The obsessive focus on standardized testing, textbooks, and core curriculum has done more damage to the learning environment in the United States than just about anything else. It is as simple as the fact that, continually studying for a test just isn’t fun for students, nor does it engage their innate curiosity about life and the world around them . . . and much worse, it creates a permanent perception that school is a boring place, with educators (highly skilled professionals) primarily taking the blame.

In his presentation yesterday morning (5/22) at the Massachusetts Association of School Superintendents Spring Meeting, Dr. Yong Zhao, Technology in Education & Educational Psychology Director for the Center Of Teaching & Technology College of Education, Michigan State University, commented that standardized testing kills creativity and teaches students that they all need to know exactly the same material in exactly the same way. More importantly he presented a challenging idea, that it might be a positive move to throw out core curriculum. (Listen to his presentation here: Innovation3)

There has been much hand wringing over education for a long time. There have been reform movements and public policy attempts to “turn things around” in school. While the intent has been admirable, the results have not been effective – but why?

After 9/11 the United States scrambled to put policy, organizations, and laws in place that would ensure that the country would be safe from those kinds of attacks ever again. That’s the problem. The terrorist organizations, no doubt, anticipated this so they were already planning ways to disrupt the lives of the citizens of the United States differentlty . . . ways that weren’t being planned for.

There is a direct corollary to educational environments as they exist today: schools are designed to solve yesterdays, and occassionally todays problems – but not tomorrows. The solution is the re-imagining of what learning is, looks like, and how to facilitate it. But to do that, we must be willing to blow up what currently exists. That’s where Rebecca Barry enters the discussion.

Little Becky, as she is known around Dublin, Ireland, is an adorable little girl who was put up to making prank calls by a morning radio show in Dublin. Here she is trying to get her school blown up:

What would happen if your school made a “crash or a whollop,” what would you do? Of course I don’t mean this literally, but figuratively. What if there were no rules, no traditions, no rituals and the idea of school could be re-imagined?

In her book The Future and Its Enemies, Virgina Postrel (blog) asks a series of pertinent questions:

“How we feel about the evolving future tells us who we are as individuals and as a civilization.: Do we search for stasis – a regulated, engineered world? Or do we embraced dynamism – a world of constant creation, discovery, and competition? Do we value stability and control, or evolution and learning? . . . Do we think that progress requires a central blueprint, or do we see it as a decentralized, evolutionary process? Do we consider mistakes permanent disasters, or the correctable by-products of experimentation? Do we crave predictability, or relish surprise? These two poles, stasis and dynamism, increasingly define our political, intellectual, and cultural landscape.”

There seems to be a steady march towards the writing of a new educational manifesto and it is taking place primarily online. EdTech leaders have seen email turn into listservs and then social networks (Ning, Twitter, Pownce), bookmarks in your browser turn into social bookmarking (Digg, Diigo, del.icio.us) and YouTube into Ustream. Technology was misapplied when it was brought into the classroom, being used to maintain stasis, perpetuate tradition and ritual that has existed in education for 100+ years. It hasn’t had the type of influence that was imagined 25 years ago. But, it can . . . and I believe it will in the hands of dedicated EdTech leaders and innovative teachers. It isn’t a panacea, it is the vehicle to implement the process of re-imagining education.

Right now the tools that students are using to construct meaning, identity, and place are considered, by the majority of the educational community, to be disruptive. This can even be the case among the staunchest of EdTech leaders. Considering this: I recall being part of a conversation in Boulder, Colorado while attending the Computer Support for Collaborative Learning (CSCL) Conference as part of my MA work in Pepperdine University‘s OMAET program. We used TappedIn as our classroom venue during the distance phases of the program and during the conference a number of us were sitting around talking to a few of our professors and mentioned the fact that while we were attending their classes in TappedIn, we also opened an instance of AOL Instant Messenger and carried on a parallel conversation. The immediate reaction from some of the professors was indignation. How dare we sit and whisper in the back of the classroom while class was going on. Remember these were professors in a technology rich program designed to prepare us to be EdTech leaders. We explained how this peripheral conversation revolved around the main discussion and actually deepened and extended the one taking place in the “classroom” – and though it appeared to be “disruptive” it actually was as essential as the main discussion. (A caveat, those professors remain, to this day, as the most positive influences in my professional life, many thanks to Linda Polin, Gary Stager, Paul Sparks, Margret Reil, Mercedes Fisher, and Sue Talley.)

The world around the classroom is in hyper-flux, changing constantly at an ever increasing pace. But what about education? The best word to describe change in education is, “incrementalism.” It seems as if reform in the educational arena is always designed to proceed at a baby step pace. This doesn’t work! So let’s blow it up and re-imagine. In his book Re-Imagine!, Tom Peters talks a lot about “relevance” in the business world, (Tom Peters photo by Allison Shirreffs):

“To my 30-year old readers: I hereby wager that when you’re my age, Wal*Mart and Dell will be either dead or irrelevant.”

Sure Peters is a “business guru” but the content of this particular book has massive implications for education. Is he right? We will find out one day, but he has been spot on far more than he has been wrong. So, if Dell can one day be irrelevant, can schools be so as they exist today? Are they already irrelevent as they exist today? How about this from Education Next a journal published by the Hoover Institute at Stanford University:

“Computer-based learning is on the cusp of transforming traditional public education, say Harvard Business School’s Clayton M. Christensen and his colleague Michael B. Horn in the summer 2008 issue of Education Next. Based on their analysis of data on enrollments, about half of all education courses will be delivered online in just over a decade’s time.”

The article goes on to point out that the online student population was 22 times larger in 2007 than in 2000. Are schools irrelevant? Yes, as they are today. But, is the idea of education irrelevant? NO! So when does the re-imagine revolution start? It begins when we look for answers in the way students learn outside the structures of the classroom. It begins when we admit they might be learning far more, and far more practical material, outside of the classroom. It begins when we pick up the phone and call the demolition company – the people who also carry the vision for designing something new – and start taking risks and leave behind the fear of failure (failure = success), leave behind the traditional proprietary attitudes of the educational arena. It begins when we plant idea seeds outside of the comfort of our networks and use our networks to extend our discussions. Nicholas Negroponte, Founder and chairman of the One Laptop Per Child program, co-founder and director of the MIT Media Labratory, and the Jerome B. Wiesner Professor of Media Technology, once said,

“Incrementalism is innovation’s worst enemy.”

Be sure and read Dr. Scott McLeod‘s post at Dangerously Irrelevant: So what if schools don’t prepare kids for the 21st century?

(A final caveat: I am unashamed about the influence that books, people, and ideas have on my thinking and this post was heavily influenced by the book Re-imagine! . . . the word itself I adopt as a hue-and-cry and I think Mr. Peters would approve)

Additional Reading: “The Builder – Designing The Future of Educational Leadership” posted by Rob Jacobs at Education Innovation.

Powered by ScribeFire and Beans ‘n Cream.

Something has been really bothering me lately. I’m taking a college course called Introduction to the Internet for Educators. When I first saw the title I was really excited because I figured the teacher would be teaching me all about how to use the Internet to help kids learn. However, thats not quite how it played out.

His post struck a chord that is constant with me so I had to reply (not to mention I appreciate @mrplough07‘s Twitter stream and blog)

Cory,

You are spot on! This is one of the main reasons that technology continues to have little impact on education. It may empower tiny enclaves here and there – but it has not had the massive impact that it should. Your experience identifies one of the major reasons.

EdTech isn’t about coding, it’s about taking what coders have already done and empowering student learning and teachers professional growth. There are plenty of people out there already creating new and usable applications every day – teachers don’t need to worry about this. It is incumbent on EdTech leaders, like yourself, to continue to push the envelope and wildly imagine ways that these tools can open the learning architecture in your classroom.

True, it is beneficial to know the underlying ideas of coding and design – it’s even fun to play with on the side (and may help you see its power more clearly). However, it does not create a new vision of education and THAT is what your class should be doing, creating vision, opening new windows.

Here is the dichotomy, your in the choir and within this space are mostly choir members. How do we stop singing to the choir and go about creating a voice outside that will foster and nurture change? How do we release the potential energy of technology/the web so that it becomes a viable vehicle for true educational reinvention?

I found a simple definition of inertia , “An object that is not subject to any outside forces moves at a constant velocity, covering equal distances in equal times along a straight-line path.” Tech/the web is moving along slowly because so many are trying to “fit it in” or use it to simply to do what they are already doing, just differently. The power of Tech/the web is that we can use it to re-conceptualize our learning architectures so that they become powerful and visionary – creating what now doesn’t exist.

You are in a position to do that, to make a change where it is needed – be a revolutionary in your class . . . sing outside of the choir. And, not to sound too grandiose and melodramatic, then go on to teach these possibilities to those around you.

- Greg

Powered by ScribeFire and Beans ‘n Cream.

The points in this slide show are a good starting point for a discussion about a new form of education – a rethink exercise about how we design new educational environments. Any serious learning environment architect (teacher) needs to address these ideas as they move their practice from the status quo to what is needed. Thanks to dharm for bringing together these points from Will Richardson‘s book, Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts, and Other Powerful Web Tools for Classrooms.

Powered by ScribeFire and Beans ‘n Cream

According to Peter Senge, “the rationale for any strategy for building a learning organization revolves around the premise that such organizations will produce dramatically improved results.” Are our schools learning organizations or are they repositories for that which is already learned – and determined to be “necessary” for students to learn. The dichotomy seems to be that learning isn’t an underlying reason for education today – supported by an endless march toward standardizing all learning in the system and measuring it to make sure that everyone meets the least common denominator expectations of the system.

Technology has come in and “flattened the world,” to borrow from Thomas L. Friedman, but had little effect in our educational systems. There are pockets of educational innovation, supported or driven by technology, that swirl in a tiny nexus here and there. Edutopia and the GLEF Learning Interchange (both part of The George Lucas Educational Foundation) do a wonderful job of highlighting many of these, but they still remain the rare exception.

When technology has been brought into the classroom, more often than not it has been to merely do what is already being done, just a little differently. Smart boards, for instance, have made their way into classrooms, but for the most part are not changing things – they merely are the new chalkboard where children go to prove they have learned a mathematical or scientific formula. Teachers occasionally use slide show software such as PowerPoint or Keynote to project their lecture notes onto a screen. You might argue that both of these simple examples are the “changing” of education, after all the teacher can print the students math computations for them to evaluate or the slide show can be printed for students to review later. Fine, but is that really “change” or innovation, or more importantly, is that redefining the educational process? No. That is why technology isn’t changing education, because our thinking about education hasn’t and isn’t changing. Technology should already have empowered us to rethink the educational process and invent an entirely new system that supports the ways in which people (including our children) now learn.

Jack Welch says, “You can’t behave in a calm, rational manner; you’ve got to be out there on the lunatic fringe.” (thanks to Tom Peters for the quote) Education has throughout history been a calm, rational endeavor where the “learner” enters a room and is told what is important by the “learned” and then asked to repeat this “learning” at some later point in time. This model of the “learned” providing information to the “learner” is totally out of sync with the daily (outside of schools) life experience of today’s students. A prime example of the out of step relationship between education and society/technology was detailed in an article in the New York Times. Samuel G. Freedman recounted the antics of Professor Ali Nazemi, a professor at Roanoke College and suggested his cell phone smashing drama should earn him the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Freedman suggests that education is in a war with technology, “Their perpetual war of attrition with defiantly inattentive students has escalated from the quaint pursuits of pigtail-pulling, spitball-lobbing and notebook-doodling to a high-tech arsenal of laptops, cellphones, BlackBerries and the like.”

The entire process of brining technology and formal education together hasn’t worked, or maybe even happened. There has been a mad rush to fill our schools with computers and to connect them to the Internet. Little attention has been paid to digital cameras, digital camcorders, software that can loose creative spirits in students, scanners, and other peripherals that can make those chained desktops become learning tools. The computers are locked away in a lab, they can’t travel, they can’t bring their power to the real learning opportunities, most of which exist outside of the lab, the classroom, the school itself. Why? Because knowledge and the perceived tools of knowledge have to remain within the confines and management of the “learned.”

We are well aware of the hue and cry of those who feel that computers are more likely to bring unsavory elements or even danger into our learning institutions. The surprising thing is that they are right – but only because there is an unspoken refusal to include, within the educational experience, instruction and leadership in appropriate digital citizenship behavior. (Caveat: there is much debate about the term “digital citizen” and its derivatives, but to date I haven’t seen a better term so I use it with a mental caution that it may not be as accurate as I would like, maybe I should call it “digital behavior.”) For technology to be the power in learning it can be, our mindsets about how it is situated there must change.

Stephen Downes offers an equation for digital behavior, “literacy” + “safety ” + “etiquette” + “learning strategies” + “networking”. The key connection in this conversation is “safety” and its relationship to technology in the learning environment. Again, the hue and cry of the naysayers is accurate. We do not want to bring a potential for danger into our classrooms or learning institutions. Of course they have, for the most part, been successful in using this argument to keep technology out of the learning process. However, those advocates of redesigning learning environments that are supported or driven by technology must begin to employ the same thinking that has driven the rest of the digital society. Technology using and supporting educators need to stop trying to reinvent what is already working. Why do we need a specialized space to host dialogues or videos or podcasts when we have blogs, YouTube, and iTunes as a means to distribute and facilitate all of these things. But “YouTube isn’t secure and we certainly don’t want students wandering through some of what exists there” – fine, agreed, so put pressure on Google to provide a safe/secure space to legitimate educational outlets for the presentation of both student and teacher/professor created video that supports the educational process. The same strategy should be employed at web venues such as WordPress, demand a safe/secure space for education to be set free. Many wiki spaces already provide this type of safety and iTunes already provides access to many universities education presentation and class offerings – here is a great place to begin exploring this possibility.

Technology can’t change education because education resists being changed. We have a lot invested in the way we do learning and change is not comfortable – however, society continues, by its actions, to demand that we develop a new concept of what a learning institution is, and what it looks like, and how we go about learning with it. Until that happens technology will not change education – it will remain in opposition to the status quo.

Powered by ScribeFire and Beans ‘n Cream

Keep up the evangelism Lucy!

Powered by ScribeFire and Beans ‘n Cream.

While home schooling and online educational environments have become more common place and less controversial over the past two decades, the judges comments on the issue show a lack of understanding about the process of online education and a glaring disregard for parental control over a child’s education. The virtual school operates as a sort of hybrid combining aspects of traditional home schooling with those of a traditional classroom education while existing in a virtual space. The judge’s justifications for his decision are simply unsupportable. Since the parents are, in the judge’s estimation, serving as teachers
in the public school they must be licensed, if they are not, then the school is violating statutes that require all public school teachers to be licensed. “The problem is not that the unlicensed WIVA parents teach their children, but that they ‘teach in a public school,’” said Judge Richard Brown. He fails to delineate between an online educational environment and those of a traditional setting. The statutes he adheres to were designed before virtual learning spaces existed and can not be used to define the learning spaces of a new time.

Could the real reason for the suit by the teachers union be hiding in dollars and not common sense? Judge Brown indicated that state funds must stop being provided to the school because, the majority of its students live outside of the district where the school is located – which also violates a state statute according to the judge. Does a virtual school have a “location” or is it by it’s very nature not situated in a specific district? The state should fund education in its many forms. Wisconsin has an extensive higher education system (which includes a large technical college component) that it funds extensively and to some degree rather successfully. Why does this area of education seem to be problematic?

An attorney for students represented in the case makes the point that, “If in fact children enrolled from outside the district are enrolled illegally, that will affect most, if not all, of the virtual schools in Wisconsin.” So it would appear that if a district does not offer a virtual school option it can essentially force students living in the district to attend only the districts physical schools. This does not seem to be conducive to the growth of virtual learning endeavors. Judge Brown’s decision seems to indicate that,

• Schools can only exist in the district where a student lives
• Courses can only be taught by state sanctioned teachers
• Oversight by certified district teachers isn’t a significant factor
• The state can not fund innovative educational projects that meet the needs of Wisconsin’s constituents
• Education professionals can not work in concert with parents in educating children

With a growing base of literature over the past twenty years that details the diversity of learning styles that exist in the nations student population it would seem obvious that the public education sector needs to find ways to meet these needs. Rose Fernandez, president of the Wisconsin Coalition of Virtual School Families, makes it rather clear that the power and possibility of virtual school environments is real, “Many [families] have kids who are thriving for the first time.” The Northern Ozaukee School District seems to have made great strides in the direction of broadening the educational offerings made with the states money – thereby reaching more potential students.

The case, which will be appealed to the state’s Supreme Court, should force state legislators and educational administrators to rewrite or better yet – conceptualize anew – what it means to educate the state’s student population. Once they have done so, they can then put into place realistic supports for a system designed to educate students rather than perpetuate tradition.

Powered by ScribeFire and Beans ‘n Cream.

Powered by ScribeFire and Beans ‘n Cream.

For years I have talked with colleagues and technophiles (geeks rule) about ways to reduce textbooks to manageable proportions. With every new technology, especially in the realm of digital storage, we have new opportunities to make headway in the problem of textbooks. So along comes Amazon.com’s Kindle.The Kindle is not the first digital book reader, but the most recent to make a splash in a rather tepid area of technology. I love the idea of a digital book reader, love the idea of digital books and yes, at the same time I still love holding a “real” book in my hand.

My first experience with “digital books” was back when I had a Palm III. I was able to download a couple of books, including Sun Tzu’s The Art of War. At the time it was great, even on the tiny monochromatic screen, to have something to read when I hadn’t planned ahead and brought along a “real” book. Since then I have been interested in the development of digital books and the tools to read them. Their obvious use in the educational world drove my interest.

I recently read a couple of blogs reviewing the Kindle. Robert Scoble, Vice President of Media Development at PodTech.net does a nice job of identifying some of the gadgets shortcomings. His most important points would be the lack of any social networking capability and the lack of touch screen technology. Alexander Falk, aka XML Afficionado and\ President & CEO of Altova, Inc.offers his take on the Kindle in his blog. He seems rather pleased with it, though the comment that caught my eye was, “I’ve started using the original Sony Reader
over a year ago and just upgraded to the newest Sony Reader about 2
months ago – the reason is that I travel a lot and I like to read when
I’m traveling, but I don’t like to either lug around 5-6 books with me
or run out of reading materials during a trip.”

That’s the point!

I don’t own a Kindle, haven’t held one in my hands, but I do get it: It’s small, light weight, and it holds a lot of content. I don’t need to own one to see its real potential. So when I read the first “customer” review at Amazon is from “Eclectic Homeschool Mom”, I expected to see some mention of the things real potential – instead I was significantly irritated by the following comment:

“For things like textbooks and other books where I want a “real” copy of
the book, I would like to see a purchase option that includes a Kindle
version for almost nothing if I am purchasing the title in book form.”

What?

The Kindle’s most innovative potential is in education – eliminating the need for mountains of textbooks! I am potentially stepping back into Grad school where the cost of one semester of textbooks can often exceed the cost of the Kindle. Then there is the size of all these books, I don’t want to lug them around for the next three to four years. What I do want is for someone at Amazon to realize that the biggest untapped market facing them is the world of Higher Education. I want to go to the university bookstore and pick up a Kindle loaded with all of my textbooks, with powerful tools for annotating them and the ability to share these annotations with my fellow classmates – electronically. I want the ability to communicate with members of a study group at the same time I am reading the hundred pages due by tomorrow and not have to be in the same location. I don’t need and frankly don’t want a “real” copy of these textbooks. One copy is enough, if I can use it the way I need to.

I wish Scoble would have added one request to the bottom of his letter:

Mr. Bezos, please find a university to partner with (preferable the one I hope to attend) and embark on an innovative partnership with them.

1. Pick a graduate program.

2. Offer the students enrolled a Kindle (at educational pricing)

3. Provide all the textbooks in digital format each semester

4. Include powerful annotation tools and the ability to network with other students

That’s all I am asking for, is that too much?

Powered by ScribeFire and Beans ‘n Cream.

The article doesn’t suggest limits, it seems to be a suggestion of complete abstinence. The memo tells educators that they are not to participate in social networking via the Internet period:

“OEA [Ohio Education Association] advises members not to join [these sites], and for existing users to complete the steps involved in removing their profiles,”

OEA‘s action is interesting considering recent recommendations by the NSBA (National School Boards Association). David Cassel talks about the actions of the NSBA in his blog, Blorge.com as does Will Richardson, ” ‘Learner in Chief’ at Connective Learning and the author of the recently released Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts and Other Powerful Web Tools for Classrooms” on his blog. Andy Carvin, from PBS, also addresses the NSBA report at learning.now.

Among comments in the report from the NSBA are the following:

“Social networking may be advantageous to students — and there could already be a double standard at work. 37% of districts say at least 90% of their staff are participating in online communites of their own — related to education — and 59% of districts said that at least half were participating. “These findings indicate that educators find value in social networking,” the study notes, “and suggest that
many already are comfortable and knowledgeable enough to use social networking for educational purposes with their students.”

“In fact, 76% of parents expect social networking will improve their children’s reading and writing skills, or help them express themselves more clearly, according to the study, and parents and communities ‘expect schools to take advantage of potentially powerful educational tools, including new technology.’”

“In light of these findings, they’re recommending that school districts may want to ‘explore ways in which they could use social networking for educational purposes’ “

Ohio seems to have, for lack of a better term, overreacted. When a teacher establishes a classroom, they provide their students with a set of behavioral expectations and the consequence for violating those expectations. Is the OEA modeling how teachers would begin to incorporate Internet and communications technologies into the learning environment? They might want to read Chris Lehmann’s blog about change vs. innovation. The idea of rethinking schools and the process of education will only be that, an idea, unless the “powers that be” see educators as professionals and the act of education as a practice (not unlike doctors and lawyers – and other professionals who continue the learning process and apply new learning all the time.)

Andy Carvin also raises the point that politicians, who always want to have their hand in the educational process, are possibly out of touch with parents, students, and teachers (in other words, their constituents), “Speaking of district policies towards social networking, the findings of this study would appear to run counter to the thinking of many in Congress, given the wide support for pro-filtering legislation last summer in the House.”

We teach and expect responsible behavior from students, why not from teachers as well? Let teachers discover new ways to use the Internet and communication tools to expand the classroom and class time – unless they teach in Ohio.

Powered by ScribeFire and Beans ‘n Cream.

A great book with wonderful windows on what is already being done, as opposed to what “might be” . . . the goal, I am sure, to spark the “what if” portion of the imagination in educators who see their work outside of the box (yea, cliche I know, but a classroom is usually nothing more than a big box – right?)

Powered by ScribeFire and Beans ‘n Cream.