1. Scott Meech at Tech & Learning

Scott describes 5 steps toward using technology as an environment for learning (and identifies popular and his own picks for tools to aid in each step):

1. Researching
2. Reading
3. Archiving
4. Reflecting
5. Participating

He goes into more detail and it’s worth the read¹, but these steps fit nicely with the three general steps I have in mind for students while working as self-directed learning in the science classroom:

1. Selection (choosing learning goals, identifying resources to help meet those goals, content selection)
2. Performance (working towards learning goals & mastery of content)
3. Assessment (primarily self- & peer-assessments)
4. Repeat

This process is surrounded by Monitoring, or self-assessing ones progress, identifying weaknesses, and focusing on strengths. I feel Scott’s ideas flesh out how technology might interface with my ideas here. Details are still pretty fuzzy, but my neurons are firing happily when I think about it- telling me it must be on the right path.

2. David Warlick: A Few Shifts I See Happening

The venerable Mr. Warlick lays this down:

Shifts in Education Not that we stop doing one and replace it with the other.  This is not a dicomedy
F r o m		T o
• Classroom/Workshop Learning (time/place-based)		Network Learning
• Institution Dependent Learning		Independent (self-directed) Learning
• Literacy		Learning Literacy
• Lifelong Learning Skills		Learning Lifestyle

Right now I’m on solidly the left, frustrated because I want to work my way more to the right, but not able to make much progress because of time and commitment constraints. If I could only take a month sabbatical or two to really hash these things out…

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1. Scott also provides a link to a presentation he gave recently that relates to all this. I haven’t had a chance to sit down and check it out yet (I will), but I already recommend it. I’m sure it’s worth it. Also check out his blog.

About 15 people came to the session I helped facilitate. I was glad the participants came ready to think about new ways of engaging students and discuss the challenges and obstacles that stand in the way.

Among the positives:

• Discussion on how our school’s filtration policies are preventing us from moving forward
• Discussion on the futility of trying to ban cell phones
• Teachers sharing anecdotes about students planning and organizing school events using facebook
• Brainstorming ways that technology can benefit our students and the challenges that come with them
• Getting to share some resources with each other (I shared Dean Shareski & Jamie Raeburn Weir).

I know there’s still a long way to go with lots of obstacles to overcome, but I feel like we’ve finally started to have these important conversations. Let’s hope we continue to move forward as a school and staff from here.

Special thanks to Dean Shareski (visit his blog) and Jamie Raeburn Weir (visit her blog) for providing the 60 second shout-outs. I believe the participants were quite impressed.

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cc licensed flickr photo shared by pfly

I’d love to have some of you share how you utilize technology in support of powerful pedagogy in your classrooms or schools. To do that, I’m going to steal a page from Dean Shareski who borrowed the format from Alan Levine².

So, if you could submit a brief (~1 minute) video to me simply explaining how you use technology to take teaching and learning to the next level, I’d love to share it with some staff members who are just getting going on this technological journey.

If you could send the files to my email (ben [dot] wildeboer [at] gmail [dot] com) in whatever format is easiest for you, I’ll share your videos with the participants and I’ll share them online in some format (if you’re okay with that).

If making a quick video clip isn’t your thing, please light up the comments with your thoughts on this topic.

I hope to provide some teachers with examples of real educators using technology to take their students’ learning to a better place. Thanks in advance!

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cc licensed flickr photo shared by db*photography
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1. Not so much the whole “21st century skill” bit. I don’t like the term and how loosely it’s thrown around. I think of it more as, “Good teaching using available tools” But anyway…    
2. Thanks! I really appreciate it!  Check out their finished products (they’re great): Alan Levine’s and Dean Shareski’s

The problem

With our 10-15% absence rate, I’ve been receiving a lot more requests from parents for the work their kids are missing. I’ve been noticing that I’m spending a decent chunk of my planning time just getting together whatever classwork I can for the absentees. I greatly value my planning time for…well…planning. I don’t like sacrificing it for non-planning related activities.

The solution

I have a class wiki where I post a weekly calendar. I also use it as a jump-off point for any online assignments or projects. I did not post every handout for several reasons: (a) it takes extra time, (b) it creates more clutter in an already hard to navigate Wikispaces file manager, (c) the vast majority of students don’t use (or perhaps don’t need to use) the additional resource.

However, a couple things have changed the last couple of weeks. As mentioned earlier, I’ve found myself spending a lot of time emailing parents of sick students and putting together handouts for them. Secondly, I’ve (perhaps a little belatedly) discovered the ease with which Google Docs lets you upload and share PDF documents.

The process

1. Whenever I print a handout or prepare a slide deck for my classes, I also save it as a PDF.
2. Upload the PDF to Google Docs

   

3. Share the pdf document so anyone with a link can view it.
4. Copy & paste the document’s URL & link to it from my class wiki.
5. Relax as the email requests for class handouts can be answered with a quick, “The handouts you need are all available on the class wiki.²“
6. Bask in the parents amazement at technology these days.

Here’s an example of a handout and a slide deck uploaded to Google Docs as PDFs in case you’d like to see what they look like.

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1. Holy cow. That article has more than a couple spelling/grammatical errors.    
2. Of course I give a little more instruction than that. Also, when parents request to pick up the handouts in person, I also oblige. I realize not everyone has the internets at home.    

After having students design an experiment to test which brand of toilet paper is the strongest when wet and going over the basics of the scientific method (view the presentation here), I show them this video and ask them to watch for the player’s use of the scientific method:

I know that may be copyrighted content¹, but it’s a great example of the scientific method.

Define a problem: The player wants to get beyond this level to eventually save the lovely Princess Toadstool. This big baby stands in the way. The research question here is pretty obvious: “How can I defeat the baby dino-plant?”

Observation: The player brings knowledge of the game so far into the duel with this large dino-plant boss. For example, the player knows Mario’s spin move often hurts the bad guys. Also that shooting bad guys with “stars” and jumping on top of bad guys often hurts them. The player also is observing the dino-plant boss for signs of how to beat it as well as for watching out for how it will try to attack Mario.

Hypothesis & Experiment: The player comes up with multiple hypotheses. Notice the spin move attack and the firing of  “stars” at the boss. Hypothesis: A spin move will hurt the boss. Experiment: Try out a spin move against the boss.

Analyze & Conclude: Did the spin move work? No, it didn’t.

ReHypothesize & ReExperiment: The player tries out several hypotheses before hitting on one that showed results. Even then the situations keeps changing so the player has to continually make observations and hypotheses.

This probably isn’t the most elegant method for introducing the scientific method, but it does seem to grab their attention². I think it also helps students realize the scientific method isn’t just an Ivory Tower scientific exercise.

It is practical. They’ve used it.

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1. Dear Nintendo, Inc.: I’m essentially advertising your game as being science-y and fun. Thanks for not suing me.    
2. Pretty amazing to think that Mario is much older than they are. He’s nearing his 29th birthday (Donkey Kong was released in 1981). My students are turning 14 (most are born in 1995 or so).    

I get this at the beginning of every semester from my incoming freshmen as we start doing internet research. Wikipedia articles regularly come up as one of the first couple results when students do internet searches, so it’s an issue that comes up right away.

I didn’t used to spend much time going over how to effectively find and use information from online sources. The last several years I’ve made it much more of a priority as it’s a skill that I find extremely useful for myself. As more and more information is available online, it’s pretty important that students know how to navigate and evaluate this wealth of digital knowledge. Below are a few of the basic suggestions I give students. We go into a little more detail than what’s found below, but I’m just looking for a little feedback on the suggestions I offer here and anything you feel would be valuable to add.

Wikipedia

No getting around the Wikipedia “issue” today. Kids are hearing lots of different things from lots of “expert” sources (teachers, parents, etc.). Here’s what I go over with students:

• Anyone can edit Wikipedia. This is true.
• Wikipedia has a large community of people who will quickly fix most errors.
• In my time using Wikipedia most information I find seems quite accurate. Most errors I see are spelling/grammatical errors as opposed to factual errors.
• Wikipedia has undergone several reviews comparing it to more traditional encyclopedic sources (primarily Encyclopaedia Brittanica). It generally fares quite well in these comparisons (see this page for some examples).
• Fun tip: Science articles on Wikipedia tend to be pretty technical. This doesn’t make them great for 9th graders who don’t have a wealth of technical science background. I suggest they check out the Simple English Wikipedia. It has fewer articles with often less detailed info, but they are all written in Simple English, which is much better for most 14 year old students.
• My advice to students: Feel free to use Wikipedia. Just realize what it is and how it works. If you see something that looks slightly fishy, check the results with other sites. If you see errors that you can fix: do it¹.

Yahoo! Answers and Wiki.Answers

Students have been using these sites more and more the last couple of years. This year is the first time I’ve specifically addressed these sites. Both sites are very similar in how they work: Anyone can ask a question and anyone can answer. Answers can be voted up or down by the users depending on how accurate or helpful the answers seem. All questions and answers are searchable. What I go over:

• Anyone can ask and answer questions (similar to Wikipedia)
• Unlike Wikipedia, the community isn’t quite as robust at voting down bad answers and voting up good answers. There’s also a fair number of users who purposely give goofy/funny/inappropriate answers. There aren’t consequences for doing these things as there is in Wikipedia.
• In my own experience many answers are good, but there are a few too may that are bogus for me to use it.
• My advice to students: These sites are good “jumping off points.” Some information is easiest to find on these sites. However, because there isn’t a robust community patrolling these sites, don’t use them as your final source of information. Instead, use the given answers to help you find more reliable sites that give the information.

Google

Students generally feel they’re great searchers using Google or other search engines. However, in my experience, they don’t know many of the simple tricks and operators to take their searching to a higher level. What I go over:

• Keywords: Student very often will type in a full question into the search box. This works enough that they’re convinced it’ll work for everything. I go over why it isn’t the best way to search².
• Operators:
  • Quotes: to search for exact phrases
  • Minus before words: to eliminate words from search results
  • Domain types: Use the “site:gov,” “site:edu,” etc. searches to narrow searches to specific domains.
• Google-y tricks:
  • Recent results: Especially helpful when looking for information on recent discoveries or current event items.
  • Related searches & Wonder wheel: Both do about the same thing (find similar search terms which might give you better results), though the Wonder wheel sure is fun.
  • Google squared: Especially nice for finding lists of items and comparing items.

While this isn’t a complete listing of online research skillz and tips that I go over with my classes, these are the tips and issues that students seem to run into the most.

Do you have any suggestions that should be included? Any critique of what I’ve put down here? Let me hear it in the comments!

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cc licensed flickr photo by burnt out Impurities

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1. Often this is a moot point since the school’s IP address is generally blocked from editing due to vandalism from anonymous students.    
2. Namely because it includes all sorts of extra words that can throw off the search results. I don’t need my results to include the question words.    

Personally, I agree with the IAU’s decision. With the discovery of several objects orbiting the Sun beyond Pluto’s orbit that are similar in size and composition to Pluto (Eris, Haumea, Makemake, etc.), it seems to make sense that Pluto fits better into a category that includes these objects instead of being lumped with the classical planets¹. However, the general public- including the general student population- vehemently disagreed. Perhaps it’s because we’ve always known Pluto as a planet, or because the media mainly reported it as a “demotion” of Pluto instead of an updated classification, or because Pluto’s always been the lovable loser of the Solar System, or perhaps because there’s a cartoon dog named Pluto. For whatever reason, Pluto suddenly became a topic of discussion all over the planet Earth.

When teaching the topic of dwarf planets, I wanted students to understand that it wasn’t just a random decision, but simply a reclassification because new information was discovered. If they disagreed with the IAU’s decision, I wanted it not to be because (as one student noted), “the other planets are just being bullies.” I had them read articles. I went over the reasons for the re-classification. Unfortunately, though the students knew the new guidelines for planets and dwarf planets by the end, they still wanted Pluto to be a planet for purely emotional reasons. I made minor adjustments from 2006 – 2008, but always with the same result.

In 2009 I decided to try something new. I invented a new planetary system orbiting the Sun-like star Tau Ceti². I made a card for each object in the Tau Ceti system and in pairs, I had students categorize the objects into a few groups. The tricky part with this was that students wanted to just group them only based upon their size, temperature, or distance from the star. It required me constantly going from group to group and asking them to tell me why 2000 km makes sense to be the upper limit for a group of planets. Why not 2500km? Does it make a difference?

I had to continually push back on the students’ categorizations. “Why is that object in that group? It orbits another object, not Tau Ceti. Is it really similar to the others?” “Those objects aren’t round and are really small. Does it make sense that they’re in with some really big objects?” It takes some work to avoid causing frustrations. Like all students, they want to just throw together a couple categories, call it good, and pick up their 10 points. I’ve also had to work hard to make sure I ask tough questions of students who’ve done an admirable job of categorizing like objects (Me: “Why are those two in the same group? One is really close to Tau Ceti while the other is way far away”; Student: “They’re both moons! They go together!”).

Once the students got their categories of planets down, I revealed to the students that though the planetary system they were categorizing is fictitious, I based it pretty much right off of our own Solar System. Then I went through and had them write the name of the object in our Solar System on the analogous card for each object in the made-up Tau Ceti System³. I then asked students to look at their categories to see if they still seemed to make sense now that they could compare them to known objects in our Solar System. Most found their categories still made sense.

Then, I asked them to find the object that was analogous to Pluto and look at what other objects were in that category. Students were shocked. All had put it in with either dwarf planets or asteroids (depending on the rules for their categories). Not one group had it lumped in a category with the other eight planets (though most groups did have categories that fit almost perfectly with the gas giant & terrestrial planet classifications). Not. One. Group.

Since this activity I haven’t heard any protests to Pluto not being considered a “full” planet. The closest I heard was, “I’d really like Pluto to be a planet, but I know it doesn’t really belong there.”

Image source: Wikimedia Commons- Pluto Protest & Counter Protest

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Files:

• PDF file of objects in the Tau Ceti system
  • When I printed, I put four pages on each sheet of paper, thus saving some paper & making the objects easier to handle. The pictures of the objects are all to scale- except Tau Ceti, which is about 10,000 pixels in diameter due to difficulties in making and manipulating the object in Keynote or PowerPoint (it should be nearly 20,000 pixels in diameter).
• PowerPoint and Keynote file of objects in the Tau Ceti system
  • For your editing pleasure. Sometimes the huge circle representing Tau Ceti doesn’t show up when you open these files. I can only assume it’s because the object it too big to save properly.

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1. I don’t really want to get into a Pluto-is-a-planet vs. Pluto-ain’t-a-planet argument- though if you have some useful insights, I’ll take ‘em.     
2. Bonus points if you know the source of the names for the objects.     
3. Here’s the list:
   Boll = Mercury;
   Bender = Venus;
   Belior = Earth’s Moon;
   Pern = Earth;
   Ruatha = Mars;
   Crom = large asteroid;
   Ramoth = large asteroid;
   Bitra = Ceres;
   Lemos = Jupiter;
   Nabol = Saturn;
   Timor = Titan (moon of Saturn);
   Tillek = Uranus;
   Keroon = Neptune;
   Golanth = Triton (moon of Neptune);
   Ista = Pluto;
   Igen = Eris;
   Nerat = Haumea;
   Telgar = Makemake
   I know the dwarf planet analogues aren’t exact, but they work.      

One goal I’ve set for this year is to push students towards thinking more deeply about what knowledge they truly own and what knowledge they really don’t yet grasp. It’s a hard thing to get at, but I feel it’s terribly important. Do they truly understand why larger stars have shorter life spans, or have they simply memorized that’s how it goes? Could they explain it in their own words?

The articles I’ve been reading and my own experience tells me there’s only really good way to get at what’s truly going on inside my freshmen students’ heads: Talk to them. Make them explain. Ask questions.

Not yes-n-no, true-false, or multiple-choice. I want to expose thought processes, challenge complacency, discover weaknesses and strengths. When starting a project I ask: “What do you want your final project to look like?” And when they reply, “I want it to be creative, and good, and for it to earn an A+,” don’t let the little buggers off the hook . “What will ‘creative,’ ‘good,’  or ‘worthy of an A+‘ look like?” I scoot¹ from group to group requesting updates on their progress and asking follow up questions. I often reply to their questions with questions of my own. I try to frame questions in a conversational tone², attempting to avoid the impression that I’m interrogating everyone.

So far, so good. Students haven’t yet stopped giving canned responses (Q: “What’s part of your project are you the proudest of?” A: “Everything!”), but they do give deeper thoughts when prodded- you just need to do the prodding.  However, the past few days I’ve found my questioning format coming too close to interrogation and not close enough to conversation. I need be very conscious to include more personal and non-class related questions. I want students to give me their best thoughts and best efforts. To earn that from them I need to do a little better job at showing that I value who they are outside of my classroom as well.

Most interestingly of all, my focus on exposing thought processes has me thinking about my thought processes: Why do I do things the way I do? What are the weaknesses? Strengths? What makes it good? What makes it engaging?

Questions beget more questions.

cc licensed flickr photo shared by grunge

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1. utilizing my fun rolly-chair, natch    
2. a la Tim Gunn

Through all of this, my biggest struggle has been working out exactly what the ideal teacher’s role should be in this type of environment. There needs to be guidance, scaffolding, and assessment, but how does a teacher do those things effectively in a self-directed learning environment?

I knew regularly talking to students and discussing their progress and understanding of their topic and learning was a must, but I was struggling to picture how that looks.

Then it hit me.

I’ve watched a few episodes of Project Runway², and though I’m not really big into fashion design, I did realize there was something relevant going on here. For each episode, contestants are given some design challenge (i.e., make a more fashionable postal uniform) and given a limited time frame in which to complete their outfit. After working for awhile, Tim Gunn (one of the hosts) goes around and talks to each of the contestants about their designs. It’s brilliant.

Conversation, questioning, and critique: Clip 1

Tim Gunn goes around to the contestants asking them how they’re doing and to explain their design. He’ll point out things that don’t look right, offer suggestions for improving the design, praise designs that are well-developed, and overall do what he can to help and support the designers without interfering too much with their particular senses of fashion. Tim Gunn doesn’t force his will on them but he does learn a great deal about who they are as a designer and their ideas behind the design. The best part? At 1 min 25 sec: “I don’t want you to ask me that. I want you to ask yourself that.” Pushing for self-assessment. Nice.

Joining a community of practice: Clip 2

In this clip Tim is more forceful. Wendy (a contestant) designs clothes for lower-end/more practical uses. However, the focus of the show (and that of the judges) is definitely “high fashion.” Tim takes her aside, validates her viewpoint as being important and necessary, but goes on to suggest that if she wants to be successful on Project Runway that she rethink her viewpoint. In essence, Tim is trying to help Wendy join the “high fashion” community of practice.

Notable differences

The designers on the show are already members of a community of practice. They want to be fashion designers and, for the most part, they are familiar with what it means to be a designer and are motivated to pursue that route. In my 9th grade science class not all students will be as interested in the material. Those that are interested in the material are probably not familiar with what it means to be a scientist or act scientifically. Fix? More support. Tim Gunn stops by once or twice in a 4-6 hour design session. I’ll have to be constantly circulating and talking to my students. Giving them stronger nudges than he does & providing more guidance.

Application

Teaching students to be able to regulate their own learning and follow their own interests will probably be more challenging than it should be in our schools. Students have been trained to expect the teacher to tell them what to study, how to study it, and when to study it. It will take time and support to help students begin to take control of their own learning. To do that, the teacher is going to have to step back from the lead role, and start a role similar to Tim Gunn’s. Talk to individual students or groups. Give feedback, offer suggestions, but allow students to express their personality and follow their interests.

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1. hat tip to @msansonetti for helping me discover that name (self-directed learning). I found lots of great research using those search terms. 
2. Wikipedia article for Project Runway if you’re unfamiliar.  

“However, as we began to scale up the program and teachers began to implement [the problem-based learning (PBL) unit] without our involvement, grading became an important issue and teachers wanted additional ‘‘gradable’’ products. They  requested two things in particular: an objective item test that could be used at the end of the program, and worksheets or activities that could be used during the program as ‘‘check-points’’ or to generate ‘‘daily grades.’’ We complied with teachers’ requests, despite some concerns that these instruments would alter the nature of PBL. A twenty-item test was developed that used a modified multiple choice format that allowed for multiple correct answers within a single item. Our reasoning in using this format was that it required a greater understanding of a given concept than a standard multiple choice format, and did not facilitate guessing or a process of elimination approach. Teachers were strongly dissatisfied with this format, arguing that it was difficult for students this age and that, because it differed from the format used on standardized tests, that it might confuse students. They wanted standard multiple choice items with one correct answer and distracters that could be quickly eliminated.”

Is this mad desire for grading & multiple-choice assessment driven by the way our institutions are set up (i.e. NCLB, etc.)? How teachers view what assessment should look like? How do we change this? I’m aware of this problem and I still feel the pressure/need to have grades and old-fashioned assessments. Is there any hope here?

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1. That is: Pedersen, S., Arslanyilmaz, A., & Williams, D. (2009). Teachers’ assessment-related local adaptations of a problem-based learning module. Education Technology Research Development, 27, 229-249.