in the lobbying business, has split the dependence of our elected representatives. True, they are "dependent upon the People alone" on election day, but that's the only day they are dependent upon them. The rest of the time the "People" are second-class citizens to those with money.

If you give money, your phone calls get returned. If you give (a lot of) money, your opinion counts (more) than my opinion.

"Individuals with family incomes over $100,000 represented 11% of the population in 2004, cast 14.9% of the votes and were responsible for approximately 80% of the political contributions over $200." Only 10 percent of American citizens give to political campaigns; less than 0.5 percent are responsible for the majority collected from individuals. (p. 233)

The statistics go on and on, you really need to read the book to get the full scope. (As an aside, I did not find this an "easy" book to read, but it's an important one.)

A second, associated problem, is the perception that money influences our elected representatives. Lessig again makes a compelling case that even if the money wasn't influencing our representatives (and he makes the case that it is), it would still be just as pernicious because the perception of the vast majority of the public is that it does corrupt. This damage to the faith we have in our political institutions is just as serious, as it condemns us to have dysfunctional political institutions that can't perform the roles they need to.

About three-fourths of the way through the book I was pretty darn depressed. In fact, I even tweeted to Mr. Lessig and asked if it would have a "happy ending." To my surprise, he replied

This post is partially due to that reply (up to you to decide if that's a good thing or a bad thing). While I have no misconceptions that my blogging will affect much, if perhaps a few more folks read his book and/or begin thinking about these ideas, perhaps it will help.

So what are Lessig's solutions? Well, he outlines several possibilities, but freely admits that they are mostly long-shots. (Yet it is up to to all of us to try.) These possibilities are the ones I found the most intriguing:

The Grant and Franklin Project: Each voter gets a $50 "democracy voucher" (Grant) that they can donate to the candidate or candidates of their choice (this money comes from the taxes we already pay). If they don't donate, it gets donated to the party they belong to. If they don't identify with a party, then it supports the "infrastructure of democracy." (p. 266) In addition, each voter could also contribute up to $100 (Franklin) of their own money to any candidate. The only requirement is that the candidates who accept this money must opt into the system, meaning they would only accept this public financing.
An Unconventional "Primary" Game: Folks enter races against incumbents for the sole reason of putting pressure on the incumbent to support citizen-owned races. By recruiting prominent people in each state (non-politicians) whose sole desire is to change the process, this could apply enough pressure on candidates to do the right thing.
An Unconventional Presidential Game: A candidate runs for President with "a single two-part pledge: if elected, she will (I) hold the government hostage until Congress enacts a program to remove the fundamental corruption that is our government, and (II) once that program is enacted, she will resign." (p. 285) You really have to read this section, it's not as crazy as it sounds. In fact, I would both support and vote for such a candidate.

So, if any of this intrigues you, please read the book. Or watch this 45-minute talk by Lessig about the book if you want a shorter version.

Republic, Lost from lessig on Vimeo.

If any of you happen to be a prominent, non-politician citizen, consider becoming that primary candidate. Visit rootstrikers.org and VotersFirstPledge to learn more. Demand that your candidates for Congress take a pledge to support small-dollar funded campaigns. Ask them the question, repeatedly (and, if possible, in public - and record and post to YouTube).

So, if this is a long-shot as even Lessig admits, why even bother? I can't say it better than Lessig:

Any sane soul who looked at this cause would have to conclude that the odds are overwhelmingly against us. So, why do it? Why waste your time?

I was asked this question quite pointedly once, after a lecture at Dartmouth. "What's the point?" the sympathetic listener asked. "It all seems so hopeless."

And for the first time in my life, in the middle of a public lecture, I was so choked by emotion that I thought I had to stop. For the picture that came into my head as I struggled for a response to this fair yet devastating question was the image of my (then) six-year-old boy, and the thought, the horror, of a doctor's telling me that he had terminal cancer and that "there was nothing to be done." I painted that picture to that Dartmouth audience. And I then asked this: "Would you give up? Would you do nothing?" (p. 306)

This is not an issue of the Left (keep in mind that Lessig clerked for Scalia and was a Young Republican, before turning to his current Libertarian bent). Or of the Right. It applies just as well to the Tea Party as it does to Occupy Wall Street. It's an American issue. I'd even say a human issue. As Lessig states,

We need to remember how different our forebears were. Two hundred-plus years later, they all look the same to us. But they had very different values and radically different ideas about what their republic should be.

They put those differences aside, and saved their nation from ruin. We must do the same. Not after the next election. Now. (p. 326)

Now.

The Perfect Gift for School Leaders

2011-10-19T16:21:00.000-06:00

Looking for that perfect gift for the leaders in your school or district?

Not sure what to get that principal or superintendent that has everything?

Search no more.

Get them What School Leaders Need to Know About Digital Technologies and Social Media (or, if you prefer, the Kindle edition). This collection of short, to-the-point chapters about a variety of educational technologies is an excellent read for those school leaders who understand that technology is an increasingly important component of teaching and learning, but who aren't very comfortable themselves with technology. This wouldn't be a good gift for folks who are immersed in this environment, but for school leaders that want to learn but don't know where to start, this is a great choice.

Compiled and edited by Scott McLeod and Chris Lehmann, this book consists of the following:

TABLE OF CONTENTS

    Introduction: Chris Lehmann and Scott McLeod
    Foreword: David Warlick

Learning Tools

    Blogs: Kristin Hokanson and Christian Long
    Wikis: Stephanie Sandifer and Vicki Davis
    Podcasts and webinars: Steve Dembo and Wes Fryer
    RSS and RSS readers: Will Richardson and Karl Fisch
    Digital video: Mathew Needleman
    Virtual schooling: Michael Barbour and Rick Ferdig
    One-to-one computing: Chris Lehmann and Pamela Livingston
    Open source software: Tom Hoffman
    Educational gaming: John Rice

Interlude: Social media is changing the way we live and learn: Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach

    Social bookmarking: Dean Shareski and Mary Beth Hertz
    Online mind mapping: Carl Anderson and Richard Byrne
    Course management systems: Scott Floyd and Miguel Guhlin

Interlude: See Sally research: Evolving notions of information literacy: Joyce Valenza and Doug Johnson

    Online office tool suites: Diana Laufenberg and Mark Wagner
    Twitter: Alec Couros and Kevin Jarrett
    Online images and visual literacy: Kim Cofino and David Jakes
    Mobile phones: Liz Kolb and Sharon Tonner
    Social networking: Ewan McIntosh and Jeff Utecht

Afterword: Christopher Sessums

(Full Disclosure: I do not receive any compensation from the sale of this book. The entire compensation for my contribution was two free copies of the book. Well, and the opportunity to co-author a chapter with Will Richardson: priceless.)

This I Believe Goes Global: 2011 Edition

2011-10-10T12:29:00.000-06:00

Anne Smith has a post up on her blog about this year's "This I Believe" project. Read her post for all the details, but here are the highlights:

Once again Anne Smith and Maura Moritz will be having their students write their "This I Believe" essays, then record themselves reading them, and post both the essay and the podcast to the wiki.
They are looking for classes who'd like to participate to team up with their classes. Those students would also write and record their own "This I Believe" essays, then the students would read, listen and provide constructive feedback to each other's essays. (Adults can participate, too.)
In addition, we're happy to facilitate additional classes if there's enough interest - we'll try to match up classes based on class size, grade level, and approximate completion date.

There's much more detail on Anne's blog but, if you're interested, check out the wiki and then fill out the Google Form.

#occupytheclassroom

2011-10-07T07:01:00.000-06:00

Back in the spring sometime I tweeted out that I was wondering why we didn’t see similar protests by young people in this country similar to the then-just-beginning Arab Spring protests. While the economic, environmental and education problems that we have pale in comparison to the issues that folks in some of those other countries have to deal with, it still surprised me that there wasn’t more protest here. After all, the present and near future wasn’t look very bright for young people and the leadership of our country seemed to be unable to get much done other than bicker with each other.

Now along comes #occupywallstreet and all the offshoots. (When I saw on Twitter last night that there was an #occupyLexington – where I grew up – that kind of surprised me, and that ultimately spurred this post.) While not only comprised of young people, they are certainly a significant portion of these protests, and I think we’re beginning to see protesters in this country leverage many of the same online tools that folks in Tunisia and Egypt, Yemen and Syria are using (although thankfully without the violence associated with those efforts).

But when I first saw the hashtag #occupytheclassroom in my Twitter stream (can’t recall exactly where or I would link) I smiled . . . and then dismissed it. I was skeptical that any kind of grassroots movement by teachers could have any effect on the current reform juggernaut. Plus teachers, despite our reputation, are generally a conservative lot when it comes to schools – we may want to change a few things, but we generally don’t want to change too much. And, historically, I don’t see much evidence of teacher-driven reform being very successful.

Well, I’m still skeptical, but I keep hearing this little voice in my head. A little voice that says that, in the end, teachers are the ones in the classrooms working with kids each day. After listening for a moment, I remembered whose voice that was. Mine.

About five years ago in some staff development we were doing in my school, I suggested to (argued with?) folks in the staff development that we did have the power to change things. That if we, as a group of reasonably respected and successful teachers in our school, got together and said, “Here are some changes we’d like to make that we think would be beneficial to our students, and here’s why,” that we’d have a pretty decent chance of being listened to.

That instead of blaming “the system,” we should realize that we are the system, and we should advocate for our students when we see things that we don’t believe are in their best interests. And that we, just like the protesters in the middle east, and just like the #occupywallstreet folks, have access to tools that Clay Shirky has shown us make it much easier to not only organize, but to actually effect change. That, really, this thing we call school doesn’t happen without us.

What if we just said, “Enough.”

What if we just said, “Your reform is bad for our students. We need to transform.”

What if we just said, “Not in my classroom. Not to my students. Not to my own children.”

What if we did #occupytheclassroom?

What if I #occupiedmyclassroom?

What if you #occupiedyourclassroom?

I’m still skeptical. But a little less than I was. And maybe, just maybe, a little hopeful.

You?

Update: It looks like this post by Jose Vilson was probably the source of the #occupytheclassroom hashtag that eventually appeared in my Twitter stream.

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

2011-10-05T18:42:00.000-06:00

Thanks Steve.

Image by Jonathan Mak

Not Just the Facts, Ma'am

2011-10-02T18:17:00.001-06:00

My sixth grade daughter came home with a social studies homework assignment this weekend: Research 10 Facts About Your Country (in her case, the Bermuda Islands).

Now, I want to be clear here, I'm not necessarily saying this is a bad assignment. I don't know where the teacher is going with this. I could see this being the start of a really interesting exploration of countries, we'll just have to wait and see what happens.

We began by doing what the assignment asked. We helped Abby find some appropriate websites about Bermuda and she read through them and tried to pull out some interesting and relevant facts about Bermuda (copying and pasting into a Google Doc). We also pulled up Bermuda on Google Maps to see where it is, and went to Flickr to look at some pictures of Bermuda. We had some decent conversations about what might be considered important about a country, but what might also be interesting to other sixth graders.

Now, at this point, it's an okay if not particularly engaging assignment and, again, I don't know where the teacher/class is going next with this. But, because Abby is our kid (some would say "has the misfortune of being our kid") we asked her if she might like to try to talk to someone in Bermuda and ask them some questions. (We're walking a fine line here, but we're trying to encourage her to be more curious and less anxious about just finishing the assignment.) She said sure, so I tweeted out

Within a couple of minutes Jennifer tweeted back

And then a few minutes later Shannon tweeted

Shannon kindly agreed to a Skype conversation the next day and Abby generated a list of about 12 questions to ask. As you can see from the video below, the Skype connection wasn't always great (my guess is bandwidth issues getting to Bermuda, but who knows), but it still worked fairly well.

We learned several things about Bermuda that Abby hadn't found in her initial search for "10 facts", including that they catch rainwater from their roofs for all of their fresh water, that girls like playing "netball," and that each house is only allowed to own one car. She also got to see what the roofs and houses looked like, and what Shannon and his wife (and their house) looked and sounded like. Ultimately Abby combined this new information with what she already had, came up with her 10 facts, and we printed out the Google Doc to staple to the homework worksheet. (Yes, I know, but sometimes it's just easier to print and staple than perhaps cause problems by asking to turn it in electronically. She also made a blog post.)

So, which is Abby more likely to remember, the facts she found from a couple of websites, or the 15 minute conversation with Shannon and his wife? (After we hung up we were talking about collecting the rainwater for all their water needs and Abby said, "Wow, they must get a lot of rain." I'm thinking that has more of an impact than reading their annual rainfall in inches.) Which one gave her a better feel for what it was like to live in Bermuda? Which is more likely to encourage her to be curious about the world around her?

What assignments of your own could perhaps be revisited? How can you help connect your students to the wider world around them?

Netbook Update

2011-09-29T19:20:00.001-06:00

Ben Grey has a post over on The Edge of Tomorrow that's worth your time if you're in the position of deciding what kinds of devices to purchase for your students. You really should go read the post (and the comments), but I just wanted to pull out my comment as some folks began investigating netbooks after a previous post of mine.

So, here was my comment (in the context of that post and comment thread, but still mostly makes sense on its own):

Let me just contribute a little info about our experience with netbooks running ubermix.

First, they clearly are inferior to the MacBooks when it comes to video editing and photo manipulation. Now, you can still do some basic video editing on low-res video, and also some basic image manipulation (cropping, brightness, etc.), but you certainly wouldn’t want to do a ton of that on the netbook unless you absolutely had to. I also agree that iLife is something that’s not matched elsewhere, which is why having some iMacs or MacBooks around for those purposes is probably ideal (which is what it looks like Ben’s district has done).

Second, a Mac is going to be a little faster than the netbook at lots of things, and that’s nice to have, and typically the screen is going to be larger (both physically and in terms of pixels), which is also nice.

Third, certainly the touch interface of an iPad (and perhaps a MacBook soon?) is a great addition in many instances (and a drawback in terms of text entry, fingerprints, and scratches).

But I don’t want to get into that part of the argument, I feel like Ben looked at many devices and tried to make the best decision possible for his students, so let me talk a bit about what our netbooks running Jim Klein’s ubermix can do, as that might be helpful to folks reading this thread. Our current district approved model is the Asus Eee #1001-PXD-MU17-BU at $259.40. I can’t tell you for sure how long the battery lasts because it lasts an entire school day, but my best guess is around 8-10 hours. Our two-year old ASUS netbooks last between 4 and 6 hours, meaning they do occasionally run out before the end of the school day. In comparison our (Dell, running Windows XP) laptop batteries last 2-3 hours and also seem to degrade and need to be replaced more quickly.

The machines boot in less than a minute (and shut down in about 20 seconds) and you have a fairly extensive list of standard software to choose from, as well as you can add just about anything open source you like. Since, like lots of folks, we are moving to more web-based software, it can quickly and easily access Google Docs (and the rest of the Google suite) using either Firefox or Chrome. It does run Flash, and Java, although occasionally we’ll run across a site that requires a specific OS (typically Windows, sometimes Windows or Mac). In general, accessing the web is quick, easy and functional.

If you don’t want to use Google Docs or something else online, it does come standard with the current version of LibreOffice, which is full-featured enough for almost any student. It also has Audacity, Skype, Gimp, Google Earth, GeoGebra, Scratch, Webcam software, and a variety of other software. The only software we’ve added to it is Logger Pro to run our science probes and some Dell printer drivers (although we have customized the look and feel quite a bit). You can, of course, download and install just about any open source Linux software.

It is easily customizable and has a very nice imaging process. Once you create the image you can copy that to a 4 GB or larger flash drive and then the imaging process takes about 6 minutes per machine using that flash drive. What I do is copy the image to 16 or so flash drives, then set out 16 netbooks on a table and start imaging. By the time I get to #16 the first one is usually done imaging. If your image is complete, then you’re done. What I do because we have netbooks in lots of different rooms is I create one image that has all of the possible printers that our netbooks print to setup on them, then after I image I simply delete all but the one that needs to be there (faster for me than copying a new image to all 16 flash drives). That probably adds about 2 minutes to each machine to do that. So, by the time I image all 16 and then work my way around and delete those printers, it’s probably about 15-20 minutes per set of 16.

These machines are not locked down (although they can be), so students can – if you or they choose – customize them. While that’s scary to some folks (again, you could lock them down), the beauty is that the built-in restore function works in about 30 seconds. On boot up you can restore to your image and it adds about 30 seconds to the boot process and keeps any user documents. Or, you can choose to completely restore – wiping out the user docs as well – and it’s about 3 minutes. You can even set them to auto-restore back to the image on each boot if you’d like. (And while I typically do it, the process is easy enough that any teacher could be given a 3-step list of instructions to restore on their own if necessary.) Other than a little bit of knowledge to first create the image (and, trust me, I only have a little bit of Linux knowledge), these don’t require much support. (In fact, that’s partially why our tech department approved them, because they don’t have to support them.)

While I don’t use this feature, you can push out updates to them from a server. A script is installed as part of your image that checks for updates, and then if you put a new update out on the server it will grab it (either at startup or shutdown I believe). I’ve chosen not to mess with that, at least partially because so far each year the updated version of ubermix has been enough better that I’ve simply chosen to reimage all of my netbooks (again, at about 15-20 minutes per set of 16, working by myself, that’s not bad, but your mileage may vary).

While our netbooks don’t go home with students, they are used pretty heavily and we’ve had very few hardware issues. In four years we’ve had 2 or 3 cracked screens, a couple of failed hard drive/ssd drives, and a fair number of keys that get picked off and then we’ve had to replace the keyboard. They connect easily to our open wireless network and seem to match our Dell laptops running Win XP in terms of download speed via wireless.

While we did do some training with our Language Arts teachers, it really wasn’t around Linux or the netbooks, it was around what to do with them. Teachers and students both just pick them up and use them – if they are comfortable using any computer, they are comfortable using these – not really much of a learning curve. We have them available for check out in our media center, and also in our Study Center, and students – even ones that don’t have a class that uses them – don’t seem to have any issues using them.

So, I’m not necessarily trying to support one side of the argument or the other, but I think many folks reading this discussion don’t have any experience with the specifics of what Ben is talking about with his netbooks running ubermix, so I’m hoping this helps a bit. For us, the cost factor (as well as the ease of setup/support) is huge. Yes, I would prefer to give our students MacBooks over netbooks, but at a greater than 3 to 1 price ratio that’s a tough call to make. I think we’ll continue to see devices evolve. In the meantime, I would encourage everyone to at least explore a netbook running ubermix if you think it might meet the needs of your students and teachers.

Just Write Poorly. In Public. Every Day.

2011-09-23T15:53:00.000-06:00

Seth Godin has some advice about writing:

The reason we don't get talker's block is that we're in the habit of talking without a lot of concern for whether or not our inane blather will come back to haunt us. Talk is cheap. Talk is ephemeral. Talk can be easily denied.

We talk poorly and then, eventually (or sometimes), we talk smart. We get better at talking precisely because we talk. We see what works and what doesn't, and if we're insightful, do more of what works. How can one get talker's block after all this practice?

Writer's block isn't hard to cure.

Just write poorly. Continue to write poorly, in public, until you can write better.

I believe that everyone should write in public. Get a blog. Or use Squidoo or Tumblr or a microblogging site. Use an alias if you like. Turn off comments, certainly--you don't need more criticism, you need more writing.

Do it every day. Every single day. Not a diary, not fiction, but analysis. Clear, crisp, honest writing about what you see in the world. Or want to see. Or teach (in writing). Tell us how to do something.

So, are you having your students write every day? In public? I know I'm not (although I'm starting to have them write a bit).

I think we're often overly concerned about the quality of our students' writing, and whether it's "good enough" to share. Now, to be clear, I think our students should be concerned with the quality of their writing, and should strive to get better at communicating their thoughts. But if we let the worry about what others will think get in the way of having our students write more, and for a larger audience, then we're doing them a disservice out of fear.

This begs the question, of course, about how much our teachers are writing. Particularly our Language Arts teachers, but really all of our teachers. If it's so important for our students to write, how come we're not modeling it?

Do you write every day? In public? Why or why not?

One. Third.

2011-09-08T19:29:00.000-06:00

Two different data depictions crossed my information stream in the last twenty-four hours. Let’s see what they have in common.

First up is this data visualization of PISA scores put together by Michael Marder, a Professor of Physics and the Associate Dean for Science and Mathematics education at the University of Texas, Austin. Unlike the usual way these scores are presented (particularly to the American public), this time the U.S. scores are broken down by poverty level. Here’s a screenshot, but you really should explore the interactive Tableau visualization or view the mp4 that Professor Marder narrates.

Second was this report (pdf) from the Colorado School Finance Project, depicting the characteristics of Colorado’s K-12 population over the last 17 years. Again, a screenshot, but take a look at the entire PDF as well.

[As you view the Colorado data above, also keep in mind the current budget situation facing Colorado school districts (pdf).]

Now, regular readers of this blog (are there any of those any more given my recent blogging drought?) know that I have some serious concerns about various aspects of our education system, and I believe there are many changes we need to make to best meet the needs of our students. My current frustration, however, is that I feel most of the talk around education reform at the national, state and even local level is not only about the wrong issues, but also misreads the data and ignores the most important factor affecting what they (not I) believe is the best metric for measuring how our students are learning.

For some reason Alex Trebek’s voice popped into my head while thinking about this.

Me: I’ll take Education Reform for $1000, Alex.
Alex: It’s the Daily Double! How much will you wager?
Me: I’ll bet it all on Education Reform, Alex.
Alex: That’s very bold. The one issue that well-known national education reformers might actually be able to have an impact on, but also the biggest issue they pointedly ignore.
Me: What is poverty?
Alex: That is correct!

To be clear, I don’t think poverty is our only issue in education. Nor do I think we should use it as an “excuse.” But as long as reformers think that "test scores" and "accountability" are the best path to meeting the needs of our students, then I think they need to get past the rhetoric and address the underlying issue of child poverty. The hypocrisy of misusing data to justify asking for more and more data from schools in order to judge how well we’re doing is stunning.

A full one-third of public education students in Colorado are on free lunch. One. Third. Until we address that, please spare me any more discussion of CSAP/TCAP/ACT/PISA/TIMMS/NCLB/RttT/YAA.

Reflective Blogs in Algebra

2011-08-27T14:59:00.000-06:00

I gave my students their first writing/blogging assignment in Algebra last week, here was the prompt (scroll down a bit):

Looking back at your first week plus in Algebra (and, for some of you, your first week plus at AHS), how are you feeling? What's going well or you're excited about? What's challenging or are you concerned about?

Then I want you to set three goals for yourself for this semester. One goal specifically related to Algebra, one goal related to AHS in general (can be related to classwork, sports, activities, or something else at AHS), and one goal outside of AHS. Make these goals fairly specific, not just "I want to get a good grade." I'll be asking you to revisit these goals toward the end of the semester and evaluate how well you're doing on them, so make them be worthwhile and achievable.

While not all of them have completed their post yet, it would be great if some of you could take a look and perhaps leave an encouraging comment or question for them.

Iowa, Did You Know?

2011-08-04T20:22:00.002-06:00

Scott McLeod and XPLANE just released an Iowa-specific version of Did You Know?, premiering at the School Administrators of Iowa Conference yesterday. Even though it's somewhat Iowa-centric, I still think it is very useful as a conversation starter in your district, wherever that might be.

Nice job Scott, XPLANE and Iowa. Join the conversation at iowafuture.org (and, of course, at the Shift Happens wiki).

What Would You Do?

2011-06-24T21:13:00.003-06:00

(Full Disclosure: Jose Antonio Vargas interviewed me when he was at the Washington Post, but never wrote that story when he was there. He interviewed me again when he was at The Huffington Post and did write a story.)

I tend not to blog about anything political here unless it's pretty focused on education, but I'm going to make an exception tonight because I found Jose Antonio Vargas's question pretty compelling:

What Would You Do?

What would you do if you were a 12-year-old sent to America?
What would you do if you were a 16-year-old and found out you were in America illegally?
What would you do if you were a teacher/principal/superintendent of that 16-year-old and found out he was here illegally?
What would you do if you got into college, graduated, and then had a chance to pursue the profession you fell in love with and make a meaningful contribution, but had to check a box on a form that wasn't true?

I don't intend to get into a discussion of immigration here on this blog for several reasons, not the least of which is it's a very complicated issue, my area of expertise (if I even have one) lies elsewhere, and nobody particularly cares about my political opinions. But I think as educators, and as human beings, it's worth our time to think deeply about this issue. Here are some resources about this particular part of the story:

My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant (New Yorker piece by Jose Antonio Vargas)

Define American (Website created not necessarily to advocate, but to change the conversation around immigration)

Video currently featured on Define American

NPR Interview with Jose Antonio Vargas

Jack Shafer's Slate piece on the ethics of journalism

ABC Interview with Jose Antonio Vargas (longer version on Nightline but I'm not finding a link as of yet)

Update 6-25-11: Here's the longer Nightline piece:

So, again, I'm not interested in having an immigration debate on this blog, but I am interested in each of you thinking about how you define "American" and what actions you might take as an educator (or a citizen) if you discovered one of your students in this predicament.

What would you do?

Twitter Chat with (and without) a Purpose

2011-06-23T10:21:00.000-06:00

I just left a long comment over on Bud Hunt's blog and thought it might be worthwhile to duplicate it here. First, please go read his post and considering participating in the #engchat conversation on June 27th.

Then here are the comments I left (first very brief comment, and then the follow-up comment when Bud asked me to say more):

I wonder how this conversation intersects with the idea of “productive eavesdropping” here and here.

Follow-up comment:

Well, I’m not exactly sure where this #engchat conversation is heading, but my overall sense of it is that some folks may be concerned that there’s a whole lot of talking around the various chats on Twitter (and outside the chats), but that perhaps it’s not all that useful because the talk isn’t very purposeful and doesn’t translate into change. That made me think of your earlier musings around “productive eavesdropping” and perhaps how that has a role to play in this conversation.

I think we need to be careful about insisting on everything having a clear purpose. I’m in favor of purposefulness as much as the next guy, and I agree that sometimes we engage in non-productive behavior (whether in meetings at school or online). But I also think we can learn a lot in situations that don’t have a well-defined purpose; that learning (especially online) can occur serendipitously and often without a fixed, defined plan going in.

It’s awfully hard to tease out what effects my online experiences have had on my own practice, so let me use my wife as an example (with her permission). She got on Twitter about two years ago, initially very much as a lurker but more recently as more of a participant. Twitter, in turn, hooked her up to conversations on blogs and she’s now a very active user of Google Reader and just started her own professional blog. It has definitely impacted her practice and it’s fascinating to watch as she now is helping bring other staff members in her building into these spaces. The conversations, at least among many in her building, have definitely changed, and they’ve changed at least somewhat due to my wife’s “unpurposeful” (at least initially) use of Twitter. As an even more concrete example, her very experienced Building Resource Teacher decided to attend ISTE this year for the first time (she did not attend last year . . . when it was in Denver), at least partially as the result of these conversations.

I guess I think we need to be careful of dismissing the usefulness of “idle” chatter on Twitter and in other spaces. I think for many of us, we may not always be using it purposefully, yet the accumulated effect of the conversations ends up changing our practices (for the better), sometimes in small ways and sometimes in larger ones. I think that simply being involved in conversations, sometimes as active participants and sometimes as more passive observers, is an important part of the ongoing learning process, even when it doesn’t have a clearly defined purpose. That’s not to say that conversations with purpose are bad; they’re not. But it is to say that we need to be very careful about dismissing the usefulness of things that may not appear to have a purpose to us (in the learning place we’re currently occupying), but may very much have a useful purpose for someone else.

Your thoughts?

Transparent Algebra: Take Two

2011-06-17T18:52:00.000-06:00

While I attempted to blog my way through my first year back in the Algebra classroom, I ended up not being able to keep up with it. So, as I'll be teaching one section of Algebra again next year, let's try take two:

What I'm going to try to do (at least for a while, we'll see how it goes) is begin to blog about my plans for next year. This summer I'm going back over my lessons from last year and trying to figure out where I should tweak a lesson, where I should do a major overhaul of a lesson, and where I need to come up with a completely different lesson. I hope that by sharing that process here that some of you will help me become a much better teacher (my students thank you in advance).

So far I have Day 1 and Day 2 up, I would appreciate any feedback you'd be willing to share. Hopefully with the extra time that summer affords I will be able to keep up with this a little better and then we'll see what happens once school begins. My goal is to blog about my plans for each day of the year in advance (although it will likely not be much in advance once school starts up). So, if you're interested, head on over to Transparent Algebra and follow along.

Calling All Colorado School Leaders

2011-06-08T08:41:00.000-06:00

The TIE Conference is holding a special "Leadership Academy" this year. While I think it would be great if all Colorado school leaders attended the entire TIE Conference, you can just sign up for the Leadership Academy day.

They have a variety of interesting folks scheduled to speak, but I'm particularly excited about the keynote speakers Pam Moran and Ira Socol. Pam is a very thoughtful superintendent in Virginia with a wide variety of leadership roles in education. Ira is at Michigan State and has a wealth of knowledge that's applicable to all students, but especially for special needs students. I guarantee that they will get you thinking and most likely making changes that will benefit all of your students.

So, if you're a school leader in Colorado (or even outside of Colorado for that matter) and you're available on June 23rd, I would highly recommend that you make time for this important day (in beautiful Copper Mountain, Colorado) in your schedule.

Daniel Pink Live Blog (May 9, 2011)

2011-05-06T14:08:00.001-06:00

Below is the live blog for our students' conversation with Daniel Pink on Monday, May 9th, from approximately 8:25 am - 10:30 am Mountain Time, and you can also view the ustream.

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Dear 16 Year Old Me

2011-05-05T10:39:00.002-06:00

If you're 16 (or 14, or 17, or 11, or really any age), please watch this.

A Whole New Mind: Join Us For Year Four

2011-04-18T09:59:00.002-06:00

Once again this year 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).

The process will be very similar to previous years, but there are a few variations on our end. This year students will also be reading excerpts of Drive, watching and evaluating some TED Talks, and then their culminating activity will be giving a 5-minute Pecha Kucha style TED-like talk answering the question What Matters? for their final exam.

We are again asking other folks from our learning networks to participate as the students discuss specific chapters of the book. We hope to broaden their perspectives by extending their Personal Learning Networks to include thoughtful folks, both locally and from around the world. Like previous years, an inner circle of students will be having a face-to-face discussion, and the outer circle of students can periodically join the inner circle but will also be live-blogging. (If you want a refresher, here are some links to help explain the process and see the students' work.) We will again be using Ustream to broadcast the inner circle discussion out to remote participants, parents and other interested folks, and CoverItLive for the live blogging.

We would love to have some of you join us as well. This wiki lists the dates and times along with which chapters will be discussed on which dates (note that due to time constraints we’ll be combining the Empathy and Play chapters). If you are interested in participating, please do the following:

Re-read (if you wish) A Whole New Mind, or simply review the chapter(s) you'll be blogging with the students.
Visit the wiki and add yourself to the appropriate date(s) and time(s). You may add yourself to any spot, even if someone is already signed up, but it would be great if we could fill all the open slots first if possible. Also please add your "participant biography" at the bottom of the page. To keep the live blogging manageable, we'd like to have a maximum of three folks sign up for each slot (although everyone is welcome to observe the live blogging).
On the day and time you've signed up, tune in to our ustream channel and to the appropriate blog post (linked from the wiki - as we get closer to each live blog date the period number will link to the live blog post).

We're really excited about this opportunity for our students and want to make the most of it. We really hope that you'll join us and add your thoughts to our conversation.

The CSAP is Dead. Long Live the CSAP (err, TCAP)

2011-04-15T19:00:00.000-06:00

The Colorado Department of Education just announced the name of the test that will replace the CSAP next year - it will be called the Transitional Colorado Assessment Program (TCAP). It's "transitional" because it's a bridge between the current test and the new test that will be coming in 2014 once our new state standards (based on the Common Core) are fully in place. (I predict it will be called the Colorado Common Core Assessment Program, or C³AP ™.)

No word on whether the TCAP (or the C³AP ™) will, in the words of Will Richardson,

. . . tell us anything about the qualities we most want from our children: a love of learning, a willingness and the patience to grapple with important, real problems, and the ability to make sense of the world as they experience it.

Dear Denver Post: No More Horoscopes

2011-04-10T12:04:00.000-06:00

Dear Denver Post,

While I’ve sometimes questioned your overall commitment to education, your columnists and editorials frequently stress the importance of education and how important it is to us as individuals, a community, and a country. If that’s truly how you feel, then I have a suggestion for you – please stop printing horoscopes.

Clearly over the last few years your paper has gotten physically smaller. As the Internet and Craigslist have bit into your revenue, you’ve had to make hard decisions about what stays and what goes, and I assume you painfully agonize over what gets printed in the limited amount of space you have left for articles. Yet in both Saturday and Sunday’s paper you devoted about 260 square centimeters to horoscopes. (In comparison, you devoted almost exactly the same amount of space in Saturday’s paper to the horrific school shooting in Brazil and considerably less to the story about the Juno spacecraft.) This prominent endorsement of pseudoscience seems to be at odds with your stance on the importance of education.

Now I know some people will argue that this is political correctness run amuck, that horoscopes are simply a form of entertainment and therefore should be left alone. I could perhaps even agree with those folks except for one small problem, survey (pdf) after survey show that about one-fourth of Americans believe in Astrology.

One. Fourth.

To be effective citizens, Americans need to understand what science is – and what it isn’t. By continuing to use your valuable and increasingly limited newsprint space to print horoscopes, you are enabling (and, in fact, encouraging) a belief in pseudoscience and are helping create a less scientifically literate population. This needs to stop.

So here’s my proposal. Stop printing horoscopes each day in your paper and instead devote that 260 square centimeters to science. Each day you could run an article looking at the science behind the headlines. (Surely there’s no shortage of material: earthquakes, tsunamis, climate change, energy production, energy consumption, health care – to name just a few.) Now, I know that 260 square centimeters is not really enough to explain such complex issues, but it is enough to write an introduction to the issue, and then at the end of the article you could link to your website which could take a more in-depth look at the issue (perhaps including multimedia and links to other sources). You would be modeling for our students the importance of science and what lifelong learning looks like.

Dan Haley’s editorial in Sunday’s paper said, in relation to a different topic,

We consider it part of our responsibility, part of the newspaper being a good citizen.

Shouldn’t supporting a scientifically literate population be part of your responsibility to the citizens of Colorado as well?

I'm Going (to) Nowhere, How About You?

2011-04-01T14:24:00.000-06:00

If you live in the Denver metro area, considering attending a screening of Race to Nowhere on Tuesday, April 5th, from 6:30 - 8:30 pm at Laura Ingalls Wilder Elementary School in Littleton. I'll be there and I hope you'll join us. You can purchase tickets for $10 (plus $1.54 fee) online or pay $15 at the door (space available, I assume).

Following the screening they will have a student panel discussion, moderated by my district's Director of Secondary Education.

Freakish Final Four?

2011-03-27T18:54:00.000-06:00

(Cross-posted on my Algebra class blog, but thought I'd share here as well.)

ESPN had over 5.9 million entries to its Tournament Challenge. Only two of them have the final four correct (here's one of the two, the one currently leading the overall challenge).

Given what you know about college basketball, the NCAA Tournament, and probability, are you surprised there are two that are correct? Or would you have expected there to be more that were correct? Or less?

If you answer, make sure you justify your answer.

Archive of School Board Social Media Discussion

2011-03-11T10:20:00.002-07:00

Here's the archive of the LPS School Board's discussion surrounding social media.

The Prezi that our CIO used:

Social Media Discussion 3-10-11 on Prezi

Ustream archive (very out of focus video, but the audio is good):

Video streaming by Ustream

CoverItLive Archive:

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The Learning Studio

2011-03-03T15:36:00.000-07:00

The School of Medicine at the University of Virginia has created a room called "The Learning Studio."

Photo Credit: Norm Shafer (original source)

[I]t coalesced into an unusual, functionally innovate design, one built around a new pedagogy.

Shades of the Collaboratory at Rutgers. You see, UVA figured something out:

Most universities continue to follow a blueprint introduced in 1910, which called for two years of in-depth study of the basic sciences followed by two years of clinical experience. A cookie-cutter approach, it means that students spend two years sitting through long lectures and regurgitating facts on tests, followed by the shock treatment in their third year of suddenly dealing with patients in a hospital ward.

“It’s become pretty clear in the last couple of decades that this is probably not the best way to learn something as complex as medicine,” says Randolph Canterbury, the medical school’s senior associate dean for education. “The idea that physicians ought to learn the facts of all these various disciplines—anatomy, physiology, biochemistry and so forth—to the depth that we once thought they should doesn’t make much sense.”

About half of all medical knowledge becomes obsolete every five years. Every 15 years, the world’s body of scientific literature doubles. The pace of change has only accelerated. “The half-life of what I learned in medical school was much longer than what it is today,” adds Canterbury, a professor of psychiatric medicine and internal medicine.

Huh. Who knew? Oh yeah.

So what happens in that Learning Studio?

. . . In teams of eight, the students debate a patient case: Walt Z., a 55-year-old chemist, comes into your clinic complaining of intermittent chest pain. As his doctor, you’ve arranged for an exercise stress test. But Walt Z. is an informed consumer of health care, and he has lots of questions about the test’s accuracy in diagnosing blockage in coronary arteries. Five large media screens hanging throughout the room delineate his medical details and a series of multiple choice questions.

Gone is the traditional 50-minute lecture. (Also gone is paper, for the most part.) The students have completed the assigned reading beforehand and, because they’ve absorbed the facts on their own, class time serves another purpose. Self-assessment tests at the start of class measure how well they understand the material. Then it’s time to do a test case, to reinforce their critical thinking and push their knowledge and skills to another level.

. . . In this “flattened classroom,” as it’s been described, the traditional top-down educational approach is reconfigured and the responsibility for learning shifts to the student.

Interesting. What about accountability?

Problem solving by teams mirrors the reality of health care today. “The traditional approach has been one patient, one doctor,” says Waggoner-Fountain. “Now, it’s one patient, one doctor and a team, in part because medicine has gotten more sophisticated and patient expectations are different.”

Studies also show that individual grades improve when working within a team. The first-year students have embraced it. Not isolated in auditorium seats bolted to the floor, they can easily move and mingle because everything is in the round.

“Working in a team reinforces what you learn in class,” says Chelsea Becker (Med ’14). “We all have different backgrounds and everyone knows something different.” Science majors don’t hold dominion; the class comprises more than 60 different majors, from astrochemistry to art.

“It allows us to teach each other,” adds Tom Jenkins (Med ’14), who estimates he’s collaborated with just about every person in the class at this point. “I think that helps with retention.”

I could go on, but it would be better if you just go read the article. Okay, just one more quote:

Every team experience was singular. “We have the sense that education should be standardized and everyone should have the same experience, but that’s not really the case for us,” says Littlewood. “The new Carnegie report talks about having standardized outcomes for individualized experiences, and I think there’s no better example than over here.”

So, let's sum up. Teaching like it's 1910 doesn't make much sense (teacher-centered, lecture-oriented, fact-recall, paper-based, standardized instruction.) Ahh, so glad all the current education reform in K-12 matches up with this vision. They have to be college-ready, ya know.

Board of Education Social Media/Networking Discussion

2011-02-21T14:45:00.001-07:00

On Thursday, March 10, 2011, sometime between 7-8:30 pm Mountain Time (depends on how the agenda goes), we will be having a discussion with our Board of Education surrounding Social Media/Social Networking and K-12 schools. Details are still to be ironed out, but we expect to host a web page with the presentation and a CoverItLive live blog session embedded side-by-side, and also plan to have a live stream that can be opened separately.

Update 3-7-11: Here's the page with the Cover-It-Live and the Prezi.

Some of the questions/issues we’re likely to address are:

What is social media/networking? How is it different? Why is it important?

What is the social value of social media/networking?

What are the realities and what are the myths? What are the risks and what are the benefits?

What are the organizational, communication, and learning power of these services?

How can these be used for learning and collaboration, not just echo-chamber and group think?

What is their role in K-12 education? (Note: I’m in high school, so that’s my focus, and I imagine most of the focus in this discussion will be age 13 and up, but thoughts on younger ages are welcome as well.)

What should Board policy look like surrounding social media/networking? Should there be policy? If so, should it be just for this, or should it fall under our current code of conduct and we don’t need a separate policy?

What should our Internet filter policy be for this? What about students that use their phones/own connection to the Internet while at school and therefore aren’t restricted by our filter?

We’ll use the hashtag #BoardChat

Proposed Prezi Presentation (First Draft 2-20-11, feedback to Dan Maas).

Please leave any thoughts you have about the above items – or additional related items not listed -in this Google Doc. Thanks in advance.

What If It Was Possible?

2011-02-20T15:15:00.000-07:00

(cross-posted on my class blog - thought some of you here might be interested.)

Teachers get this fairly often.

That's impossible Mr. Fisch. I can't do that.

Is it really impossible? Or does it just take a whole lot of work?

Watch.

So next time you feel yourself getting ready to say,

That's impossible.

remember this video and ask yourself,

Is it really impossible? Or do I just have to work at it?

What kind of box have you put yourself in?

(via A Year of Reading)

No One Right Way

2011-02-08T14:38:00.001-07:00

(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?

Kiva Loans

2011-02-07T09:12:00.000-07:00

(cross-posted from my Algebra Class Blog)

It took a while because Kiva didn't have very many available loans there for a little bit, but I was finally able to loan out the $300 we raised for Kiva today. I picked 12 different entrepreneurs/groups in Kyrgyzstan and loaned them each $25. They are all women (or the groups include women), as empowering women in underdeveloped countries is one of the best ways to help.

Here are the 12 different loans:

Click through the links to learn more about these folks, and consider contributing on your own to Team Shift Happens (or just to Kiva in general, it doesn't have to be part of a team).

Blended Algebra

2011-02-01T15:11:00.001-07:00

I need your help again. I'm currently in the brainstorming phase of trying to figure out what a blended learning high school Algebra class might look like in my school. We're defining a "blended" class as one that is designed with both virtual and face-to-face components, with a significant portion of the class taking place in a non-school setting.

(Note: "significant" does not indicate a certain percent, it just means that this is not a "regular" face-to-face class with an online component. A "significant" portion of the content/learning will be delivered/completed/happen outside of a traditional brick-and-mortar classroom.)

Since this is very much in the beginning of the brainstorming phase, it's pretty wide open in terms of how it might be structured. At this point, the following are the only parameters that we can't change (and I may be assuming too much even with these):

We have to teach our current Algebra curriculum. See the skill list from my current Algebra class for an idea of what we have to "cover." So this is not the time or place to have the discussion of whether we should be teaching Algebra.
We have to assign grades, and those grades have to be kept in our student information system and available on our portal for student/parent access at any time.
The class is time-bound to our school year, so students need to start at the beginning (mid-August) and finish the course by the end of our school year (late May). (And the course might have to be time-bound to our semester schedule, so they have to finish the equivalent of first semester Algebra by mid-December - not sure of this yet.)

Other than those three restrictions, the rest at this point is open. Here's my Google Doc with some notes (not editable, also embedded below) and the brainstorming wiki page (editable, please do edit). You can comment on this post, edit the wiki page, or start/contribute to a topic on the discussion tab of the wiki page.

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You can see from my notes that I am making a few assumptions in addition to the three non-negotiables above, with the most significant one being that this will be a "flipped" or "reverse" classroom, with the traditional lecture component delivered via online video outside of face-to-face time. While these assumptions are where I'm leaning, they still are subject to change.

You can also see that one of the huge questions that is still up for grabs is whether this class just teaches the Algebra skills, or whether we try to teach the skills and have the students try to go deeper, exploring the mathematics (perhaps through a project/problem-based approach, perhaps not). While it's probably no surprise that philosophically I prefer the latter option, this pilot course may not be the place to try this.

So, I'd appreciate any feedback/brainstorming you'd like to contribute.

One Year of Solar Panels

2011-01-27T15:37:00.000-07:00

(Note: This post is a departure from the regularly-scheduled content of this blog.)

Today marks the one year mark of having our solar panels up and running, so I thought I'd post a quick update. (Technically, it's the one-year mark of having the monitor up and running, the solar panels were actually working for almost a week before that.)

After a full-year we've generated 6074 kWh of electricity and consumed 6371 kWh, so we've used 297 kWh more than we've produced. One of our two inverters broke last August so we were down one set of panels for about three weeks (you can see that reflected in the second graph below) until the new one came in and they could replace it. Based on how much we were generating in the months around that breakdown, my estimate is that if it hadn't broken it probably would've generated pretty close to that 297 kWh necessary for us to break even over the course of the year.

Once we got to April we pretty much stopped paying for electricity (it's still about $7 a month to be connected, though), except for August when we lost the inverter. With the shorter days we have currently we'll likely have some net kWh usage in January through March (so a small electric bill), and then go into positive territory for the rest of the year until December or so. Not too bad.

AHS Faculty Dance 2011

2011-01-21T19:53:00.000-07:00

Today was the day for the annual Faculty Dance (the 80's again this year). Here's a link to last year's, which includes links to previous' years.

Looking for Some Help from Ireland

2011-01-11T08:05:00.000-07:00

Lauren Lee, a fabulous Language Arts teacher at my high school, is looking for some help from someone in Ireland:

I'm hoping to begin another collaborative adventure as I start James Joyce's The Dubliners with my junior-senior college preparatory course. In a perfect world, I would love to collaborate with a class in Ireland who is also engaged in the same text but, realizing that might be an unachievable aspiration, my hope is to connect with someone who is from Dublin and is familiar with the text. The city of Dublin is such a prominent character in Joyce's works and I would love the students to get the perspective of someone who knows both the city and the text and might be willing to Skype into my class. Any takers?

If you're interested, leave Lauren a comment on her blog or contact me.

No Extra Credit Required

2010-12-21T10:11:00.000-07:00

There have been some discussions in my neck of the woods lately about extra credit. It will probably surprise no one who’s been reading this blog for very long that I don’t like extra credit, don’t see a need for it, and think it actually undermines learning, but I’m not going to delve into that right now.

Instead, I wanted to reference one small piece of that discussion which revolved around offering students extra credit for charity-related activities like canned food drives or Toys for Tots. My thoughts on that are very similar, offering extra credit for students participating in charity-type activities not only undermines the learning, but it undermines the caring.

So when I wanted to give my students the opportunity to participate in some of my small activities around Kiva, I let them know there would not be any extra credit involved. It was not a requirement to participate, but I hoped they would. Now, I did challenge them a little bit with

Some folks think teenagers won’t do this kind of thing if there’s not a payoff for them in it – we’ll see if they’re right.

But it was all pretty low-key. I talked briefly about it that first day in class, referred to the blog post if they wanted to know more, then simply reminded them at the beginning of class each day that if they had any change to contribute that they could give it to me now or drop it by my office throughout the day.

Our goal was a quarter a day per student for the remaining ten days we had of class, which worked out to $62.50 for the twenty-five students in my class. We ended up at $77.26. (Including one student who chased me down in the cafeteria on the last day before break – which is three days after the last day my class meets – to hand me 85 cents.) I said I would match up to $100, so I’ll be matching with $77.26. My Dad apparently still reads my blog and he said he’d match at 50% of what I matched, so that’s another $38.63. And then Rob in Afghanistan, who I’ve blogged about before, sent me an email letting me know he would be sending me a $100 check as well.

So that works out to $293.15 (okay, I’m gonna chip in another $6.85 to make that $300). Now, I know that’s not a huge amount of money, and I didn’t take advantage of the full educational possibilities here (see some of Bill Ferriter’s excellent work with Kiva), but it will still make a difference for the entrepreneur(s) we fund with this (and, of course, when it gets paid back I’ll re-loan it again and again – that’s part of the beauty of Kiva).

Students are always going to want extra credit. At least they always will as long as we model for them that that’s the way things work. But I think if we lay out our thinking for them, they’re going to step up most of the time – just like my students did. Will teenagers do this kind of thing? Yes, they will.

And no extra credit is required.

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

2010-12-15T20:36:00.000-07:00

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.

Tis the Season

2010-12-14T18:36:00.002-07:00

Just like the last four years, I can't afford the postage to send this to all of you in my PLN. If you celebrate a holiday this time of year, then I wish you a good one. Thanks for all you do. And I wish all of you peace and happiness.

A Quarter is More Than Just a Fraction

2010-11-28T16:40:00.000-07:00

I just posted this on my Algebra class blog, but I thought I'd share it here as well. You're welcome to play along with your classes as well (or do something similar). Or, if anyone out there would like to join me in matching what my students raise, just contact me.

Arapahoe, as you know, puts our collective might behind several causes throughout the year. Currently we are asking students and staff to bring in a toy for Toys for Tots (pdf). I encourage you to participate in that, not just by bringing in a toy, but also attending the wrapping party and going to Schmitt Elementary on December 15th to help distribute the toys.

But I also want you to think more globally in this class. If you happened to read my blog over Thanksgiving break, then you read about Kiva and Team Shift Happens. Here’s a brief description of Kiva:

Kiva's mission is to connect people through lending for the sake of alleviating poverty.

Kiva is the world's first person-to-person micro-lending website, empowering individuals to lend directly to unique entrepreneurs in the developing world.

And here’s part of what I wrote on my blog about Team Shift Happens:

I lend $25 to an entrepreneur ($25 is the minimum they accept). But I also purchase two $25 gift certificates that I then email to two members of my PLN. I’m asking those folks to then do two things.

First, they can choose which entrepreneur to loan the $25 to. Then I’m asking them to consider doing the same thing – purchasing two $25 gift certificates and emailing them to two members of their PLN (with the same request that those folks continue the cycle, sending two Kiva gift certificates to folks in their network - a Kiva Pay It Forward plan).

Over break I also read this post by Chris Harbeck, a teacher in Canada, and I thought I would challenge you guys in a similar way – challenge each of you to bring in $0.25 a day for each day our class meets between now and the end of the semester. Conveniently, our class meets ten times before the end of the semester, so that’s challenging you to donate a total of $2.50.

I want to be clear – this is not a requirement. This has no effect on your grade. There’s no extra credit, nor will I berate anyone who doesn’t participate. This isn’t about you. Or about me. This is about helping empower people who haven’t had the same opportunities that we enjoy. Some folks think teenagers won’t do this kind of thing if there’s not a payoff for them in it – we’ll see if they’re right.

I wrote a couple of years ago:

Poor people in impoverished communities often don’t have access to financial institutions and capital, and microfinancing addresses this problem. It is especially helpful to women, who often are the key to raising families – and communities – out of poverty. It’s also my opinion that this is one of the best ways to help achieve peace in the world.

So I challenge you to bring in what you can. If that’s a quarter a day (or $2.50 total), that’s great. If it’s less, or more, that’s great as well. You can bring money to class each day expressly to donate, or you can simply find me during the day when you perhaps have some change in your pocket (after lunch?) and donate (no amount is too small – or too large). You can choose to participate yourself, or you can cajole your family and friends to donate some change as well if you want – it’s up to you.

Then I’ll match whatever you donate (up to $100 – I’m not completely crazy). So I’ll take the total of whatever you guys bring in by the last day we meet (our final is on Tuesday, December 14th), and match it with an equal amount, then I’ll take the total and lend it out on Kiva. (If you’d like to help me pick which entrepreneur to lend to, start looking around Kiva and let me know who you think we should fund.)

So, if you occasionally visit Starbucks, consider skipping it once in the next couple of weeks. Or perhaps you could skip that overpriced, not-really-very-healthy-for-you “energy” drink I see some of you drink in the morning. Or if you go out for lunch, skip the soft drink a couple of times. Not only will you be doing your body a favor by skipping one or all of these, but a minor deprivation for you could turn into a possibly life-changing loan for someone else.

It might only be a fraction of a dollar to you, but to someone in the developing world – it’s priceless.

Year 3: Team Shift Happens on Kiva

2010-11-25T09:45:00.002-07:00

This is the third year that I'll be microlending through Kiva. You can read these three previous posts for even more detail, but here is the basic idea:

I lend $25 to an entrepreneur ($25 is the minimum they accept). But I also purchase two $25 gift certificates that I then email to two members of my PLN. I’m asking those folks to then do two things.

First, they can choose which entrepreneur to loan the $25 to. Then I’m asking them to consider doing the same thing – purchasing two $25 gift certificates and emailing them to two members of their PLN (with the same request that those folks continue the cycle, sending two Kiva gift certificates to folks in their network - a Kiva Pay It Forward plan). It would also be great if they blogged about it and left a comment on this post.

Since I’m apparently always going to be connected to the phrase Shift Happens, I thought I’d try to use that to do some good, so I created Team Shift Happens on the Kiva site:
We loan because Shift Happens, and we want to be the change we want to see.
So, those email requests will also ask that when they make those loans they consider adding them to Team Shift Happens so that we can keep track of the total. They still direct where the loan goes, it just gets aggregated under the team. Joining Team Shift Happens is completely optional, and is not the point of all of this, but it's just an interesting way to try to keep track of the lending spurred by the original blog post.

Team Shift Happens has loaned $10,375 so far. You don't have to join the team, but please consider giving. I'll be sending out my gift certificates today (Thanksgiving here in the U.S.), but these obviously make great gifts for many of the holidays coming up.

There are many worthy causes out there, this is obviously not the only one. But, if you're like my family and you already have more than enough "stuff," perhaps you could dedicate some of that disposable income to this cause.

For those of you interested in possibly doing this with your students, Bill Ferriter has compiled some nice classroom resources you can use with students around microlending.

We See This as the Future of Higher Education

2010-11-09T07:18:00.000-07:00

(Cross-posted on my Algebra class blog - thought I'd share it here as well.)

I’d like you to read this article in the New York Times titled, Learning in Dorm, Because Class is on the Web (two pages, make sure you click through to page two). Go ahead, go read it, then come back.

This article illustrates that many colleges – which most of you will be attending in 3-4 years – are starting to utilize some of the same video techniques we’re trying to use in our Algebra class. There are a variety of different ways colleges are using this, some are pretty similar to what I’m doing, others are very different (consider yourself lucky, you only have to watch 8-10 minutes of me, not an 85 minute streamed lecture!).

Note that some colleges are doing this primarily for financial reasons,

You have X amount of money, what are you going to do with it?

others are exploring whether it can be a more effective way of delivering instruction,

She said an advantage of the Internet is that students can stop the lecture and rewind when they do not understand something.

No matter the reason, it appears likely that more classes will be offered this way by the time you get to college.

We see this as the future of higher education.

So consider our Algebra class a chance not only to learn Algebra (and enjoy my amazing wit), but an opportunity to begin preparing yourself to be successful in college – and beyond – by learning how to learn through online components of courses.

Notice how some students don’t like this approach.

In a conventional class, “I’m someone who sits toward the front and shares my thoughts with the teacher,” she said. In the 10 or so online courses she has taken in her four years, “it’s all the same,” she said. “No comments. No feedback. And the grades are always late.”

This is one of the reasons why I believe hybrid classes – where there’s an online component and a face-to-face component - are perhaps currently the best of both worlds when done well (although that may change as we get better at implementing online courses). But several things have to happen in order for classes like this to work.

First, students must watch/complete the “lecture” or “content-delivery” video portion of the class outside of class. Clearly some college students – as well as some of you – are not doing this. If this part isn't done, the entire model falls apart.

Second, just as critically, students must be active participants in class to maximize the value of our time together. Students must be willing to use class time as an opportunity both to explore and to practice mathematical ideas and concepts, not as a time to sit back and be “told” or “shown” what to do. This is why I continue to try to get you guys to think more on your own, to talk and work in your groups, and to take risks in your learning, instead of simply waiting for me to show you the “right” answer.

So I’m hopeful that as we continue with this approach we all will get better at it. I need you to hold up your end of the bargain (watch/complete the videos outside of class - including the Guided Practice and Self-Check portions, complete the homework and online pre-assessments, actively participate/explore/think in class, and come in for help and to re-assess), and I hopefully will get better at structuring class to complement the video instruction outside of class. Together we can not only help you master Algebra, but prepare you to be successful learners in college and beyond.

Can't We Just Memorize a Formula to Plug Stuff Into?

2010-11-05T09:02:00.000-06:00

(Cross-posted on my Algebra class blog. Thought I'd share it here as well.)

I've been wanting to share something with you the last couple of days in class but just haven't had time, so I decided to just put it here on the blog instead. I'm currently reading The Myths of Innovation by Scott Berkun and I came across a couple of passages that I thought were relevant to our class. In a section of the book talking about the myth that good ideas are hard to find, he writes:

While waiting in a city park to interview someone for this book, a nearby child played with Silly Putty and Legos at the same time. In my notepad I listed how many ideas the young boy, not more than five years old, came up with in 10 minutes. Sitting in the grass, he combined, modified, enhanced, tore apart, chewed on, licked, and buried various creations I'd never have imagined. His young mother, chatting on a phone while resting her morning coffee on the park bench, barely noticed the inventive creations her toddler unleashed on the world. After being chased away for making her nervous (an occupational risk of writers in parks), I wondered what happens to us, and what will happen to this boy, in adulthood. Why, as is popularly believed, do our creativity abilities decline, making ideas harder to find? Why aren't our conference rooms and board meetings as vibrant as childhood playgrounds and sandboxes? (p. 82)

. . . To open minds and find good ideas, return to the kid in the park. What is it about his attitude that allows fearless idea exploration? Linus Pauling, the only winner of two solo Nobel Prize awards in history, had this to say about finding ideas: "The best way to have a good idea is to have lots of ideas." This sounds idiotic to most ears because it cuts against the systemic, formulaic, efficiency-centric perspective worshiped in schools and professions. It seems wasteful to follow Pauling's advice. Can't we just skip to the good ideas? Optimize the process? Memorize a formula to plug stuff into? Well, you can't. (p. 85-86).

The passage also includes this picture of the first computer mouse with the caption, "The superficials of innovation are rarely impressive. This is a version of the first computer mouse."

(image source: Wikipedia)

What does this have to do with Algebra? Well, this is very similar to the philosophy of what I'm asking you to do in this class. Yes, we do have some formulas that you're going to need to learn and "plug stuff into." But our more important goal is for you to open your minds and be willing to explore ideas. This is why I'm always asking you to try to figure things out, both individually and as a group, and not wait for me to tell you how to do it.

Sure, we can "skip to the good ideas" and I can just show you how to do certain procedures, but that ends up not being very meaningful for you, and you're also not very likely to remember it very long. Instead, I want you - as much as possible - to play with the ideas. To be curious, and creative, and try to figure things out and find patterns and methods on your own, including exploring various real-world applications of the mathematics. And, yes, that's harder than just memorizing the formula and doing random problems out of the book. But I think it's also much, much, much more worthy of your time.

As Eric Hoffer said,

In a time of drastic change it is the learners who inherit the future. The learned usually find themselves equipped to live in a world that no longer exists.

I want you to be a learner; to take the attitude of "fearless idea exploration." In my class, in all your classes, and in life in general.

Do You Believe in Algebra?

2010-10-29T21:44:00.000-06:00

(Cross-posted on The Huffington Post).

Let me clarify. I'm not asking do you believe in Algebra in the same sense as do you believe in the tooth fairy (full disclosure: I do not). I'll posit that Algebra exists. Rather I'm asking if you believe in Algebra as a separate course/curriculum that we should teach in high school.

After my last post, Dean Shareski wrote a thought-provoking post that asked whether it was possible to offer a customized educational experience in a standards-based system of education.

Our current system and structure fights personalized learning with nearly every new policy and protocol it can generate. The system craves standardization while we desperately need customization. These competing ideals butt heads constantly and for those teachers who do believe in personalizing learning, they live in perpetual frustration. . . In the end, without a restructuring of time and current curriculum requirements the best we can hope for is small pockets of success or the .02 percent of students whose passion happens to be trigonometry or Shakespeare.

Dean later acknowledges, however, that while he wants personalization, he also wants students exposed to a broader range of ideas:

While I'm busy advocating for changes that might support an education that fuels and fosters students' passions, I worry that we lose sight of what a liberal education is all about. They don't know what they don't know. Providing students with broad experiences that invites them to develop a variety of skills, understand and appreciate diverse perspectives and potentially uncover hidden talents and interests speaks to a fairly well accepted purpose of school. . . If we were truly starting education from scratch today, I can't imagine we'd build the same system we have. There would be lots of discussion as to what types of content all students need. Even if core content and skills could be determined, we'd never teach them all as segmented subjects taught in isolation in 45-minute increments.

And therein lies the dilemma - is it possible to provide in a systemic way a customized educational experience for all students that both allows and encourages them to pursue their passions, but also exposes them to the wide range of human endeavors that they may have little or no knowledge about and therefore wouldn't be able to even know if they were passionate about in the first place?

Which brings us back to Algebra. I teach in Colorado, which recently adopted the Common Core State Standards. In general, I believe the Common Core Math Standards (pdf) are much better than most standards that came before them. First, there are fewer of them, with 156 standards for grades 9-12. In addition, 38 of those standards are identified as "advanced" standards, which leaves us with 118 standards for all students spread out over four years of high school, or just under 30 per year. That's much, much more doable then what we had before, and I believe targets much more of what I would consider mathematics that is essential for people to know.

But it still begs the question of whether all students need these 118 standards. For example, do you believe that all students (scratch, that, all people) need to know "there is a complex number i such that i² = -1, and every complex number has the form a + bi with a and b real?" (CCSS, N-CN 1). Or how about "prove the Pythagorean identity sin²(x) + cos²(x) = 1 and use it to find sin(x), cos (x), or tan(x) and the quadrant of the angle?" (CCSS, F-TF 8).

(My not-so-modest proposal is that no state legislature is allowed to require standards that they couldn't demonstrate proficiency on themselves. Since they are clearly successful adults and they are saying that these standards are necessary for all students to be successful, surely they'd be able to demonstrate proficiency by taking the same tests our students do. But I digress.)

As G.V. Ramanathan recently asked in the Washington Post:

How much math do we really need?

In an age of information abundance, when Wolfram Alpha can do pretty much all of high school math quickly and at no charge, do all students need to be able to know all 118 standards? When instructional videos (either homegrown or created by others like Khan Academy) exist that replicate many aspects of a traditional math classroom and allow students to learn the skills at a time and a place of their own choosing, what activities should be taking place in our math classrooms?

Consider these statistics:

1985: 3,800,000 Kindergarten students
1998: 2,810,000 High school graduates
1998: 1,843,000 College freshman
2002: 1,292,000 College graduates (34%)
2002: 150,000 STEM majors (3.9%)
2006: 1,200 PhD's in mathematics (0.03%)

(source: presentation by Steve Leinwand, American Institutes for Research at NCTM Regional Conference in Denver on October 7, 2010. His source U.S. Statistical Abstract)

There's lots we could talk about with those statistics, but I'm just going to focus on what percentage of our students truly need the Common Core Math Standards. I would suggest that it's most likely somewhere between the 3.9% and the 34%, which makes me wonder how "core" they really are. While I think Common Core, combined with replacing Calculus with probability and statistics as the capstone to high school mathematics for most students, would be an improvement on much of what we're currently doing, I'm still not sure whether teaching Algebra as a separate course is the best way to accomplish it - even for that small subset of our student population that is passionate about math and science.

Can we find a way to have students whose passion is math and science explore rich, meaningful mathematics that isn't divided up into courses (Algebra), semesters (first semester linear, second semester non-linear), and units (Chapter 5: Writing Linear Equations)? Can we do this in a meaningful way for all students, even those who currently don't have a passion for math and science? Can we do it in a mathematically coherent way that doesn't impact a student's ability to progress to higher-level mathematical thinking should they choose to do that? Can we do this within a system that - at its heart - is an assembly-line model designed to mass produce a fairly standard product?

I think this is essentially what Dean - and many of us - are asking ourselves. Is there a way to combine the best of both? The best of passion-based learning and a liberal arts education that exposes students to some "standard" body of knowledge that we believe all people should be exposed to. Can the current system - with all its flaws and all its successes - adapt to a personalized, on-demand, anytime, anywhere learning environment? Or do we have to start over with a system that is designed to meet the needs of the learner and one that - at its heart - is antithetical to a standards-based system?

I honestly don't know. Because while I do believe the current system is designed to meet the needs of a rather small portion of our students, I'm not sure I can clearly define what mathematics education would look like in such a new system. As I stated in a previous post, I believe we can have high standards without standardization, yet like Dean I struggle to envision exactly what that looks like in practice in any kind of systemic way.

So, do you believe in Algebra as a separate course/body of study in high school? Or, like the tooth fairy, is Algebra - and standards-based, one-size-fits-all education - something we should've outgrown by now?

This I Believe Goes Global: 2010-11 Edition

2010-10-21T13:41:00.000-06:00

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:

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.
If your class(es) are interested in participating, fill out this Google Form. Then we'll get back to you reasonably soon.
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.

Neuroscientist and Cheerleader: Our Next Skype Session

2010-10-20T19:12:00.001-06:00

PBS has a great series titled The Secret Life of Scientists and Engineers. A month or so ago the featured scientist was Mollie Woodworth, a Ph.D. candidate at Harvard in neuroscience who also happens to be a cheerleader (for MIT, no less).

When I watched some of the videos and read her blog on the site, I knew she would be another great choice to Skype with my Algebra kids. Not only is she energetic and engaging and can talk about how she uses math in her career, but she also has the opportunity to perhaps break some stereotypes high school students sometimes have about both women and cheerleaders. You can read the background information we provided to my students on the class blog and here are the questions we'll be asking:

How do you define “math?” How would you describe what “math” means to a scientist to non-scientists? - Me
Was there a time in your life when you ever thought about quitting cheerleading and just focusing on your studies? Did you ever get really overwhelmed? - Becca
Is it possible that, in the near future, we will find a way to successfully clone any type of cell, even going so far as stopping cellular aging? - Alex
Do people think you’re not as bright as you are because you’re a cheerleader? - Jeremy
As you began moving in the direction of science did you begin to notice ties between what you were studying and math? - Mackenzie
What advice would you give us about succeeding in math? - Grant

Again, if all goes well, I'm hoping to ustream it as well, so you're welcome to tune in on our ustream channel. We'll be skyping from approximately 7:21 - 7:45 am Mountain Time Monday, October 25th.

Update 10-25-10: Here's the archive of our session. Mollie was fantastic.

A Conversation with My Students

2010-10-20T14:16:00.000-06:00

(Cross-posted on The Huffington Post. Regular readers will recognize that this is essentially this earlier post with the intro and conclusion slightly adjusted for HuffPo, but several folks suggested it was worth re-posting.)

I had a conversation with my Algebra class about a month ago. I realized that I hadn't done a good job of conveying my thoughts and beliefs about the class, of sharing my passion, of explaining why I setup class the way I did and what I was expecting from them -- and what I was hoping for them.

So here, more or less, is what I said. I'm sure it wasn't quite this smooth, as when I write I automatically edit and tweak, but this is pretty close (and definitely the spirit of what I hope I conveyed).

I wanted to talk a little bit about this class and why I'm doing the things I'm doing. Mr. Krause, one of our English teachers, is doing a project right now where his students are asking people how they define success. I answered that for several groups of students, but I wanted to talk for a minute about how I'll decide if I'm successful with you guys in this class.
I won't think I'm a success if you do well and get a good grade in Algebra, although I certainly hope you do and I'm going to try really hard to help you do that. I won't think I'm a success if you score well on tests like CSAP or ACT, although I hope you do, and even though a lot of well-intentioned people think that's how I should define success. I won't even think I'm a success if you go to a good college and then get a good job, although I certainly want you to do that because I'd like to retire someday and I need you all to have good jobs to support me.

No, I'll consider myself successful if you turn out to be good, kind, caring adults. If you're a good spouse, child and parent. If you contribute to the world and to your community and help those around you. If you participate. And learn.

Here's the deal. The education that I received was a pretty good one. But it's not good enough for you guys. Not anymore. You see, in a rapidly changing, information abundant world, the people who are going to be successful -- both professionally and personally -- are the learners. And by "learners" I don't mean people who just learn what we teach you here at AHS.

Now, I want to be clear, that doesn't mean I don't think you should learn what we teach you here at AHS. I don't want you to go to your second period teacher, raise your hand, and say, "Mr. Fisch said I don't need to learn what you're teaching." Please, don't do that. That's not at all what I'm saying. Your teachers here work very hard trying to share important, meaningful and relevant knowledge and skills. And that's important, but it's not enough. Because to be successful you're going to have to be a learner, you're going to have to learn how to learn, and go after things on your own. You're going to have to be independent, curious, passionate learners, who don't just sit back and wait for someone to tell them what they're supposed to know, but who go out and try to figure things out for yourself. Who pursue your interests, your goals, your passions with intensity, and who actively participate in everything you do. Who go out and find other learners who are passionate about what you are passionate about and learn from them -- and alongside them.

The world has shifted. The world of school, and the world of work, and the world in general has shifted, and so I need you to shift as well, and that's what I'm trying to do in this class. I'm trying to get you to be actively involved in your own education, to be independent and curious learners in mathematics, even if Algebra is never going to be your favorite subject.

I believe you need the skills I'm trying to get you to learn for three main reasons. First, to be a successful citizen you have to be numerate. In order to deal with all the data that is going to get thrown at you, and to make good, responsible, effective decisions, you're going to need a lot of the skills we're learning in Algebra.

And, frankly, that's not necessarily true about all the math classes you'll take. Honestly, if you take Trig. and Pre-Calc., the skills you learn there are very important if you go into the math and sciences, but perhaps not so much in day-to-day life for most of you (some folks will disagree with that). But the skills we learn in Algebra you'll be using every day to make sense of all that data in the world, to be informed voters and decision makers.

The second reason to learn the skills is that if you decide that you are passionate about math and science, you need these skills in order to progress to more complex topics and to go deeper.

The third reason -- and it's the one I think is least important but you may think is the most important -- is that right now in the short term you have to learn these skills to get a good grade in this class, to do well in school, and to get into college if that's what you choose. So while I prefer that you focus on the first two reasons, this one is still a valid one for many of you.

This is why it's critical you do the assignments I'm asking you to do, like watching the videos I've created for you. Those videos are designed to help you master the skills, and to become more independent learners. But they're also designed to free-up class time so that you can become more curious, active learners, in class, and so we can explore interesting (or not for some of you) applications of Algebra like the bike gear ratios or Tim Tebow's speed at the NFL Combine or a variety of other activities we'll be doing this year. In order to apply the skills in class, I need you to do the necessary work outside of class.

In order for that to happen, in order for us to use our class time to be the kind of learners I think we need to be to be successful, I need you to step up and take care of business. I need you to watch the videos, and use them as they're intended, and do the other things I ask you to do outside of class. And I really, really need you to participate in class, to be active learners. To ask questions, and be involved, and talk to each other, and help each other, and be willing to take risks in order to learn more, even if that makes you a little nervous or uncomfortable. I need you to do more of the talking in class, and me to do less. I need you to do more of the thinking, and the questioning, and the figuring out.

So I'm asking you to please, please consider what kind of future you want, not just for yourself, but for those around you, and make an effort to be as independent, as curious, as responsible, as passionate of a learner that you can be. And I promise that I'll bring the passion every day and do the very best I can to help you become that learner.

In all the conversations around school reform, about standards and global competitiveness, about teacher tenure and accountability, about charter vs. public, urban vs. rural vs. suburban, I think we sometimes forget one of the most important conversations we need to be having -- the one with our students.

This conversation with my class continues. What conversation should you have with your students today?

It Gets Better

2010-10-20T06:54:00.001-06:00

Bullying is not okay.

Hate is not okay.

Neither is standing by and letting it happen.

Tell someone you trust. Or report it. Or tell me (720-ToFisch).

Fort Worth City Councilman Joel Burns tells a very personal, and very moving story. It happens to be about bullying and his sexuality, but it applies equally well to any kind of bullying, whether it be face-to-face or on the Internet. The heart of his message? It gets better.

Here are some helpful resources.

National Suicide Hotline: 1.800.273.8255
Suicide Prevention Hotline: 1.800.784.2433
Trevor (GLBT Youth): 1.888.488.7386
National Youth Crisis Helpline: 1.800.999.9999
National Teen Dating Abuse Helpline: 1.866.331.9474
Safe2Tell (Bullying): 1.877.542.7233
Comitis Crisis Center (Youth Shelter): 303.341.9160
Arapahoe Douglas Mental Health: 303.730.8858
Arapahoe House (Substance Abuse Counseling): 303.412.3701

HBO's Brave New Voices 2010 National Poetry Slam Team Championships

2010-10-17T14:14:00.000-06:00

Some of you may remember this post back in May that featured Kyle giving his "last lecture." I just wanted to post a short update that Kyle will be on HBO next Saturday, October 23rd at 9 pm (Mountain Time) as part of their Brave New Voices: 2010 National Poetry Slam Team Championships.

Embedded below are two previews, one from HBO's site and one from YouTube. If you're available next Saturday and have HBO (alas, I do not), you might tune in to see how Kyle's doing.

Preview

Journalist Citizens?

2010-10-15T17:06:00.000-06:00

Let me preface this blog post with the following disclaimers:

I’m not a journalist (at least by the traditional definition).
Lots of really smart folks have thought about these issues for a long time and I’m not presuming that I know better.
This is complicated (but I think it’s important to think about)

Is a “mainstream” journalist allowed to be a full-fledged citizen?

Do professionals of any kind have to be hamstrung by rules just in case someone makes a mistake?

Is avoiding the “appearance of impropriety” and “protecting your brand” more important than seeking the truth?

There’s currently a little dustup over a memo NPR put out to their employees telling them they could not attend the Jon Stewart or Stephen Colbert rallies in Washington, D.C.:

NPR journalists may not participate in marches and rallies involving causes or issues that NPR covers, nor should they sign petitions or otherwise lend their name to such causes, or contribute money to them. This restriction applies to the upcoming John (sic) Stewart and Stephen Colbert rallies.

This is nothing new in journalism circles, as they’ve typically had these kinds of policies. But what is new is that people like Jeff Jarvis are questioning the wisdom of such policies:

But my real problem here is, again, that NPR is forbidding its employees to be curious. There’s a big event going on in Washington. It could — just could — be the beginning of a movement mobilizing the middle. But NPR people are not allowed to even witness it, to go and try to figure it out, to understand what’s being said and why people are there. No, they can do that only if they are *assigned* to do that. Otherwise, it might seem as if by merely showing up they might have a forbidden opinion.

NPR has responded in several ways, including this post by their ombudsman:

But there’s another, more important issue than management botching a memo. The question arises in every election season, and boils down to this: If you become a card-carrying journalist, do you have no freedom outside of work?

. . . Media guru Jarvis agrees with these views. He even encourages NPR staffers to protest management’s decision. “Use social media, folks, and have an opinion about opinions,” he wrote.

I don’t agree.

Sure, journalists have opinions and causes they support.

But at the end of the day, they have to be professional – and that means avoiding actions that create the perception that they are taking sides in political controversies, including elections.

Specifically, mainstream journalists can’t put a political sign in their yard or carry one at demonstrations. They can’t donate money to candidates. They can’t sit on a school board. They can’t participate in political rallies. They can’t lobby, and they can’t become partisan activists.

To me, it’s a small price to pay for the privilege of being a journalist.

NPR is not restricting its staff’s freedom. It’s protecting its credibility as a news organization that tries to give its audience fair, non-partisan coverage.

Interestingly, folks at some NPR affiliate stations don’t necessarily agree:

The issue isn't whether reporters "take sides" in political controversies. They do. They're not mummies. The issue is whether those opinions make their ways into news stories or in the process of selecting what stories to cover in the first place. Not allowing you the opportunity to know what the biases are does nothing to guarantee the impartiality of NPR (or any other organization's) content. It's designed more to prevent the questioning of the impartiality of the content.

The two are not the same thing.

I came upon this story via some tweets by Andy Carvin, Senior strategist at NPR (but tweeting as himself). Andy was simply pointing folks to the controversy, not taking a position, but it stirred my thinking about this in relation to how we are preparing our students.

Citizen journalism has been a term we’ve talked about a lot the last few years, arising from lots of places but not least the work of Jeff Jarvis and Jay Rosen. But in this case I think we’re really talking about journalist citizens – what rights, responsibilities and restrictions does a “mainstream journalist” have in a participatory age?

According to Alicia Shepard, the NPR ombudsman, “mainstream journalists can’t put a political sign in their yard or carry one at demonstrations.” But I wonder if that wouldn’t tend to drive people who want to be active in their community to become “non-mainstream journalists,” and wouldn’t that be bad for both the community and for mainstream media?

And the letter from NPR’s President Vivian Schiller comes across as defensive and a little elitist:

This is the case in almost all legitimate news organizations, indeed in many professions. In our case, the rules are designed to protect the impartiality of our content.

“Legitimate" news organizations? As opposed to, say, illegitimate ones? I think I understand the intent of this, to underscore that “legitimate” news organizations attempt to maintain impartiality in their reporting, whereas other ones may not. But in the context of this story that comes across as, “We’re legitimate, and you’re not, simply because you have concerns with our policy. And if you don't have a similar policy, then you're neither professional or legitimate.”

She goes on to say:

We live in an age of "gotcha" journalism where people troll, looking for cracks in our credibility. We need to err on the side of protecting our journalism, our journalists, and our reputation. While the credibility and trust that attaches to the NPR brand depends principally on the quality of our news reporting, it can be easily undermined if our public conduct is at odds with the standards we seek to uphold as a news organization.

But can’t we trust good people to do that? Can’t we trust them to do their jobs well, yet still fully exercise their rights as citizens? It seems to me that this is very similar to the restrictions placed on teachers. We can’t campaign or advocate for issues at school, but once we leave we retain our full rights (and responsibilities for that matter) as citizens. Couldn’t journalism operate the same way? Couldn’t we expect journalists to have journalist integrity, but still participate in and contribute to their community? In fact, isn’t it actually poor “public conduct” for them not to participate? This comes across more as trying to protect the NPR “brand” instead of pursuing truth and good journalism.

Finally (and thankfully now I’m going to try to relate this back to education), it seems to me that journalists actually can’t do their jobs well unless they are participating to a certain extent. In this participatory age, how can a journalist possibly do their jobs to the best of their ability if they aren’t participating? Whether that’s by attending rallies (Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert, and/or Glenn Beck), participating in social media (not just broadcasting using social media, but engaging with it), or putting political signs in their yards, journalists have to participate if they are going to truly understand – and help us understand – what is going on. As long as they don’t represent their activities as NPR’s views, and as long as they do their best to maintain impartiality in their reporting, can we not expect that these professionals are capable of doing this? Sure, mistakes will be made, but instead of issuing blanket policies assuming that your employees will be unprofessional, why not trust your employees to do the right thing and then deal with the few that don’t? The idea that anyone is truly “unbiased” seems quaint, why not simply acknowledge your biases (publicly) and then do your best to overcome them? Wouldn’t that actually be more honest and show more “journalistic integrity?”

In the end, this feels like so much of our current public policy and leadership debates. People seem more concerned with avoiding the “appearance of impropriety” instead of doing the right thing. Organizations (and politicians) seem to be more concerned with protecting the “brand” instead of actually accomplishing good things. We’re more willing to run attack ads then simply lay out our own positions; more willing to hide behind blanket “ethics policies,” instead of struggling with complex issues in an honest and transparent manner.

So much of this is in direct contradiction to what so many of us are trying to accomplish in our classrooms. We encourage our students to be active, involved members of their communities, to be curious, passionate learners. We encourage them to think critically, and to wrestle with complex issues, instead of removing all possibility of independent thought and action. We encourage them to think out loud, to debate in public (including through social media), and to continue to evolve and adjust their thinking through their interactions with others. By prohibiting their employees from experiencing the full gamut of citizenship in a participatory age, NPR (and many other organizations) are crippling their employees’ abilities to learn and to do their best work. If we don’t allow our journalists to be citizens, and to be curious, passionate, participatory learners, then what kind of journalists can they possibly be?

What Will You Share Today?

2010-10-12T18:46:00.001-06:00

Dean says it so well in his K12Online Preconference Keynote. This is worth 25 minutes of your time. Really.

If learning shouldn't be confined to the four walls of your classroom, should teaching? Why would we hoard good teaching and learning?

What did I share today? Well, at 6 am my time I Skyped for about 25 minutes with Sharon Peter's students in Mozambique - they had some questions for me. Then I Skyped for about 5 minutes with some teachers in Florida about Skype - they just got it opened up through their filter.

Then I went to school.

What Should Students Know and Be Able To Do?

2010-10-11T11:54:00.000-06:00

(Cross-posted at The Huffington Post.)

I'm a teacher. A parent. A citizen. Those are the lenses I view teaching and learning, educators and students, education and school through. That doesn't make me an expert, and I don't have all the answers, but I think I have some good questions, so let's get started with one of those questions.

This is the question that educators are constantly asking themselves.

What should students know and be able to do?

It gets back to an old argument in education, the argument about which is more important -- content or skills. Like most teachers I've talked with, I think that's a false dichotomy. I want both. I want students to know some content and have the skills to be able to use their knowledge. I don't want them to just "cover" the material, I want them to uncover their own understanding, and to think critically about the content.

My bias, however, is that too often in schools we err too much on the side of content. I once heard Cris Tovani, a wonderful reading teacher in Colorado, say,

Yeah, as a teacher I can cover my curriculum. I can get to that finish line. But often when I get to that finish line and look around, I'm all by myself.

That's even more true today, when we live in a rapidly changing, information abundant world. We live in exponential times. There's just too much content out there. As Eric Hoffer said,

In a time of drastic change, it is the learners who inherit the future. The learned find themselves equipped to live in a world that no longer exists.

He said that more than thirty years ago, and I think most of us would agree that the pace of change has only increased since then.

Schools were designed for an age when information was scarce, when students came to school because that's where the information was. It was in the textbook, it was in the teacher's head, and -- if they were lucky and had a good library -- it was in the additional resources the school library provided. But now, now we live in an information abundant world. I don't hear many people complaining that they don't have enough information (although they may complain about the quality of that information), yet schools are still designed around the concept that this is where you go to get information. That needs to change.

Which leads, I think, to an even more basic question. A question I think that, despite all the education reform lately, we haven't really talked much about.

What's the purpose of school? Is the primary purpose of school to meet the needs of society, or to meet the needs of the students?

There's a strong argument to be made that since society is investing so many resources into educating the young, that schools should be designed to meet the needs of society. After all, if schools don't meet the needs of society, why should society support them? This is the argument that is currently in fashion.

But I'd like to suggest an alternative, that the primary purpose of school should be to meet the needs of the individual. That if we meet the individual needs of students, we will ultimately meet the needs of all students. And if we truly meet the needs of all students, we will then meet the needs of society. I think this has always been the case, but it's even more important in a rapidly changing, information abundant world, a world where society doesn't even know what its needs are going to be in five years, much less in thirteen (for K-12 education) or longer (if you include post-secondary education).

This is a problem for many of the current school reform discussions because, despite the rhetoric about leaving no child behind and racing to the top, they rely on a standardized view of success, a one size fits all approach. I think individual students are different, and to ignore that fact is to deny the evidence that is all around us, at least if you ever met more than one kid.

No, I'm not talking about lowering expectations. I think we can have high standards without being standardized. Standardized curricula create standardized minds. Standardized minds create collateral debt obligations and credit default swaps. You know all those folks on Wall Street aced their standardized tests. They were the best and the brightest, the success stories from our schools, at least by our current definition of success in schools. Yet clearly there must be more to success than just those test scores.

So, I would suggest we need to slightly modify the question we ask ourselves as educators. Instead, perhaps we should be asking,

What should this student know and be able to do?

I think the addition of just one word might just make all the difference.

Nothing Ruins Your Life Forever

2010-10-09T18:37:00.005-06:00

I really don't have anything to add to this post by Vicki Bell. I'll be sharing it with my daughter and with my Algebra students, please consider sharing it with those you care about as well.

Colorado Suicide and Crisis Hotlines

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

Parent/Teacher Conferences

2010-10-05T15:51:00.001-06:00

At my high school we hold parent/teacher conferences in the fall and spring. In the fall it's two consecutive nights from 4:00 - 7:30 pm and in the spring it's just one night. All the teachers are in our two gyms and we have "five to seven minute conferences" with parents.

You probably won't be surprised to find out that I don't particularly like this format. While I think it's great we dedicate time for conferences, the one-size-fits-all conference format isn't ideal, and I would much prefer that the students be present for the conference as well. (In fact, I would prefer student-led conferences, but I could live with students-at-least-being-present conferences).

Having said that, this is the format and structure I have, so I'm trying to make it be as meaningful as I can. I had intended to write this post about two weeks ago, so that I could get feedback before conferences were upon us, but that didn't happen. So, instead, I'm going to share what I just gave to my students and ask for feedback so that if I'm still in the classroom a year from now I can do this better next time.

Below is what I shared with my students (inside Google Apps - they write to the prompt and put it in a folder shared with me). I'm going to ask them to share it with their parents before conferences (I may even email it to their parents before conferences, still deciding), but I will also have it available at conferences in case they did not. I'm also going to email the parents to encourage them to come and to tell them that I think it's very important for the student to be present if at all possible.

I would love your thoughts/suggestions for ways to make it better (although please keep in mind the restrictions I'm working under - I don't have the ability to change the basic format of the nights).

Parent/Teacher Conferences are coming up next week. Since these conferences are about you, I think you should be there. It makes very little sense to me that we should have a conference about you and you’re not there, so I’m encouraging your parents to come and to bring you with them. Please bring your Algebra notebook as well, so that we can look at your work if we need to.

Whether you end up attending or not, I want you to spend some time thinking about what you want your parents to know about this class and how you are doing. Here are some questions for you to respond to.

Has class met your expectations? Why or why not?
What’s going well for you?
What’s challenging for you?
What could I do as your teacher that would help you be more successful?
What could you do as a student that would help you be more successful?
Is there anything your parents can do to help you be more successful?
Is there anything else you think your parents should know about this class or about how you are doing in this class?

Please be thoughtful and specific in your responses, and please don't wait until the last minute, as I want you to put some real thought into this. The more you put into it, the more valuable it will be for you, me and your parents.

Thanks.

A Fundamentally Different Place?

2010-10-04T18:28:00.000-06:00

Some of you may recall that I announced way back when that I would be blogging for the Tech + Education section of The Huffington Post. Well, it ended up that they changed their minds and never launched that section. Instead, today they launched an Education section and I'll be one of many contributing bloggers (many of whom regular readers of this blog will recognize - and probably already read) to that section.

It was difficult to write my first post for them because I felt the need to "introduce" myself in this new space. That's not at all the style of HuffPo, people just dive right in with what they want to say. But, for me, blogging is still a conversation (or at least it should be) as well as a place of reflection, and it didn't feel right to skip that piece. I felt like people had to have at least some idea of why I had been asked to blog for HuffPo, some idea of the context, so I decided to write an intro piece even though it doesn't really fit with their style.

This is all a long way of saying that my first post probably doesn't say that much to folks who have been reading this blog for any length of time. Despite that, I hope you visit HuffPo Education and support the many folks there that you'll recognize. Join in the conversation, add words of support or push back, but don't let their posts languish in the shadows of the "celebrity" bloggers. I think you should comment on the celebrity bloggers as well, but I think if we take some of the passion and energy we have been a part of on our blogs and infuse that into the conversations on HuffPo Education, then perhaps we can expand this conversation outside of the relatively narrow and confined edublogosphere. And if we do that, then maybe, just maybe, we can create some of the change that we believe our students deserve.

I've cross-posted that first post below. Second post is in the queue at HuffPo, it will hopefully appear soon.

I'm honored to have been asked to contribute to the Education section of The Huffington Post. I'm going to focus mostly on the impact technology has -- or should have -- on education. I'll talk about learning. And students. And teachers. And technology. And how best to do this thing we call school. I hope to have thoughtful discussions about how to leverage the creative, collaborative and connective powers of technology to help our students learn and grow. To help them be successful in school and in work, in their personal lives and as citizens.

Let's review how I got here. In reverse order and slightly abbreviated:

Contacted by HuffPo to write for their new Education section.
Mentioned in two HuffPo pieces, one by Jose Antonio Vargas and one by Arianna Huffington.
Presentation gets shown to or used by various folks, including the National School Boards Association, the Senate Subcommittee on Intelligence (including the heads of all the intelligence agencies), Major League Baseball owners, various high-tech companies, politicians on the left and right politically, televangelists, Time Magazine columnists, and many, many others -- variations viewed at least 40 million times.
Had presentation go viral on YouTube, in email and elsewhere.
Had presentation go semi-viral in the education blogosphere.
Posted PowerPoint presentation on my blog to continue the conversation.
Was inspired by many in my learning network, so created a PowerPoint presentation to start a conversation among the teachers in my school.
Attended some great conferences and learned from folks, many of whom were in my learning network.
Had some great staff development conversations as a result of that learning network.
Created my own personal learning network, both online and off.
Started a blog to complement our staff development efforts.
Started reading lots of blogs by following the links in that one blog.
Started reading one blog.
Read an article about a teacher that was blogging.

Now, the point of all this (and there is a point) is not to say how wonderful the presentation is or how great I am (this story is not about me, I just happen to be the one that gets to tell it). The point is that this PowerPoint ended up being an example of itself. If a simple little PowerPoint -- some folks would say simplistic, and they'd be right (it was supposed to be the start of a conversation, not the entire conversation) -- can start at least 40 million conversations around the world, then we live in a fundamentally different world than the one I (and most of you reading this) grew up in.

I know some folks would dispute that, and that's an interesting conversation in and of itself, but if you buy that -- if you buy that, on so many levels, the world is a fundamentally different place -- then it just begs us to ask the question of whether schools have similarly transformed from when we grew up. If your answer to that question is no, as I think it probably is for a large majority of you, and if you see a problem with that, then what should we do?

So much of the current debate around education is only touching the surface of these issues. I hope to use my contributions to Huffington Post Education to explore these shifts further.

With you.

Together.

Please join me.

Who's the Teacher? You're the Teacher.

2010-09-28T21:40:00.000-06:00

Watch this TED talk from TED founder Chris Anderson. Go ahead, I'll wait.

I'm not going to say too much about this other than I'm just going to pull a few quotes from this to ponder.

Crowd accelerated innovation.
(Or, perhaps Crowd Accelerated Innovation, deserving of capital letters?)

It's the crowd, that shines the light, and fuels the desire . . .This is a model that pretty much any organization could use to nurture its own cycle of crowd accelerated innovation . . . Invite the crowd, let in the light, and dial up the desire.
(Schools? Education? Individuals? Learning?)

You have to show your stuff to the world . . . Radical openness.
(Radical. Openness. Is there anything more unlike what most schools/classrooms look like today? And do we think programs like Race to the Top are going to make things more open, more collaborative? Or less?)

We’re a social species. We spark off one another.
(Oy. Back to the drawing board for my Algebra class. I have to do better.)

We watch 80 million hours of YouTube every day . .. Cisco predicts that in 4 years, more than 90% of the web will be video.
(And more video has been uploaded to YouTube in the last two months than has been broadcast by ABC, NBC and CBS combined since ABC started broadcasting . . . in 1948.)

It’s in that non-verbal portion, there’s some serious magic.
(I like to think my writing is sometimes good, and I don't think anyone is saying that writing is going away, but he has a point.)

Reading and writing are actually relatively recent inventions. Face to face communication has been fine-tuned by millions of years of evolution . . . This is the connective tissue of the human super-organism in action.
(I have to think about the idea of "connective tissue" a little bit more, but shades of Clay Shirky here - both Here Comes Everybody and Cognitive Surplus.)

Print scaled. The world’s ambitious innovators and influencers now could get their ideas to spread far and wide. . . But now, in the blink of the eye, the game has changed again. . . . what Gutenberg did for writing, online video can do for face to face communication . . . that primal medium which your brain is exquisitely wired for just went global. (Wow. Shades of both Shirky and Steven Johnson here.)

For the first time in human history talented students don’t have to have their potential and their dreams written out of history by lousy teachers. (I, of course, don't love that line, but I get the point. I would say it more like, "For the first time in human history talented learners don't have to have their potential and their dreams written out of history by lousy circumstances," but, yeah, okay. Also see Disrupting Class.)

Who's the teacher? You're the teacher. ('Nuff said.)

IKEA and Geothermal Energy: Skyping with Ms. Anderson

2010-09-27T15:54:00.002-06:00

IKEA is in the process of building a giant store about five miles from my school. This is no ordinary store construction, however, as they are putting in a geothermal energy system to help heat and cool the store. When I saw the article about it, I thought this would be another good opportunity for my students to Skype with someone, so I tracked down the contact info of the engineer from NREL that was mentioned in the article. She kindly agreed and the Skype session will happen this Wednesday.

You can read the background info we provided to my students on the class blog, and here are the questions we'll be asking:

How do you define “math?” How would you describe what “math” is to non-engineers? Me
What is the difference between geothermal energy and other forms of energy? Grant
How does the temperature change from the winter to summer underground, and how effective is the water being pumped to control the temperature of the building, especially due to the bipolar weather of Colorado? Alex
Do you think that this system could one day be in the average American home? Why or why not? Jordan
When you were in school getting all those different degrees, did you know that you would be doing everything you are? Did you ever want to start all over? Becca
Two part question: Out of everything you have done and will do in your life, what would you want a youth to remember out of it all? With all your work with renewable energy/heat pump technology what are you most happy about doing and what are some ideas you have to work on in the future? Jessica

If all goes well, I'm hoping to ustream it as well, so you're welcome to tune in on our ustream channel. We'll be skyping from approximately 9:35 - 10:00 am Mountain Time (PLC day for us, so late start) on Wednesday, September 29th.

Update 9-29-10: Archive of the ustream.

Welcome Sunday Telegraph and Daniel Pink Blog Readers

2010-09-22T18:19:00.000-06:00

If you’re visiting this blog for the first time due to this article in the Sunday Telegraph or this post on Daniel Pink’s blog, welcome. As Mr. Pink thankfully mentioned in both places, I did not originate the idea of flipping homework and lectures. Many other folks are doing this also and, frankly, most of them are doing it better than I am. Two of the teachers I know that have done the most work in this area are Jonathan Bergmann and Aaron Sams – you might check out some of their work. (And, if you’re a teacher that’s also using video in a similar way and you threw up a little when Daniel Pink chose to link to me, please leave a link to your work in the comments so people can perhaps take a look.)

If you’re interested in learning more about my partial return to the math classroom, you can check out all the posts related to that endeavor and/or the Transparent Algebra blog.

If you’re visiting for my other claim to my fifteen minutes of fame, you might check out the Shift Happens wiki or the last blog post I wrote about that to learn more about Did You Know?/Shift Happens.

If you’re interested in what else goes on around here, then look around a bit. My blogging has tapered off lately as budget cuts have added a bit to my plate, but you might be interested in the Best (?) Posts of 2009, 2008, 2007, 2006 to get a feel for the place.

Dear Denver Post, Would You Be Okay With Us Cheating on the CSAP, Too?

2010-09-19T13:19:00.000-06:00

So two weeks ago the Denver Post disappointed us with this headline:

Summer is almost over, and the disappointment about returning to class . . .

Now this week they follow that up with a column about the Derek Jeter cheating incident, where he fooled the umpire into thinking he’d been hit by the ball so that he could get on base instead of making an out. Troy Renck, the Denver Post baseball columnist, had this to say:

All those people who talk about the honor in baseball, I wonder when exactly they watched the game. Don't they realize that third-base coaches used to do cartwheels to try to get pitchers to walk or balk?

. . . I agree it doesn't set a great example for kids. But that's where parents should be able to articulate the difference between professional athletes and youth sports. For the pros, their livelihood depends on the results of the games, not whether they get banned from the orange slices and Capri Suns.

If Jeter is guilty of anything, it's bad acting, not cheating.

Really?

So, what you’re saying is, the more important something is the more okay it is to cheat? Following your logic, then it would be okay for schools and students to cheat on CSAP because most certainly “our livelihood” depends on the results. What you’re saying is, “Hey, he cheated too, so it’s okay for me to cheat!” My fifth grader already knows that’s not a legitimate excuse.

I can’t help but point to the irony of this story being on the facing pace in the print edition of the sports section, with the headline “Question of Honor:”

Undisclosed Creek players conspired to fix results in a preseason intrasquad qualifying "ladder" tournament that determines varsity seedings. Several players were serving suspensions this past week when Creek dropped one match at Fairview and another at home against rival Regis Jesuit.

. . . "What this was for (the players involved) was a life lesson," Cherry Creek spokeswoman Tustin Amole said. "It showed poor sportsmanship and very bad judgment. The school and the athletic director and the principal took this very, very seriously."

So, on the one hand, we have educators at Cherry Creek High School making an unequivocal statement that cheating is not okay. That it’s not only wrong, but that we’ll punish both you and ourselves as an institution to make sure you understand how wrong it is. Then, on the other hand, we have Troy Renck and the Denver Post supporting – no, in fact, promoting – the win at all costs culture that has given us not only Derek Jeter, but also Enron, Lehman Brothers, credit default swaps, and our current economic crisis.

A few years ago Charles Barkley stated that he didn’t want to be a role model for young people. Put me firmly in the camp that believes that all of us: teachers, athletes, coaches, and adults in all manner of occupations should be role models for our young people. And, yes, that includes sports columnists and newspaper editors that are asleep at the switch.

If I asked students at my high school the following question,

In non life-threatening circumstances, and in cases where it’s not a conflict between good and evil (think World War II), is it okay to cheat?

I’m pretty sure that all 2,150 of them would get the correct answer. Now, to be sure, it’s likely that some of them have cheated in a variety of endeavors, but yet they still know it’s wrong. And most of them, like the tennis players at Cherry Creek, know they made a mistake and regret it.

Yet apparently Derek Jeter, Troy Renck and the editors at the Denver Post would disagree with our high school students, and would tell them that, “Yes, it is okay to cheat if the stakes are high enough.” So now those tennis players at Cherry Creek, who got a very clear message from the educators in their lives that cheating is not okay, have to be asking themselves, “Wait. What you’re saying is that what I did wasn’t wrong, I just should’ve been making money off of it?”

In combination with the disappointing headline from two weeks ago, that makes two strikes on you Denver Post. You know what they say in baseball, “Three strikes and you’re out.” Of course, perhaps that doesn’t apply anymore to people like Derek Jeter . . . or Troy Renck.

No, Mr. Renck, I’m not going to “give you a break.” I expect more from you Mr. Renck, and from the Denver Post. As I said a couple of weeks ago, perhaps you should pay closer attention to what you are actually communicating to our young people. That instead of undermining what we are trying to teach our students about respect and responsibility, about right and wrong, about honor and doing the right thing even when no one is looking (and that includes umpires), perhaps you should try to support us.

If you have an opinion on this, feel free to leave a comment on this post. But, perhaps more importantly, feel free to contact the Denver Post with your thoughts.

Troy Renck: trenck@denverpost.com
Sports Page: sports@denverpost.com or sportsletters@denverpost.com
Dan Haley, editorial page editor: dhaley@denverpost.com or @danhaleyDP on Twitter
Letters to the Editor: openforum@denverpost.com or 303-954-1331
Daniel Petty, Denver Post Social Media Editor: @danielpetty on Twitter

Homecoming Pep Assembly

2010-09-18T07:57:00.002-06:00

For those of you who don't work in a high school, you might enjoy this taste of a Homecoming Pep Assembly.

Cheering. Dancing. Singing. Tug-of-War. Centipede Race. The kids are alright.

Dear MLA and APA

2010-09-05T19:55:00.004-06:00

Two questions.

How often (not counting grad school) have you actually followed a written citation, found the source material, and then read it?

Gibaldi, Joseph. MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers, Seventh Edition. New York: Modern Language Association, 2007. Print.
How often have you clicked on a link to learn more?

Dear Denver Post - You're the Disappointment

2010-09-04T14:08:00.000-06:00

I teach high school. I love all of high school, including high school sports, and including the fun that students have at Friday night (or Thursday night this week for us) football. So I understand the intent of the following headline in The Denver Post.

But, as it does every year at this time (and several times throughout the year), The Post throws the rest of school under the bus.

Summer is almost over, and the disappointment about returning to class . . .

Really?

Really, Denver Post, that's the message you want to send? With all your whining on the editorial page about the state of our schools (and pretty consistently getting it wrong by the way), you don't feel any responsibility to actually read your own paper and perhaps, just perhaps, make sure you aren't contributing to the anti-education culture of the state of Colorado?

Not only did school start for most of us quite a while ago, but many of us are excited about returning to school (teachers, administrators, students and parents - apparently everyone except The Denver Post's writers and editors). Yes, I know many high school students won't readily admit to being excited about being back, and certainly students don't love everything about school, but come visit my school and you can feel the excitement. We've got great students, a great staff, and a great community, and we're doing important and meaningful things with students every day (including Friday night football), but you chose to go with "disappointment about returning to class."

So, as the self-proclaimed Voice of the Rocky Mountain Empire, perhaps you could pay closer attention to the headlines in the section that many students turn to first because it's about them. Because, if you continue to use your "voice" to undermine what we try to do day in and day out, you'll have plenty more to write about on your editorial pages. Of course, maybe that's your intent.

What I Said Today

2010-09-01T11:34:00.000-06:00

[cross-posted on Transparent Algebra]

Today was our Skype session with Professor Garibaldi, and I thought that went well. After the Skype session we only had about twenty minutes left (shortened classes due to a PLC day) so I took that opportunity to talk with my class a little bit. I realized that I hadn't done a good job of conveying my thoughts and beliefs about the class, of sharing my passion, of explaining why I setup class the way I did and what I was expecting from them - and what I was hoping for them.

So here, more or less, is what I said. I'm sure it wasn't quite this smooth, as when I write I automatically correct and tweak, but this is pretty close to what I said (and definitely the spirit of what I hope I conveyed).

I wanted to talk a little bit about this class and why I’m doing the things I’m doing. Mr. Krause, one of our English teachers, is doing a project right now where his students are asking people how they define success. I answered that for several groups of students, but I wanted to talk for a minute about how I’ll decide if I’m successful with you guys in this class.

I won’t think I’m a success if you get a good grade in Algebra, although I certainly hope you do and I’m going to try really hard to help you do that. I won’t think I’m a success if you score well on tests like CSAP or ACT, although I hope you do, and even though a lot of well-intentioned people think that’s how I should define success. I won’t even think I’m a success if you go to a good college and then get a good job, although I certainly want you to do that because I’d like to retire someday and I need you all to have good jobs to support me.

No, I’ll consider myself successful if you turn out to be good, kind, caring adults. If you’re a good spouse, child and parent. If you contribute to the world and to your community and help those around you. If you participate. And learn.

And here’s the deal. The education that I received was a pretty good one. But it’s not good enough for you guys. Not anymore. You see, in a rapidly changing, information abundant world, the people who are going to be successful – both professionally and personally – are the learners. And by “learners” I don’t mean people who just learn what we teach you here at AHS.

Now, I want to be clear, that doesn’t mean I don’t think you should learn what we teach you here at AHS. I don’t want you to go to your second period teacher, raise your hand, and say, “Mr. Fisch said I don’t need to learn what you’re teaching.” Please, don’t do that. That’s not at all what I’m saying. Your teachers here work very hard trying to share important, meaningful and relevant knowledge and skills. And that’s important, but it’s not enough. Because to be successful in the 21st century you’re going to have to be a learner, you’re going to have to learn how to learn, and go after things on your own. You’re going to have to be independent, curious, passionate learners, who don’t just sit back and wait for someone to tell them what they’re supposed to know, but who go out and try to figure things out for yourself. Who pursue your interests, your goals, your passions with intensity, and who actively participate in everything you do. Who go out and find other learners who are passionate about what you are passionate about and learn from them – and alongside them.

To quote myself (sorry), the world has shifted. The world of school, and the world of work, and the world in general has shifted, and so I need you to shift as well, and that’s what I’m trying to do in this class. I’m trying to get you to be actively involved in your own education, to be independent and curious learners in mathematics, even if Algebra is never going to be your favorite subject.

I believe you need the skills I’m trying to get you to learn for three main reasons. First, to be a successful citizen in the 21st century you have to be numerate. In order to deal with all the data that is going to get thrown at you, and to make good, responsible, effective decisions, you’re going to need a lot of the skills we’re learning in Algebra.

And frankly, that’s not necessarily true about all the math classes you’ll take. Honestly, if you take Trig and Pre-Calc, the skills you learn there are very important if you go into the math and sciences, but perhaps not so much day-to-day life for most of you (some folks will disagree with that). But the skills we learn in Algebra you’ll be using every day to make sense of all that data in the world, to be informed voters and decision makers.

The second reason to learn the skills is if you decide that you are passionate about math and science, you need these skills in order to progress to more complex topics and to go deeper.

The third reason – and it’s the one I think is least important but you may think is the most important – is that right now in the short term you have to learn these skills to get a good grade in this class, to do well in school, and to get into college if that’s what you choose. So while I prefer that you focus on the first two reasons, this one is still a valid one for many of you.

And this is why it’s critical you do the assignments I’m asking you to do, like watching the videos I’ve created for you. Those videos are designed to help you master the skills, and to become more independent learners. But they’re also designed to free up class time so that we can become more curious, active learners, in class, and so we can explore interesting (or not for some of you) applications of Algebra like the bike gear ratios or Tim Tebow’s speed at the NFL Combine or a variety of other activities we’ll be doing this year. In order to apply the skills in class, I need you to do the necessary work outside of class.

But in order for that to happen, in order for us to use our class time to be the kind of learners I think you need to be to be successful in this century, your century, I need you to step up and take care of business. I need you to watch the videos, and use them as they’re intended, and do the other things I ask you to do outside of class. And I really, really need you to participate in class, to be active learners. To ask questions, and be involved, and talk to each other, and help each other, and be willing to take risks in order to learn more, even if that makes you a little nervous or uncomfortable. I need you to do more of the talking in class, and me to do less. I need you to do more of the thinking, and the questioning, and the figuring out.

So I’m asking you to please, please consider what kind of future you want, not just for yourself, but for those around you, and make an effort to be as independent, as curious, as responsible, as passionate of a learner that you can be. And I promise that I’ll bring the passion every day and do the very best I can to help you become that learner.

Math on the Rocks: Skyping with Professor Garibaldi

2010-08-27T15:03:00.001-06:00

Sometime this summer someone tweeted out this video from Emory University.

It features Professor Skip Garibaldi talking about the mathematics of rock climbing and I immediately tagged it to use when teaching proportion. But then as I thought about it, I thought this might be the perfect guy to be my first Skype connection into my class. I searched and found his email address at Emory, then contacted him with the basic pitch. We traded a few emails and we'll be Skyping on Wednesday, September 1st.

You can read a little bit more about Professor Garibaldi on this post on the class blog, where I gave my students some background information to help them develop some questions for him. The basic structure is that he's going to talk for five to ten minutes about rock climbing, or the lottery, or mathematics, or learning in general, then we'll ask him a few questions. Students submitted questions via a Google Form, and I was going to try to use Google Moderator to have them vote on them, but I had trouble getting it to work the way I wanted it to, so I ended up selecting the questions myself.

How do you define “math?” How would you describe what “math” is to non-mathematicians? -Me
Does learning about things that interest you, like rock climbing and the lottery help you learn/teach better? -Kara
Can you recall an analysis/equation that was particularly frustrating for you to work on and what did you do to work through it. -Gabby
If you dropped out of high school as a sophomore, how could you go on and graduate and get a bachelor's degree and a PhD? -Ashley
What made you realize the connection between algebra and rock climbing? -Mackenzie
If you were playing the lottery with, say, 5-10 tickets, what effect would that have on the risk? -Caleb

We're keeping it to about twenty minutes for several reasons, not the least of which is that he has to teach a class twenty-four minutes after we start. We'll see how it goes, but I'm hopeful the students will find it interesting and meaningful.

Here's part of the email I sent Professor Garibaldi describing what I hoped we get out of this:

I'm hoping to accomplish three main things by inviting folks such as yourself to skype in:

1. Give them an idea of "when are we ever going to use this?"

2. Have someone who is passionate about math (and learning) talk about how they use/think about math/learning. (And hopefully get them more excited about math and learning.)

3. Expose them to professionals from a variety of backgrounds (and geographic areas) to expand their view of the world and what's possible.

If we touch on one or all of these, I'll consider it a success. Depending on a few things, I'm hoping to ustream it out for parents to view as well, so you're welcome to tune in on our ustream channel. We'll be skyping from approximately 9:21 - 9:41 am Mountain Time (PLC day for us, so late start) on Wednesday, September 1st.

Oh, I also have to say that I think this (see the entry for September 1st) is kinda cool.

Transparent Algebra: First Week

2010-08-24T16:55:00.000-06:00

So my Algebra blogging has been taking up what little "extra" blogging time I have, but here's the summary of the first week of Algebra: I'm rusty. So far I've over-planned (or underestimated the amount of time things take, depending on your perspective) every day. I guess the good news is that I don't think I've done any irreparable harm to my students. (I think.)

Day 1 - Saw them for 10 minutes before the Freshmen class meeting. Pointed them to the blog to get them started.

Day 2 - Mandatory Math Department Skills Assessment

Day 3 - First real day of teaching. Probably had about 130 minutes of material for a 59 minute class. Oops.

Day 4 - Did better on the timing, but still too much material.

My class only meets four days a week (MWRF), so that was the first week. Feel free to follow along on Transparent Algebra if you're interested.

Transparent Algebra: The Blog

2010-08-13T21:37:00.000-06:00

So I've been writing about my planning and thought processes as I get ready to teach Algebra for the first time in a long time. With students starting on Monday, I thought it was time to move that over to Transparent Algebra. I hope to find time to regularly reflect there, but we'll see. No promises. If you're interested in that part of what I'm doing, please consider heading over and subscribing.

While I'll probably cross-post here occasionally, this blog will return to its usual content. Well, assuming I have any time to blog here as well.

Transparent Algebra: Parent Communication

2010-08-05T20:37:00.001-06:00

As is hopefully pretty obvious by the titles of many of my recent posts, I want my Algebra class to be transparent: transparent to students, transparent to parents, transparent to everyone. While I think I did an okay job with parent communication during my first stint in the classroom, the communication was generally after the fact, dealing with a behavior problem or an academic issue. I did communicate positive information as well, but this time I want to not only communicate those pieces of information, but I also want to share more of what we're doing, as well as why we're doing it. As I plan for this, I'm primarily struggling with two things: how much is too much information and how involved should parents be.

I generally like information. Lots of information. And, as the staff at my school will attest, I'm not adverse to sending out fairly long, involved emails that try to communicate important information in (sometimes excruciating) detail. At times folks have let me know that those emails are not always helpful, because they contain so much information that they often end up going unread. So as I contemplate how to communicate with the parents of the students in my class, I worry that I will bombard them with so much information that they'll end up ignoring it. How to strike the balance between being informative but not overwhelming?

My other concern is that high school is a time for parents to step back a little and students to step up. My philosophy has always been that I want the important conversations to typically be between me and the student, not me trying to get the student to comply by going through his or her parents. Yet I also think that parents should still be involved, and usually want to be involved, just not as a referee. If I communicate too much with parents, will I undermine the students' investment in my class?

With those concerns as backdrop, here are the various ways I'm currently planning on communicating with parents.

I've already called all the parents to confirm their student has broadband access from home. When I did that, I asked for an email address I could use to contact them.
I followed-up that phone call with an initial email message with some general information about the class.
Yesterday I then sent a second email message, which had information for both the parents and the students.
As you can see from that second message, I'm encouraging them to subscribe to the class blog via RSS or email. If they choose to do that, they'll get a daily glimpse into what we're doing, as that's where I'll post any homework the students have or other important information about the class.
I'll be encouraging them to come to our scheduled parent-teacher conferences, preferably with their student present.
I'm still thinking about how best to do this, but I want to encourage them not to wait until the scheduled parent-teacher conferences, but to come in and visit before that. I want to invite them in to observe/participate in a class, then perhaps stick around after and talk with me a bit about what they saw, as well as about their student. But this is one where I worry about my second concern, is that inviting them too far in, and will that make the students uncomfortable?
I'll be emailing them periodically with good news, such as when their student does well on an assessment or has a great idea in class.
I will, of course, contact parents if students are struggling, either academically or behaviorally, if talking with the student first doesn't seem to be helping.
I'm trying to be pretty available for them to contact me as well, sharing my Google Voice number, my email address, and various other parts of my digital footprint.
I hope to share interesting things that are going on in class, some of which may not be apparent even if they subscribe to the class blog. So, if we Skype someone in, or are doing a particularly interesting activity, I'll share that out.

I have a few more ideas floating around, but I think this is the core of my plan. What do you think? Too much? Not enough? What could I do better?

Transparent Algebra: Writing

2010-07-27T15:22:00.000-06:00

It won’t come as a surprise that I value writing. A lot. For me, writing helps me think about whatever I’m thinking about. It makes me clarify what I understand and don’t understand, and what I believe. One of the main reasons I blog is to help me think about stuff.

I also value writing in the classroom, whether that’s a Language Arts classroom, an Art classroom, or, yes, a Math classroom. I want my students to reflect on their own learning process, to think more about whatever they are thinking about, and to be able to communicate that to others both verbally and in writing. My struggle is how to do that well in a Math classroom.

It’s a struggle for me primarily for three reasons. First, the old excuse of time. I’ve complained previously (see my comment here, the one from me that starts “@David Cox - You're going . . .” - I can't link directly to it) about not having as much time as I’d like in my Algebra class, and providing time for writing is one more thing to try to squeeze in.

The second issue is overcoming expectations. Students (and their parents, and my administrators) have an expectation of what a math classroom looks like. I’m pushing the envelope on those expectations in quite a few ways, and writing will be one more way. While I’m willing to have those conversations, there’s also the practical matter of not pushing too far, too fast, or I might lose some folks along the way.

The third, and perhaps most important issue, is that I’m not sure how to do it well. When I’m writing primarily for myself, like on this blog, I know what to do. But when I’m having students write in the service of mathematics learning, then I feel like I need to reach a higher standard of purpose and meaningfulness. I don’t want to have them write just because I find writing valuable, I want them to write because it is valuable for them.

So, given all those caveats (yeah, okay, excuses), here are my fledgling ideas for how I’m going to use writing in my classroom. Please chime in not only with suggestions about my ideas below, but additional suggestions of how I could use writing in my Algebra classroom. This first year back I anticipate not being able to do as much writing as I eventually hope to, but the great thing about this blog is that it will still be here a year from now when I try to improve what I did this year.

About Me
The first writing assignment the students will do is an About Me piece. In fact, I’m actually giving this to the students before the school year even starts. I already called all the parents to make sure they had broadband access at home and I asked for an email address when I talked with them. I then emailed them some preliminary information about the class (more on parent communication in a future post). Next week I’m going to follow-up that email with a second email, that will have a little more information for the parents, but is primarily information that I’m asking them to pass along to their student. (Once the school year starts we’ll have Google Apps for Education, and therefore students will have an email address I’ll use but, for now, I’m going through their parents.) One part of that is giving them the About Me assignment.

They do not have to work on this before school starts, it will be an assignment the first week, but I highly recommend that they do for two reasons. First, that’s one less piece of homework they’ll have to do that first crazy week back. And second, it will allow me to know a little bit about them before that first week of school. Here’s the prompt as well as my own About Me piece, as I want to – as often as is practical – complete any writing assignments I assign to my students. This will also give them a chance to know a little bit about me before the first week of school.
Reflection
One of my stated goals for this course is for students to be metacognitive, to think about their own learning and use that self-knowledge to become better learners. So a yet-to-be-determined number of times a semester I’m going to ask them to reflect on their learning. I’m not sure of all of those prompts yet, I’d like to strike a balance between giving them something pretty specific to focus on (like Dean’s suggestion in the comments here), and leaving it general so they can write about what they feel is important.

I’ve tentatively scheduled the first reflective piece to be at the end of the first week of school. I’m going to ask them to reflect back on the first week, to share any questions or concerns they have about the structure and expectations of our class, and to set a couple of goals for the semester (one related to our class, one related to another class, or an activity or sport, or something outside of school). Then periodically throughout the semester/year, I’ll ask them to reflect on their learning, what’s working for them, what’s a challenge, and anything else they’d like to share. I’d love any suggestions for prompts you’d like to share in the comments.
Conferring
I really like the idea of conferring, where teachers meet with students to talk about their writing. I’m going to try something similar about the first of October, when I’ll ask my students to write something. It might be along the lines of the reflection mentioned above, or it might be about a mathematical topic, I’m not sure yet. In either event I’ll ask them to submit it and then schedule a time to come in and meet with me so that we can talk about it. The timing (first of October) is designed so that this happens once we're well into the school year, but before our scheduled Parent/Teacher Conferences.
Parent/Teacher Conferences
We have two nights scheduled for parent/teacher conferences in the middle of October. This is designed as a time for parents to have 5-7 minute conversations with teachers. While I like the spirit of this, I don’t particularly like the format, as I don’t think it’s particularly timely or useful. If a student is struggling in my class, I don’t want to wait until mid-October and conferences to talk about it. I also don’t think 5-7 minutes is necessarily optimal, and I’ve always been a fan of having the student present at any conference that talks about the student. While I can think of a few rare occasions when it would be helpful to meet without the student present, the vast majority of the time I think they should be there.

I’m going to suggest to the parents in my class that they bring their student with them. I’m also going to ask my students to write something for parent/teacher conferences a few days ahead of time. This will be along the lines of the reflection/conferring ideas, but directed toward this parent/teacher/hopefully-student conversation about how Algebra is going for them. I’ll then ask them to share it not only with me, but also with their parents before conferences. That piece of writing will then provide the focus for our conference, and should provide some student voice even if the parents choose not to bring the student.
Writing about Mathematics
I’ll be asking my students to write about mathematics on a fairly regular basis. They’ll have writing questions occasionally as an opener, sometimes as part of their assessments, and fairly frequently as part of our in-class activities. Again, I would love any suggestions you have in terms of prompts that would help elicit their thinking about mathematical ideas.

There are other things I’ve considered but have decided not to do, at least initially. Most notably are scribe posts, an idea I first learned of from Darren Kuropatwa, and an idea I really like. At the moment, I don’t feel like I have time to do them well, or that they would add enough value for my students. I know I could do them, but I feel like I would be doing them just so that I could say that I’m doing scribe posts. Given all the other new (and perhaps unusual) things I’m asking my student to do, I’ve decided to hold off for now on scribe posts.

That's what I've got so far. I’d love your thoughts on any of the above ideas, including suggestions for prompts, as well as any additional suggestions for me to mull over and perhaps implement sometime this year (or next).

Thinking in Hashtags

2010-07-27T13:10:00.009-06:00

We went shopping for clothes today. This is not something we do very often, but my wife had a gift card for Dillards so we went to see if we could find anything. My wife finally found some shirts she wanted to try on, but the store was short-staffed so the first couple of fitting rooms we tried were locked up. Eventually we found an open fitting room and a salesperson, and my wife said the salesperson laid out the clothes she was trying on in the dressing room, ruffled them up, and generally made it look like a display before leaving and letting her try them on.

I'm sure the salesperson was doing her job the way she's supposed to, and many people would consider that customer service, but I was thinking that true customer service would've had all the fitting rooms unlocked instead of treating your customers like potential shoplifters. Actually, what I thought was

#realcustomerservicewouldvebeentohavethefittingroomsunlocked

Seriously, that's the way the thought generated itself in my head.

I'm not saying this is necessarily important, there may be no "there" here, but I find it interesting that apparently my online activities have actually affected the way I think. If I'm actually thinking in hashtags, then it's almost like I've changed the grammar of the way I think. I find that fascinating. Has anyone else found themselves actually thinking differently as a result of how you interact online?

The Myth of the Echo Chamber

2010-07-16T09:23:00.014-06:00

This topic deserves more than what I'm going to write today, but I wanted to quickly share this thought. On a regular basis on Twitter and on blogs and in books I read, people warn about not getting stuck in the echo chamber. In fact, I've said it myself more than once. While I value diverse and opposing opinions, and think they are necessary and critical, here's what I think:

There is no "echo chamber." It's a myth.

Do you follow at least one person on Twitter? Then you're not in an echo chamber.

Do you have someone's blog other than your own in your RSS aggregator? Then you're not in an echo chamber.

Do you teach/work in a building with at least one other person that you talk to? Then you're not in an echo chamber.

Do you have a family? Friends? A neighborhood? Then you're not in an echo chamber.

Yes, if you look at the folks I follow on Twitter, or the blogs I read, or the friends I associate with - they probably share some characteristics in their views about education (just to narrow this down a bit). But echo chamber? No way.

I learn from people that believe IWB's are a huge waste of time and money. And folks that think they are very useful.
I learn from people that think PLN is a term that is essentially meaningless and does more harm than good. And folks that think PLN is a powerful organizing concept for how we can learn in a networked world.
I learn from people that think if you can't measure it, it's not important. And from folks that think that if you can measure it, then it's not very important.
I learn from people that think standards-based-grading is a powerful way to provide meaningful feedback to students. And from folks that think that "standards" and "grading" are the antithesis of what education should be about.

And, at different times, I find myself agreeing with both "sides" of the above supposedly-there-are-only-two-sides-of-the-argument issues. As I continue to search for the "truth" (lowercase 't', capital 'T', I don't know), I expect that that will continue.

Not only do I think there is no echo chamber, I think there is also tremendous power in having discussions with people who do think in a similar (although not exact) way to you. Communities of similarly-minded people, passionate people, working in concert, can accomplish amazing things. We shouldn't denigrate that, we should celebrate it.

So, by all means continue to bring in diverse and opposing viewpoints into your PLN (or your not-PLN if you don't like the term). And continue to stretch yourself and your thinking by reading and tweeting and talking to new people. But please don't ever apologize for associating with other folks who passionately believe things similar to you, and please don't buy into the myth of the echo chamber. It doesn't exist.

Feel free to disagree in the comments.

Transparent Algebra: Course Expectations

2010-06-23T10:54:00.000-06:00

Teachers at my school are required to create a list of course expectations that they give to students (typically on the first day of school) and often also post to their website. This is pretty much what you would expect, a list of general information, procedures, and rules and regulations regarding the class.

I'm creating one as well, and it will be similar to everyone else's. But I won't be printing, copying and distributing mine, it will just live on the web and I'm going to ask students and parents to read it before school starts (via an email sent to the parents that I'll ask them to share with their student).

But I also wanted mine to be a little different in another way. Many of the course expectations from my school that I looked at when brainstorming what I wanted on mine included phrases such as:

No food, drinks or hats are allowed in the classroom.

Any academic dishonesty as defined in your school calendar will result in a zero grade.

Three attendance points will be lost for each tardy.

Late homework will not be accepted.

It's not that I necessarily disagree with their policies, although I do with the points off for tardies and the late work policy, and I certainly don't approve of academic dishonesty. I guess what I didn't like was the overall tone of the course expectations. While about half of each course expectation was tone-neutral (essentially informative), the other half of each of them seemed very negative to me. They seemed to be listing all the ways kids could mess up in their class and what the penalty was for each type of infraction.

That troubles me for two reasons. First, it seems like the basic assumption is that students are going to be a problem, so let's make sure we identify all the punishments up front. Now, I'm certainly all for transparency, and stating these policies up front is certainly transparent. But my basic assumption is that students are going to do the right thing most of the time, so I don't want my course expectations to focus on the outlier events.

Second, it troubles me because, in many respects, the course expectations are my first impression on my students and their parents. I don't want my course expectations to send the message that I think they're going to mess up, I want my course expectations to be welcoming, informative, and perhaps begin to convey a little bit of my philosophy. I realize I may be over-thinking this a bit, but you never get a second chance to make a good first impression, and I want mine to match what I hope my classroom is going to be like.

So, here's the current draft of my course expectations. I would really appreciate any feedback you're willing to give.

Solar Panel Update

2010-06-16T17:00:00.016-06:00

Several people have asked for an update on the solar panels we installed. The panels were installed and became active in January (although our monitoring system didn't get activated until a week or so later, January 27th, so that's when all my easily accessible data will be from).

Overall, the system is performing well, even slightly better than expected. Here's a typical (sunny) mid-winter day:

And a typical (sunny) spring day:

A typical (sunny) day this week when it wasn't quite warm enough that we had the air conditioning on:

As you can see, we generated 20 kWh's more than we consumed.

And here's a typical (sunny) day when it was warmer, and we had the air conditioner on.

We didn't quite break even this day, but still not too bad.

Here's what the last month looks like:

And here's our total consumption versus generation since our monitor was installed on January 27th.

As you can see, we've generated more than we've consumed. For the past three months we haven't paid for any kWh's on our bill (although there is still a monthly fee to be connected to the grid). We'll probably continue to generate more than we consume through about September, maybe even October, then start dipping into that accumulated "bank" through the winter.

It's still too early to predict, but my guess is that we might finish our year with some still left in the bank. If that happens, they'll send us a check for the kWh's still in the bank, and then we start over again for the next year. (You can rollover your excess hours, which is better because when they send you a check it's at the wholesale price. But right now once you choose to rollover you can't ever change back, which means you'd never get "paid" for those excess hours that would keep accumulating if you generate more than you consume. We're waiting to see what a year or two looks like before deciding whether we want to switch to rollover.)

Overall, we're very pleased and would recommend anyone who's interested take a serious look at installing the panels (particularly if you live in Colorado, which is not only sunny, but has some decent incentives from our energy companies in addition to the federal ones).

Welcome Huffington Post Readers

2010-05-18T20:41:00.000-06:00

If you’re visiting this blog for the first time due to this article, welcome. I feel like I should have something profound to say, but it’s the end of May. And in my high school, that means finals week, projects, grades, graduation, scheduling and some reimaging of laptops and netbooks, so I’m fresh out of anything profound.

Actually, even if it wasn’t the end of May, it would be unlikely that you’d find much profound on this blog. But, if you’re interested in what goes on here, here are some links to some of the interesting stuff we’ve talked about over the last few years. Pick one and drill down into some of the posts if you’d like.

The Best (?) of The Fischbowl 2009
The Best (?) of The Fischbowl 2008
The Best (?) of The Fischbowl 2007
The Best (?) of The Fischbowl 2006

Thanks for stopping by. And, if you have a question to ask, you're welcome to ask it here as well. I have a feeling I'm not going to end up in the top five, so you might be better off asking it here.

Transparent Algebra: Assessment Revisited

2010-05-14T14:52:00.001-06:00

A while back I blogged about my current thinking regarding how I’m going to assess next year. I wanted to write some more about this because I received some really good pushback that I want to address, and because I want to help clarify some small revisions to my plan and blogging about it helps me think it through.

The two main pieces of pushback on that previous post were:

By having students re-assess outside of class, I’m making it “optional” which undermines both the intent and the effectiveness of the plan.
By putting a grade in the gradebook, my assessments aren’t truly formative.

Let me state up front that I pretty much agree with both of those criticisms, yet I’m more-or-less not changing what I’m doing. Let me explain.

I commented at length on that previous post explaining how and why I’m having students re-assess outside of class. Go read that comment if you’re interested (I can’t seem to link directly to the comment, but it’s the one that starts with “Thanks everyone, this is really helping my thinking”), but, to sum it up, my school is different, and I think how it is different helps address some of the concerns that were stated. At the moment, I’m pretty comfortable with this one (subject to change, of course, in the fall when I put it into practice).

And I agree that if you put a grade in the gradebook it has the potential to undermine that assessment being formative. Certainly my class is not going to be as flexible as I would like it to be – I don’t foresee differentiating in class as much as a truly formative-based, adjust-what-you’re-doing-on-the-fly classroom would (at least not this first year back). But I see my assessments as allowing me to target which skills individual students are struggling with, and allow us to address those on a student-by-student basis in a timely fashion, so I still see these as “almost formative” (yes, I know it’s an oxymoron).

Because the grade in the gradebook is also dynamic (in the sense that a re-assessment that shows a higher level of understanding replaces the previous score), I think I can do a decent job of explaining to my students why that’s not a permanent assessment of their learning. Given the realities of time (I’ll see my Algebra students about 50% less than many other folks do), curriculum, my other full-time job responsibilities, and student-information-system gradebooks that have to be up-to-date on a weekly basis for eligibility purposes, I think this is a compromise I can live with and still have it be effective for my students (once again, subject to revision when put into practice).

So I want to lay out my slightly revised assessment plan and fill in a few more details. This will only fully make sense if you’ve read the previous post and comments as I don’t want to repeat everything.

Grades are still going to be weighted 10% preparation, 70% formative, and 20% summative. For now, I’m sticking with still including the preparation grade as I think going cold-turkey on students in this area would be counterproductive. (This category includes homework, but also some writing/reflection pieces and some-in class preparation stuff as well.) I’m also leaning toward still calling the 70% formative part “formative,” even though it technically isn’t. But that’s the best label I can think of that I can use to make this transparent to students and parents and help me explain what I’m trying to do. We’ll see.
I’m no longer going to define my assessments as six questions over three skills – it’s going to be more flexible than that. I still anticipate two to three questions per skill, but my assessments will often be over just one skill at a time, not three (depending on a variety of factors). The number of questions will be determined by how many I think I need to help me identify where students might be struggling and accurately assess mastery.
In the previous post, I’m not sure I clearly laid out some of the other pieces of what would happen before the first true assessment. Certainly my openers and other in-class activities will give me – and my students – many opportunities to assess (both formally and informally) how they are progressing on a specific skill. I’ll also be offering a pre-assessment of sorts online, where students can self-assess a couple of days before the formal assessment that goes in the gradebook. Here’s a quick sample of what that will look like. (I had been planning on doing this as a PDF, but thanks to David Cox sharing his Examview question banks with me, it’s now going to look like this. This sample is taken from his work as I haven’t had time to start writing my own yet.) Go ahead and click “check your work” to note the type of feedback that students can receive from this. (Note that this is not formally graded or recorded, but also see David’s post of how you could do that if you chose to.)

Students will do this as a homework assignment and then make a note of it on their checklist that will look something like this, and then we’ll have a better idea of what we need to work on before the first formal assessment over the skill. When they take the first formal assessment (in class, pretty much as I described in the previous post, including the worked out solutions posted to the class web page that afternoon), it will get graded and entered in the gradebook (viewable online by students and parents, and identified by skill) along with information that identifies what (if anything) they need to work on. They will then make appointments (using something like this – thanks to Kate Nowak’s example) to come in and re-assess, and will have multiple opportunities to get help before that re-assessment (from me, from other math teachers, from peer tutors in our study center, from friends, from their siblings or parents, or even on their own with online and textbook support).
I’m currently leaning toward using a five-point scale to grade each assessment. Here is my scale and the descriptors (thanks to Matt Townsley):

5 = Demonstrates thorough understanding
4.5 = High level of understanding, but with small errors
3.5 = Demonstrates understanding, but with significant gaps
3 = Shows some understanding, but insufficient to be successful
2.5 = Attempts the problem

This gives me the gradations and descriptors that I’d like to use and that I think students (and parents) can understand, but still works reasonably well within a student information system gradebook that is going to average all the scores to determine an overall grade. (Again, please keep in mind that each re-assessment replaces the previous score if they demonstrate a higher level of understanding, they're not averaged.) It’s not perfect, but I think it’s a good start toward shifting the focus away from points and toward understanding.

I’m sure that a year from now – if I’m still teaching Algebra in 2011-12 – I’ll have learned a ton and will be making lots of adjustments. I still have about three months to obsess over and modify this plan for the coming year but, at the moment, this is feeling like a fairly solid way to start the school year this first year back in the classroom.

Dear Education: I'm Your Child

2010-05-07T10:01:00.002-06:00

Kyle's "Last Lecture":

Update 5-14-10: Here's the text of Kyle's poem. It's not exactly how he delivered it, but it's pretty close.

Dear Education

Dear education: I am your child, an offspring of wild thoughts entangled with knots and photos of poorer countries, people sleeping on cots. I am the series of words ordered to make enough sense to partly understand the past tense; I am a present poet of no specific dazzling hero heroics. These pages in my corporate friendly text book do no good to me, I am like Socrates, I seek knowledge through my own means enlightened conversation, dreams, books, meditation. I am the raised hand waiting patiently for the teacher to hear my answer, so answer me this teacher, why must I wait for you to hear me?

I will blurt out senseless answers to answerless equations, learn the ways of other nations through cultural vibrations which sink deep into the solitude of my sleep, and speak very loudly for the hungry, the weak. This week is next week’s memory of repetitive cycles and styles, hair cuts and new shoes, no new thought on the newest news, yo, I learn out of pure bliss of learning, in me is a yearning to continue turning in and out of realizations.

Dear math, your certainty scares me. I am uncertain that algebra will aid me, for I refuse you, it is so clearly absent in me. I will make up my own numbers, and number them none through no more, no more comes right after when can I, can you is before will you, will I keep going? Going is nowhere if everyday you are where you were, where you were is where I could be. Could you please tell me why I must learn this uncertain certainty? Certainly you can understand that I am no average man and thus trust that I will soak in passing thought while these formulas for fractions gather dust. I need not geometry, for nature doesn’t produce your so called square, your man made perfections and imperfections. Sections of rock are not measured; they are felt and seen, in real life not square screens. I have seen this in my dreams… and I remember in the morning, there is no math in waking, math is taking me from wisdom and forcing me to understand mere riddles.

Dear grades; Why do you try to cut me like a cookie and shape me to a mold? As if to then be sold to another institution of being told what to think and how to arrange this ink on my notebook surface, scribbling flight without the gift of wings. I do admit that you do teach me the potency of further potential somehow essential for a good job, to spend my time gathering money to exchange for my right to own anything. I should be taught but not graded, there is no reason, we are all as inconstant as the seasons.

How does one grade the slow hover of leaves braking away from treetops tossed into fate filled gravitational landing spots? I have graded politicians and cops, judges, CEO’s, American Idols. This system has failed and cannot continue in its current direction; it must be re-thought and re-taught so that maybe somehow people in this world will actually seek understanding between one another.
I will recite my right to recite my voice by choice of creating sound for others to listen to and ignore till they stoop so low in ignorance that their brains land with a Thud on the floor.., I have a fist full of forgiveness, to forgive what I forget. And pave a path for truth to flow which is diminishing, yet, it is all too much. Much is all too well, and as long as there is hope for heaven there is a need for hell. My mellow moon is melancholy.

If I could express the spirit, I would rise above lies and find the truth for all to hear it and know the reasons why…why we still have not found our place, our place as intellectual apes.
Dear students of “acting like your paying attention”; learn if you choose to, do as you want to and let me entangle thoughts with knots while reason looses value, and slowly rots. You lend yourselves to faulty fictions and contradictions only audible when nobody wants to listen. So listen now, now you listen to me, for I too have a need to say what’s right when right is wrong and life is blinding me.

Dear education; I am your child.

Transparent Algebra: In-Class Part 2 of TBD (When are we ever going to use this Wednesdays)

2010-04-29T11:00:00.009-06:00

Does this sound familiar?

Student: Mr. Fisch?

Me: Yes?

Student: When are we ever going to have to use this?

Math teachers get this question a lot.

A.

Lot.

In the past my answer was typically one of the following:

You’ll need this in [fill in the name of the next math course they have to take].

If you go into a career in math, science or engineering, you’re really going to need this.

It teaches you reasoning and problem solving, and that will help you in whatever you do.

I really don’t know.

Yeah, I don’t like those answers much. The problem is, I often really don’t know, other than a vague sense of particular careers, careers that many of my students may not have an interest in. I’m hoping to do a better job of answering that question this time around, and I have a couple of tools at my disposal that I didn’t have last time.

First up, obviously, is the Internet itself, as well as various communication mediums like my blog and Twitter where I can reach out and ask those kinds of questions. While I certainly intend to do that (or, better yet, have the students do that), this post is more about my second option: Skype.

In my previous incarnation as a math teacher, it was certainly possible to try to find guest speakers that could come in and talk to my classes about how they use math. But it certainly wasn’t convenient (especially since my one class next year starts at 7:21 am), and the speaker had to be local, willing, and available. Often if you tried to bring a speaker in, you had to make it more of a big deal in order to justify the event, especially if it involved getting students out of class in order to have the speaker speak once to a large group.

This time I’d like to make it be not such a big deal, but more of a semi-regular occurrence in my class, just part of what we do. So my plan is to fairly regularly invite folks in via Skype to talk with my students (not saying I wouldn’t take a speaker in person, but remember the 7:21 am start time, as well as having to be local and available). Despite the title of this post, this may not always be on Wednesdays (although I like the alliteration of it), and I’m not sure how often to shoot for. My current thinking is that I want this to be often enough that it’s part of what we do, but not so often that it just becomes routine, so perhaps once every 4-5 weeks (still thinking about that).

I’m going to reach out to folks in a variety of places, including universities, companies and my PLN, and try to get folks from many different fields with multiple interests to Skype into my class for perhaps 20-25 minutes or so (depending on the speaker – if they want more time, then I’d provide that, but I don’t want it to be such a commitment that it discourages folks). I’d provide a little bit of background information ahead of time on the speaker and/or their field of work, and then the students will be responsible for researching a little bit more and generating questions they’d like to ask.

While I’m still thinking this part through, I’m considering having the students submit their questions via Google Moderator (part of our Google Apps installation) and then the class can vote up the questions they think are the best. Then when our guest Skypes in they can spend perhaps 8-10 minutes talking about what they do and their use of/thoughts on mathematics, and then the students would ask their questions.

What do you think? Give the voted-up questions to the speaker ahead of time and have them just address it after their intro? Or have the speaker just answer on the fly as the students ask the questions?

I’d also record the Skype call and post that to our class web page for further review by the students, or for their parents or other students who might be interested. I toyed with the idea of ustreaming it to try to allow parents to watch it live to get them more involved, but am worried that I’m taking on too much all at once (second computer, second webcam - adds complexity and stress).

What do you think? Is it worth the added time and hassle to ustream it out to parents?

So, I’d love feedback on this idea in the comments, but I’d also like your help generating a list of folks to contact. I’d appreciate that if you know someone that might be appropriate and willing to participate, or if you are someone who is appropriate and willing to participate, that you fill out this Google Form (also embedded below) and give me a brief description and some contact information. Please note that the results of this are public (and embedded below the form itself) so that others can use this information as well. If you’re interested, but don’t want the info you give to be public, please email me directly instead. I have no idea if this will generate much response here, but I figured it was worth a shot – thanks in advance if you’re willing to share.

The Form

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The Results