Cell phones and teens seem to go together like PB & J these days. It's hard to imagine one without the other...and yet cell phone technology is banned in most classrooms. Is it possible, however, that we might make peace with these tools---even use them for our benefit?

Liz Kolb thinks so. Her blog, From Toy to Tool: Cell Phones in Learning, has me thinking about all sorts of new things. I admit that I don't use my cell phone for much more than a few calls and some text messaging. I have used the camera option a few times to document some information, but I truly haven't thought about the range of this tool.

One of my favourite new discoveries is Poll Everywhere. How cool is this for teachers? You know those fancy-dancy clicker systems? You don't need them now. Just set up your questions ahead of time and then have students use cell phones to respond. What a great way to do formative assessment during lessons. Imagine the power of using this in staff development. People can text questions into you, participate in formative assessment polls, and more. I SO want to give this a test drive at my OSPI presentation at the end of the month.

Did you know that Google has all sorts of cell phone apps? Need directions? Just text the location (if your phone has GPS, you don't even have to supply it with the starting point). You can do searches for information and Google with text your answer to you. Can you see kids finding information to questions while you work with them or they do another activity?

What about broadcasting reminder messages via text (or audio) to students? What about them recording information and sending it to you? Imagine them using their camera phones to document changes in an experimental setup over time and then using those to create a product (either digital or on paper).

I can see that you would need to work with kids to make it clear when and why the phones could be out being used during class time. There would need to be some procedural training, but then that would be true for other classroom routines. This is just a new aspect.

If all of this is piquing your interest, too, here are a couple more useful sites developed by Liz:

• New Tools: Cell Phones as Classroom Learning Tools from the 2008 K-12 Online Conference
• Cell Phones in Learning wiki

Maybe cell phones aren't the enemy of our classrooms. Perhaps it's time to make our peace with them and put them to work.

Labels: technology

Teachers are packrats. The saving grace of the digital age is that most resources don't have to take up real space, just occupy spots on a server. Thank goodness for that, because with new tools and ideas generated daily, there would never be room for them all. My del.icio.us account keeps growing (if you want to add me to your network, e me for details as I have things there under my real name). I really do like this service. I'm rarely check my network for new ideas, but I also like that I can bookmark all sorts of things, label them, and then access them from anywhere.

Here are a few highlights which were either suggested to me or that I stumbled upon as I was rollin' around the web:

• Two new and interesting mind-mapping tools. One is Text 2 Mind Map and the other Mindomo. (Screen shots for each are below. Click to embiggen.) I think that Mindomo has many more great features and classroom applications. I like that you can link the map to other areas on the web, notations, etc. And you can download maps onto your classroom website. Text 2 Mind Map, however, is really simple to use and has an easy interface for moving between an outline and graphic form. Speaking of graphic organizers, check out this great page with 100 Helpful Web Tools for Every Kind of Learner. There are amazing ideas for differentiation using technology here.

• Privnote is truly just for fun. In Mission Impossible form, you can send e-mail that will self-destruct after it is read. I can imagine what a kick it would be to send students reminders about deadlines or tests or other events using this tool. It would be great for communicating with peers about meetings, too.
• In terms of meeting up, have you ever struggled to find a time and date which works for everyone? Next time you're trying to set up something, why not give When Is Good? a try? You click the times on a grid which work best for you and then send the link to others so that they can do the same. This saves a ton of e-mail time and hassle with coordination. Let this site save you from an aching head.
• Have a look at all of these game templates. While I can easily imagine using some of these with student and teacher groups, I can also see where it would be great to have students build their own representations of learning. Kids can also develop their own study aids over at the Flash Card Maker.
• iRubric will help you build and integrate scoring guides for your classroom while PageOnce can act as your personal assistant on the web to "remember" all kinds of information for you while you cruise.

I seem to add to my list daily. Am I using all of these consistently? No, not yet---but that's okay. There are different tools for different jobs. It's good to have the variety at hand for when I need it. Is there anything else you'd recommend I have a look at?

Labels: technology

Some small thoughts generated from my wanderings through digital environs as of late...

• Hugh wrote about his decision to blog under his own name and how that may have influenced some self-censorship on his part. I applaud his decision, but it made me wonder about why so many men in the edusphere are "out" and why so many women use pseudonyms. Of the education related blogs on my sidebar, only five (out of 20) are women who use their own names. For men, 10 out of 12 put themselves out there. If I broadened my look to all of my RSS feeds, the relative percentages play out, too. Does this difference say something about edublogging? About education? About our culture? I think it might, but I'm not entirely sure what that message is. Is this gender bias something that women perceive from the real world---or is there something hidden in the on-line world which makes us feel safer to mask our voices? Why is there a greater need to separate the real self from the digital one? What message is that sending to young teachers reading here and there?
• I check my school e-mail about once a week during the summer. I know I should completely disconnect, but one never knows what sorts of offers will show up. The admin in the building recently sent out an e-mail to all staff suggesting that they pray for a student who was injured while hiking. Can state funded e-mail be used to promote a religious goal? It was not comfortable to have this in the inbox, knowing that there will be several offended people on the staff.
  
• Does anyone know what's become of the Education Wonks or Mike from Education in Texas? They've been MIA for some time. And while it's not unusual for bloggers to hang up their keyboards, there is usually some indication about imminent retirement.
  

Speaking of MIA, I'll be away from the blog for a couple of days while I try to focus on some other work. Not to worry, I have posts in the queue; but, your comments might not appear for a day or two. I hope you're getting out to enjoy your summer, too!

Labels: blogging

If you've ever hosted a Carnival of Education---and done it well---then you know it is a lot of work. It is good "community service" for the edusphere, to be sure; but, one must plan on several hours of reading, organizing, and writing. In spite of all of that (and having a life), Mamacita is hosting her second Carnival in a row! This week she has posted it over at Steve Spangler's blog. Go have a read and give her some love, will ya'? She's hardcore when it comes to the Carnival of Education.

Labels: Carnival

I took a class once on Great Books. The premise of the course was really about who decides what makes a book "Great," how we know whether it belongs in the Canon of Literature, and what the inherent messages are that we as a culture are being fed through the selection of these books. I was reminded of this class because of a comment left here not too long ago. Roger said (in response to my post about a Thought Experiment):

Perhaps "standards-based grading" can get them to say "I have to learn to get that diploma" so they will actually learn. But I have my doubts.

Partly because of the elephant in the room. Any time we assess a student's learning, we are partly assessing what the student has actually learned. But we are also assessing what the student has managed to memorize or absorb without thinking, and which will be out of his or her head in a few weeks or months.

My hypothesis, which I keep being unable to reject, is that most of what we assess falls into the second category. And I keep coming back to the same questions, "Why is what a student has memorized at that time especially good? What makes that more important than other things that students do?"

It's a fascinating elephant, isn't it? I've been pondering it a lot for the last week or so. At times, I find myself thinking really broadly about this. Does it revolve around the concept of what is education and the purpose of school? Or, perhaps it's simpler to think about things at the classroom level.

For example, do I care whether or not students remember for the rest of their lives that amylase is a kind of enzyme in saliva that can break down carbohydrates? No. Then why do I teach it? It's a means to an end. What I really want to know is whether or not students understand systems thinking---that there are inputs and outputs...that matter can be transformed and energy changed. Amylase is one example...one peg to hang ideas on. There are a myriad of others throughout the year, with every example meaning something different to each student's understanding of the whole. Maybe a kid struggles with cycles and systems when we talk about photosynthesis, but they "get it" when we work on digestion. For me, taking a more gestalt view of learning and grading in the classroom has freed both students and me. A student who didn't master systems thinking with one piece of content, but did with others is still credited.

As a teacher, I want most to know that every kid has a set of thinking tools and can learn on their own. It's okay if they forget much of the content from their high school biology class as they move through life. It's more important that they have the skill set to find and use the information again, if needed. I haven't retained much of what I've learned over a lifetime. That doesn't mean the information wasn't useful or good to know---it just didn't turn out to be something I regularly need access to. But other people in those classes? Perhaps they are doing jobs where they depend upon that information. It would be nice to think that we could know or anticipate all of the careers and life experiences students would have in the future so that we could tailor their schoolwork for that. Instead, we try to give the best general background set of skills that we can.

The state tells me that there is a Canonical Curriculum in the form of the standards. Like the Great Books, these weren't selected by me and I have to think carefully about whatever underlying message is there. The vast majority of these are skill-based and I tend to view the content ones as the vehicles for getting students to develop and practice the skills.

I also find myself being unable to reject Roger's hypothesis, but I'm hoping that within my own classroom, I'm moving more steadily toward doing so. I do want to do more to assess thinking over memorization. I often tell my students that knowledge isn't theirs until they do something with it. They can't just depend on filling in a worksheet---they need to apply, synthesize, and create. Even then, I'm okay with knowing that they will forget some content over time. The memorization aspect is the basis for the learning, but the real goal is for them to learn how to use it. I think that if I was more UbD'ish in my planning, I could give even more strength to this approach. Maybe that should be my goal for next year. Perhaps that will help finally shoo the elephant from my room.

Labels: student learning

My house would be considered "old" by some. It was built in 1941 and is more or less what you'd expect for a space from that time. It's small (living space <1000 sq. ft + unfinished basement) with short board hardwood floors, coved ceilings, eat-in kitchen, a tiny bathroom, and two very small closets. It sits at the bottom of about a half-acre hill. Out of the nine houses I remember living in over the years, this one is my absolute favourite. It fits me just right.

But as I do things to maintain or improve the property---both inside and out---I can't help but think of the other people who must have loved the house, too.

Someone was really into trees. I have a California Redwood in the back yard. It is a giant of a tree, as you might expect, and must have been planted around the same time as the house was built. My reading about such trees indicates that this one has been mature for some time. It may be the only Redwood in the yard, but it is not the only unusual tree on the property. All the way along the property line are different types of trees: various firs, maples, and more. Who planted them? Why?

Inside the house, there is evidence of changes over time, too. Who built the staircase and created the loft out of the attic space? Materials suggest something within the last two decades. What happened to the old octopus furnace in the basement? Its location on the concrete in the basement is still present. One of the doors to the outside appears to have been the main door at one point---but how did that work with the rest of the house? The configuration now doesn't make sense.

I want HGTV to do a show where they reunite all the owners of a property. What a great opportunity to find out whose grand idea it was to have pink bathroom fixtures (as I had in one place) or to put outlets in the middle of a wall (as I have here). But also, I'd like to see pictures of this place in its various incarnations. There must have been birthday parties, Christmases with small happy children, tears of sorrow, and all manner of memories created here. Someone must have documented all kinds of small moments over the last 67 years. There should be family photo albums or scrapbooks with these pieces of history. Several people out there remember this house differently than I will. Perhaps they came here to have Sunday dinners with grandparents. Maybe they remember walking across the street to the beach. They might even remember who planted what. If I were independently wealthy, I could see writing a book about this---the search for former owners and connecting to the history of a house.

I'm the custodian of this space for now. I am doing some small things to the interior---like paint, updating the bathroom, and (eventually) new carpet for the loft. Outside, I am trying to maintain what was here---including beds of blueberries, strawberries, and hydrangeas---and add a few touches of my own. At some point, I will likely move on and someone else will have their chance to make this home their space.

Labels: personal

I got my first set of scores back from my elementary endorsement tests that I took last month. Oddly enough, I received the one for my Texas test---which I took later than the one for Washington. The score report is "unofficial," but is good enough for me. I missed 8 out of 100 questions---half of them in the area of literacy, which I fully expected. My knowledge and experience with teaching small children how to actually read is negligible. I missed a science question (perhaps the Pluto one I mentioned?) and three social studies questions. Believe it or not, I didn't miss anything in the realm of math, PE, music, or art. I was scoring ~80% on all the practice tests I took, so I'm pleased with how well I did. This is especially in light of finishing my duties for the school year at 9:30 a.m...rushing to Sea-Tac to fly out at 1 p.m...getting to my final destination at 1 a.m...and testing about 12 hours later. There was more pressure on this test as it would be more difficult for me to retake: cost of plane ticket, time, scheduling, etc. It was also the one upon which everything else would hinge---the first in a series of dominoes to knock down in order to add my endorsement here.

I'm still a ways away from having all the paperwork finished. Now, I have to wait 2 weeks before I apply for the endorsement to be officially added to my Texas certification. Once I receive that documentation, I send it and some paperwork from Washington to the university in Texas where I was originally certified in order to verify that I, indeed, meet the criteria for that state. Once that is in hand, I send that paperwork, plus the Washington paperwork, plus a big check to our certification office...and then wait 4 - 6 weeks for my new certificate to show up. But hey, I'm on my way.

Hide your children. :)

Labels: elementary