EdTechTalk - Teachers Teaching Teachers

TTT #296 String Art with Fred Mindlin - 05.09.12

TTT Team — Mon, 21 May 2012 02:31:51 +0000

46:48 minutes (32.13 MB)

On this episode of Teachers Teaching Teachers, +Fred Mindlin/@fmindlin starts with string art, and pulls us into his world of anthropology, story-telling, collaborative learning, and more!

Fred inspires and entertains all of us in this episode of TTT: +Lacy Manship/@now_awake, +Gail Desler/@GailDesler, +Kelsey Shelhart, +Denise Colby/@Niecsa, +Paul Allison/@paulallison, +Chad Sansing/@chadsansing, and +Diana Maliszewski/@mzmollytl.

To get the full effect, take a moment to find some string before you listen to this episode of TTT. How much? Fred says, "About two meters or a little over 6 feet is usually a good length. Hold the string between your two hands stretched out as wide as they go, then add about 6 inches."

Fred explains that he was "inspired by the session we had with teachers using Minecraft, where we explored an online game world via another virtual world, http://edtechtalk.com/node/5102 and I was intrigued by whether it would be feasible to explore a meatspace game in our virtual Teachers Teaching Teachers forum." He sees "string games as a gateway to keyboarding and creativity or finger calisthenics, and computer keyboarding: media magic for tradigital storytelling."

Playing games with string is a human cultural universal. This ancient art form is surprisingly helpful in developing both the manual dexterity and strength needed for computer keyboarding. The approach I use for teaching string games to groups also provides a helpful practice ground for some of life's essential skills: creativity, resilience, cooperation, and storytelling.

And that's not all. Here's an excerpt and a couple of photos from a post that Diana wrote shortly after this episode of TTT:

There were some great quotes that Chad, a fellow participant, shared via Twitter. (I can't recall them all - they were things like "it's important to model failure" and "string games are 'digital' fun".) What I realized was how potent teaching string games would be to analyze your own teaching practice. Listening to Fred teach the group how to make a 3-pronged spear made me hyper-aware of how important detailed, clear instructions are, and the different learning styles at play. The first time I tried it, I failed. The second time, when Fred re-explained and added a few "notice this part here" tips, I did it! I cheered pretty loudly when I succeeded. My webcam wasn't working on Google +, so I convinced my daughter to take a photo of my accomplishment.

I made a 3-pronged spear! Here's proof!
A less complimentary shot of me, with my string jedi master Fred on-screen
Fred mentioned that there are several books and YouTube videos that explain, step by step, how to make different shapes. I think I need a person near me to give feedback (though the string collapsing in unrecognizable shapes is pretty immediate feedback too). I gave myself a goal - to teach the kids in my SK and Grade 7 classes how to make the 3-pronged spear and do it to music at a June assembly. I'm repeating it here so it'll be my contract to myself to try it out and report what results.

Enjoy!

TTT #293 Exploring Minecraft with Joel Levin, Chad Sansing, Liam O'Donnell, Denise Colby, and Diana Maliszewski 4.18.12

TTT Team — Mon, 07 May 2012 02:06:37 +0000

45:26 minutes (31.2 MB)

This episode of +Teachers Teaching Teachers was recorded in Minecraft. We were Livecasting from +Joel Levin's / @MinecraftTeachr 's server with +Liam O'Donnell / @liamodonnell , Chad Sansing / @chadsansing , +Diana Maliszewski / @MzMollyTL , and +Denise Colby / @Niecsa .

Watch or listen as newbies +Paul Allison / @paulallison and a colleague of his, James Joseph learn first-hand what's so engaging about Minecraft!

Consider this episode of TTT to be an "in-world" follow-up to these TTT episodes: http://edtechtalk.com/node/5001 and http://edtechtalk.com/node/4980 And also 21st Century Learning's recent interview with Joel Levin: http://edtechtalk.com/ett21_166

This was lots of fun and the perspectives shared by these Minecraft teachers about their students' lives in the game both profound in themselves, and easy to transfer to any classroom or learning situation.

Some ways to follow up:

Joel Levin's Minecraftedu.com Bringing Minecraft to the Classroom
You can find more about the work of Liam O'Donnell, Diana Maliszewski, and Denise Colby with Minecraft at their gamingedus wiki: http://gamingeducators.pbworks.com and the students' work at the Minecraft Club Hub wiki: http://minecraftclubhub.pbworks.com. And their Bios are here: http://gamingeducators.pbworks.com/w/page/50831789/Who%20We%20Are
For more about Chad Sansing's work with Minecraft and gaming, see these resources at the National Writing Project's Ditigital Is: http://digitalis.nwp.org/resource/2458 and http://digitalis.nwp.org/resource/2232

TTT#295 - Discussing NetSmart w/ Howard Rheingold

TTT Team — Thu, 03 May 2012 11:38:30 +0000

49:06 minutes (22.48 MB)

TTT#295 - Discussing NetSmart w/ Howard Rheingold
May 2, 2012

Our third of three episodes of Teachers Teaching Teachers in which we discuss Howard Rheingold's New Smart: How to Thrive Online. For this conversation, Paul Allison, Chris Sloan, and Monika Hardy, are joined by Howard Rheingold, Fred Mindlin,Valerie Burton, Mariana Rios, Cristian Romero, and Jeff Lebow.

Chat Log Below

TTT #294 Net Smart w/ Fred Mindlin, Mura Nava, Vinnie Vrotny, Valerie Burton, Sarah Rolle, Tinashe Blanchet, & Christian 4.25.12

TTT Team — Wed, 02 May 2012 19:25:29 +0000

45:00 minutes (10.3 MB)

Our second of three episodes of Teachers Teaching Teachers in which we discuss Howard Rheingold's New Smart: How to Thrive Online . Howard is joining us on May 2. For this conversation Paul Allison and Monika Hardy are joined by Fred Mindlin, Sarah Rolle, Mura Nava, Valerie Burton, Vinnie Vrotny, Tinashe Blanchet, and Christian.

TTT #292 Net Smart w/ Alice Barr, Nancy Sharoff, Vinnie Vrotny, Valerie Burton, Sarah Rolle, Scott Lockman, Andrea Zellner 4.11

TTT Team — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 13:57:09 +0000

42:20 minutes (9.69 MB)

This is the first of three shows (#292 April 11, #294 April 25, #295 May 2) in which we are talking about Howard Rheingold's new book, Net Smart, How to Thrive Online. Howard joins us on Wednesday, May 2.

Joining Paul Allison, Monika Hardy, and Chris Sloan on this episode of Teachers Teaching Teachers are Alice Barr, Nancy Sharoff, Vinnie Vrotny, Valerie Burton, Sarah Rolle, Scott Lockman, and Andrea Zellner.

On this episode we mainly talk about the introduction to Howard's book and a syllabus for a social media literacies course on the high school level that he has compiled from his college-level syllabus.

Syllabus: Social Media Literacies, High School Level, Seed Version Compiled By Howard Rheingold

Howard writes:

As an instructor of undergraduate and graduate students at University of California, Berkeley, and Stanford University, I created a syllabus for the benefit of other college/university level instructors. I created a copy of the original syllabus for modification to use with high school students (probably juniors or seniors). I will rely on actual high school teachers to help me modify this source document. Please feel free to use, modify, and share this syllabus in your own way. Reorder the modules, add or subtract required or recommended texts and learning activities. Use your own assessment methods. If you wish to help improve this seed document, contact howard@rheingold.com and I will add you as a commenter and/or editor.

This syllabus is based on my 2012 book, Net Smart: How to Thrive Online, as a textbook. I set out to write the book as an educational instrument. As I explain in the introductory chapter, (which is downloadable free of charge), I have concluded, after thirty years as an online participant, observer, and teacher, that social media literacies are a critical uncertainty in the issue of whether digital media improve or erode human individual capacities and collective culture. Just as in the eras following the invention of the alphabet and printing press, literate populations become the driving force that shape new media. What we know now matters in shaping the ways people will use and misuse social media for decades to come.

The 21st century depends on a critical mass of people who understand basic scientific literacy, media literacy, information literacy, in addition to the literacies I cover in my book and in this syllabus. I use “literacy” in the sense of a skill that includes not only the individual ability to decode and encode in a medium, but also the social ability to use the medium effectively in concert with others. I didn’t write the book as a syllabus, but as a logical ordering of the five social media literacies of attention, crap detection, participation, collaboration, and network awareness: attention is the starting place for all media use; crap detection is necessary for effective participation; knowledge of individual participation is by its nature enmeshed with collaborative communications that take place through networked publics. When composing the syllabus, I duplicated much of this progression, but chose texts that can offer analytic tools, explanatory frameworks, and competing perspectives -- the basic building blocks for teachers to use. For high school communities, “Critical consumption online” or “critical consumption of social media” could substitute for “crap detection” as a label. The methods are identical, although many resources most appropriate for high school students must exist to replace texts in the original, college-level version.

Here are a couple of moments from Teachers Teaching Teachers #294 where we think about Crap Detection in light of KONY 2012. The entire show is there as well.

Please join our conversation with Howard Rheingold on Teachers Teaching Teachers this Wednesday, May 2 at 9:00 PM Eastern / 6:00 PM Pacific / World Times.

TTT #291 What we talk about when we talk about Trayvon Martin with Ashleigh Dennis, Al Elliott and Kiseem - 04.04.12

TTT Team — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 00:00:28 +0000

48:00 minutes (10.99 MB)

On this episode of Teachers Teaching Teachers we talk about what we talk about when we talk about Trayvon Martin #trayvonmartin. What have you been talking to your students about this?

Here are some of the things that have been going up on Youth Voices the past few weeks: http://youthvoices.net/taxonomy/term/33223 And follow this link to find some of the the articles we have been reading and annotating together. (Once in the "Mission," click on each individual title to see students' comments.) http://youthvoices.net/node/36643

Recently, when I (Paul Allison) walked into my teachers room, it took about 4 seconds of talking about what my students were doing for three African-American colleagues to talk in wide-ranging ways about violence and protecting children and dress and racism, and more. I just listened as carefully as I could, trying to learn what their questions were.

We made an open invitation to teachers to come talkbout Trayvon Martin at EdTechTalk http://edtechtalk.com. Paul Allison, Chris Sloan and Monika Hardy hosted this conversation with Ashleigh Dennis , Al Elliott and Kiseem, one of Paul's students.

We agree with what Dan Cantor wrote recently on the Working Families blogs: "What is new and welcome is that more and more white people are reminded or learning for the first time what the persistent existence of the color line means to millions of our fellow Americans." http://www.workingfamiliesparty.org/2012/04/my-son-doesnt-look-like-trayvon/

We think this episode of TTT will add to the conversations you might be having with students and colleagues -- or you wish your were having. Let us know your thoughts by commenting below.