As a child, I grew up in a world that was dominated by left-brained thinking. Both my parents were in professions that required in-depth analytical thinking. The “rule” in my house was: “If you break something, try to fix it. Only THEN come ask Dad for help.” Dad was an avionics engineer and had an incredible mechanical ability. He could fix anything, and he instilled within his children a desire to understand how things work and a hunger to ask questions that clarify thinking.

Looking back now, I realize something I never understood then — what he had instilled was an ability to think critically. Along with creativity, collaboration, and communication, critical thinking is one of the four components of learning in the 21^st century. Unlike the other three, critical thinking is often difficult to reduce to bite-size pieces of understanding and challenging to teach to others.

Several months ago, as I was visiting one of our diocese schools, I was fascinated that a first grade teacher was actually teaching critical thinking to her students within a math lesson. The students had to create number sentences with the numerals of 5, 3, and 2. I was fascinated when she asked for volunteers (in pairs) to come to the whiteboard, write down their first sentence, and then, using manipulatives, prove that the sentence was correct. The other students “voted” whether or not the sentence was correct by either “a thumbs up” or “a thumbs down.”

The addition sentences were easy for the six and seven-year olds. The subtraction ones proved to be a bit challenging. Students could “phone a friend” or “ask for help.” If the partners still couldn’t solve the problem, the teacher intervened with some targeted questions and demonstrations using manipulatives. As I sat there in the back of the room, I was awed by the way the teacher got her students to think and work with one another!

Reflection, Reasons, Alternatives

Shortly after my classroom visit, I came across a website dedicated to teaching critical thinking. Upon diving deeper within the site, it was obvious why this is such a key component to 21^st century learning. Robert H. Ennis, author of the site, suggests three underlying components to critical thinking: reflection, reasons and alternatives.

Reflection always includes stopping and thinking before making rash judgments about the topic at hand. I have personally witnessed deep reflection by many students as they comment and question both within their personal and/or class blogs and wikis and during face to face communication). The use of blogs and wikis make it possible for others within their learning community, not just their class, to question their thinking patterns, thus deepening their learning experience.

It never ceases to amaze me how deep the learning experience can become when ideas are critiqued by others. So many good teachers I’ve had the opportunity to observe understand this concept and invisibly incorporate this within their teaching style.

‘How do you know what you know?’ and ‘Why do you think that?’ are questions that are often voiced by teachers and students alike. This is the core of the reasoning part of critical thinking. Individual thought patterns can be the result of cultural experience and/or a lack of personal experience. Questions like the above, from members within a learning community, broaden perception and deepen understanding.

Today’s learners must be put into situations that help grow global awareness and insight in order to make good decisions personally, professionally, and politically.  These attributes heighten the awareness of the similarities and differences of individuals, thus creating depper insights into what being human is all about.

Finally, in today’s world, learners of all ages need to understand that there are many ways to arrive at a good answer to a problem. They need lots of practice exploring alternatives. I have often said, “There is more than one way of getting to 2 besides 1+1.” This is the creative side of critical thinking.  Students should be given time to delve into questions in order to explore every dimension of the problem or question. This is when authentic, sticky, deep learning occurs.

Overall, I must acknowledge that our schools are filled with examples of teachers doing an excellent job teaching our young people to think critically. As I travel and visit schools and classrooms, I am often awed at the excellence that I find. It’s “Absolutely Amazing!” and all too often unrecognized or underappreciated in a world where so many are quick to be critical of schools without doing much critical thinking themselves.

This post is part of a series of featured action research projects from our 2011-12 teams as they prepare for their culminating presentations. First up is this interview with our team from William Penn Charter School and their virtual field trips project.

William Penn Charter School is the oldest Quaker school in the world, established in 1689 by William Penn. This Pennsylvania school has a rich history and diverse enrollment of students. Learn more about this historic school.

View this exciting sneak peek into their project, entitled Field Trip Fiasco!

Your action research project tackled the possibility of using virtual field trips to enhance learning, and save teachers time and money. What made you aware of this particular challenge in your school? Why did you land on this issue as the focus of your action research project?

One of our lower school team members mentioned local field trip resources as an area of interest. After she mentioned the idea, many of us felt an immediate enthusiasm about learning and doing more. Personally, I had written a sabbatical proposal a few years ago about researching regional museums to supplement our Latin curriculum. Although the sabbatical didn’t happen, the idea has stayed in my mind. One of the other cohort members, who is very interested in environmental and outdoor education, had already done a lot of work and thinking about getting kids to learn “outside the walls.” A math teacher on our team is very interested in interdisciplinary experiences (e.g. geometry and art), so that was a natural fit. Our performing arts teacher immediately came up with the idea of using film at the various locations.

The idea of virtual field trips came up pretty organically from our informal conversation. It seemed like a natural companion piece and a way to really help teachers enhance curriculum and content delivery. We realized pretty quickly that there’s a lot of opportunities on the web, but that they are not always easy to track down.

I think a lot of our inspiration came from both personal experience and anecdotal awareness of the challenges facing colleagues in all divisions around the issues of trips, both actual and virtual.

Tell us a little bit about the process you went through during your journey through PLP’s professional development this year? How did your action research come together? Who did what and how did you identify who would be good at different aspects of the project?

Once we picked our topic and our “product” (i.e. a website), we each identified particular areas of interest and just kind of ran with them. For example, the arts teacher immediately found someone who was going to a museum and sent them with a flip cam and list of questions to ask the education director. She then edited the video. As the person most familiar with the platform for our webpage (the school’s professional development website), I took on creating the prototype for the website, trying out various templates and designing the icons. All of us skyped with Gene Carboni, who helped us think about some rights and privacy issues with the filming. Some other team members researched and added some of the field trip sites to the website.

We tried to meet when we could, though it was hard for us all to be in the same room at the same time. In some ways, it was easier to “divide and conquer,” doing work on our own and then coming back together to review, refine, and ask questions.

The William Penn Charter School team shoots their action research teaser video - Kevin Berkoff, Monique Durso, Sonia Duprez, Doug Uhlmann, EvaKay Noone, Marianne Master, and Chuck Hitschler

What was your biggest revelation or aha moment during this year’s action research?

I think we were all pleasantly surprised at how well our ragtag team worked together, and appreciated the chance to develop something tangible to help our colleagues and to further develop in the future.

How did the concepts and strategies you learned during your PLP journey help you along the way?

We were all pretty familiar with googledocs and googlesites already, but we made good use of them as a way to communicate when we weren’t all together. I think the conversation we had in the last webinar about the different stages and challenges of action research was helpful as we move forward.

What was a major challenge or roadblock you encountered during your project? How did you mitigate this difficulty?

From a logistical point of view: TIME. Three different divisons, three different schedules. Finding time to meet, in addition to doing the webinars, really stretched us thin. We did have some opportunity to get coverage, but it’s still hard to miss class. We did the best we could, and used a googlesite workbook and our Community Hub page to share ideas.

From a project point of view: We also ran into some issues uploading our video from the Penn Museum. We needed to create an email address and private googlevideo channel to do it. We had some help from our director of technology, but it felt like we were going in circles for a while.

What was the most positive or transformative thing to happen as a result of your project?

I think our project will be a great resource for our faculty. I hope that people can really begin thinking more about using virtual field trips in their classrooms in a systematic and exciting way. I think the students will both enjoy and benefit from this new way to learn content!

Do you think this project will have implications into the future? Is it ongoing?

Definitely. I showed the website to our professional development committee (people who aren’t involved in PLP), and they were incredibly excited. In fact, some have volunteered to form a small working group to refine and add to the website next year. There are also specific ideas about tying in to the work students are doing in a Global Studies course.

How has being a part of PLP changed you as a teacher or leader?

Being involved in the professional development committee at school, I am familiar with taking on a leadership role in terms of supporting faculty and professional development. PLP has helped make me more aware of the role technology and PLNs can play in that process. I think other members of our team have also been tremendous leaders, both before and during this process. I really believe in developing the teacher-leader model in our school, and this program works well with that. It’s another way we can empower educators and encourage collaboration.

As a classroom teacher, I have appreciated knowing more about the different resources and social networks that are out there. I teach high school and I think it’s incredibly important to know what the kids are doing and interested in, and trying to tap into it when possible. Plus, I find that knowing about technology (even though I teach Latin), gives me a certain amount of “street cred” with my kids. It’s just another way to open up a dialogue with the students.

Join us for a year of action research and learning

Check out the complete details on William Penn Charter School’s virtual field trip project here. Like the idea of using action research to solve problems in your school? We have built an entire year of job-embedded learning around action research and social media tools called The Connected Learner Experience. Teams are forming now. Check it out here and join us for 2012-13.

While running a review session two weeks ago, the students took and then we went over a practice test. One of the practice test questions (from the leading test prep book) was about President Garfield. Only one of our bright, eager students even knew we had a President Garfield. And what this student knew was that he was one of four Presidents assassinated. In making choices about what to cover and what to leave out, my colleagues and I chose to skip past Garfield, spending time in Reconstruction, the Gilded Age and then jumping to American Imperialism in the late nineteenth century.

I have a Ph.D. in History from University of Pennsylvania. I have been teaching US History since 1997! What I know about Garfield is brief:  self-made man from Ohio, compromise candidate for the Republican Party in 1880, worked hard to reform the Federal Civil Service. His successor President Arthur actually signed into law legislation establishing the Civil Service as a merit based system (as opposed to a spoils system). To learn more specifics about Garfield, I can open a browser and do a Bing or Google or Wikipedia search.

Is this what colleges really want students to know?

I don’t want to get into an argument about whether Garfield was a part of US History, or whether the Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act was a a game changing piece of legislation. The question I want to ask is this: What is it we want our students to learn from their US History survey courses?

Every state requires high school students to take a US History survey course. Given the shortness of the school year and the increasing body of US History (every year we add another year of events, people and topics) we have to make choices. Not so for the makers of the SAT Subject Test. Every event, every President, every person of note is of equal importance and equally likely to show up on the examination. To prepare for any eventuality means moving through the survey textbook at a measured pace, constantly committing facts to memory, reviewing them frequently, and finishing the year with a head full of facts, a knowledge base a mile wide (or at least 300 years long) and a half inch thick. We can hope some of it will stick to the teen brain past the test date.

By using this test in their admissions process, colleges are saying: this is what we want our incoming students to have — heads full of facts.

But what can these students do with these facts? If I were a college admissions director I would want an assessment that sought to tease out a young person’s sense of what it means to be an engaged citizen. As a baseline, this sort of assessment might begin with geography. Where are the Appalachian Mountains and what do they have to do with the Proclamation of 1763? Where is the Grand Coulee Dam and what does it have to do with the Second New Deal? Where is the Rio Grande and what was its importance to the Mexican American War?

Along with geography, I would want to examine what students know about the evolution of the concepts of liberty and equality from the time of the Puritans and Cavaliers through to the present. How informed are they of the ways in which the Constitution has been interpreted and re-interpreted? Then I would want to see how much they know of all those times when citizens came together to effect change — all the 19th and 20th century citizen-led reform movements, including those of Reconstruction and the Progressive Era, to improve the lives of others or reform the government. For instance, I would want students to compare the Bonus Army with the Occupy Wall Street Movement.

If I were representing these respected higher education institutions, I would want such an assessment to measure effective writing and thinking. Then, I would want to know what potential students could actually do with all of this knowledge. Are they active, critical-thinking citizens or passive receivers of information?

That is what I would want to know. How about you?

This post is part of a series of featured action research projects from our 2011-12 teams as they prepare for their culminating presentations. First up is this interview with our team from The Baldwin School and their 3D classrooms project.

Established in 1888 by Miss Florence Baldwin, who was “dedicated to the tradition of academic excellence in education for girls and young women.”  The Baldwin School will celebrate its 125th anniversary in 2013. This diverse school enrolls more than 550 students in grades Pre-K through 12 with an average class size of 14, and many students having dual citizenship.

View this exciting sneak peek into their project, entitled Go 3D!

Your action research project tackled the problem of pushing teachers to expand what they do beyond the traditional classroom into a “3D classroom” and how to showcase the interesting things teachers did in this capacity. Tell us a little bit about what a 3D classroom means to you.

To me, a 3-D classroom means taking the relationship between teacher and student to a higher level—adding a third variable to the equation. This variable can be introducing or connecting with a different subject (interdisciplinary), connecting with other people from students to professionals (collaboration) and/or adding to the possibilities of student production (creativity).

What made you aware of this particular challenge in your school? Why did you land on this issue as the focus of your action research project?

We decided to start from the positive. We didn’t want to focus on what we weren’t doing; we wanted to take a close look at what we were doing and find some hidden gems of lessons within our school. We found several. In order to communicate what elevates these lessons from the educational norm, we needed a type of label and a flexible definition for our “hidden gems.” “The Three-Dimensional Classroom” fit the bill.

Our group represented many areas of the schoolhouse, so it seemed our project would necessarily be on the theoretical side to include everyone. I think as a collective team that was our natural bent anyway. This topic isn’t limited to a particular task or a specific grade: It could reverberate throughout the school as we undergo curriculum changes. Perhaps the situation of the school reinventing itself (from the test-oriented AP program to personal inquiry and interdisciplinary studies) influenced us more than we realized at the time.

From left to right: Janice Wilke, Laura Blankenship, Jessica Davis, and Diane Senior. Not pictured: Kelly Grimmett

Tell us a little bit about the process you went through during your journey through PLP’s professional development this year? How did your action research come together? Who did what and how did you identify who would be good at different aspects of the project?

It was essential for us to meet regularly and build a genuine social relationship. I can’t overemphasize this point. We enjoyed sitting down and having coffee together, checking in on each other’s week and life situations. I feel a sense of trust and respect builds from this personal awareness, and then philosophical discussions and more tangible results can flourish. This holds true for committees and for classrooms. We had a strong leader who held us all together and kept us on task. Individuals naturally reached for their own enthusiasms and one piece of the project would stimulate discussion in another. The truth is everyone has something worthwhile to say about everything, so listening and trusting each other helped shape the different aspects of the project into a more coherent whole.

What was your biggest revelation or aha moment during this year’s action research?

The team was highly inspired by Sir Ken Robinson's "Changing Paradigms of Education" talk.

I can only answer for myself on the “aha moment”; probably it was different for each of us. For me, it was the thought that in a truly collaborative classroom, the traditional definitions of teacher and student dissolve. So if I am not the person “in charge,” then what am I? I don’t like the phrase “guide on the side”; I think there is more to being a teacher than that. So what exactly is my function? (Janice Wilke)

Perhaps, opening myself up to wondering and exploring possibilities alongside my students and not providing answers but instead serving as a sounding board for their ideas best defines my role for a certain percentage of classroom time. This could happen as a whole group or on a one-to-one basis. When I see students develop their abilities to wonder and ask really great questions, I feel inspired. I know that their learning will continue long after they walk out of my class. (Diane Senior)

For me, it was realizing that I didn’t have all the answers.  I feel this every day in my computer science classes (which are new to me and to the school), where I’m really only a week or so ahead of my students.  But in the tech classes I teach, and in working with faculty, I often feel that I need to have all the answers.  Realizing that my team members were smart and capable and had really wonderful ideas was a relief and a wonderful thing to experience.  I’ll admit that it was uncomfortable at first–I like being a know-it-all!–but it added so much to our experience, and I’m glad I was able to let that happen.  They really were great people to work with, and I truly appreciate the opportunity to get to know them better. (Laura Blankenship)

How did the concepts and strategies you learned during your PLP journey help you along the way?

I think it helped to take a step back.  My team wanted to accomplish something immediately–like by December.  But stepping back meant we refocused and came up with a better idea, one that I think will benefit our school, and won’t languish in a folder or on a web site somewhere.

What was a major challenge or roadblock you encountered during your project? How did you mitigate this difficulty?

The major challenge, initially, was time and a clear sense of purpose. It was up to us to find time and create a sense of purpose, and so we did.

What was the most positive or transformative thing to happen as a result of your project?

A positive thing to emerge from our project was a sense of connection—working together created a feeling of “recognition” as we saw each other in different contexts throughout the day.

Another transformative thing to happen during our project was thinking about how to take it forward; what else it could become. We will morph into a committee on “innovative teaching” for our school’s self-study year for the re-accreditation process.

Do you think this project will have implications into the future? Is it ongoing?

The project will definitely have implications for the future.  We hope to bring part of it to new faculty orientation as well as to committees that are forming now on technology and innovative pedagogy (as mentioned above).  Also, the PLP team will become leaders for the rest of the faculty in terms of implementing our ideas.  It’s going to be very exciting!

How has being a part of PLP changed you as a teacher or leader?

As a “leader,” I think the project gave me more courage to be a “content creator” for the the school’s website and make stronger connections to other concerns, such as alumni relations. It is a bit odd to think of creativity and collaboration as a type of leadership, so maybe the traditional idea of what a leader is can also undergo a transformation.  As a teacher, I think it taught me to sit back a bit more and stop trying to supply answers for my students. The students can supply their own answers and then we can consider the merits and possibilities of each on their own terms and in a variety of contexts. (Janice Wilke)

I feel empowered to share exciting and innovative pedagogical practices and to serve as a model for others who want to take a calculated risk and try something new. (Diane Senior)

I have to say that though I’ve been called a leader and have had leadership roles in the past, I tend to shrink from such roles as I prefer to be simply a significant contributor rather than the person leading the pack.  My team members made taking on this role challenging but successful.  For the first time, I felt like I could ask things of my team and I would get more than I asked for.  I’m really proud of what we accomplished.  As Janice said, I think letting students (and faculty) supply their own answers was something I really learned from this experience.  I already do that in many areas of my teaching, but I feel I can do more, and I feel that it actually worked with this group. (Laura Blankenship)

Join us for a year of action research and learning

Check out the complete details on The Baldwin School’s 3D Classroom project here. Like the idea of using action research to solve problems in your school? We have built an entire year of job-embedded learning around action research and social media tools called The Connected Learner Experience. Teams are forming now. Check it out here and join us for 2012-13.

Act One. The scene is a large conference room. Laptops and iPads litter the tables that stretch from one end of the room to the other. Black power cords snake vine-like over and around the men and women in numerous chairs. They seem to wriggle out from the floor and the table legs and the leather attaché cases, in search of outlets.

At rise, we meet our subject of interest, seated back left, third row. She is by no means a principal character, but merely plays a small part in the intricate backchannel chat ballet that will unfold the moment the presentation begins. She positions her fingertips, poised to weigh in on the discussion, and much to her dismay, the stage fright sets in. Without so much as a keystroke, she slinks into the scenery and then disappears out the backstage door.

Act Two. Three months later. Ditch the conference room, keep the laptop. Add an active Twitter account, a handful of posts on her newly-launched professional blog, and a healthy dose of confidence. Our lowly player has catapulted herself into a more noticeable role in a learning community that is a living, breathing protagonist in its own right: defining and redefining its character with every click. She is replying to discussions within her online learning communities, she is writing blog posts, and she is transparently sharing her successes and failures as a learner and as a teacher. She is even starting her own discussions that — to her genuine shock (and secret pleasure) — have elicited responses and taken on a threaded life of their own, leading to others learning from and with her.

With this, her eyes are opened and her approach to the role she plays in this ensemble is no longer self-centered, riddled with worry about sounding uninformed or being cast aside as useless. Now, she sees herself in the part she was truly born to play, a role into which she has been written and with which many can identify.  She is connected to every other player in a way that allows her to be a source of knowledge as well as an active participant in the shared learning that occurs.

But, with newfound confidence and involvement comes newfound respect and, consequently, responsibility. Eager, she volunteers to write for the Voices From the Learning Revolution blog. I have credentials, she says. A backstage pass. Experience. A writing degree. I can do this, she says. I have found my voice.

And then suddenly it arrives. The stage fright. Again.

It’s me, Stephanie

Our player is me: Stephanie, a second-year fourth grade teacher and novice player on the teacher-tech stage. I could be any one of the many teachers on a similar journey toward becoming connected educators who value life-long learning not only for our students but ourselves. I would venture to say that we all experience bouts of stage fright at some point in our careers, from directors to actors to understudies. It is normal. Expected, even. We ask ourselves the same questions: What do I have to offer that someone else can’t supply? What good will my opinion do? Hasn’t my question been asked countless times before?

At first, these questions were left unanswered. This collaboration thing was hard. I was plagued with Lurker Syndrome, and I resigned myself to thinking that I’d spend the rest of the year watching and waiting, letting this valuable time slip by without taking advantage of what was being offered. Soon, though, through conversations with educators in my PLN, answers began to surface.

Aren’t those teachers smarter than I am? (Some are, of course.) Won’t they fare just as well without my input? (Maybe, but they’ll be better off with it.) Who will benefit from what I have experienced? (Give it a break; no way to be sure, but someone will!) I began to realize that the journey toward connectedness, toward incorporating technology into my curriculum, has not been about the fear itself, but about how to overcome it, and furthermore, how to help others in overcoming it and fully transitioning into the 21^st century educators we were written to be.

I am still faced with stage fright time and time again.  But the professional relationships that I have cultivated with those who have a wealth of varied experience, and the conversations that have ensued on Twitter or other online communities, have given me the tools to confront it, to understand it, and to transform it into the kind of learning and teaching that effects change, promotes transparency, and showcases successes and failures.

Finessing the fear factor

Through several conversations and interactions, I know that some of my colleagues—both in my school and in my PLN–are still struggling with the stage fright. How to stand up to it. How to move past it. And surely there are many other educators who have entered this brave new place called “connected community” with some trepidation. Allow me to share what I have learned in hopes that it helps you to forget the heat of the spotlight and the pressure of a large audience (however difficult they are to see beyond the virtual footlights).

• Start small. And this is true, even if the work you’re there to do is almost done. It is never too late to jump in and it is never too late to learn. In September, when I started on my road to connectedness, I was bombarded with email notifications containing links to discussion themes that in some cases baffled me.  I shut down and repeatedly hit delete. I rarely spent time in the community discussion space and certainly was not an equal participant in our shared learning.  My presence on Twitter was weak at best. Sound familiar? Try this: pick one. One discussion thread. One task.  One tool. Something that appeals to you. That sends that tiny spark. That makes you think twice, if only for a second. Click over. Read. Write. Ask. Reply. Reply again. Trust me when I say that it will be liberating and exhilarating and will give you a sense of worth as contributor of experience, advancer of knowledge, agent of change.

• Gather support. I didn’t even know what PLCs and PLNs were in September, let alone did I cultivate and contribute to one. (They are “professional learning communities” and “personal learning networks,” by the way.) And now, I am not sure how I’ve survived these several years without them. Within these communities and networks, look out for the friendly faces (or avatars). Our Voices editor, with his nudges to get writing, did not let me off the hook, even when I made the excuse of being caught off guard by stage fright and wanted to give up. A fellow Voices writer (Patti Grayson) offered her encouragement and direct support in the comment thread of a blog post we were both following. It happened to be a post about not being afraid to share. These are merely two examples of many that showcase what we can do—together. They are more than just a pat on the back. They are guideposts that seem to say, “I’ve been there. Others have been there. I’ve seen what happens when you get to the other side. Got your back. Don’t give up.” When I find something more valuable than that, I’ll let you know.

• Keep going. In order for the two previous bits of advice to work, moving forward is a must. It takes precious time. And it is hard work. But the feedback, conversations, relationships, and changes that take hold are worth every minute. Make an effort to build upon the simple steps it takes to start. Try new things often and seek support to help you through the learning process. There are many people in every connected community (I am assured by veterans of this work) who are just waiting to help, yearning to offer guidance and share their experiences, and eager to get you to peak performance.

This brings us to Act Three. We’re not the same characters we were when we started. Our roles are being written and rewritten, constantly shifting with each new thing we learn and bring to our teaching. Whether you have been center stage, playing your part convincingly for quite some time now or whether, like me, you’ve been waiting in the wings and are just moving to the edge of the spotlight, there is always time to own your role and deliver your lines.

There is no excuse for stage fright now. In the world of connected educators, Time is always on our side. The learning curtain has yet to close. In fact, it never will. The crowds are cheering and we’re stepping toward the front of the stage.

We want to let you know that our Connected Learner Experience is at its’ lowest price ever for our early bird registrants. But that price isn’t going to last long. In just two weeks, we’ll be raising our prices and shutting down the early bird registration. We want to make sure you get in under the deadline, and so we’re writing to personally invite you to take part in our Connected Learner Experience – whether individually, in a team, or schoolwide.

How much will I save? What if I’m not satisfied?

Save $250 on an individual pass or $1,000 on a school team passwhen you sign up before June 1. Don’t wait and kick yourself for missing this early bird deadline!

Best of all, we are offering a no risk, money back guarantee. At the end of the year, if you have been a full participant in the Connected Educator Experience, but feel that your teaching and learning haven’t shifted and you don’t feel connected as part of a global community of educators, we will refund 100% of your money.

Why should I care about being a Connected Learner or Educator?

The world is changing and you as an educator need to change with it, for the sake of your iGeneration students.

• New and emerging Web technologies are connecting our children in ways never before possible. Through blogs, social networking sites, multimedia and other Web 2.0 tools, their world is becoming more and more networked and participatory.
• Your students spend time every day in virtual environments that are highly engaging and encourage creative thinking and problem solving. They frequently participate in games and social media where they routinely acquire and apply knowledge and collaborate with “colleagues.”
• And then these digital natives enter our classroom spaces. Is the transition seamless? Or is it more like time travel — a leap back into yesteryear?

Our most important message is always this: If you want to become a 21st century educator, you first have to become a 21st century learner. 

PLP’s Connected Learner Experience will show your teachers how to become self-actualized professionals who can leverage personal learning networks and a dynamic, collaborative online community to become confident and effective 21st century educators.

“The life of a Technology Coordinator can be a pretty lonely experience. I speak a language only a small number of people understand; few people want to buy what I’m selling. At least it seems so much of the time. That’s why the Powerful Learning Practice has become so important to me both personally and professionally. Contrary to the popular myth that the internet has weakened social connections, I have found my professional family with the individuals I have met through this organization. I share, I learn, and I grow with with teachers from all over the world.” - Renee Hawkins, Garrison Forest School, Maryland

Exactly what will I get as part of the Connected Learner Experience?

When you join our Connected Learner Experience, you will actively participate in mind-shifting webinars, collaborate in a dynamic online community of fellow learners, and ultimately create a custom learning product that you design.

Teachers, principals and other educators emerge from our year-longConnected Learner Experience as classroom, school and system leaders who get  SHIFT and who have an arsenal of inquiry-driven, technology-embedded, student-directed teaching and learning strategies.

Best of all, throughout your professional learning experience, our Community Leaders, Connected Coaches and Experienced Voices will be on hand to help you master both the tools and the concepts you need to create classrooms where deep student learning and high achievement are the norm.

I need more info.

Get a breakdown of exactly what you’ll learn, who will help you on your learning journey, and more: The Connected Learner Experience. Or you can chat with us live and get your questions answered. Powerful Learning Practice holds regular information sessions in the form of one-hour live webinars. We’ve got several coming up in the next few weeks. Seating is limited, so reserve your spot today!

Cathy Beach, Grade 7 Classroom Teacher

PLP eCourses attract participants from across the globe to learn and grow with one another.  Over the next few weeks, we will feature interviews with current and past PLP eCourse participants.  We’ll ask participants to share information about themselves, why they chose PLP eCourses and what they are up to professionally.

Cathy Beach is a past eCourse participant from Peterborough, Ontario, Canada.  She is a seventh grade teacher.

1.  Which PLP eCourse did you take this Winter?

“Transformation, One Lesson At A Time” and “Project-based Writing”

2.  Have you taken other online courses from PLP?

Yes, last summer I took PLP’s “21st Century-ize Your Curriculum” with Kevin Jarrett and the self-paced “Do It Yourself Web 2.0 Tools”

3.  Why did you decide to take more eCourses from PLP?

I’m just a regular classroom teacher and until recently, I couldn’t find colleagues in my local area who were interested in the same issues, or who could help me with all the questions and frustrations I was having trying to figure out how to integrate 21st technologies with my Grade 7 class on my own. And the more I started to learn, the more I realized there’s so much more I need to learn to provide them with rich, engaging, and meaningful – authentic – learning tasks.

4.  Prior to taking courses with PLP, would you describe your knowledge on 21^st century education as basic, intermediate or advanced?

Basic – but now feel I have progressed to intermediate

5.  What was your favorite thing about this eCourse and/or instructor?

The thing I love most about the PLP courses is being connected with an instructor and a small group of colleagues who understand both my technical challenges, and my deeper philosophical and pedagogical questions, who have ideas, suggestions, their own questions, and resources for me to work with. It means so much to me to be able to chat and discuss things with a group of educators in an atmosphere of “we’re all in this together – we’re just at different stages along the way”.

6.  What is your personal philosophy/belief on learning in the 21st century?

I believe that Tsunamis of Change have already begun to surge over us, and that in education, a vast number of us are caught underwater, trying to survive the swirling currents of budget cuts, standardized testing, and enormous work load – so much so that we can’t even afford to think about lifting our heads out of the water and dealing with the changes taking the rest of the world by storm. As a classroom teacher becoming more ancient and out-of-date every day, I’ve spent the last 2 years on a very steep learning curve, just trying to learn about some of these new tools and technologies. And I’m only now finally starting to grapple with the very fundamental changes I need to make in the way I teach and learn with my 21st Century students.   I’m really concerned about the implications of all of this for my fellow classroom teachers… And I’m really hoping that by the time they are forced to surface and adapt to the changes these new technologies are bringing, that there will be a huge depth and breadth of support, models and resources for them to draw on for help. Change in pre-service training is an essential starting point.

7.  Any other information you would like to share about yourself personally or professionally?

Things I’ve learned:

1. Listen to our students. They are constantly telling us what is effective and what is not.  Respect and credibility is earned by our hearing, valuing, and responding to them.

2. New Rules! “Don’t count on it.” What we thought we knew, what we thought would be – may not.  New F-word: Flexibility.

3. Technology in education allows us to build new relationships. I’ve learned that we need to build really good relationships. Surviving tsunamis of change will depend on it.

4. I have so so much more to learn…

PLP loves helping educators’ transform their 21st century classrooms through eCourses and year long programs of study.

Have you seen Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach’s A Day in the Life of a Connected Educator infographic?  Are you ready to start connecting with other educators and expand your PLN?  Register for PLP’s Connected Learner Experience (prior to June 1st to receive our early bird pricing) and join over 5,000 other educators who have taken their classrooms into the 21st century.

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]]> http://plpnetwork.com/2012/05/17/cathy-beach-loves-learning-and-transforming-her-21st-century-classroom/feed/ 0 http://plpnetwork.com/2012/05/17/cathy-beach-loves-learning-and-transforming-her-21st-century-classroom/ http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/PowerfulLearningPracticeLLC/~3/eSOkjhBSc_o/ http://plpnetwork.com/2012/05/15/flipping-blooms-taxonomy/#comments Tue, 15 May 2012 14:59:19 +0000 Shelley Wright http://plpnetwork.com/?p=5459 Teacher Shelley Wright is on leave from her classroom, working with teachers in a half-dozen high schools to promote inquiry and connected learning.

I think the revised Bloom’s Taxonomy is wrong.

Hear me out. I know this statement sounds heretical in the realms of education, but I think this is something we should rethink, especially since it is so widely taught to pre-service teachers.  I agree that the taxonomy accurately classifies various types of cognitive thinking skills. It certainly identifies the different levels of complexity. But its organizing framework is dead wrong.  Here’s why.

Old-school Blooms: Arduous climb for learners

Conceived in 1956 by a group of educators chaired by Benjamin Bloom, the taxonomy classifies skills from least to most complex. The presentation of the Taxonomy (in both the original and revised versions) as a pyramid suggests that one cannot effectively begin to address higher levels of thinking until those below them have been thoroughly addressed. Consequently (at least in the view of many teachers who learned the taxonomy as part of their college training) Blooms becomes a “step pyramid” that one must arduously try to climb with your learners. Only the most academically adept are likely to reach the pinnacle. That’s the way I was taught it.

Many teachers in many classrooms spend the majority of their time in the basement of the taxonomy, never really addressing or developing the higher order thinking skills that kids need to develop. We end up with rote and boring classrooms. Rote and boring curriculum. Much of today’s standardized testing rigorously tests the basement, further anchoring the focus of learning at the bottom steps, which is not beneficial for our students.

I dislike the pyramid because it creates the impression that there is a scarcity of creativity — only those who can traverse the bottom levels and reach the summit can be creative. And while this may be how it plays out in many schools, it’s not due to any shortage of creative potential on the part of our students.

I think the narrowing pyramid also posits that our students need a lot more focus on factual knowledge than creativity, or analyzing, or evaluating and applying what they’ve learned. And in a Google-world, it’s just not true.

Here’s what I propose. In the 21st century, we flip Bloom’s taxonomy. Rather than starting with knowledge, we start with creating, and eventually discern the knowledge that we need from it.

Blooms 21: Let’s put Creating at the forefront

In media studies we often look at the creation of print and digital advertisements. Traditionally, students learn many of the foundational principles for creating a layout through a lecture or text book reading, and then eventually create their own.

What if we started with creativity rather than principles? My students start with the standard elements of an advertisement (product photo, copy, logo etc.)  and create a mockup.  Then students evaluate their mock-up by comparing their ads to a few professional examples and  discuss what they did right and wrong in comparison to what they’ve seen.

As students are pointing out design elements that work, we begin to analyze for similarities and divide them accordingly into groups. Most will likely fall into the four design principles of contrast, repetition, alignment, and proximity. At this point, students compile their findings as a class, and only then are the four design principles formally introduced.

Now students can apply what they’ve learned as they return to their own mock-up and fix elements based on the design principles they’ve begun to absorb.

Finally, students research the four design principles to flesh out their understanding where needed, and possibly correct any misconceptions. From this research, students create their own graphic organizer of the four design principles for future reference and to help them remember.  We started with creativity and ended with the knowledge my students have curated. They’ve been engaged with the entire process from start to finish, and my students have make some significant decisions about the essential knowledge they need.

Blooms 21 works great in science

Not only does flipping Blooms work for classes like media studies,  it also blends beautifully with my inquiry-based Chemistry class.

As we study science, I’ve come to realize that it’s very important for my students to encounter a concept before fully understanding what’s going on. It makes their brain try to fill in the gaps, and the more churn a brain experiences, the more likely it’s going to retain information.

When we study ionic compounds, we start with a lab. My students begin by creating conductivity testers out of tin foil, batteries, and mini Christmas lights. Students then create their own lab and test 10-12 different substances, from salt water, to HCL, to sugar water, to check which substances conduct electricity. Usually, about half of the solutions provided do.

I have them compare their findings to how scientists usually categorize these solutions. Sometimes, solutions that are supposed to conduct electricity, don’t.  So providing the results of experts helps them to have more confidence in their own results.

However, it’s not enough to discover which substances conduct electricity. I want them to try to figure out why. With the results my students have obtained, they analyze their findings. By dividing the solutions into appropriate categories, students often discern that the solutions that conduct electricity are made up of two elements and the elements combined are found on opposite sides of the periodic table, such as NaCl. They also realize that solutions that don’t conduct, such as sugar, are usually made of elements found on the same side of the table.

Once they begin to analyze each solution’s makeup more closely, they tend to realize that conductive solutions are, for the most part, made up of a metal and non-metal, whereas solutions that don’t conduct usually don’t contain any metals. Once they’ve exhausted this activity, I introduce the concepts of ionic and covalent bonds to label each category.

Then students re-evaluate their own findings and apply their learning by fixing elements in their categorization system.

At this point, my students research ionic and covalent bonds, either through cooperative research, or by using the flipped classroom model, to fill out their findings with information about the characteristics of each type of bond, such as malleability, boiling and melting points, etc. They’re essentially creating their own notes.

And in English class . . .

Flipping Blooms — putting Creating, Evaluating, Analyzing and Applying first — also works in English.  From what I can tell, it’s likely the easiest route to creating a flipped English classroom. In the past, I’ve struggled to teach my students concepts such as grammar rules and abstract ideas like voice. Flipping Blooms makes this much easier.

I begin with having my students write a paragraph, either in response to a prompt or their own free writing. Next, students, working in small groups or pairs, evaluate several master texts for the criteria we’re working on. How does the writer use punctuation or voice in a particular text? What similarities are there between texts? Students then compare their own writing with each text. What did they do correctly or well? How does their writing differ and to what effect?

As a class, or in their groups, we analyze the pieces for similarities and differences and group them accordingly. Only then do I introduce the concept of run-on sentences, comma splices, and fragments. Essentially, through this process, my students identify the criteria for good writing. From this, we’re able to co-construct criteria and rubrics for summative assessments.

Students then apply what they’ve learned by returning to their own writing. They change elements based on the ideas they’ve encountered.

Students further their understanding by either listening to a podcast, or engaging in their own research of grammar rules. Finally, as the knowledge piece, students create a graphic organizer/infographic or a screencast that identifies the language rules they’ve learned.

I think the best flipped classrooms work because they spend most of their time creating, evaluating and analyzing. In  a sense we’re  creating the churn, the friction for the brain, rather than solely focusing on acquiring rote knowledge. The flipped classroom approach is not about watching videos. It’s about students being actively involved in their own learning and creating content in the structure that is most meaningful for them.

Blooms 21 actively places learning where it should be, in the hands of the learner.

Photo: Lecates, Creative Commons

Art: Chris Davis, Powerful Learning Practice LLC

We love teachers! 20% discount off any eCourse starts today!

Last week we thanked teachers for inspiring, challenging, and making us better students and people. We also asked teachers if they “would recommend teaching as a profession and give us their most compelling reason for becoming an educator in the 21st century”.  Bonus entries were awarded to those who Subscribed to the Top Shelf Newsletter, Liked Powerful Learning Practice on Facebook, Followed Powerful Learning Practice on Twitter and/or Tweeted about the contest.

We thoroughly enjoyed reading all of the responses and inspirational words.  We encourage you to read all of the comments shared by educators from across the globe.

Teacher Appreciation Grand Prize Winners:

1.  Tracey D’Amato: Free PLP Summer eCourse

2.  Simon: Copy of Personal Learning Networks: Using the Power of Connections to Transform Education by Will Richardson

3.  Jeff: Copy of The Connected Educator: Learning and Leading in a Digital Age by Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach and Lani Ritter Hall

To celebrate and show our appreciation for ALL educators, we decided to add a special prize (in addition to those listed in the original contest).  Starting today, (May 14th) ALL educators will receive a 20% discount off any PLP eCourse.  To receive this discount, you’ll need to enter the promotion code of SUMMERLEARNING20 when you checkout!

So this summer, grab your sunscreen, laptop and sign up for a learning adventure with Powerful Learning eCourses.  Our flipped online classes include a blend of readings, videos and discussions in an asynchronous (online course community is open 24/7) and synchronous (live) environment.  All of our webinars are recorded and can be accessed within thirty minutes of the live session (in case your vacation plans prevent you from joining the webinar live).  Our eCourses are flexible, practical, affordable, and an easy way to get your professional development in from the comfort of your own home (or wherever your laptop and your imagination take you). Our summer offerings include:

21st Century-ize Your Curriculum

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School Communications Toolkit for School Leaders

The Complete Guide for Implementing The Flipped Classroom: The Full Picture

Transformation, One Lesson At A Time

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Bits and Bytes: Helping Kids Make Smart Choices

Digital Footprints: Helping Teens Make Smart Choices

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Amy Musone, a year 1 team leader in the IU 13 community from the Central York District, PA, encouraged her team members to reflect with her as they wind down this year of Powerful Learning Practice professional learning. The team had been immersed in an action research project, examining how their teaching would be transformed as they engaged in PBL in order to promote 21st century learning.

Our goal for this post is to reflect on where each of us started and where we have come.  Remember our driving question:

 

How will the Pringles Project transform our teaching practices to promote 21st century skills within our students?

 

Our beginning: We started with a survey to gather information about how each of us perceived ourselves along with information about what we felt comfortable and uncomfortable with. We inputed data using a Google form and shared our thinking when we met via Skype and on the Community Hub.

 

Now: Now it is time for us to reflect on what we have done, how we’ve grown, and struggles that still hold us back. It is also important for us to consider and share where we plan to go from here.

 

Looking forward to hearing your ideas!

Amy being the leader that she is, modeled her own reflection for them:

Okay…when we began this venture, I felt unsure of myself and a little self-conscious that I just wasn’t “getting it.” One thing I wasn’t sure about was what exactly was expected of me. As I became more involved I came to the conclusion that the expectation was going to be set by one person…myself. I could get guidance and encouragement from my team members and the PLP community at large, but ideally, the motivation to move forward and become a more effective educator came from within. I knew that I alway wanted to engage in PBL, but never knew how to fully embrace it. Through our meetings both with my PLP Year 1 team and the larger community webinars I felt like I could wrap my head around this idea.

 

So…my head was in the right place, finally. My students are just completing their projects. My room was a disaster (we were using packaging materials), there was a constant buzz of excited and on-task conversations, and the creative juices were flowing. There is NO way that I could have “taught” them everything that they discovered (technology, and science) and that made me glow. ….

 

This project has begun to infiltrate other activities that happen throughout the school day. I worked to devise a project with another teacher in my classroom and have collaborated with the gifted support teacher on a project. I am truly excited about this. My hope would be to work with the PLP group on other projects…. I know that in order to do this, we are going to need teacher and administrative buy in. Luckily, I have plenty of artifacts created by kids to demonstrate learning, problem solving, critical thinking skills, and collaboration. Still have a hill to climb…sure, but I’ve taken a couple of steps!

With Amy’s powerful reflection on her PLP journey, I decided to “follow” the discussion; sure enough, the next day Melissa Wilson responded. She shared in part her challenges and her beliefs in the power of PBL:

This has been a very challenging project.  At the fifth grade level there are many obstacles to overcome just to find the time to proceed with a problem based assignment. …

 

I believe that there is a real need for problem based learning. …  The challenges created by this type of project parallel the types of challenges the students will face in real life….

 

Next year I plan to look at ways that I can create projects such as “The Pringle Project” that will fit in the curriculum.  In designing these assignments the plan is to be able to deliver instruction covering the curriculum and then allow the students to use what they have learned in creative real world problem solving. With support from my colleagues I hope that this will help my students to learn and prepare them for the future.

And then Barb Ream chimed in a day later attributing their success and learning to their coach; Amy, their team leader; and their collaboration:

I know that the point of this whole project was to think differently about education by experiencing it firsthand. I am an old fashioned learner who is used to having everything laid out for me. ..

 

I felt like I was floundering – a fish out of water. I felt like it must just be me, however after talking to the rest of my group I realized it wasn’t just me. We all floundered together and somehow we managed to figure it out in the end.

 

I feel the reason we were able to pull it together was for a number of reasons. The first was we had a great coach. Peter Skillen really guided us through the process and made us think outside the box. Our fearless leader, Amy, was invaluable. Her insight, leadership, creativity, and motivation pulled us through. We would have been lost forever without her. Lastly, my team members. It was such a great experience getting to know members of my school community better. We met through skype and in person. We had great collaboration sessions and worked very well together.

 

I think this project taught me many things. The first is that it is ok to be messy learners. …. I learned that if you give students an interesting project, they will come up with some amazing solutions to problems.

 

My plan for the future is to continue to create more Problem Based Projects. I actually enjoyed how all of the students came up with different solutions to the same problem. I also plan on sharing this with more colleagues in hopes of having them do something similar.

Deep reflections with common themes–

• Initially overwhelmed with uncertainty and challenges yet persevering
• Floundering and figuring it out together
• Appreciations for collaboration, the risk taking that enables, and hopes to continue that
• Recognition of the power of a collegial team working together and of PBL in learning
• Evidence of profound, collegial professional learning– absorbing, doing, interacting and reflecting

Although this team is winding down their formal time together in year 1 PLP, these reflections portend a gearing up–

• for future collaborations, collegial learning,
• for more in depth journeys into transforming their teaching practices to promote 21st century skills within their students.

Cross Posted