I have been thinking about effective means of professional development for teachers for a long time. I started my edtech career as a Professional development specialist at Tom Snyder Productions. They still use my picture on their website. Not to bite the hand that still occasionally feeds me (I freelance for TSP), but lately I have been questioning the effectiveness of the group training model. On the surface it seems like the most efficient way to reach the largest number of people with the most information. In reality however, it doesn't quite work that way. I find it hard to get people to…
Selected by lizbdavis
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The Power of Educational Technology
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Rethinking Professional Development
20 Nov 2009 | 10:08 am -
Making Meaningful Connections
14 Nov 2009 | 5:25 pmNEIT2009 Days 2 and 3At the closing keynote, Michael Wesch (@mwesch) posed this essential question: "How can we create students who can create meaningful connections?" At this conference I made dozens of meaningful connections. I learned about school to school collaborations, tried to figure out Google Wave (still don't get it), introduced more folks to Twitter and had a great discussion about effective professional development.I talked and danced with many new faces including more people I had only known previously online. These included Bill Campbell (@BillCamp), Karen Blumberg… -
Reflections on NEIT2009 - Day One
14 Nov 2009 | 8:58 amI could hear my heart beating in my chest as I drove up to the Mohonk Mountain House, the site of the NEIT (New York State Association of Independent Schools (N) Education (E) Information (I) Technology (T) conference. I was excited, but also nervous at the end of my 3.5 hour drive.I learned about this conference from the tweets of two independent school educators, Alex Ragone and Arvind Grover, whom I greatly respect, but had never met.It has been a while since I have attended a conference without knowing lots of people. I remember back to my first Educon 2.0 when my Twitter network first… -
Twitter List Screencast
3 Nov 2009 | 9:51 amRecently Twitter introduced the ability to create and subscribe to lists. I've been playing around with this new feature and I think it has a lot of potential. I created this screencast to show a few of the things I've learned.In addition to my screencast, @_stevewoods wrote a great post describing Twitter lists. And, here is the direct link to the Twitter Gadget for embedding your list on a website.Please share your tips. What have you learned about lists? Do you like them? I'm still trying to figure out how to subscribe to a list in a reader. Does anyone know how to do that?P.S. This is the… -
Article for Alumni Magazine
31 Oct 2009 | 4:23 pmI just finished writing this article for the Belmont Hill Alumni magazine.What I've been up to for the last year and a bit..."Respecting tradition yet alive to innovation..." These words from the Belmont Hill mission statement illustrate the unique way that Belmont Hill marries technology with pedagogy. In a school where face to face relationships are primary, the faculty at Belmont Hill seek out technologies to support this mission, while remaining true to the traditions that have been at this school for decades. In my second year at Belmont Hill as the Director of Academic Technology, I…
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Pairadimes for Your Thoughts
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moments
16 Nov 2009 | 1:41 amHow would you define a moment? I love how this video takes absolutely random visuals and makes a story out of them… a story about the value of time, or at least single moments in time. This video changes my breathing pattern, it alters my thoughts, moment by moment, in a way that says more than words can. I think too often we let moments slip by when they should be cherished. Take a moment now and enjoy… (for those of you behind a filter who can’t get YouTube: Watch it here.) -
Cassie and Katie have blogs!
1 Nov 2009 | 12:47 amPlease welcome my daughters, new bloggers Cassie and Katie to the blogosphere. Cassie has uploaded some photos of our Xi’an trip to tell you a bit about our recent vacation. Katie started her blog with 3 simple introductory sentences and an updated ‘About’ page. I’m not sure how much they will use their blogs yet? My hope is that they will chronicle their adventures here in China, however I don’t plan on making writing on their blog mandatory. They get enough homework here that I don’t want to add anything to their plate that they don’t want to do. I… -
Caring across the curriculum
14 Oct 2009 | 3:49 pmCaring across the curriculum Sometimes I get tired of seeing the school day broken into subject-matter based courses. We don’t teach subjects we teach students, and students of all ages engage in a real life that matters across individual fields of study. Watch the video Miniature Earth: How many different ’subjects’ can we teach with this video? How real is the Math? How relevant is the Social Studies? Can we tie in History? Current Events? Economics? Environmental Issues? Healthy Living? How far can we extend the learning? These are 1990 statistics from the state of the… -
Facebook Revisited
11 Oct 2009 | 2:40 amA 2nd year teacher that I keep in touch with sent me an email yesterday: “Hey Dave! How do you feel about adding students as friends on Facebook? I use my Facebook mainly as a communication tool. I don’t put anything up that I wouldn’t want people to see. In the evening, my students have trouble getting in touch with me via [district] email, so I’ve had a few messages via facebook (which they can do without being my friend.) I have had a few requests from legitimate students. There have been a few requests from students I don’t want on my list…and I… -
Openness and Acceptance, Mr Deng and his Allegories of Windows, Flies and Coloured Cats
5 Oct 2009 | 3:24 pmWe just completed a vacation in Xi’an, one of China’s oldest cities and the starting point for the silk road. The silk road was the first gateway to and from the Orient, it was the first real global link to the ‘Eastern’ countries of India and China. Trade of spices and silk, as well as cultural exchanges, started to take shape and lay the foundation for ‘world trade’ long before Europeans ‘discovered’ the America’s (in their quest for a shorter route to the East). This was the first of many ‘windows’ open to a new, more…
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Practical Theory
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Gary Stager: First We Kill the Teacher's Unions
11 Nov 2009 | 12:36 pm[No... he doesn't really mean it.] A little over a year ago, Gary Stager wrote an article for the Huffington Post about the new-found Democractic fascination with bashing teacher's unions -- and why that is about as counter to Democratic ideals as one could imagine. Today, his words are all the more true. Blaming educational problems on teacher unions is even more absurd when you consider that states like Texas have no teacher unions. Is Texas immune from student achievement challenges? Hardly. The larger question is a matter of leadership and employee relations. How does reducing teacher…
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Bud the Teacher
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Digital Is. Or Isn’t. Or Always (Never?) Was. Or Not.
18 Nov 2009 | 8:59 pmI spent today engaged in some work with the National Writing Project and several of their thinking partners at the Digital Is . . . Convening event, a day of structured thinking and looking and conversation about what it means to write and teach writing at a time of such profound technological change in the world and, perhaps, our schools. It was a classic NWP event, in the sense that there was a good collection of really smart folks present as well as thoughtful processes and protocols to help us have productive conversation and inquiry time. What follows are a collection of the thoughts… -
The Week in Tweets for 2009-11-15
15 Nov 2009 | 9:15 pm@johrt Good idea. How's Friday look for lunch? I'm available most of the day. in reply to johrt # A nice surprise was waiting for me when I got to work this morning. Thanks, @hickstro. Looking forward to it. http://twitpic.com/ovuor # @brueckj23 Build the subgroups as calendars and attach/subscribe them to the master, perhaps? in reply to brueckj23 # @hickstro Think we should? Tomorrow and Wednesday are very flexible. in reply to hickstro # RT @BadAstronomer: "Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known." #CarlSagan, 1934 – 1996 # So. Yeah. That was Monday. -
Superheroes
11 Nov 2009 | 5:18 pmAni reminded me tonight, as we were driving to an event, that today was November 11th. She’s been working on her calendar at preschool. “Veterans Day,” I told her. “Do you know what that means?” “Yeah.” She answered without hesitation from the back seat of the dark car. “It’s the day for when superheroes save our city.” I let that sit for a moment. Not quite. But as I thought about it, and the fact that she’s four, I couldn’t bring myself to correct her. There will be time later for deeper conversations, for more… -
The Week in Tweets for 2009-11-08
8 Nov 2009 | 9:15 pm@wbass3 Likewise. in reply to wbass3 # T-Minus Two days until DLC. Deep breath. # @techsavvyed Digital Learning Collaborative. Although I like yours, too. in reply to techsavvyed # I'd like to talk to the folks who made it dark this early. Soon. # RT @Franki22: RT @buffyjhamilton: Brilliant post: "Robbing Students and Teachers of Joy" by Dean Shareski: http://bit.ly/5n1rY (Yes.-Bud) # @beverson I like driving to work in the dark. It's the driving home that's horrible. And you're welcome. Glad that worked. in reply to beverson # Some meetings look more fun than… -
The Week in Tweets for 2009-11-01
1 Nov 2009 | 9:15 pmOrange glow behind us lighting up the fresh white snow on the mountains in front of us. # At the doctor's. Time for a physical. There is a gown on the table. Uh oh. # Looks like I'm good for another 30,000 miles. # RT @cshirky: "IT doesnt typically help forge new acquaintances; it mostly helps communicate with existing ones." http://bit.ly/zceII # @vgloucester I always try to tie new accounts to existing authentication services. More accounts, same credentials. in reply to vgloucester # @robwall That's because it is. in reply to robwall # Reviewing DLC applications with…
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NYT: Education
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Teachers at Some Low-Performing Schools Get Bonuses
19 Nov 2009 | 11:07 pmTwo different measures of progress explain the discrepancy, said officials from the New York City Department of Education. -
Regents Raise College Tuition in California by 32 Percent
19 Nov 2009 | 11:06 pmFacing steep cuts in state financing, the university system voted on Thursday to raise undergraduate fees. -
University Weighs Tighter Limits on Stem Cell Research
19 Nov 2009 | 10:15 pmThe University of Nebraska would be the first such institution to set stricter limits than what national or state law allows. -
A Crown Jewel of Education Struggles With Cuts
19 Nov 2009 | 10:14 pmStudents and faculty worry that deep budget cuts are pushing the University of California into decline. -
Learning to Teach to Bridge the Achievement Gap
19 Nov 2009 | 10:03 pmAn underperforming school in San Jose sets high expectations, and students and parents respond with positive results.
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Weblogg-ed
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What Does “Getting It” Mean, Anyway?
19 Nov 2009 | 5:09 pmWhile my trip to Australia this last week and a half was primarily pleasure with my family, I did get a few days to work with teachers in Brisbane and throughout Victoria (a la our PLP cohort there), and I had some great conversations about the state of the education world with some good friends. Since the trip also came on the heels of my annual two-day visit to Skywalker Ranch as a GLEF board member, these last couple of weeks have provided a lot to think about, but between travel and exorbitant internet fees and surfing expeditions, not a lot of time to write. (As usual, these days.) One… -
Teachers as Learners (Part 32)
4 Nov 2009 | 3:06 amRecently at the beginning of a day long workshop, I used a Google form to get feedback on this question: If there was one part of your personal learning practice that you wanted to focus on today, what would it be? What questions would you seek to answer? Now I’ll be the first to admit that it’s not a perfect question in terms of trying to get some sense of the personal learning lives from the teachers who were participating. But in the context of a discussion we’d been having about the passion-based learning opportunities that the Web now affords, I was hoping to learn what… -
Teaching, Testing and Counseling
23 Oct 2009 | 2:58 pmIt’s no secret that many of us who had high hopes that the Obama administration would start a meaningful conversation on re-envisioning education are feeling sorely disappointed these days. All of the hoopla over “The Race to the Top” as a catalyst of real “reform” is getting a bit much to take, and to be honest, I’m surprised that more educators aren’t voicing their displeasure at the idea of being paid based on the scores their students make on standardized tests (among other things.) But I have to tell you, David Brooks’ column in the Times… -
On Common Standards
16 Oct 2009 | 5:18 amSo without bemoaning in the fact that I haven’t been able to find any time of late to get to this space to do some reading and thinking and synthesizing and extended writing and that I feel like a truly important part of my life is being slowly and painfully left behind and that there is a post that I really need to write about that at some point sooner rather than later… Tom Hoffman has been bugging many of us to blog about the English Language Arts Standards that are being written by Core Standards group as an attempt to provide some national standardization for ELA (and… -
Don’t, Don’t, Don’t vs. Do, Do, Do
20 Sep 2009 | 6:11 amRecently, I presented at a school on an opening day for teachers where the first thing that greeted everyone on the table in the lobby was an 8-page Acceptable Use Policy which staff members were picking up as they filed into the school. I picked one up too, and when I had a moment I started paging through it, looking at all the ways in which students (and teachers) could get themselves in trouble on the school network. The middle three pages were filled with an A-Y double spaced list (guess they were saving room for one more rule next year) which spelled out the many transgressions that were…
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HeyJude
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gr8 lol ~ Great Libraries of Learning
8 Nov 2009 | 9:54 pmSupport for school libraries in Far North Queensland is gr8! The team at the Far North Queensland FNQ Learning Development Centre – ICT, have put together a fabulous brochure promoting change and essential development to ensure quality school libraries. They have allowed me to embed the document here, so that you can download a copy for your own school district. There is also a gr8 lol::Great Libraries for Learning wiki to support the document – making it easy to cross-reference within your own online sites. It’s pretty nice to be quoted in this brochure View this… -
Mobile Visual Search
1 Nov 2009 | 6:29 pmMobile visual search signals a very interesting shift in product marketing. Perhaps this is also a introducing a significant shift in information search for students too? Right now we can ask: What is the object? Where can I get it? What it is useful for? What do others say about it? Does it help me understand (something I’m learning about ) a little better? In the future? more about “Mobile Visual Search“, posted with vodpod Posted in Digital Media, Search -
Personal Learning Network – want one?
29 Oct 2009 | 1:59 amConvince your key stakeholders of the importance of a Personal Learning Network – with the help of this excellent presentation (videos included)!! Great work from Mark Woolley! Posted in Australia, Personal Learning Network Tagged: PLN -
Sending documents to Your International Kindle
28 Oct 2009 | 3:21 amThe Kindle 2 has a number of cool features that you need to get the hang of to maximize the value of your purchase. Since I’ve played with my Kindle for nearly a whole week now – I’ve been asked to pass on information about basic document management. Documents to your Kindle Go to Your Account in the top right hand corner of Amazon. Once there, scroll down till you find the Manage Your Kindle Link Click on that link, and sign into your account. This Account Page is an important one for managing lots of things, but for now we’ll just focus on how to set up the email… -
Kindle-ing discussion about learning
25 Oct 2009 | 11:57 pmLots of people have asked for a post about my first reactions to the Kindle. I started writing this up, but found what I needed to say for people new to the Kindle was rather long - so here are my first few day’s evalution rolled into a scribd document ready to print and share with others. View this document on Scribd Posted in Australia, eBook Readers Tagged: Kindle
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EdTechTalk
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Parents as Partners Episode #31 November 16, 2009
16 Nov 2009 | 8:35 pmTonight's session was the first in a series of brainstorms about a special project that would creating digital parent courses. Show hosts Matt Montagne and Lorna Costantini welcomed Justin Reeve, Colleen McGuire, Penny Lindballe to the show. The purposeof this project is to ... 64:57 minutes (29.73 MB)read more -
Jeff Utecht and Daneah with students from International School Bangkok: Operation Smile
16 Nov 2009 | 6:30 pmJeff Utecht and wife Daneah share their students from International School Bangkok with us for an evening of inspiration and hope as their students relate their experiences with a very special project: Operation Smile. Daneah and two of the students have created videos to capture the visit the students had with young patients who experienced facial reconstructive surgery in Thailand. The Chat: [18:23] <PeggyG> here we go!!! :-) [18:24] <PeggyG> WOW3 :-) [18:24] == kathym [i=4b452a2c@gateway/web/ 56:22 minutes (51.6 MB)read more -
Week of November 7 - November 13, 2009
16 Nov 2009 | 9:36 amWelcome to this week's EdTechTalk (ETT) newsletter! This has been another great week of stimulating, thought-provoking, informative webcasts on EdTechTalk.read more -
Teachers Teaching Teachers #175 - Looking Forward to the National Writing Project's Annual Meeting with 3 Presenters - 11.04.09
15 Nov 2009 | 7:33 pmIn connection with the National Writing Project's Annual Meeting, we invited a few teachers who will be presenting in Philadelphia to join us on this episode. Paul Oh, an associate with the NWP joined us as well. In addition, this same cast of characters will be joining us fora follow-up show after the Annual Meeting on December 2. This podcast, co-sponsored by the New York City Writing Project and the NWP Technology Liaisons Network, features: Robert Rivera-Amezola, Philadelphia Writing Project http://www.nwp.org/cs/public/print/nwp_amsession/1584 Joe Conroy, NWP at Rutgers University… -
EdTechWeekly #143
15 Nov 2009 | 5:26 pmWithout Dave ... John, Jeff, and Jen do their best with this week's edtech news and resources. Everyone misses Dave (boo hoo). EdTechWeekly #143 November 15, 2009 This Week's Delicious Links Chat Log Below 44:05 minutes (20.19 MB)read more
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Teach42
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Mobiles to Help Learning? High School in UK says OK
25 Oct 2009 | 10:30 amImage via Wikipedia Via @TerryFreedman: Looks like Notre Dame high school in the UK is taking the bull by the horns and moving forward with an initiative to allow the use of mobile phones for educational purposes during class time. Assistant headteacher Paul Haigh said mobiles, MP3 players and gaming devices were “untapped resources” for teaching and learning. “We realise as a comprehensive state school we could never afford to buy every student all the IT and mobile devices we would like them to have. He added: “But most students own many of these devices anyway… -
If you Tweet, will anybody hear it?
20 Oct 2009 | 10:10 amImage via Wikipedia I think that many people (myself included) that share sites like Twitter at conferences inadvertently do our attendees a disservice. In the effort of attempting to demonstrate how wonderful, simple, powerful and dynamic it is, we make it seem much more effortless than it really is. For example… How many times per day do you see somebody say, “Give a shout out to the people in Nepal who are attending my presentation about social networks about using the Luge to teach physics!” And then 30-40 people reply with a hearty “Hello”. So attendees… -
Ted Talks… for Kids
13 Oct 2009 | 8:01 amLooks like TEDxSMU has organized the first ever Ted Talks for kids. TedxKids was the first of its kind and invited local students to share their thoughts in the TED format, as well as attend presentations. The organize of the conference had this to say: “It’s important to get kids interested at an early age and one of the hopes is that TEDxKids will be a meaningful experience for both us and other kids.” The event was a couple of days ago and as of now, there haven’t been any videos released from it, but I did find this blog post mentioning it. On Friday, the TEDxSMU team also… -
WAVE to the ITEC conference
12 Oct 2009 | 7:57 amNot sure if this is going to work, but going to try to embed in a Google Wave for following the ITEC conference. Unfortunately, yes you do need to already have a Wave account to see it, but them’s the breaks. Looks like it works! If you can’t see it, I apologize. But these are the eggs we’re cracking to learn how to make an omlette! -
CDWG presents: Dembo and Davidson on Web 2.0
9 Oct 2009 | 9:53 amSpeaking of tools (no pun intended), Hall and I had the pleasure of spending a few days in Discovery’s green screen studio recently to create a series of videos focusing on Web 2.0. They’ve been released as part of CDWG’s Conquering Technophobia mini-site, which has the videos we created as well as a slew of resources for teachers who are looking to learn more about new technologies. I have to admit, we had an absolute blast creating these. Hall is a creative genius and really had some wonderful vision for how to make these fun yet informative. We broke Web 2.0 down into 6…
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Steve Hargadon
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Howard Rheingold Presents "Howard's Brainstorms!" Part 2
17 Nov 2009 | 6:30 amPart of the Conversations.net interview series.Join us this coming Thursday as Howard Rheingold continues "Howard's Brainstorm," the second in a monthly series of interactive discussions in Elluminate on technology, culture, and education.Learn more about the eclectic Howard Rheingold at http://www.rheingold.com/howard/ and join us for a fun discussion! The topic will be "Thinking about Thinking Tools." Howard will briefly summarize some of the foundational documents in this area, recap via screensharing and TheBrain, and then facilitate a discussion inviting questions from the community… -
PBS & CR 2.0: Helping Kids Understand Viruses and Vaccinations with Sid the Science Kid
16 Nov 2009 | 6:13 amDate: Tuesday, November 17, 2009Time: 5pm Pacific / 8pm Eastern / 12am GMT (next day) (international times here)Location: In Elluminate. http://tinyurl.com/pbscr20 If you haven't used Elluminate before, you can make sure your computer is configured correctly to enter the room by going to http://www.elluminate.com/support.PBS Teachers and Classroom 2.0 are hosting a free webinar for educators on Tuesday, November 17th at 5pm Pacific / 8pm Eastern to share information about a currently airing episode of Sid the Science Kid that helps children better understand the science behind germs, viruses… -
Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice
7 Nov 2009 | 5:52 pmPart of the FutureofEducation.com interview series.Date: Thurday, November 12th, 2009 Time: 5:00m Pacific / 8:00pm Eastern / 1:00am GMT next day (international times here)Duration: 1 hourLocation: In Elluminate. Log in at http://tr.im/futureofed. The Elluminate room will be open up to 30 minutes before the event if you want to come in early. To make sure that your computer is configured for Elluminate, please visit http://www.elluminate.com/support. Recordings of the session will be posted within a day of the event.Join me as I talk with Larry Cuban, Emeritus Professor of Education at… -
Richard Halverson and Allan Collins - Rethinking Education in the Age of Technology
7 Nov 2009 | 5:29 pmPart of the FutureofEducation.com interview series.Date: Wednesday, November 11th, 2009 Time: 5:00m Pacific / 8:00pm Eastern / 1:00am GMT next day (international times here)Duration: 1 hourLocation: In Elluminate. Log in at http://tr.im/futureofed. The Elluminate room will be open up to 30 minutes before the event if you want to come in early. To make sure that your computer is configured for Elluminate, please visit http://www.elluminate.com/support. Recordings of the session will be posted within a day of the event.Join me as I talk with Richard Halverson and Allan Collins about their… -
Henry Jenkins on the Popular and Participatory Culture
7 Nov 2009 | 3:57 pmPart of the Conversations.net interview series. Date: Tuesday, November 10th, 2009Time: 5pm Pacific / 8pm Eastern / 1am GMT (next day) (international times here)Duration: 1 hourLocation: In Elluminate at http://tr.im/futureofed. The Elluminate room will be open up to 30 minutes before the event if you want to come in early. To make sure that your computer is configured for Elluminate, please visit http://www.elluminate.com/support. Recordings of the session will be posted within a day of the event.Steve Hargadon and you spend an interactive hour with Henry Jenkins in the Elluminate LIVE…
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Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day...
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“Learning to Teach to Bridge the Achievement Gap”
20 Nov 2009 | 1:13 pmLearning to Teach to Bridge the Achievement Gap is a nice article about strategies that a California school is using to assist its students learn. It appeared today’s New York Times. But, as I note in a post I have at my other blog, Engaging Parents In Schools, I have a “bone to pick” with the headline wording. I believe it helps perpetuate a myth that most schools can indeed “bridge” the achievement gap. You might want to check out the post. -
Mugurdy Search Engine
20 Nov 2009 | 12:55 pmThe Mugurdy Search Engine is a simple visual search engine that is very accessible to English Language Learners. Once you type in a query, search results are show with good size images of the actual websites. It reminds me of the old Page Bull visual search engine, which I rated highly two years ago but then went out of business. It doesn’t have any of the “bells and whistles” of my other highly-rated search engines, but I’m still adding it to The Best Search Engines For ESL/EFL Learners — 2009. -
“Let’s Celebrate Thanksgiving”
20 Nov 2009 | 4:59 amLet’s Celebrate Thanksgiving is a brand-new online activity by Renee Manfroid, whose main site is on The Best Websites For English Language Learner Students — 2009 list. I’ll be adding this new exercise to The Best Sites To Learn & Teach About Thanksgiving. -
Ninth-Grade Challenges
20 Nov 2009 | 4:56 amOur school places a heavy emphasis on working with our ninth-graders. As regular readers know, I teach a lot of students in that grade. Stuck in 9th Grade: The Bulge in the Education Pipeline is a report from Education Week which shares recent research showing why that kind of focus is just so important. -
Best Pearl Harbor Day Resources
19 Nov 2009 | 9:11 pmJust a reminder to readers that I’ve been continuing to update The Best Sites For Learning About Pearl Harbor that I published last year. You might find that list useful.
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Generation YES Blog
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NAEP Technological Literacy Framework Feedback Opportunity
19 Nov 2009 | 10:19 amI’ve mentioned before that I’ve been serving on the NAEP Technology Literacy Assessment Planning Committee. (Post: NAEP Technology Assessment 2012) Now it’s your turn. The current draft of the framework is available for public review and feedback at www.naeptech2012.org. You can download the framework from the Outreach section of the website and provide feedback using the online survey link. In addition to feedback on the framework as a whole, the project is asking for specific input on a title for the assessment. It has been suggested that “Technological Literacy” may… -
Celebrate creativity and innovation at NYSCATE
16 Nov 2009 | 1:18 amThe New York state educational technology conference, NYSCATE (Nov. 22-24) always has a top lineup of speakers and keynotes. This year is no exception. The featured keynote is Sir Ken Robinson, a world-renowned advocate for creativity and innovation in learning. I’ll be there as well, participating in the Constructivist Celebration, two sessions, and a panel. My Monday session is on teacher professional development in a “technology ecology,“ and on Tuesday the topic is games in education. The panel will tackle an intriguing question – What does it mean to be literate in the 21st… -
Speak Up 2009 – add your voice!
11 Nov 2009 | 5:34 pmSpeak Up 2009 will be open until December 18, 2009! Over the years, the annual Speak Up project has collected and reported on the views of over 1.5 million K-12 students, teachers, administrators and parents representing over 18,000 schools in all 50 states. Speak Up data represents the largest collection of authentic, unfiltered stakeholder input about education, technology, 21st century skills, schools of the future and science/math instruction. Sign up now for student, parent, teacher surveys. This won’t take long and EVERY VOICE COUNTS. Sylvia -
Students are not the enemy part 2
7 Nov 2009 | 1:29 pmThe response to the last post Students are not the enemy has been pretty overwhelming. The NYSCATE wiki for this presentation: The Enemy Within: Stop Students from Bypassing Your Web Filters has been edited by several people with very cogent comments asking the company and presenter to rethink a declaration of war on students. My original posting was not a criticism of NYSCATE – which is one of my favorite ed tech conferences. Vendor-led sessions are a fact of life at any conference, often informative, and NYSCATE does a good job of identifying them as such. A quick search on the Google… -
Students are not the enemy
6 Nov 2009 | 6:20 pmThe upcoming NYSCATE conference includes this session. The Enemy Within: Stop Students from Bypassing Your Web Filters So this session (by a security software vendor) sets up students as the enemy. The job is not to educate the people who come to this session or help schools provide the best educational Internet experience (by those same evil students.) No, the idea is to create a climate of fear, demonize students, and imply that there is a war between students and IT administrators. And why not? You need weapons to fight a war. Fear the children, buy our stuff. Kids are not the…
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Antonio Viva
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edSocialMedia Bootcamp Keynote St. John’s Prep
15 Nov 2009 | 4:28 amA word of thanks to the folks over at WhippleHill Communications for streaming my keynote at the edSocialMedia Bootcamp at St. John’s Prep in Danvers, MA. Over 20 independent school professionals in all areas of advancement came together to learn and discuss the power and potential of social media in our schools. Enjoy! You might also be interested in.. Your Neighbor’s Story Are we ready? edSocialMedia Bootcamp, Montclair Kimberly Academy A Conversation About Social Media & Education Social Media in Education Videocast from TABS -
A Conversation with Michael Stoner
27 Oct 2009 | 10:44 amA few weeks back I was contacted by Michael Stoner, one of the partners at mStoner, a leading edge marketing and communications firm based out of Chicago. Michael was researching and writing an article for the January 2010 issue of CASE Currents Magazine. We spent part of a late afternoon on the phone talking about topics ranging from social media, to marketing and communications and trends in these areas with respect to the independent school world. I really enjoyed getting the chance to speak with Michael and encourage you to consider reading the post he wrote about WA Mash. Random Posts… -
Presentation to WA Board of Visitors
14 Oct 2009 | 7:25 amI was recently asked to make a presentation to the Academy’s Board of Visitors on Teaching and Learning in the 21st Century. The focus of the presentation was to provide a context of how has the purpose of school changed, what skills, attributes and experiences do students need to be successful and how do we better understand these digital natives as unique learners. It is my firm belief that schools should focus on fostering creativity, collaboration and courage in our students and provide ways for them to demonstrate what they know and understand beyond the traditional assessments and… -
Sharing thoughts on 1 to 1 Laptop Learning
8 Oct 2009 | 8:17 amI was recently inteviewed by members of Worcester Academy’s Board of Visitors regarding 1 to 1 laptop learning. You might also be interested in.. “Equity, Access, and Opportunity” – Harvard Education Letter EduCon 2.1 Sunday Morning Reflections 21st Century CIOs for 21st Century Schools Second Life Pow Wow… Presentation to WA Board of Visitors -
Monday Morning Meditation – A Great Revolution
14 Sep 2009 | 8:28 amI came across this great quote by Daisaku Ikeda, who is president of Soka Gakkai International (SGI), a Buddhist association which claims 12 million members in 192 countries and territories, and founder of several educational, cultural and research institutions. I was searching this past weekend for some inspiration around the idea that change in schools is not a “revolution” but an “evolution.” I think those of us who work in schools often struggle with helping create change. I have heard educators describe schools as “change adverse” and I struggle with…
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Moving at the Speed of Creativity
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Oklahoma Bears, Tar Pits, Mountains, Girls Circles, and Marriages of 70+ years
20 Nov 2009 | 6:31 amCross-posted to the Storychasers blog. This week Oklahoma educators participated in our 29th “Celebrate Oklahoma Voices” workshop since 2008, and created some fantastic digital stories about the history, geography, and people of our great state. Did you know Oklahoma is home to a growing black bear population and just had its first open hunting season for bears this year? Brad Hill used photos from his own game camera to create the 1 min, 17 second video, “Bears of Leflore County.” Find more videos like this on Celebrate Oklahoma Voices! When you think of tar pits, you… -
Thoughtful teachers need to engage students collaboratively across the web
18 Nov 2009 | 6:31 pmThis is an excellent thirteen minute video of ideas from Alan November about transforming our schools into the learning spaces we need in the 21st century. Find more videos like this on NL Connect Among many things, Alan says: We need to redefine learners as contributors. This requires a fundamental shift in our thinking about schools. The toughest part is not teaching teachers to use technology… What I can’t do in an afternoon is help people become comfortable with shifting control… Global communicator, global researcher, tool builder, and internal collaborator (with Google… -
K12Online09 LAN Party #3 Tonight! (22:30GMT/ 3:30pmPST/ 4:30pmMST/ 5:30pmCST/ 6:30pmEST)
18 Nov 2009 | 2:02 pmPlease join educators worldwide TONIGHT/TODAY on November 18, 2009 at 22:30GMT/ 3:30pmPST/ 4:30pmMST/ 5:30pmCST/ 6:30pmEST for a live event of the 2009 K12Online Conference On November 18, the K12Online Conference is hosting a LAN party from 6:30PM to 8:30PM EST. We invite everyone to gather at the LAN party site with colleagues in order to view two past conference presentations and then engage in lively discussions in the EdTechTalk chatroom. The following presenters will be in attendance. 6:30 – 7:15pm Second Life: K-20 Educators Exploring Virtual Worlds – Panel Kevin Jarrett… -
We must re-imagine our school cultures and end the madness of high stakes testing / standards-based reform
18 Nov 2009 | 12:50 pmGreg Thompson in his post, “The Landscape of Educational Culture” has it right. We must re-imagine our schools and end the madness of high stakes testing as well as “standards-based” educational reform. He writes: We can’t have both. We can’t create a thriving, innovative, creative, vibrant learning environment and pair it with common standards supported by textbooks and assessed by standardized tests. The two ideas are diametrically opposed. To waste time and money attempting to force these two into a relationship would be as futile as Romeo and Juliet’s parents… -
Google Buys Gizmo5: More VoIP calling and videoconferencing power headed our way soon
17 Nov 2009 | 9:46 pmLast week Tom Krazit reported for CNET that Google has confirmed its purchase of Gizmo5. This was confirmed on the official Google Voice blog the same day. The old Gizmo Project website (www.gizmoproject.com) now directs to Google (www.google.com/gizmo5) and new memberships have been temporarily suspended. According to Tom’s article: Gizmo5 is a Web-based VoIP client that lets you make phone calls over the Internet, similar to programs like Skype. It’s based, however, on an open standard called SIP that fits a little better into Google’s worldview, rather than Skype’s…
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The Thinking Stick
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Make students your fans!
17 Nov 2009 | 8:12 pmTeachers face a dilemma with Facebook. Do you or don’t you become fans with students past and present? It’s a topic that has come up in some of my sessions and a discussion that we’re having here at our school at the moment. But, I think I’ve found the answer to having your private Facebook stay private with your friends and family and also allow students to connect to you in the most popular social-networking site to date. The solution: Start a fan page Jeff Utecht on Facebook It’s rather easy to do and it allows students to still feel connected to you, their… -
When kids lead the way
17 Nov 2009 | 12:21 amI believe that part of my role, or any role of a teacher with a Personal Learning Network, is to use that network to spread the word when good things happen with your students. The Operation Smile group here at ISB continues to find ways to spread their message about their trip, about what they learned, and what you can do if you want to take part. Last weekend Ciel, a student on the trip sat down and decided to create a video. But as she said on the Women of the Web 2.0 podcast “I put it on YouTube because I wanted to spread the message.” This is the now third video created by… -
Why Facebook is Unblocked at ISB
12 Nov 2009 | 11:07 pmI thought I would share an e-mail that was sent from our department today to a parent who had raised a concern about Facebook being unblocked at school. A very well thought out e-mail from the group. Chad Bates did most of the work with Dennis, Kim and I adding our two cents in as well. Dear Parent, Thanks for your email, you raise an issue that schools, teachers, parents and workplaces are currently grappling with i.e. weighing the benefits of social networks against the concerns. When considering the relative merits of Facebook, there are some very obvious negative uses as well as positive… -
When did content trump learning?
9 Nov 2009 | 7:09 amI know it sounds like such a stupid question….and maybe content has always trumped actual learning but I continue to find myself in conversations that end with: “I’d love to do so much more, but we have to cover all this content and I just don’t have time.” Why is that? Why is content…which is now available anywhere and everywhere still what we feel like we have to do as teachers. I hate to say it but I think I got out of the classroom just in the nick of time. I would be considered a horrible teacher today. We use to go off on tangents in my classroom that… -
Videos that speak to the heart
9 Nov 2009 | 3:38 amSupport Operation Smile and the 6th Graders at ISB by donating here http://www.tinyurl.com/isboperationsmile There are days like yesterday when everything comes together technologically that allows you to create some of the most amazing artifacts. Yesterday The Thinking Chick (my wife) sat down at around 2 o’clock and started working on a video that she wanted to create about her recent Operation Smile trip to Surin, Thailand with 9 middle school students. 8 Hours later she had created what I truly think is an amazing video capturing students feelings and reflections about the trip. I…
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Dangerously Irrelevant
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UCEA Week 01: I gave a bad presentation yesterday
19 Nov 2009 | 8:01 amI gave a bad presentation yesterday. It wasn’t bad because I had poor content or delivery. It was a bad presentation because I didn’t sufficiently account for the needs and understandings of my audience. Let me explain… I’m in Anaheim, California for the annual conference of the University Council for Educational Administration (UCEA), which is the primary association for educational leadership faculty members at large research institutions. In other words, UCEA is the organization for professors that prepare school principals and superintendents. I currently serve as UCEA’s… -
"You're fired. I only want people who already know how to do their jobs."
16 Nov 2009 | 3:09 amBack in July I said that I was concerned that we never seem to hold folks accountable for being self-learners. I also noted that In many job sectors, employees are expected to keep up with relevant technologies or risk job loss. When do we require that of K-12 and postsecondary educators? At what point do we say to them “No, we’re not training you how to use this. It’s easy enough for you to learn on your own. And if you don’t, we’ll find someone else who can.” Many of you chimed in and shared your own thoughts on this topic. Apparently, now Dilbert has too: When will we,… -
3 MINUTE SURVEY: Why isn't your school organization making more progress?
13 Nov 2009 | 3:51 amWhy aren’t schools making more progress when it comes to effective implementation and integration of digital technologies? Here’s what K-12 educators usually tell me when asked (list is in no particular order): Lack of adequate funding Unsupportive state / federal legislators Teacher / union resistance Lack of professional development Ineffective leadership Lack of time / space within curriculum Accountability demands of NCLB Parent / community resistance I’m curious about your own situation. So I created a 3–minute survey! Simply click, drag, and drop the items to reorder them. Take… -
The (un)certainty of professional persistence
6 Nov 2009 | 7:13 amThere has been a lot of good discussion on my post about the future of books, libraries, librarians, and schools (thank you, everyone). In addition to the comments on the post itself, there are some excellent thoughts elsewhere as well: Flat World Library Corporation Dangerously irrelevant libraries Ten hard questions Random questions on future libraries by Scott McLeod I was struck, however, by something that Erin Downey said in her own post: What has, does, and will distinguish us from [coffee shops, community centers, and Internet cafes] are LIBRARIANS. Your barista doesn't know… -
Data-driven decision-making resources from CASTLE
4 Nov 2009 | 3:32 amI have done a lot of work over the years on various data-driven decision-making projects. I've taught courses, given workshops, delivered multi-day institutes for state departments of education and corporate partners, and written book chapters and white papers.I collected some of the highlights of that work on my new DDDM page here at Dangerously Irrelevant. Resources include some of the products from my work with Microsoft, the American Psychological Association, the Chicago Public Schools, the Minnesota Department of Education, and others. I hope these are useful to you. Happy reading!
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A Difference
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Google Never Forgets
27 Oct 2009 | 7:23 amCopied in it's entirety from Seth Godin's blog this short post will be featured prominently in the next conversation I have with my students around digital ethics. A friend advertised on Craigslist for a housekeeper. Three interesting resumes came to the top. She googled each person's name. The first search turned up a MySpace page. There was a picture of the applicant, drinking beer from a funnel. Under hobbies, the first entry was, "binge drinking." The second search turned up a personal blog (a good one, actually). The most recent entry said something like, "I am applying for some menial… -
New Math 10 Curriculum
25 Oct 2009 | 1:48 pmThere's a new curriculum coming. Gave a little talk about it and the text book that supports it. Here it is. You can download it if you like. All the links I shared in the session can be found by clicking around on the slides below. MHR Math10 WorkshopView more documents from dkuropatwa. UPDATE Joe, one of the folks who attended the session on Friday, has shared the Graphing Calculator Lease Form he uses in his school. You can see it here. Feel free to copy and edit or or just print it as is. Thanks Joe! -
Social Media Counter
22 Oct 2009 | 8:32 pmThanks to a tweet from Alec I stumbled upon Gary's Social Media Count over at Gary Hayes blog. Interesting. -
Scribes Spreading
21 Oct 2009 | 5:48 pmThanks to some blog love from Roland I put together a small, inadequate list of how the scribing blog love is spreading; check out these wonderful teachers: Chris Harbeck's class blog hub (innovator par excellence!) Ryan Maksymchuk's suite of class blogs (more scribing class blogs than you can shake a stick at!) Derrick Willard's class blog Jim Homan's Cathoilic Morality wiki Mr. Marti's precalculus class blog Reversearp's (an alias I believe) precalculus class blog Mrs. Everard's AP Calculus class blog Image by dkuropatwa via Flickr Every new day brings more new math (and non-math) bloggers. -
I've Got 5 Minutes
10 Oct 2009 | 11:15 amactually, it was 11 minutes and 45 seconds. This is the slidecast from one of three talks I gave on Friday October 9, 2009. I was in Virden Manitoba participating in the NIBBLE Conference for the Fort La Bosse School Division. More coming soon. Everything will be aggregated on the Senior Years Information and Communication Technology wiki I'm maintaining to share all the work I do in Manitoba with teachers across the province ... and you. I've Got 5 MinutesView more documents from dkuropatwa.
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Cool Cat Teacher Blog
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WaterShed Moment in the History of Online Safety Education
12 Nov 2009 | 5:51 amIn Larry Magid's Brief, Poingnant Overview of the recent third annual conference of the Family Online Safety Institute, he called it a "WaterShed Moment int he History of Online Safety Education" I felt buoying hope. Below are the extracted annotations from his article from me but I'd like to add something that I just emailed to Larry. Wow, Larry. Just a note that your current article in the San Jose Mercury News is SPOT ON - http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_13723472?nclick_check=1 We've been seeing this in our Digiteen projects where the kids determine their own ACTION… -
Blessings and Stressings: Reflections from Home
11 Nov 2009 | 8:16 pmA Break from Traveling Since July I gave myself five months off from travel. There were simply some things to attend to. My youngest son needed to be tested in more detail (he has dyslexia and a form of ADHD) and my older two - one in high school and one in middle school needed a chauffeur and a cook each night. Life begins at home and if I should raise children who do not contribute to this world in a positive way then no matter what else I do, in my own mind, I'd be a failure. Also, we have had the Eracism project to kick off and have been struggling and trying to raise money for the… -
The Conference for Educators and Students to Change Your Life
9 Nov 2009 | 5:32 amLast year, we had our first Flat Classroom conference in Doha, Qatar during which the students invented global collaborative projects that they believed would improve a social issue. Out of that conference, the students invented and voted the Eracism Project as their winner, a project to hold weekly debates around creating an understanding of race and culture. The first week into Eracism, I'll say the student vision was amazing and as teachers we are so excited about what we see with the potential for "simulated sychronous" environments to bridge gaps. Now, Julie Lindsay and I are… -
Daily Spotlight on Education 11/07/2009
7 Nov 2009 | 1:30 amInnovative Learning - Free Newsletter Fall 2009This phenomenal special interest group of ISTE has a great quarterly newsletter which is really the best of innovative learning in all of education. On pages 15-17 there are three pages of an article from two of my students and I about teaching in a virtual world including my "quick tricks for teaching in a virtual world." Print this, share it, and learn - so many great things in this newsletter!tags: education, opensim, reactiongrid, ipod, iphone, iste, learning, edu_news, edu_trendsTeachingWithContests.comThis blog shares contests to use and… -
Daily Spotlight on Education 11/05/2009
5 Nov 2009 | 1:30 amTICAL - Technology Information Center for Administrative LeadershipWill be speaking in Arkansas on February 17th at their TICAL conference. I'm so excited! This is information if you are in the area so that you may plan to attend. If you do, please plan to say "hi" - it really means a lot to meet the people from cyberworld, I guess it makes it all more "real."tags: education, coolcatteacher, inthenewsNetSmartzKids: TunesUse Clicky's Raps to teach your kids Internet safety. Lisa Durff recommended this site on Twitter. Cool tool.tags: education, digitalcitizenship, digiteenPosted from Diigo.
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Ideas and Thoughts from an EdTech
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Why Audience Matters
20 Nov 2009 | 5:46 amCross posted at The Tech Learning Blog This facebook/twitter posting by Chris Lehmann got my attention. It's hard to argue with that statement and it raises some interesting questions and implications. It reminded me this cartoon by Hugh MacLeod (warning, Hugh as an affection for the f-bomb) It's powerful statement warning about our ability to connect and yet wallow in shallowness and fluff. While I concur with Chris's concern I also think it's important to explore the nature and purpose of audience. Placing a clustr map on your blog or receiving a comment from someone on the… -
Robbing Students and Teachers of Joy
2 Nov 2009 | 10:02 amMaybe I'm just too lazy or unimaginative so I stole the title of my last post to make this one. Whatever. I'm not sure why but this topic runs pretty deep with me. I found Alfie Kohn's article this morning on twitter (I like the fact that he brings back stuff from the archives, I wish more people would do that. Old is not bad) and thought I'd highlight a few gems found inside it. While I recognize many peoples opposition to Kohn's highly progressive, Deweyesque slants, I find myself more in agreement with him than opposition. In the case of this article, I find it hard to… -
Robbing Students of Recognition
30 Oct 2009 | 3:44 pmCross Posted at the TechLearning blog Our district uses its front page to post success stories from our 40 schools. These range from academic achievements to athletic accomplishments of school teams. Schools post the stories to their own Website and submit them to me to post to the district page where generally there is more traffic. This one was sent to me earlier in the week. Tanner Spencer from Craik, SK, attended team Canada's World Junior top 35 camp in Orlando, Florida from October 5th to October 15th. Tanner is the youngest Saskatchewan player ever chosen to go. The… -
Podcast 47…When You’re Not the Smartest Person in the Room
29 Oct 2009 | 6:00 amThis is the audio and the slides from a presentation for SIAST Virtual Campus. When You're not the Smartest Person in the Room View more documents from shareski. You can subscribe to my podcasts in itunes. -
Follow up to a Rant
26 Oct 2009 | 8:41 amLast week I posted a rant entitiled, "We have to Stop Doing This to Teachers". I lamented about a number of conversations with teachers about the struggles of doing good work and dealing with change. Anytime you tag your post with the word "rant" it usually means there is some unfinished thoughts. (I guess you could say that about every one of my posts) Rather than commenting on each person, I thought I'd highlight some of the more salient remarks and perhaps add some commentary of my own. Alan writes: I am less sanguine about the consensus for change. Competing…
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apophenia
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Call for descriptions: online safety programs
18 Nov 2009 | 6:01 pmThe Risky Behaviors and Online Safety track of the Youth and Media Policy Working Group Initiative at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University is creating a Compendium of youth-based Internet safety programs and interventions. We are requesting organizations, institutions, and individuals working in online youth safety to share descriptions of their effective programs and interventions that address risky behavior by youth online. We are particularly interested in endeavors that involve educators, social services, mentors and coaches, youth workers, religious leaders,… -
Web2.0 Expo Talk: Streams of Content, Limited Attention
17 Nov 2009 | 12:04 pmI prepared a new talk today for Web2.0 Expo that I wanted to share with you: "Streams of Content, Limited Attention: The Flow of Information through Social Media" The talk is about the shifts in information flow thanks to new kinds of technology, focusing on some of the challenges that we face because of the shifts going on. Unfortunately, my presentation at Web2.0 Expo sucked. The physical setup was hard and there was a live stream behind me. I knew something was wrong because folks started laughing in the audience. Unable to see anything (the audience, the stream), I found myself closing… -
Hanging Out, Messing Around, and Geeking Out
8 Nov 2009 | 11:59 pmI am delighted to announce that "Hanging Out, Messing Around, and Geeking Out: Kids Living and Learning with New Media" is now in the wild and available! This book was written as a collaborative effort by members of the Digital Youth Project, a three-year research effort funded by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and conducted at the University of California, Berkeley, and the University of Southern California. The project was spearheaded by Mimi Ito and my late advisor Peter Lyman. I had the honor of being one of the members of this group and led one of the chapters in this… -
Choosing the Right Grad School
28 Oct 2009 | 12:16 pmLately, I've been getting all sorts of emails from folks applying to grad school who are seeking advice. I noticed that I was starting to say the same thing over and over again so I thought maybe it'd be better off to write some of it down in a more publicly consumable way. So here goes... Choosing the Right Grad School If there are faculty or students out there reading this, I'd love your comments and suggestions too. I know that we all have different advice we give to potential grad students so I know that this isn't the end-all-be-all. Please feel free to comment, send links to your own… -
Some thoughts on Twitter vs. Facebook Status Updates
25 Oct 2009 | 1:24 pmThe functional act of constructing a tweet or a status update is very similar. Produce text in roughly 140 characters or less inside a single line text box and click a button. Voila! Even the stream based ways in which the text gets consumed look awfully similar. Yet, the more I talk with people engaged in practices around Twitter and Facebook, the more I'm convinced these two things are not actually the same practice. Why? Audience. There are two critical structural differences between Facebook and Twitter that are essential to understand before discussing the practices: 1) social graph…
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The Fischbowl
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A Good Day
19 Nov 2009 | 1:41 pmAnne Smith’s English Literature class recently discussed Act III of Hamlet with Debi Ohayon’s AP class. Not that unusual, perhaps, except that Anne’s class is here at Arapahoe in Centennial, Colorado, and Debi’s class is at The Lovett School in Atlanta, Georgia.Anne tweeted out that she was looking for classes that might be interested in interacting with her class around Hamlet, and Laura Deisley – who’s the Director of 21st Century Learning at Lovett (great job title, btw) – responded that she knew a teacher that might be interested. Anne’s students are pretty comfortable… -
Copyright: Living Life Against the Law
18 Nov 2009 | 1:52 pmLawrence Lessig (now at Harvard) has another thoughtful presentation regarding copyright that he gave at EDUCAUSE 2009. He makes a compelling case about how "things have changed" but that our copyright laws have not kept up with those changes. In the past, "copyright had a tiny role." He quotes Jessica Litman:At the turn of the century [the last century, not this one], U.S. copyright law was technical, inconsistent, and difficult to understand, but it didn't apply to very many people or very many things. If one were an author or publisher of books, maps, charts, paintings, sculpture,… -
What Makes a Chat a Chat?
18 Nov 2009 | 1:39 pmI had the opportunity last week to participate along with the amazing Jim Burke from English Companion in an Education Week/Teacher Magazine chat on Social Networking and Teacher Professional Development. I hope some people found it useful and I appreciate the folks at Education Week/Teacher Magazine that put this together. None of the rest of this post is meant to disparage those folks, but simply to ask the question: What makes a chat a chat?We used CoverItLive for this and Jim and I were fed questions throughout the hour long chat. People in the chat submitted a question, the moderator… -
Learning 2.0: A Colorado Conversation (2010 Edition)
17 Nov 2009 | 6:03 amI'm pleased to announce that the 2010 Edition of Learning 2.0: A Colorado Conversation will be hosted by Loveland High School on February 20, 2010. Like the original in 2008 and the 2009 Edition, this year's get together is free.What is Learning 2.0: A Colorado Conversation?Learning 2.0: A Colorado Conversation is a one day conference/meetup for teachers, administrators, students, school board members, parents and anyone who is interested in education. It will be held on Saturday, February 20th, 2010, from 8:00 am until 3:30 pm at Loveland High School in Loveland, Colorado, USA (different… -
Diigo Ideas: Results from my Earlier Post
9 Nov 2009 | 12:53 pmI posted a couple of weeks ago asking how you used Diigo instructionally, and asking folks to complete a Google Form to share how they used it. Here’s a quick-and-dirty Google Site I created for a brief lunchtime staff development session on it. It includes the embedded results from the Google Form in that previous post. (Note: that Google Form is still active, so you can still add to the results.)
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Around the Corner-MGuhlin.org
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DiigoNotes - Empowering Principal Leadership Behaviors
20 Nov 2009 | 4:04 amThe following are my notes from Maxfield and Flumerfelt's article entitled "The Empowering Principal: Leadership Behaviors Needed by Effective Principals as Identified by Emerging Leaders and Principals" appearing in the International Journal of Teacher Leadership. Too often teachers experience isolation and a lack of opportunity to collaborate with colleagues in taking on the difficult work of improving student learning. Ingersoll (2001) cited this as a major factor in the alarming “drop out” rate of early career teachers. Schools have tended to embrace the traditional stratified view of… -
The Agony of Defeat - TCEA Area 20 Election Results
19 Nov 2009 | 6:57 pmYouTube Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2yvkT2uMnIY This is one of those moments that reminds me many a time in my youth when I watched the video above. Of course, it's not really a valid comparison...but it's fun to make the connection. Wednesday morning, the call came in regarding the TCEA Area 20 Election Results. The news? Jennifer Faulkner, the current Area 20 Director, will continue to serve as Director for another two years. I immediately sent her a congratulatory note. Although my initial reaction was relief, I have to admit to disappointment. Both feelings--contradictory as… -
Update on Moodle Inappropriate Access
17 Nov 2009 | 6:52 amAn email came out today to Moodle admins...I've put in bold the areas I found fascinating. The Moodle security issue aside, the bold section raises the question as to whether any organization has a reasonable expectation that exploits will be kept private until they can fix them and announce the problem and solution. Is this really realistic? One of my expectations--perhaps incorrect, and therefore worthy of being challenged--of free open source software is that software is MORE secure because the code is freely available. And, as a result, all programmers--foe or friend--can study it and… -
Tools - Banned and Mobile
17 Nov 2009 | 4:05 amThanks to Jane Hart coming up with a list of tools. There is a lot to like in the list but I can't help but ask, "How many of these tools are banned in public schools?" For example, here's the list of top 50 that includes tools that are banned in Texas school districts I'm familiar with...of course, not ALL school districts ban all products at the same time, although some districts sure try to! (smile) Aside from how many of the tools are banned, what does the selection of these by voters mean? If many of these tools are banned, how many are accessible by mobile phone? How many are used… -
Digital Crescent - How Does YOUR Team Collaborate
16 Nov 2009 | 8:29 pmSource: http://www.earthhistory.org.uk/wp-content/FertileCrescent.jpg Ask me any day of the week what my best work experience has been, and I default to a golden age when I worked on a team that allowed me to be very creative in the situation I found myself. The context or culture of the organization did not limit the creativity, but rather, served as raw materials for that creativity...such experiences, I've found, are rare. They endure for a short time and then slip away...changes in leadership, staffing, the magic only lasts a short time. Although I could work alone--and often did, since…
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The PrincipalsPage.com Blog
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Fired.
15 Nov 2009 | 7:29 amWhen The Suits say it’s not you, it’s them. It’s you. I’ve been fired. Axed. Booted. Canned. Discharged. Dropped. Given my marching orders. Received a pink slip. Handed my walking papers. Let go. Sacked. And officially terminated. This pleases me (it was time… and I have something to blog about). Several months ago, I was contacted my an educational magazine (that I’d never heard of… but I don’t get out much) to see if I would be interested in having my blog posted once a week on their website. After… -
Maybe It’s Not the Most Wonderful Time of the Year. But It Should Be.
12 Nov 2009 | 5:20 pmIt’s that time of year. The honeymoon is over. The fat lady hasn’t sung, but she is warming up (is this an insult to fat or skinny people??). If you work at a school it’s very likely that your patience is getting shorter, shorter, and/or gone. We’re a long way away from the happiness the beginning of school brings and an even longer way from the next sweet sweet summer vacation. It’s too early to start the year-end countdown (although I’m willing to bet each and every reader can name the person in their school that will start the countdown… usually by January 1) and it’s too… -
You Have Email. I Have a Blog. Let’s Work Together.
11 Nov 2009 | 6:32 pmWould you like to receive the PrincipalsPage.com Blog via email? It’s easy. Just sign up (next to my cartoon wife’s right elbow) to receive notifications when new blog entries are posted. That’s it. It’s so easy, my dog Buddy could do it. And he doesn’t have thumbs. -
The Weather is Too Nice to Blog.
8 Nov 2009 | 10:01 amI’m taking the day off from blogging. Laying (lying… whatever) low. Going incognito if you will. It’s the weekend and I deserve some time off (plus my garage is a mess and Buddy is starting to complain about his unsanitary living conditions). At least for today, no sitting at Larry the Laptop and trying to blog about something amusing and/or entertaining (often failing miserably, but you have to admire my effort). Where I live the weather is perfect. Sunshine, no wind, and 72 degrees. In my part of the world, that’s pretty good for early November. … -
Sick Day. Work Day. Sick Day.
6 Nov 2009 | 6:30 pmMy Evil Spawn missed 3 days of school this week. Much to our surprise she wasn’t suspended. Just sick. Maybe the suspension will come later. Or maybe she will just be incredibly sneaky and not get caught. Either way, any chance of her having perfect attendance is gone. Someone will undoubtedly email me to let me know that I’m way too negative when I blog about my Evil Spawn/daughter (odds are the email will be long, angry, hate-filled, use abusive language, and question my ability to parent… and it’s 50/50 that it will be from her mother). I’m not…
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Holy Kaw!
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Why the right fertilizer can cut greenhouse gases
20 Nov 2009 | 4:32 pmIn a stinky Science development, researchers have discovered that using alternative types of fertilizers can cut back on greenhouse gas emissions, at least in one part of the US. Nitrogen fetilizers are often necessary to yielding sufficient crops, but their use leads to the release of nitrous oxide, a major atmosphere enemy. Fertilizer use is one reason an estimated seventy-eight percent of America’s nitrous oxide emissions come from agriculture. But scientists have compared those emissions with newly developed fertilizers formulated with “controlled release” polymer-coated… -
Capturing water in sloooow mooootion
20 Nov 2009 | 3:12 pmSome things just look cooler in slow motion. Jell-O? Totally better. A punch to the face? Way more awesome. Photographer Martin Waugh spends his day watching single droplets of water, capturing the tiny and beautiful splashes with super slo-mo video. Check out the video from Discovery and you’ll definitely never look at a leaky sink the same way again. Science geekiness galore. Permalink | Leave a comment » -
Netherlands to charge drivers by the kilometer
20 Nov 2009 | 2:31 pmThe Netherlands is proposing charging drivers by the kilometer. Other taxes would be eliminated. Vehicles would be tracked by GPS. Doesn’t this make sense? Get rid of all the other taxes and tolls and simply pay-as-you-go. Or is it even simpler to use only the fuel tax to pay for roads? Think any of this could ever happen in the U.S.? Netherlanders are very practical people. Permalink | Leave a comment » -
Rosetta Project stores 13,000 pages and 1,500 languages on 2.8" analog disk
20 Nov 2009 | 1:50 pmThere’s little doubt that 100’s of languages will disappear in the next hundred years. The loss of these languages is a loss of human history and cultural diversity. That’s where the Rosetta Project comes in. As part of the Long Now Foundation, the Rosetta Project plans to archive thousand’s of languages for millennia. A first step is the creation of a durable storage medium that can easily be deciphered in the future—just like the Rosetta Stone. The prototype Rosetta Disk is a 2.8” (7.1cm) disk made of nickel. The disk is housed in a stainless steel… -
Tech nerds take it all off
20 Nov 2009 | 12:28 pmA techie strip club would probably feature plenty of outlets, free wi-fi and dancers flinging off Geekologie-brand undies to a song of remixed iPhone ringtones. Calm down, pervs, there’s no plans in the works for nekkid techie discotheque (that I know of), but, in the meantime, get your dweeb kicks with the Nude Tech Calendar 2010. London’s top new media entrepreneurs stepped out from behind their computers and stripped down for the 24 picture, limited edition calendar. Proceeds go to Take Heart India, a charity that raises funds for IT education programs for blind and disabled…
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ReadWriteWeb
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An iPhone Visualization App That Syncs with the Cloud
20 Nov 2009 | 3:50 pmRoambi announced a pro version of its iPhone application this week that syncs with Salesforce.com and other cloud-based services or on-premsie sales environments. It's a visualization application, providing mobile workers with a pretty cool way to see sales information. Integration is by far one of the most significant trends we are seeing in the enterprise space. It's a wave, really, marked this week by Salesforce.com and its move to turn the Force.com development platform into a service that makes all of its applications social. Sponsor A good example of this trend are small companies like… -
Three Great Light Blogging Tools Compared
20 Nov 2009 | 3:35 pmOnce the service for those serious enough to pay for the privilege to post, TypePad recently released a free "Micro" service. The company made the decision to offer a free product realizing the demand for a platform more formal than Twitter and less formal than Wordpress or Typepad's original product. ReadWriteWeb compared TypePad's Micro against 2 other leading light blogging tools. Below are our thoughts: Sponsor TypePad Micro: In addition to being able to blog via email, iPhone app, "Blog It" bookmarklet and the general WYSIWYG dashboard, this tool also allows users to cross post to… -
8tracks to Launch Playback API and Developer Program
20 Nov 2009 | 12:00 pmIt appears that the time for freemium music services in the US has passed. Earlier this week streaming music site Imeem sold to MySpace for under $10 million dollars while laying off a large number of staff. For a company with all four major record labels signed, more than 15 million uniques a month and well over 5 million tracks in its catalogue, it came as a sobering blow to the industry. While many companies move to a subscription model, 8tracks continues to forge along in what some describe as a convenient loophole. As of this weekend the company is publicly launching its API for Boston's… -
Memento: Protocol-Based Time Travel for the Web
20 Nov 2009 | 11:45 amThe Web constantly changes and evolves. That, of course, is what makes the Internet so exciting, but it also means that finding older versions of a website is hard. The current push towards the real-time web is making this problem even more apparent. Memento, a project based at Old Dominion University, wants to make it easier to access older versions of a web page without having to go to the Internet Archive. To do this, the project is using a relatively obscure feature of the hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP). Sponsor The Memento project wants to give browsers a 'time-travel' mode. -
The Future Is All About Context: The Pragmatic Web
20 Nov 2009 | 11:14 amThe semantic Web has long been heralded as the future of the Web. Proponents have said that Web experiences will some day become more meaningful and relevant based on the AI-esque computational power of natural-language processing (NLP) and structured data that is understandable by machines for interpretation. However, with the rise of the social Web, we see that what truly makes our online experiences meaningful is not necessarily the Web's ability to approximate human language or to return search results with syntactical exactness. The value of the semantic Web will take time because the…
