Tinkerings

There’s been a lot of stuff flying around the Internet lately about how both Apple and Google are tracking data from our cell phones.  I think we all knew that before the news decided to make it a big deal.  After all, we willingly sign over our lives every time we download and install an app, or every time we play a new game on Facebook, or…

Tracking seems to be inevitable.  Even in schools.  We have tried so hard to create classrooms that are all inclusive.  We’ve talked ad naseum about creating lessons that include differentiated instruction.  We’ve purchased software that allows us to offer as many different forms of a single assessment as their are kids in our classrooms.

And yet, when its all said and done, we still look at kids as those who are Advanced, those who are proficient, and those who aren’t either.

It was pretty evident during elementary school when we would use our reading program.  I love to read.  I will read sugar packets at the restaurant if that’s all there is to look at.  But it didn’t take any of us long to realize that the colored tab on my reading booklet and the colored tab on Billy Bob’s booklet meant something.  We were reading the same story, but mine was 4 pages long and his was 2 pages long.  But at least we were in the same class together, and when group time came, I could help Billy Bob with vocabulary.

I lived through being tracked in high school.  When I moved from South Carolina to Arkansas just before my junior year, I ran into the tracking mechanisms of the Arkansas school system.  They had their students in high, medium, and low classes.  Even though I had all As and Bs, I was placed in the medium track for 11th grade.  Even though I had to take a 9th grade class in the 11th grade because I had already taken it in the 8th grade (so it wasn’t on my transcript), I was placed in the medium track.  Even though my English teacher told my parents that I didn’t have to do any of her homework or even read the texts and still get an A, I was put in the medium track.

No big deal.  Except, there was only one class in each grade level that was considered to be academically advanced.  And I had two cousins in that class.  And everyone in the school knew I was related to them.  And even though I loved the medium track, I was embarrassed by not “measuring up” to others in my family.

So my senior year the school put me in the advanced group based on my grades and my incredible boredom.

No big deal.  Except now the kids from the medium tracked classes no longer spoke to me.  And several kids in the advanced class thought I was an interloper of sorts (they had been together in the advanced class since kindergarten I was told), so some of them didn’t really accept me as part of the class.  And even though I was now in the advanced track, my cousins were still  smarter than me.  It was just easier to cover that up.

And the low track?  I never really met anyone from the low track.  I knew who they were.  Everybody knew who they were.  And I can only imagine how that label made them feel about being in school day in and day out.  That was when I wondered how Billy Bob felt when he pulled out his colored tab for the whole class to see.

Yeah, I’ve been tracked.  Long before there were cell phones.  Long before there was a Facebook.

And it didn’t feel any better then either.

Sometimes my mind just wanders to weird things.  Like this thought I had today that just came to me in a flash.  I didn’t dwell on it.  Its like the whole thought came to me in one blinding split-second big bang.  Instant clarity.

What if I went into my class one day and decided I was going to run it like the school systems of our state?  We are a right-to-work state, so naturally that would transfer into every child is allowed to have an education regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, socio-economic status, etc.

My class is going along smoothly.  When students are having trouble with work, or understanding rules, they come to me one at a time and we talk through the issues.  But, one day it changes.

In my class of 30 students, 16 decide they want to bind together to form a collective bargaining unit.  (That’s 50% plus 1 in case you have trouble with math the way I do).  So we meet together to hammer out a contract for “all” the students in the class.  When I ask about the other 14 kids, the response of the student union is that if they want to be represented they can pay a percentage of their lunch money to join the collective bargaining unit.  Otherwise, they can live the decisions made by the 16.

But then, 16 students talking to me at one time is unmanageable, so they elect 3 to sit at the table.  When the contract is over, I am only allowed to talk to the 16 students about any changes I may want to make in the rules regarding how my class will be run.  I only have so many homework assignments I can make in a given grading period.  And I can’t give a grade lower than a 70.  After all, the idea of a failing student is incomprehensible.

In addition, I can only post work examples on my wall of one of those 16 students.  The other 14 are not allowed to use the walls to display their work.  The student union gets to decide the seating arrangement for their group. The others get what’s left over.  And the union members get first dibs on the computers in the back of my class.  If I am going to call home, or send a letter to parents, I have to get it approved by the committee of 3 beforehand.

In this model of a classroom, two things are certain.  First, learning would stop.  Second, I would be fired.

When I was in school, I was (for all intents and purposes) one of those 14.  I wasn’t the popular kid in school.  I didn’t play sports.  I didn’t run for SGA. In junior high I hung out with the misfits and left-outs.  As a result, as an adult I root for the underdog.  And as a teacher I pull for those that are under represented, both student groups and teacher groups.

No doubt many of you reading this post looked at my class as a collective bargaining unit and thought, “This is NOT the way to run a class.”  And yet, it is the way we run our education system.

Hopefully, with the current legislation under review in Nashville, we will change things from a monopolistic bargaining model to a collaborative bargaining model.

And those 14 students will breathe a huge sigh of relief.

(Cross posted to www.bcape.org)

Or so goes the phrase made by the Borg in Star Trek: The Next Generation.  In those episodes (and later the movie featuring the Borg) the Borg was destroying all planets in its wake and absorbing humans into its part-human-part-machine totally networked existence.

Libya’s soon-to-be ex-ruler should be learning this lesson as well.  Although he has shut down protesters’ access to social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter in an attempt to stop, or stall, the revolution, these  young men and women are doing what their generation has always done.  Or should I say what every young generation has always done.  They are circumventing the system and finding new ways to communicate that changes the entire game plan.

According to a news report on NPR this morning, protesters have started using an online dating site to get their message out.  Posting their profile in code, they say things like, “May your day be filled with Jasmine” to indicate that they are part of the Jasmine Revolution.

We cannot fight the use of technology any longer in education.  We must begin to open doors of access where access has been denied.  Our kids have already done this.

Cell phone bans are futile.  Kids have them.  Kids use them.   Website filters are futile.  See the previous statement of futility.

Do we really think saying to our 7 year old daughter, “I don’t ever want to hear you say that word again!” is going to stop her from saying it?  But doesn’t it make us feel powerful to put that restriction in place?  Wouldn’t it make more sense to sit down with our child an explain why that is considered a word that is not acceptable?  That it shouldn’t really be used anywhere because it causes damage?  She may still use it later, but she will be aware of its consequences beyond that of being “caught” saying it in front of her parents.

Oh, if only I had been this wise when my kids lived at home.

Believe me.  Resistance is futile.

Ask just about any teacher, in any school, in any system, in any state and they will tell you they feel overwhelmed.  Never have so few done so much with so little.  Isn’t that how the quote goes?

It is especially true in the area of technology integration.  The best way to learn a new technology is to receive a little training (sort of an introduction to how the software or website works) and then go play.  That’s right.  Play.

In a perfect world, teachers would be able to use their planning period to play with one new piece of technology until they have a pretty good mastery of it for classroom use.  But this world hasn’t been perfect since God put a “Closed” sign on the Garden of Eden.

Instead, our teachers are faced with countless new technologies (SMART/Promethean Boards, document cameras, flipcams, websites, PLATO, Success Maker, RTI, blah, blah, blah) alongside new standards, new assessments, and a very different kind of kid.

Teachers often come to technology training with their eyes glassy.  They are dizzy.  Lightheaded.  About to throw up….  OK, I’m kidding.  But a common question that comes up is this, “How important is it that I learn this right now?”  Well, as a technology coach I think its pretty important.  But what would I say as a principal? A parent? A student? Or just a plain old fellow teacher?

And these are adults.  Adults are supposed to handle the stress of new things.  They are supposed to be able to multi-task.  They are supposed to have coping mechanisms in place to de-stress.

How do you think our students feel?  We want people to sympathize with us for all the new stuff we have to learn and make useful.  But, what about our kids?  Do we sympathize with them?

And so new memberships at the local gym go up.  More pills are prescribed. Energy drinks are flying off the shelves (even if they kill us).  And we are retreating into our own private world as much as possible, often eluding the need for community connections…and not just the ones on Facebook.

Teachers, I feel your pain.  I really do.  But today, I challenge you at the beginning of each class, while your kids are getting settled into their chairs and putting their overstuffed, filled-with-everything-but-a-pencil bookbags on the floor (in your way), take a deep breath and look at them.  I mean really take them in.  Do you see their feelings of being overwhelmed?

How will you help them cope…so they can learn?

Like Microsoft’s new round of commercials for Windows 7, everything seems to be going to the “cloud” these days. It is an interesting transition to watch.  It means a lot less privacy and a lot more connectedness.  The yin and yang of social computing.

Today as I was perusing my Twitter feed on my Droid (sound sufficiently “cloud-y”?), I ran across an article tweeted by one of my PLN members, Peter Schneider. The article, How Will Content Be Purchased in the Future? really got me thinking about the benefits to teachers, parents, administrators, and district level personnel when our curriculum goes to the cloud.

Yes, I’m talking mainly about digital textbooks, but it could be a lot more than that before its over.

Currently, we hand out heavy textbooks to students and assign reading passages, problems at the end of chapters, and quizzes and tests as we move students through the process of learning each subject.  We have little way to track whether any of this work gets done, or how long they spend doing it.

But the cloud will change all that.

When curriculum content is posted to the cloud, students will log in using their unique and secure username and password.  Teachers will get a report that tells them what time the student logged in and logged out, how long they spent reading a particular page in the “textbook”, whether they watched the accompanying video, which of the links to other sites were clicked, and every other action the student takes.

When curriculum content is posted to the cloud, students will take quizzes and exams online.  Results are automatically graded and immediately posted to the teacher’s gradebook.  Reports that identify trends in what students know and don’t know guide how instruction can be changed…overnight.

When curriculum content is posted to the cloud, administrators and instructional coaches can look at grade-level trends, sub-group trends based on ethnicity, socio-economic status, and other reporting categories that impact a school’s standing on state standardized tests.  Teacher effectiveness could be judged on hundreds of data points rather than just one each year.  And the academic direction of an entire school can be moved, tweaked, and prodded back toward gains.

When curriculum content is posted to the cloud, budgetary decisions can be tracked on a minute-by-minute basis if necessary.  Each module purchased can be tracked as to the number of students who accessed the program, how many assignments were created by teachers, and whether or not there is a correlation between the use of that content and student success.  The programs that are underused can be evaluated based on real-time data.  Decisions based on opinion or anecdotal data can be eliminated or refuted.

When curriculum content is posted to the cloud, parents can have 24/7 access to everything going on in a classroom.  They can easily track what their students are reading, watching, and learning.  Parent engagement can even be tracked as teachers and admins look at reports of how often a parent has accessed information.

I could go on, but I think you’re beginning to see the point.  Hard copy textbooks are so last century.  Everything is moving to the cloud (or an app tied to the cloud).  Education should be going that direction as well.

What do you think?

As you may have noticed by now if you follow me on Facebook or Twitter, or read this blog regularly, or visit my 365 Photo Challenge page, I am trying to learn how to take better pictures.  One of the first things I learned about improving my pictures was a little thing called “the Rule of Thirds.”

You will see what I mean in the picture in this post.  Each picture is divided in thirds from top to bottom and from left to right.  If you are shooting a horizon, for instance, you may want the horizon line to be on the blue line at the bottom to give you a lot more sky, or on the blue line at the top to show more depth to the image of the land or water.

Fairy Cake

The ideal (many times) is to get faces or objects of interest on one of the intersections of the lines as shown in the red dots.  In this case, I lucked into a shot that had both my granddaughter’s face and her cake on a red dot spot in the picture.  I accomplished this by turning the camera slightly to put the image at an angle.

The Rule of Thirds will help anyone with any type camera take a more interesting picture.  Gone are the days of putting a small head and body smack dab in the center of the frame where he or she gets lots in the surrounding scenery.  Of course, this is just one rule of photography; and, like most rules, there are times when it has to be broken in order to use another rule.

For me, teaching to standards is a lot like that small head and body shot that gets lost in the scenery.  Not only is it uninteresting, but it makes for a pitiful education experience.

My advice? (from the sidelines, of course)

Teach to the red dots.  Those are the ideas and thought processes just off center from the standards.  Those are the areas where students have to think and not just recite.  Those are the areas where students create and not just list.  Those red dots are where rigor, relevance, and relationship line up to make education interesting to the students again.

Engage your students in thinking again.  Its difficult, I know.  Believe me, I know. I know.  But don’t take no for an answer.

I’m committed to the 365 Photo Challenge.  Taking one good picture a day and posting it online.  Not just taking a picture, but taking a good one.  Sometimes I get that shot in 10 or 12 attempts.  Sometimes I have to take 100 or more pictures to get that one.

Your classroom won’t be any different.  Keep asking the questions.  Keep pointing them in the right direction.  Keep hounding them.  Give them questions in the classroom.  Give them questions over lunch.  Give them questions at home.  Post questions on your website.  Ask them in your blogs.  Engage the students.  Engage their parents.  Make them think.

If you can get a student to think, the standards and the standardized tests will take care of themselves.

You can use the Rule of Thirds to take better pictures.  And you can use it to create better learners, too.

As I was out looking for places to find interesting camera shots, I found this crumbling building on Lee Highway, just off the Bonnie Oaks exit in Chattanooga.  It is surrounded by flourishing businesses and newly constructed buildings.  Yet, here it sits looking like a bombed out shell of a former building you might find in a war-torn country.

In the midst of all this devastation, I noticed a purple plush toy face down in the debris of what appeared to be a former garage.  Boxes and paper and cups and other trash were strewn everywhere, and yet this plush toy jumped out at me in the midst of the clutter and color.

A child lived here.  More than one by the looks of other things I found in other rooms as I wandered around taking black and white shots of what I was seeing.  Something happened to these families that made them leave so much behind when they moved out.  Their lives were uprooted and cast away to some other location with such force that they could not pack all of their belongings.

As I stood there, camera in hand, taking in the site of destruction I was witnessing, my first thought was about these kids.  I’m a teacher, yes.  But I’m a parent and a grand parent.  And at one point, oh so many years ago,  I was a kid trying to find my way in new schools, seemingly one after another at times.  Our family never faced a crisis like the one these families must have encountered.  I still had a healthy, happy to go home to at the end of the day.  But these kids….it was a sobering moment.

Teachers, these kids are in your classroom.  Maybe not these exact kids, but kids like them.  Kids who come to school for food because there isn’t any at home.  Kids who come to school for safety because they don’t feel it at home.  Kids who have nothing but the same clothes you see them wearing practically everyday, clean or dirty.  Kids who are haunted by the devastation of being removed from one home and cast into another.  Kids who go home to see the depression and shame and servitude in the eyes of their parents and wonder if that is the future written in stone for them.

These kids need more than standards.  They need more than benchmarks.  They even need more a free breakfast and lunch. They need more than the latest and greatest technology your district office can afford.

They need teachers that care and care openly.  Teachers that connect and connect freely.  Teacher with compassion and compassion that touches the very core of their being to let them know they are not alone in the world.

They need you.

This is my third conference in 2 weeks.  OK, 2 and a half conferences.  I spent 3 days in Nashville at TETC and NSTA, and now I am in Memphis at MSTC.

Wait, wait.  That’s the Tennessee Education Technology Conference, the National Science Teachers’ Association, and the Mid South Technology Conference.  Now you know why educators, politicians, the military, and healthcare prefer acronyms.  I’m just sorry that none of these acronyms actually spell anything.

I think TETC and NSTA could learn a few things from MSTC.  Here are a few I’ve been mulling over in my mind.

1. Free wifi for everyone. You would think this would be a given in this day and age.  However, I know that the convention centers have not really kept pace with the demand.  Three conferences produce three very different results.  I thought TETC was bad for not providing wifi for attendees (presenters get an ethernet connection), but NSTA provides NOTHING for anyone.  They wanted $500 to provide me with a cable connection for 1 hour!  But at MSTC they have provided free wifi for two years.  Great choice.  TETC uses the excuse that the wifi is undependable for so many people.  Yet, their own keynote speaker said something to the effect that “to try is to succeed.”  Stop worrying about 100%.  Give us 60% and we’ll be happy!  The wifi went down for about 15 minutes at MSTC this morning.  Everyone just seemed to understand it was part of the price of doing business.

2. Teachers teaching teachers. I can’t really speak for NSTA since I was just there for one session, but at TETC this year it seemed that every other workshop was conducted by a vendor.  I’m all for vendor workshops, but I would like a little more choice.  MSTC has a few vendors giving presentations as well.  Who can fault the vendors for wanting to talk about their product to a captive audience?  But the vast majority of sessions seem to still be from teachers.  Those are the people I come to hear.  Tell me what’s working in your classroom.  I don’t have any money, or authority, to buy anything.

3. Truly push the back channel. TETC tried this year.  They had a twitter hashtag (#tetc10) and encouraged people to post there.  Yet, without wifi access, everything was limited to smart phones.  The back channel is where the real conversations take place.  It is where the learning starts to solidify as it bounces off the minds of others who aren’t even at the conference. You can follow the back channel here at #mstc10 on Twitter.

4. Stay in the trenches. Last year at TETC I tried to talk to people about the lack of wifi.  I got a cold shoulder and an unsympathetic ear.  Look, I know it is all about costs, but at least act like you’re listening when we complain.  Today, MSTC had some glitches with their registration system.  They even had people coming into my room to use the bank of Dells provided in order to register.  The blue shirted staff seemed to be everywhere on their radios.  I had a problem with my Promethean Board, and they kept checking on me until it was resolved.  I was in my room 2 hours early just to get set up.  I got the problem fixed 5 minutes before my session started.

Is MSTC without problems?  No.  What education conference isn’t?  But they are setting the foundation for a great conference down the road.  Right now they’ve got around 1,000 attendees.  It could easily rival FETC in 5 to 10 years.

And I’ll be proud to say, “I presented there when….”

No, this isn’t how much sleep I’ve lost since becoming a father…or a teacher.  I recently read this blog highlighting some findings from Malcolm Gladwell regarding talent.  It takes approximately 10,000 of practice on a thing to be able to develop professional talent in a thing.  10,000 hours.

So I did some math.  On average, teachers have 5 to 6 hours of class time each day.  Let’s just agree to call it 6.  10,000 divided by 6 is 1,667 days of teaching to really become a professionally talented teacher (rounded up to the nearest day).

We have 180 student contact days in our calendar, but with professional development teachers in Tennessee work 200 days a year.  1,667 divided by 200 is 8.3 years of teaching to become a truly talented professional teacher.

This is my 8th year of teaching.  I feel like I am finally starting to really “get it” in some ways.  I’m understanding kids’ behavior better.  I’m more reflective of my own practice.

Interestingly, it only takes 5,000 hours to be trained enough to teach someone how to be truly talented in a profession.  Maybe that’s where the misnomer comes from that “those who can do, and those who can’t teach.” (I would refer those who believe this concept to watch Taylor Mali’s video on YouTube one more time).

So, I suppose that it is no accident that we tenure teachers after about 5,000 hours of teaching.  They have proven they are on the right track.  The mistake comes when teachers are satisfied at being a “good teacher.” Another 4 years of practice and they could be a truly talented teacher.

It is kind of like the difference between a pastor who stays at a church for 30 years and another who changes churches every two years for 30 years.  One has 30 years of experience.  The other has 2 years repeated over and over and over. Which one do you want to lead your church?

Are you new to teaching?  Don’t be one of those statistics that says most teachers quit after 2 years in the classroom.  Change your paradigm.  Your college degree and Praxis scores didn’t make a you a good teacher.  They just got you in the door.  Put your head down.  Firm up your stance.  Get ready to attack that line again.  Did you get knocked on your backside yesterday?  Learn from it.  Don’t change grade levels just because someone told you 3rd grade was easier than 7th.  Keep working.  Practice. Practice. Practice.

Talent doesn’t come cheap.  Or quickly.

One of my favorite stories about the ministry involves a young minister who was assigned to a church where the former pastor had been there for over 30 years.  It was a daunting task to follow in the footsteps of a man so loved and revered by the small country congregation.

After a couple of months in his new pastorate, he noticed that the congregation was not really engaged when he would offer communion at the end of the Sunday morning services.  They did not look happy.  In fact, they would rarely look at him at all.  A few would walk to the front of the church, accept the wafer, and then quickly throw a disapproving glance his way.

Finally, in desperation, he went to the head of his deacon committee and asked if he knew what the problem could be.  “Well,” said the older gentleman, “I think the congregation is just used to having communion served a certain way after so many years.  You see, our former pastor had a ritual where he would walk over to the side of the church to serve communion instead of standing in the middle as you are.  When he prayed, he would reach down and touch the radiator.  I guess we just kind of got used to a certain ritual for our communion.”

Bewildered, the young man went to see the retired pastor the next day to ask about this “touching the radiator” thing.  After explaining how the congregation was not enjoying communion because he wasn’t touching the radiator when he prayed, the elder pastor threw his head back and let out a loud belly laugh.  “I’m so sorry,” he said after finally catching his breath.  “There is nothing spiritual about manner in which I served communion.  I went over to the side of the church and touched the radiator so I wouldn’t give anyone an electrical shock from my shoes running across the church carpeting!”

This congregation had seen something happen the same way for so long they began to feel there was something mysterious, magical, even spiritual about it.  They would not be satisfied unless they saw the same thing from their new pastor.

I wonder sometimes if teacher evaluations are like this.  Principals come into classrooms and “judge” the effectiveness of a new teacher on a regular basis.  But what happens when the principal doesn’t see what he or she “expects” to see?  What happens when the rituals they think work aren’t present?

Recently, Dr. Riggins of Lee University spoke to a group of aspiring administrators about a study he and his colleagues did a few years ago.  In the study, he asked principals to rate various teachers on a group of items the literature says make for effective teachers.  The principals completed a Likert scale for each of the teachers in question, ranking them from not very effective to very effective.  They were not told why they were doing the rankings.

When the data was collected, a correlation was made between the principals’ evaluations and the “effectiveness scores” (value added) of each of the teachers.  And the result?

There was a fairly strong negative correlation between what the principals perceived as effective and the actual effectiveness of teachers.

In other words, the more effective a principal rated a teacher, the less effective that teacher actually was.  And vice versa.

So my question is this: Were they looking for the radiator thing?