2zanne’s Weblog

At the beginning of every month I complete a monthly calendar of all of our activities and other commitments. I also add my night classes to the calendar so my family knows what’s happening. I can’t believe that we only have three weeks until presentations start. I’m not sure where my students will be by then. Regardless, I think I will choose the latter of the scenarios presented in the title. I know that learning new technology takes time and I have heard many times this semester, “you learn by doing”. My students and I are definitely learning and what’s cool is that we are learning together. I have also seen progress in other participant’s blogs and classroom blogs. A lot of work has gone into the development of these tools.

I wonder if people who are involved in working daily with technology realize how much work it takes for someone who is not familiar with a program to produce a short video or some other presentation. Do you become desensitized to this fact? Do you become impatient with the lack of progress in your own professional development? And, how do you gauge someone’s progress in technology? I would love some feedback from anyone in our course.

I watched several videos throughout the day and the one that resonated with me on this particular day was Tom Peters, Educate for a Creative Society. The reason it stuck with me is my son was the child he spoke of; the one that coloured outside of the lines and received a poor grade for art. There are many children who do not fit the mold and whose creativity and spirit are crushed by the implementation of a plethora of curricular objectives; and systemic issues that have nothing to do with learning. When children don’t fit the mold educators attempt to “fix” the child rather than fix the mold. If you haven’t had the chance to view the documentary Stupid in America, you really should. It brings to light a lot of issues that the public education system is currently experiencing. A worthwhile viewing!!

I spent the last Friday afternoon, Saturday and Sunday officiating at a swim meet. The days were very long but they provided parents with an opportunity to catch up with what was going on with the kids. What struck me that weekend was the talk related to motivation and success. I had one parent ask if I thought kids were sometimes scared of success. We were of course talking about swimming but I believe it is relevant in other fields. I do think kids are sometimes afraid of success. I explained that with every achievement the bar is raised and for some the thought of having to work harder is unbearable. I know with my son’s swimming success this weekend he will now have to train harder to move beyond the times he got. Will he be motivated to improve on those times or will he find the expectations of the next level unattainable? Only time will tell.

To bring this back to this course and the issues we are dealing with I would say that one of the reasons teachers lag in computer technology might also be due to this fear of success. I have heard, here and there, a few teachers express concern regarding expectations placed on them. What else would be placed on their plates if the majority of teachers are competent in integrating computer usage into daily teaching and learning? What would be expected of them regarding programming and evaluation? These are questions that have been raised.

On Friday (Feb. 22) I presented our subject blog and Voicethread presentation to my grade 12 and adult ed. class and six out of nineteen students were somewhat excited about working on a blog and volunteered to complete the Voicethread. I was extremely disappointed. I asked the others why they didn’t want to participate and some said, “It looks like a lot of work!” I was hoping that integrating computers into daily learning would motivate the students. Not so! I am also learning that what would normally take a week to complete at another school takes about three to four weeks to complete here. I’m hoping that I have something to add to our course blog soon. You can check it out at “Voices at Cochrane”. Not much there but we are working on it.

Last night I participated in the WoW 2.0 session in Ed.Tech Talk. It was a great session. It was a little intimidating at first as there were a lot a people in the session who are quite knowledgeable in the technology sphere. It was nice to see other participants from our class. Of course every time I go into a new program or to a new site my stomach turns as I don’t know what to expect (Will I figure out how to turn on the audio?; Is there video?; Will I be able to keep up with the chat? Am I knowledgeable enough to participate?, etc.). It’s getting better as I get more comfortable with technology. I do realize that there are similarities between programs so really I shouldn’t panic every time.

This brings me to the issue of technology being embraced by teachers (discussed in last night’s session). These are the doubts and feelings that we have to deal with when talking about moving forward with technology. Last night we talked about PD and giving time to teachers to “play” with technology. I have organized many PD sessions in my twenty years of teaching and I can honestly tell you that in school-based PD sessions time for “playing” is not usually given to teachers. I’m afraid many would view this as a waste of time; and if a planned, structured PD session exploring new tools on the Web was presented, which tools would meet the needs of most teachers. In my school I’m not sure we would be able to convince the shop teachers of the value of learning about Voicethread, and others. We still have some that refuse to check their email because they don’t like working on the computer. Yeh, pretty sad!

I guess you start small. I’ve offered to show the English teachers how to integrate Voicethread and ComicLife into their units. I hope they find it useful. I’ve also forwarded Paul Hami’s blog to teachers as it has some useful information (especially in our school).

Well, I spent part of the day learning about WordPress blogs. There are still things I don’t understand but I will eventually figure it out. I have set up my class blog, Voices of Cochrane. I did manage to set up categories (not sure if I will keep them) and insert a picture of our school.

I also spent some time today putting together a Voicethread to present to my students- What we’re about!. I managed to get the pictures uploaded and organized. The next step will be to add audio and then present to my students. Some of my students have already starting working on a Voicethread presentation.

I did manage to spend some time with my family today. We all went to the gym to workout and then came home and prepared a very nice meal. It was a ,quiet family dinner. We don’t often have that luxury as we are very busy with competitive swimming and hockey.

It was nice to have the day to get caught up in readings and videos.

Yesterday was our first crack at using ComicLife in the computer lab. We’ve been studying Medieval Warfare (Grade 9 English-all boys) and one of the writing assignments is to create a comic/graphic story of their own. I demonstrated how to use the program and showed them what they could do (first time for me!). They’ve been paired up and each student must produce a page for their story. The rest of the hour was spent completing graphic organizers and finding pictures. Tomorrow the students actually get into using the program. Out of a group of 14 boys, there were only two that didn’t like what we were doing (but they don’t ever want to participate so…). I will post a sample when I can. It’s a fun program. Comiqs is a similar program. I will probably have a couple of students using this program due to limited supply of MACs in our lab.

For my project I had originally wanted to use Voicethread in my Eng. 31 class but I think I can go beyond that now. What I really want to do is start a class/English blog but I’m still figuring out how to do that with the students I am currently working with. I work in a vocational school and all students follow a modified curriculum. Most students aren’t even at the grade level that they are placed in. In this particular class the reading levels range from grade 1 to grade 10 (I completed informal reading inventories with each student). I have 26 students in that class and no assistant.

In my last curriculum class I presented a book written by Dennis Littky entitled “The Big Picture: Education is Everyone’s Business”. It has some great ideas pertaining to curriculum, assessment and motivation of reluctant learners in alternative schools. In short, it talks about interest-based and project-based learning. If you have any spare time (ha!ha!), it’s a great book and an easy read. I am doing more of that type of learning and the students are buying into it. Technology is a great way to pique their interests. I’m wondering if I should just go with an English blog and ask students to volunteer to post items.

I have a couple of concerns: 1) What impact will a class/English blog have on students who can only complete the simplest of tasks?, 2) In my opinion (and Kim’s too), a class blog should be updated regularly, this would probably not happen with my students as it takes 2-3 times longer to get my students to produce any writing or complete assigned readings, 3) What would I include on the blog as students are following individualized programming?, 4) Those of you who have created class blogs do you evaluate student postings?

I have a pretty good idea what I’m going to do but I would greatly appreciate any thoughts or comments you might have?

Wow, what a week. Trying to keep up with semester turn around, reading, individualized project-based learning, reading inventories, interviews, video viewing, Elluminate, Skype, iGoogle, Voicethread, Animoto, ComicLife, and Blogging. Whew!! I’ve learned more in the last four weeks about computers than I have in the last twenty years.

I enjoyed both sessions this week. Wednesday’s session was a great overview of what’s available to us for use with students or for presentation purposes. Still learning computer lingo. My goal this week is to explore Jing and Twitter. I haven’t yet opened a Twitter account but with all of twittering going on I should probably check that out. I can’t believe how much is “out there”!

I’ve included a very short sample of Animoto. This is a great program that allows you to produce a short video accompanied by music. I can see this being used to promote your school, a pep rally or simply a video project for students. The program is limited in the sense that text can’t be added but it’s great for introducing ideas or simply entertaining your audience. I believe Dean used it to present a short video on the Roman Empire. Have a look, the students would love it. (Yeah, the link worked!!).

Cochrane Rocks!

George Siemens and Michael Wesch in the podcast entitled “Future Learning” state that the reason young people are able to successfully use Web tools, such as Facebook, Wikipedia, etc. is due to their willingness to experiment. I can attest to that. My boys have been playing/exploring WorldofWarcraft for awhile and they love it. Siemens makes reference to this game and 2ndLife. I have asked my youngest to show me the game. I’m not really interested in learning how to play but I figure I should see what the commotion is about. The point has been made several times throughout the course material that” the importance of a tool is not realized until it is used” (Siemens and Wesch). I don’t see how WofW can be useful but one can never tell.

Siemens (podcast) states that a core skill that educators will need to develop among students is how to function in a constantly changing environment. I agree, however, I think Boards of Education first need to assist teachers in how to function in this fluctuating environment, and then we can focus on teaching students. A class such as this one is a perfect Professional Development opportunity to assist educators in moving forward, into the 21st century. My participation in this class is due to a credit requirement for the completion of my Masters. I probably never would have taken such a class on my own. I’m glad I did. It has provided me with access to the world of our young; vital when working with youth. I’ve been sharing some of the tools, such as, YouTube, WordPress and Voicethread with colleagues. They are resistant, and yes, even afraid. Emotions felt by many!

How then do we get teachers to explore the various educational tools out there? Do we mandate it? Other professions do, why don’t we? Money, time, resources (computers)? I have a cousin who is a pilot for Westjet. When technology changes he has to be trained to use it otherwise he’s pretty much useless. How can we effectively do our jobs when we are not trained in the tools of today or the tools of the future, as “the future is already here” (Siemens, podcast)?

Well, I’m off to play World of Warcraft. Talk to you soon!

Well, I spent some time playing and learning on Voicethread this week. What a great tool! I already have several ideas for its use in my English courses. I’m looking forward to starting semester two so I can get going.

I listened to Marc Smith’s interviews (Parts 1 & 2) entitled “An Inflection Point” and found them to be fascinating and frightening at the same time (couldn’t help think of the movie “I Robot” and other SciFi movies/books). Smith essentially talks about mobile devices such as phones, blackberries, computers, and how they will transform our society from one that is ephemeral to one that is archival. He was even talking about communication between devices and the power of self-documenting. A few quotes that resonate with me are, “every object has a story or will have a story to tell” and “mobile devices will sprout sensors like a Swiss Army Knife”. Smith spoke about the possibility of “life logging”. This idea is similar to the idea of LPWS (Lifetime Personal Web Space) presented by Cohn and Hibbitts. Smith goes on to state that mobile devices are changing the social network and that the world could become annotated in every aspect, not just books, DVDs, movies, but personal phone calls/emails and even actual activity (movement) documentation. Meaning your every move is recorded on some device and is stored somewhere.

Of particular interest to me was the question: What are the implications of having all collective action recorded or annotated? Pretty scary if you ask me. It would be difficult to remain anonymous, detached or removed if one wanted to. In my opinion we would be sacrificing personal freedom and privacy for information access and sharing. Smith states that a lack of activity or interaction via mobile devices would easily identify or single out an individual. Take for example this course, a lack of activity or participation by a participant would certainly bring that person to the attention of the professor and other participants. Is that person having difficulty with the course work; is he/she disinterested; or is it as simple as not wanting to complete the required work? Who knows! The point is inactivity signals or flags the individual. Maybe that person wants to be left alone. That would be difficult in an annotated world. It becomes much easier to single someone out when analyzing the amount of activity through on blogs, emails, and other tools than it would be in the traditional classroom (world). Do you want this? Are you willing (is there a choice?) to sacrifice your personal freedom and privacy in the New Age?

What do you think? Give it a listen, it’s worthwhile. Fascinating stuff!!

Well, I need to get my act together. I (like Angie) have learned so much in this class already. However, I have yet to move away from the textbook. Ahhhh! I even printed off some of the readings required in this class. Why? Because I don’t like reading text on the computer screen. I often feel like I’m wasting my time when I sit at the computer screen. I have been comparing that time to the time my own children spend at the computer screen playing games. I know it’s not the same thing! I have vowed to set aside time everyday to sit and read, view, blog or converse on this black box. I will walk away from the comfort and security of the paper world and leap into a visual and interactive world of technology. I know, enough already, move on!

I found the article on LPWS very interesting but frightening. I’m not sure I’d like a personal web space with my personal history posted somewhere out there in cyber space. I understand that a blog is similar to that but what Cohn and Hibbitts are talking about is beyond comprehension, for me anyways. Several questions came to mind: security of the site? management of information? time involved in the input of information? the validity of the information? I discussed some aspects of this article with my grade 11 students and asked them what they thought about the idea of a LPWS. Most of them didn’t like the idea because of “hackers”. They were afraid to have too much personal information out there. This of course led to other topics but the majority of comments dealt with security of information. Most students said that they don’t even do their banking online because of security issues. I found this interesting as they are active participants in the webage.

In the article “Reconceptualizing the Digital Divide”, the concept of literacy and the link to meaningful use of ICT is what was of particular importance to my teaching and student learning. Paolo Freire states that” literacy instruction is most effective when it involves content that speaks to the needs and social conditions of the learners” (p.9). The issues of relevancy and engagement are issues that educators continue to grapple with. I believe it was Cindy, who in Tuesdays session made the comment that if students are engaged they stay in school. This is the issue that we are dealing with at Cochrane, and I’m sure that many of you deal with this issue as well. In my school attendance (lack of) and drop-out rates are very high. Traditional teaching methods do not engage our students. I often hear students state that they are unable to read yet they can surf the web, blog, post videos and spend hours on the computer communicating with friends. This is why I think it is imperative that teachers be better trained in technology so they can use these tools (computer, web, etc.) to link the teaching sphere to the learning sphere (does that make sense?). I know that I need to incorporate the computer more in daily sessions. One program I just finished working with was “icomic” on the Apple. I enjoyed learning how to use it (not difficult at all) and my students had fun using it and produced quality work. They put together comics related to the Middle Ages.

I am still exploring some of the tools mentioned in Tuesdays session. I have spent most of that time in Google (Reader, Calendar,Documents, etc.). I find if I try to learn about to many of the tools I get a little anxious and overwhelmed by the amount of information coming my way. So one tool at a time. I’m also still playing with all of the options in WordPress. Some of the blogs out there are so informative and well presented. I would love to be able to put something together for one of classes by the end of the semester. We shall see.