Okay, I think I’ve got this figured out, at least for now…
I use five primary tools to post content and resources to the Web:
Dangerously Irrelevant - where I put my longer, hopefully more thoughtful writing and have extended conversations with readers
Twitter - where I share resources and converse with others in shorter snippets
Delicious - where I bookmark sites that I want to use or revisit later (although I don’t use this as much as I should)
Mind Dump - where I put things that I want to capture (e.g., quotes, videos, images) for posterity; my personal archive for stuff that is too short or off-topic for Dangerously Irrelevant but also is too long for Twitter or Delicious (i.e., I want more than just the URL and a few keywords)
Google Reader - where I share out items from my incoming RSS feeds that I think will be of interest to others
I’m now using TwitterFeed to feed everything from Dangerously Irrelevant, Mind Dump, Delicious, and Google Reader to Twitter and Facebook. Everything that goes through Twitter also is sent automatically to LinkedIn and Google Buzz. So if you’re following me on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and/or Google Buzz, you should see everything that I’m sharing out. And, of course, many of you have put Dangerously Irrelevant and/or Mind Dump in your RSS readers (thank you!).
I could use Evernote for sharing publicly but instead I use it to archive things that need to be more private than Mind Dump (such as meeting notes, my highlights from Kindle books, and the HTML coding for my web sites). I also use other social media sites such as Flickr, YouTube, and Vimeo but I share their content through my five main channels above.
The feeds for Dangerously Irrelevant, Mind Dump, Delicious, and Google Reader all have been run through Feedburner so I can monitor RSS subscribers. I set up TwitterFeed to run everything through bit.ly so I can track how often items get retweeted. I also am using Google Analytics.
For those of you who are interested, here are the URLs and RSS/email feeds for my five main channels:
I think I’ve got all this set up so that there’s no duplication in any one place. For a while there, for example, I was posting the same resource more than once in Facebook. If you notice any future duplication, please let me know.
Is there anything I’m missing, forgetting, or also should be doing?
On the Internet, we write ourselves into existence.
That’s a wonderful thing. It allows us to reach audiences that we otherwise wouldn’t reach. It allows us to try on personas – and perhaps to reinvent ourselves – in ways that may be difficult in our everyday, face-to-face interactions.
But it also can be misleading.
Several recent incidents have caused me to revise some of my pre-existing beliefs about a few fairly prominent education bloggers. I now think and feel differently about them than I did just a few months ago, simply because I now have more information and thus a more complete picture of who they are.
I’ve been thinking about this as I get ready to head to the ISTE conference later this week. I won’t necessarily be wary as I interact with my edublogger peers, but I may be just a little less willing to accept things as they appear on their face. Not much, just a tiny bit. Most of the time people are as they appear – face-to-face or online – and I’d rather be a naive, trusting optimist than a negative, surly skeptic. But we have to recognize that we all also have secrets, ones that may remain uncovered because of geographic and/or interactional distance.
That edublogger who’s active in Twitter every evening and has a bunch of followers? He seems cool but maybe he beats his kids.
That edublogger with 20,000 subscribers and a heart of gold online? She seems great but maybe she’s cheating on her spouse. Or a cutter.
That charming, effervescently cheery and witty edublogger that everyone loves to hang out with at the conference? He seems wonderful but maybe he’s embezzling funds. Or a kleptomaniac. Or a drunk driver.
As you head to the ISTE conference later this week, or simply interact with folks online, I leave you with the thought:
Can you ever really know that edublogger beside you?
Update: I’m not as pessimistic as this may read. I’m just thinking out loud here…
Civic Enterprises has released its latest study, Raising Their Voices, concerning America’s dropout crisis. What resonated with me the most was the voices of the students in the report. Here are some samples:
“To me, high school is like elementary and middle school. It’s all the same. We’ve been doing the same thing over and over again.”
“If you just fight your way through it now and get through school … eventually it will be interesting when you get into your career field.”
“I’m going to be honest: school is really, really boring. I hate coming here.”
Issue 1: Student boredom
I hate coming here. If you just fight your way through it. The same thing over and over again. These are pretty damning words. They also are pretty common. As the report noted, many students view high school as something that must be tolerated as a stepping-stone to [something] better (emphasis added).
When’s the last time your school organization asked its students how interesting and engaging their classes were (and then took their responses seriously)?
Issue 2: Meaningful community discussion
The researchers brought together students, parents, and teachers in four different communities to collaboratively discuss the high school dropout program in their local area. In each case, individuals remarked that this was the first time that teachers, parents, and students had been brought together to talk about any issue, including the dropout crisis (emphasis added).
When’s the last time your school organization had teachers, parents, and students (and, yes, administrators) in the same room talking candidly and safely about important issues?
Issue 3: Disconnects between groups
The report noted that:
while dropouts cited boredom as the leading cause for dropping out, many educators we surveyed did not see this as the central cause. In fact, only 20 percent of teachers saw a student’s lack of interest in school as a major factor in most cases of dropout. More than twice as many believed students were making excuses for their failure to graduate. . . .
Additionally, although students said that higher expectations would have mitigated the factors leading to their dropping out, only 32 percent of teachers agreed that we should expect all students to meet high academic standards and graduate with the skills that would enable them to do college-level work, and that we should provide extra support to struggling students to help them meet those standards.
These disconnects exist everywhere, of course. No organization is immune from them. But perception shapes reality. If students say they’re bored and teachers just think students are making excuses and don’t reflect on their own instructional practices, the problem never gets solved.
When’s the last time your school organization intentionally worked to uncover and then meaningfully address existing cognitive, emotional, and perceptual disconnects between groups?
Wrap-up
The Raising Their Voices study was conducted on behalf of the AT&T Foundation and the America’s Promise Alliance. The report illustrates the kind of conversations that can occur when you bring disparate groups of school stakeholders together. It also shows that disconnects between groups can be effectively bridged through structured dialogue and a spirit of mutual respect. The report includes recruiting instructions and a sample discussion guide to help schools set up their own local focus groups. As school leaders, we should do this more…
Here's another envisioning of the forms that traditional print publications are going to take as tablet eReaders and computers become more prevalent. This one is from Penguin Books and shows what some interactive experiences might look like for younger children.
Iowa State University held its second annual ComETS symposium a couple of weeks ago. Faculty, professional staff, and a few outside folks gathered together to talk about technology integration and implementation in higher education.
Building a community of practice through blogging
Below is my 10–minute ‘lightning strike’ presentation, Building a Community of Practice Through Blogging. I didn’t have my ‘A game’ that day and wasn’t as energetic a presenter as I usually am. I also spent too much time on the ‘creating a listening station’ portion and not enough time on the ‘participating in the conversation’ portion. That ratio was supposed to be 50–50, not 75–25. Despite all that, I think that the presentation came out pretty well and is a solid introduction to RSS and blogging communities for academics. Here’s a quote from my talk:
Most academics have yet to realize the power of social media. . . .
The reason we go to academic conferences is for the conversations. It’s not for the research presentations because you know how good those are. And it’s not to access the papers because we can get those in other channels. It’s to be around other people and have those conversations in the hall and after the sessions and at dinner and so on that solidify our relationships with people. Well, now we can have those conversations year-round. All we have to do is choose to be part of the conversation.
The other thing that we generally fail to think about when we give presentations is a call to action. What is it that you want someone to do after you’re done?
Funny thing about paradigm shifts: If we knew what the next paradigm was, we'd already be there.
Where is the student in all of this?
The opportunity is in increased student engagement [Do most profs at research universities really care about increased student engagement? If so, they haven't really showed it to date.]
I like ComETS because it's an opportunity to learn from other ISU educators, both faculty and professional staff, across campus who are doing interesting things with digital technologies. The annual ComETS symposium gives us an opportunity to intersect face-to-face in a variety of different ways. The ongoing ComETS listserv connects us and allows us to share and discuss in between symposia. We're off to a good start. Now the challenge becomes: how do we expand from those that already are technology-inclined to those that need to be? The latter group is much larger than the former…
You can see some backchannel conversations from the symposium by searching for the Twitter hashtag: #comets. Happy reading!
Roger Wilcox, principal of West Cedar Elementary School in Waverly, Iowa, has a burgeoning YouTube channel that he’s using to communicate with his local community:
Given how easy it is these days to post online video (think YouTube QuickCapture and a webcam, Flip cameras, etc.), I’m baffled that more administrators aren’t taking advantage of the opportunity to speak directly to their communities on a regular basis. Forget newsletters, e-mail listservs, or blogging; just turn on the video camera and start talking!
There are numerous benefits to being in regular communication with internal and external stakeholders. The use of online video to connect, explain, build goodwill, create enthusiasm, be transparent, share student work, highlight teacher excellence, tell a story, etc. is a powerful but untapped possibility for most school leaders. Videos don’t have to be polished or professional. Simple, honest, direct communication usually is more meaningful, anyway.
Dive in!
School leaders, take the plunge: Turn on the webcam or Flip camera and start talking from the heart. You won’t regret it.
[P.S. Teachers can do this too. Dump that paper classroom newsletter. Instead, start a weekly broadcast to your families!]
Judy O’Connell asked if the video below is the future of magazines. Yes, absolutely. Maybe not by 2010 or 2012 but sooner than we think. And for newspapers and books too. And, to a lesser extent, maybe we’ll even start seeing more interactivity and/or multimedia embedded within scholarly research, government or policy center reports, and other manuscripts.
If ‘news’ is becoming more of a commodity every day, perhaps it’s this sort of added value from which publishers will make their money. I know I’d pay for something like this from my favorite periodicals.
Here are four tales out of school, as relayed by parents:
Hatshepsut and Thutmose
Four questions from a study packet for a middle school World Civilizations class:
A. Nubia developed trade routes over land because:
there was not enough wood to build boats
the Egyptians controlled the Nile
the cataracts prevented river travel in Nubia
Nubians only traded with West Africans
B. According to legend, who united Upper Egypt and Lower Egypt?
Hatshepsut
Menes
Amon-Re
Thutmose III
C. Thutmose III was all of the following except:
a conqueror
an educated man
unmerciful to the defeated
a great Pharaoh
D. What was the kingdom of Kerma known for?
great poverty
skilled archers
delicate pottery
ironworking
These are just a sample; most of the items in the packet are similar. Students have to ‘learn’ these because they’ll be quizzed on them.
It’s very hard for me to see this kind of schoolwork and not think that vast amounts of student time are just being wasted. And I’m the first to admit that I did this when I taught 8th grade. I didn’t know any better, but that didn’t make it right. There are lots of great higher-level concepts possible in this unit, such as the inter-dependent relationships between people and land, what influences where civilizations develop, and so on. But I don’t see those concepts here (and I wasn’t ever taught to focus on those as a teacher or student teacher).
[Correction: I've been informed that students did get to learn/write about some of those higher-level concepts too. That doesn't remedy the multiple-choice items for me, but it does help me feel slightly better.]
Study hall rules
In a high school cafeteria, there are flyers about study hall that say (among other things):
Students may eat and drink as long as they clean up after themselves.
Students may listen to music as long as they have headphones.
Students may talk quietly.
Game/Card playing, laptops, or any other such devices are not permitted in Study Hall. I-Pods are for music only.
NO CELL PHONE USAGE!
In other words, you can eat snacks, hang out and talk with your friends, and listen to your music during ‘study hall,’ but you can’t use what may be the most powerful learning devices that humanity has yet invented.
Assessment reliability, validity, and parent (dis)trust
An e-mail exchange between a parent and a high school teacher…
Parent
Dear [teacher], I would like to find out how to get a copy of my son's exams for his Algebra 2 class. My son's name is XXXX XXXX. He informed me that he is not allowed to take them home. I am very surprised by this. I don't know how I, as a parent, am supposed to help him if I don't know what he is not understanding. Also, it is very helpful to students to have their exams to study for the final. I am happy to pay for copies. Please let me know what I need to do. Thank you.
Teacher
I am attaching a pdf of our departments rationale for keeping students' tests on file. In addition, students are welcome to set up times when they may review a test in the math study center. When exams are returned, they are welcome to write down a question in their notes to which they may refer later.
Parent
I am very disappointed by this policy although at least the department lets parents and students look at their old exams. I appreciate not letting them come home until all students have taken the exam, but it seems that waiting a week would be fine. The "needing copies on hand" can be dealt with by letting a parent pay for a copy to take home if requested or by scanning and emailing. As for the issue of not wanting to make up new problems, math is one of the easier subjects to do this in so I'm really surprised.
I hope that students have been informed of this policy; I as a parent certainly haven't been by any department. My son didn't seem to be aware of it though, but that could be a teenage thing. What times are available for me to come in and look at the exams? Do I make the appointment with you to get the exams or go through the math study center? Thanks for your help.
In other words: No, we don’t trust you or your child (and/or we can’t be bothered to make an alternative assessment); if you are willing and available to take off work and come down here, we’ll show you what you want to see and you can take some notes but you may not have even a copy of your child’s work.
No computers for you!
It’s December and some upper elementary students have yet to use a computer this year for anything other than typing practice and to look up things in the library catalog. [I’m not sure there’s anything to say about this except to sigh in dismay]
Wrap-up
Four tales out of school. Four tales that could exist in most districts in the country. Four tales that illustrate the disconnects that often exist between our schools and the caring, empowering, relevant, meaningful, modern learning environments that we should be creating for students and their families. Got one or more tales to share of your own?
I could use Evernote for sharing publicly but instead I use it to archive things that need to be more private than Mind Dump (such as meeting notes, my highlights from Kindle books, and the HTML coding for my web sites). I also use other social media sites such as Flickr, YouTube, and Vimeo but I share their content through my five main channels above.