always learning

One of the things I love about being a technology facilitator is that I get to see all sorts of fantastic management strategies in the many classrooms I visit. Every teacher seems to have a unique way of handling the variety of tools we have at our disposal here at ISB. Thankfully, as part of our CoETaIL course, Jeff and Dennis asked all of the participating teachers to add to a shared VoiceThread about technology management strategies in the classroom.

Check out all of the great tips they shared here:

Do you have any special tips to share about managing tech in the classroom? Please feel free to add them to our VoiceThread!

One of the issues that comes up again and again in our CoETaIL program is the “essential technology skills” that all of our students (and teachers) need to know. Now, I have to admit, I usually have a hard time with this idea, because it often comes with a list of skills like: bullets in Word, formulas in Excel or animations in PowerPoint. Basically all the things I’ve been trying to de-emphasize in favor of bigger, more wider-reaching concepts like collaboration across distances, communicating ideas to multiple audiences, or creating something new using technology tools.

Sure, you need to know how to add bullets – but you should learn how when you’re writing a list (“just in time“), not for the sake of knowing “just in case” you might need it. So, it was very interesting to me when our conversation in our last course took a turn to something I can really relate to – rather than the list of standard MS Office “skills” that were all the rage in the 1990s (with the previous edition of the NET*S), but those almost unidentifiable skills that frequent computer users just seem to take for granted. Things like:

• knowing to hold your mouse over an icon or a link to see what it does.
• understanding that the menus for any program are at the top of the screen, that they are usually very similar, and generally what you find within them (for example: “view” usually means how you see things on the screen and that menu is found in almost every program).
• recognizing when something is lit up (or underlined) on a website, you can click on it.
• knowing that the cursor changes when held over different parts of the screen and what that means (the little arrow turning into a hand over a weblink for example, or being able to stretch out a picture when it turns into the double-sided arrow).
• using tab to move from cell to cell or box to box on forms or websites.
• being able to recognize drop-down menus – and that they hold additional features.
• understanding that right clicking on things brings up more options.

These are things that are common from program to program as well as on multiple operating systems. They’re not specific tasks that you only use once in a while, they’re things we do every day, and those that are comfortable with these skills often find learning new technology tools a lot easier than those that are not. It’s like these skills are part of a special language that we can speak in order to understand how to interact in any given technology-based environment.

What’s especially interesting about these little, seemingly meaningless, skills is that they truly are transferrable and haven’t changed much over time – they’re certainly not dependent on a specific version of software. Unfortunately, despite their consistency, they often cause a lot of confusion for people who aren’t really comfortable with technology.

But here’s the thing: how many of these kinds of skills are there? Is there some kind of list? Because it’s almost impossible to think of all of them once they become second nature. Yet it’s easy to see how much people struggle when they haven’t learned them or don’t “see” them when they’re using technology. Even when we support people who are new to technology, we almost expect that they can see these small clues the computer gives us, in fact, they become implicit in our understanding of how to use a computer.

We simply expect people to know why the mouse and cursor change shape and what the shapes mean, or that you can figure out how to do pretty much anything by checking the help menu in any program, or that you need to highlight something before being able to change that item because that’s how you “tell” the computer what you want to change. These have become intuitive skills for those of us that use technology regularly, but unfortunately not knowing them has become an obstacle for others to overcome.

How can we make these simple and far reaching technology skills explicit?

A few weeks ago, I was in a grade 2 classroom demonstrating VoiceThread for a quick and easy science project. Based on our conversation in CoETaIL from the day before, I wanted to see what the second graders knew about these basic skills, so I spent a few minutes of my lesson specifically highlighting the many ways which the computer gives us “clues” about what to do.

First, when we logged into VoiceThread, we looked all around the screen to see if we could figure out how to make our own VoiceThread based on the options. It took them a few tries to understand that the “Create” button was telling us that this is the place where we can create our own Thread.

Once we got to the create screen, I asked them if they could tell me where to start. Again, it took a few tries, but once they realized the Upload button was the only one they could press, I asked them how they could know that in the future. They figured out that it was the only button in color, and it was the only button that, when you moused over it, turned the mouse into the shape of a hand.

We basically went on like this throughout the process of creating a VoiceThread. To be honest, I thought all of those “signs” would be blatantly obvious to these 7-year old students, who have grown up with computer games, but they weren’t. As soon as we pointed them out, it was clear to see that they made sense and that with continued discussion, they would become second-nature. But again, who’s going to be having this discussion with them if their teachers aren’t comfortable with these implicit skills either?

Not that I’m looking to make another old-school list of standards, but what else would you put on the list of implicit tech skills like these? Do you teach them in your school?

Sunflowers by marcomagrini
Key Blanks by Ben Oh
Steps by two more days

It’s hard to believe, but it’s been two full years since I taught my own technology classes. Of course I’ve done all sorts of co-planning and co-teaching in the last couple of years at ISB, but it’s certainly not the same as having your own group of students to work with. So, this year, in my new role of Middle School Technology and Learning Coordinator, I am thrilled to be back in the classroom, teaching our one middle school IT class – a sixth grade quarter-long exploratory course – for just one quarter this year. With the end of the semester quickly approaching, we’re almost finished with our ‘big project’, so I thought I’d share it here.

Given that I’m only teaching one section of this class (and my colleagues Ross, Matt and Jean are teaching the others), I felt it was important to keep the content as consistent as possible, but of course, I couldn’t resist transforming the process of how we would learn that content, along with the finished product that we would use to demonstrate our learning. As can be expected, since this is the first time I’ve taught this particular class in this particular way, there are a few things I would change for next time around, but overall, I think it turned out pretty well.

Basically the course is intended to teach the “basics” of Microsoft Office (you know the course, you probably taught it back in the 1990′s like I did when I was first teaching). So, considering the content, I tried to develop a project-based unit that would emphasize independent learning (since so many of the students would probably already know the basics), as well as allow them to share what they’ve learned in an authentic environment, and utilize some new technology tools in a creative way.

As usual, I followed the Understanding by Design model to plan the unit and the MYP Technology Design Cycle to break down the stages of the project into manageable chunks. Basically, what we’re working towards is a shared wiki with student-created tutorials on all of the MS Office basics (inspired by Chad Bates, our fantastic tech director who taught the class last year and experimented with the tutorial idea with his class) and an overview of digital citizenship, which we will share with the entire middle school as a resource for their potential technology needs.

Here’s what it looks like:

Established Goals (ISTE NETS Standards)

2. Communication and Collaboration: Students use digital media and environments to communicate and work collaboratively, including at a distance, to support individual learning and contribute to the learning of others. Students:

a. interact, collaborate, and publish with peers, experts or others employing a variety of digital environments and media.
b. communicate information and ideas effectively to multiple audiences using a variety of media and formats.

4. Critical Thinking, Problem-Solving & Decision-Making: Students use critical thinking skills to plan and conduct research, manage projects, solve problems and make informed decisions using appropriate digital tools and resources. Students:

b. plan and manage activities to develop a solution or complete a project.

5. Digital Citizenship: Students understand human, cultural, and societal issues related to technology and practice legal and ethical behavior. Students:

d. exhibit leadership for digital citizenship.

6. Technology Operations and Concepts: Students demonstrate a sound understanding of technology concepts, systems and operations. Students:

b. select and use applications effectively and productively.
d. transfer current knowledge to learning of new technologies.

Enduring Understandings:
Students will understand that:

• Responsible digital citizens demonstrated shared characteristics, habits and attitudes.
• We can work together to teach others what we have learned.
• We can use web 2.0 tools to collaborate and communicate with a global audience.

Essential Questions:

• What are the characteristics, habits and attitudes of a responsible digital citizen?
• How can we work together to teach others about responsible digital citizenship?
• How can we collaborate and communicate with others online?

Assessment Evidence

GRASPS Task

• Goal: Your goal is to produce a multimedia handbook about basic technology tools and digital citizenship for ISB elementary students.
• Role: You are a team of student leaders at ISB.
• Audience: Elementary students at ISB, and around the world.
• Situation: You will need to collaborate together to produce a thorough, easy to understand, multimedia tutorial wiki about basic technology tools and digital citizenship for a school and worldwide audience.
• Product/Performance: Your wiki must demonstrate everything that you have learned about digital citizenship and basic technology tools this quarter.

Six Facets of Understanding:

• Explain: Produce a screencast tutorial about how to use a specific technology feature in MS Office.
• Apply: As a team, create a multimedia handbook about digital citizenship for ISB elementary students.
• Interpret: As part of your presentation to ISB elementary students, write a skit to demonstrate your understanding of digital citizenship.
• Perspective: Develop and deliver a lesson to ISB elementary students presenting all facets of responsible digital citizenship.
• Self-Knowledge: On your blog, describe what you know about digital citizenship. At the end of the course, go back to your first post and reflect on what you’ve learned. What more do you need to learn?
• Empathize: On your blog, write a post in the perspective of one of the characters in the public service announcements. Reflect on the events of that day and how they made you feel.

And here’s how I broke it down into the stages of the MYP Technology Design Cycle:

Investigate

During the first part of the project, we spent most of our class time exploring different types tutorials and determining what the criteria are for a quality tutorial. To get the discussion started, we watched and critiqued the first one (on adding a survey in Moodle) as a class. Then, they had class (and homework) time to watch at least 2 other tutorials from the list below (or a different tutorial that they found and shared with the class):

• Adding a chart in Google Docs
• How to draw realistic eyes
• Student Sample from last year
• Discussion Settings in WP
• RSS in Plain English
• VoiceThread tutorial
• Switch to Mac

For each tutorial they watched, they added a response to the Moodle discussion forum answering the following questions:

• What did the creator of this tutorial do well?
• What would you change about this tutorial?
• What aspects of this tutorial would you like to include in your own tutorial?

In the end, we came up with a list (as a class) of criteria for a good tutorial that all students will be assessed with at the end of the project. Then, because we had so many different skills to create tutorials on, I asked students to form groups based on the tutorials we needed (this list was based on the course curriculum I was given). Finally, each student wrote a blog post reflecting on what they learned in that section of the project , which tutorial they had chosen to create and why, and what they need to learn to complete their tutorial.

The next time I teach this course, I would also add some exploration time with ScreenRecorder and MovieMaker (and maybe even GarageBand) since we ended up doing quite a lot more editing than I thought we would. I would also add in brainstorming time for students to create a mini-storyline for their tutorial to help give them focus and to make the tutorials a little more interesting.

Plan

During the planning, students created a storyboard and script of their tutorial, keeping in mind all of the criteria we developed during the investigate stage. We focused on: making the tutorial understandable by anyone (even people who are not in our class), using simple and clear directions, including a basic introduction and credits, and changing the view and “zoom” on the screen to keep the tutorial interesting. Once the students completed their storyboard and script, they posted it on their individual blog along with a reflection on this part of the project.

Create

At this point, students have a good idea of what their tutorial will look like and exactly what steps they need to take to complete their tutorial. They spent a little bit of time exploring with the SmartNotebook SmartRecorder (which happens to be our only screencasting software available to students), after watching this tutorial created by Matt, and then got right down to the recording.

Aside from some serious Windows-related drama about recording volume (oh how I miss working in a Mac lab), it really only took one lesson for the students to record their complete screencast. Of course, they all wanted to add the extra features, so we brought their screencasts into MovieMaker and started adding the finishing touches. Once they had their introductions and credits, it was time to add background music. Since we have access to a smaller Mac lab, we spent one lesson exploring with GarageBand to create simple (and original) background tracks.

As each student finished their tutorial, they did a peer assessment based on the class criteria. Once they had feedback from their peers, they had time to edit and fix any issues with their completed tutorial. After they were satisfied, they uploaded their finished tutorial to YouTube, embedded it in a blog post and reflected on their finished product.

Evaluate

For the last few days of the project, we spent some time determining which aspects of the ISB Definition of Learning we achieved throughout the process of completing our tutorials:

I used a simple checklist to get students thinking about which aspect of learning they met during each stage, then they shared their results with a peer knowing that they would be asked to share 1 or 2 ideas with the whole class, and then we had a whole class reflection. Finally, they wrote a personal reflection as a blog post.

Here are a few highlights from what they shared with me during the whole class-reflection:

• We learned a lot having to do our tutorials independently instead of being directly taught each skill. This way we learned it when we needed it and as we were doing our project, which helps us remember how to do it.
• We learned more by being able to test out the tools by ourselves and helping each other than by having the teacher teach us everything together.
• We would have preferred to do one single blog post at the end of the project reflecting on everything, instead of one for each stage.
• By writing a blog post at the end of each stage, we really reinforced everything we learned during that stage.
• We learned a lot about what makes a good blog post from having to write so many.
• We learned about ISB’s Blogging Guidelines and how to write a blog post with just the right kind of information.
• We learned how to be independent in our projects, but we liked having the checklists and all the steps broken down for us.
• We would have liked the steps to be broken down into even smaller chunks so we could meet our deadlines better.
• We learned that we can use websites and YouTube to learn new things and to teach other people things that we know.

Putting it all together

I waited until the last three weeks of class to have the students start compiling the wiki because I really didn’t know how long it would take to complete the tutorials. So now we’ll spend the next few days putting the finishing touches on the wiki and publicizing it around the middle school so that other students can learn from our work.

We also have a collaborating class in the US who are doing something very similar, except using the Mac version of all of these applications. We’re hoping that they will finish their tutorials before the end of our semester so we can also include them on our wiki and have a brief discussion about the transferability of skills from one platform to another.

We’ll also use this time to discuss digital citizenship and online safety and responsibility to be able to add those sections to the wiki. If we have time, I would love to do something in one or two elementary classrooms to share what we’ve learned  with an authentic audience (that can always use some reinforcement about appropriate online behavior).

Final Thoughts

Considering that I really didn’t have a good idea of how long it would take students to complete this type of tutorial – especially in a PC lab working with MovieMaker (my old enemy), I’m quite impressed with how things turned out. I was so happy to see how much the students learned in this very project-based course. I did very little direct instruction, even though some of the screencasting and editing tools were completely new to most students. It was a pleasure to see how much they appreciated being able to learn independently and to create something new with their knowledge.

Next time I would really like to add a more in-depth collaborative element – having our global partners do the peer assessment instead of simply within our class, potentially sharing more directly via our blog posts, and maybe coming up with some kind of collaborative lesson for our elementary classrooms that could involve multimedia elements (or a Skype connection) from our partner class. Of course, this is all dependent on timing, commitment and logistics. Hopefully, I’ll have a chance to teach this course again to make it even better!

One of the challenges of an integrated technology program is the fact that some responsibility for teaching essential technology concepts is placed on the shoulders of teachers who are not specialists in that field. Although adopting (or creating your own) technology standards is a step in the right direction, those statements are often general enough to leave room for uncertainty, especially for those teachers that don’t have a special interest in technology. This can lead to situations where classroom teachers feel that they lack guidance or concrete expectations about how to authentically and appropriately embed technology into their curriculum in a way that’s relevant to students and deepens their learning, which in turn leads to frustration and confusion.

In schools that are fortunate to have technology facilitators, often this kind of confusion is resolved through conversation and collaboration. However, even in those schools, usually there’s not enough time in the day for the facilitator to be able to support every single teacher. And even if there were enough facilitators to work closely with every single teacher, it’s simply not sustainable or advisable to place all of the essential knowledge about such a critical subject in the hands of one or two specialists. Although many teachers appreciate the personal support of a technology facilitator, it should be possible for individual teachers to get a sense of what they could or should be doing without having to go through a “gatekeeper.”

Having been a technology facilitator for 10 years now, I had always thought that individualized, personal conversations were the best way to help teachers embed technology into their classroom practice. While I still believe that collaborative planning and teaching is by far the most effective approach, I’m also realizing that having a clearly defined and readily accessible set of examples of classroom experiences, alongside a set of standards, would not only help teachers understand what’s expected of them, but would also provide an approachable starting point for conversations with teachers who may be unsure where to start.

So, here at ISB, we’ve decided to adapt and revise the ISTE Learner Profiles so that they reflect specific examples of units being done here at school. Currently, the general profiles provided by ISTE, which are broken down by division, provide basic examples of age-appropriate learning experiences (which meet the NET*S standards) that teachers can use to develop projects at their grade level. Of course, these examples are quite broad and don’t include samples of student work. So, we’re hoping that by documenting, on the ISB21 wiki, these types of experiences that are happening at our school, with links to completed student work, unit planners, and feedback from teachers, our faculty will feel they have a strong starting point for planning new projects (and implementing those that are currently part of our curriculum).

We’re just in the begining stages, but the ISB21 team will start this documentation process by linking and describing the projects we have collaborated on here at ISB, on the ISB21 wiki:

• PK-2
• 3-5
• 6-8
• 9-12

Next, we will ask the CoETaIL cohort teachers to share other projects that they may be working on independently. Finally, we will bring the profiles to the rest of the school community and ask them to contribute as well. In the end we hope to have an easily accessible, frequently updated, relevant and specific list of projects that meet our Technology and Information Literacy standards (TaILs) that all teachers can use to guide their planning, spark their interest, and start conversations.

Do you have these kinds of Learner Profiles at your school? Are they helpful? How do you build or clarify shared expectations for authentic, technology-rich student experiences with the faculty at your school?

signpost mage by will_hybrid
scaffolding image by kevindooley

Last weekend I was honored to present a session at the Bridging the Gap conference at Yokohama International School in Japan. YIS has hosted this community conference annually since 2001, and the topic for this year was “The Future of Education: Using Its Tools Today.” The three day conference included formal sessions led by teachers from YIS, other international schools and keynote presenter, Chris Toy, as well as a full day of BarCamp unconference sessions. It was a great opportunity to dialogue about the way schools may look in the near future with not only teachers and administrators, but also parents and students.

One interesting topic of discussion came up on Saturday: an administrator asked me if we should be expecting classroom teachers to teach technology, to be responsible for this additional subject along with their standard course material. Basically the question was about the value of technology as an integrated subject (with all teachers responsible for the instruction) versus a discrete course (with one or two specialists responsible for the instruction). Interestingly, I haven’t really had this conversation in a while, since ISB had adopted an integrated approach before I even arrived three years ago, but it certainly was a hot topic in both KL and Munich where I was part of the transition process from stand-alone IT courses to an integrated model.

Having developed and implemented an integrated technology program from scratch in two schools and expanded an existing program here at ISB, I firmly believe that technology is best taught within the context of the core curriculum. The natural use of authentic technology within the classroom setting, just like the way we use paper and pencil without any second thoughts, is always what I’m striving for.

A good analogy might be the way that over the past decade or two, classroom teachers have become more accustomed to the idea of differentiating for English language learners – especially in international schools, where often the majority of the class are not native English speakers. I have heard many administrators say “we are all ESL teachers,” with the expectation that no matter what subject we teach, we must ensure that all students are engaged with material that’s comprehensible to them. In all of the schools I’ve worked at, we’ve had extensive professional development in this area, and the consensus in education seems to be that if you’re a teacher in a linguistically diverse class, it is your responsibility to employ some of the professional strategies of an ESL teacher, even if you yourself are a Math, Social Studies, Science, etc teacher.  At this point, we’re all comfortable with the fact that we can’t simply give oral instructions, or that new vocabulary should be introduced in context, or that certain students might need more time to understand directions and perform certain tasks.

Maybe now it’s time to say “we are all technology teachers.”

I certainly understand that this is not a change that will happen overnight. Much like the move towards more ELL friendly instruction, teachers will need to learn appropriate skills, strategies and approaches to authentically and successfully embed technology within their core subject. Of course, this will take time, and during this transition, in my opinion, it’s the responsibility of the technology facilitator (or coordinator or integration specialist or whatever they may be called) to help their colleagues build their understanding of successful technology-rich teaching practices.

Often my colleague, Jeff, likes to say that his goal is to “work himself out of a job” by building teacher skill level to the point where they don’t need him anymore. Although I would agree that this is also my ultimate goal, I am conscious of the speed with which technology changes, and I’m not sure that we will ever get to the point where schools will no longer need some sort of pedagogical support in the technology field. After all, most schools still have ESL specialists, even though many of their practices are adopted by mainstream teachers.

Similarly, most ESL programs have a mix of in-class and pull-out support – blending the best of both approaches to ensure that all students are learning and understanding both the language and the curricular content. Although I firmly believe technology should be embedded within classroom practice, I also see a place for discrete technology classes – especially when they are designed with a curricular context that enhances the learning in core subjects, or when they emphasis the process of learning how to learn with technology, or when they offer a specialized skill for students that are highly interested (like graphic design or Flash animation).

The important thing to remember, is that even if there are seperate technology courses offered at a school, that doesn’t mean that those classes are the only place where students learn with technology. To continue to use the ESL anology one last time, a student who has a pull-out intensive ESL course isn’t excused from using the English language in all of their other classes simply because they attend a class that focuses on language. Students and teachers should expect that technology will naturally be a part of every class.

What do you think? Should all teachers be technology teachers?

Cross-posted on the K12Online Conference blog

I could not be more honored to be the pre-conference keynote speaker for this year’s K12 Online conference!

I have been participating in this annual conference since its inception in 2006 and every year I am amazed at the quality of presentations shared by educators around the world. The opportunity to learn together over the course of the conference (and beyond) is one of the most inspiring and engaging experiences of the year for me. Of course, this year’s lineup is no different!

When I was asked to keynote this year’s event, I knew right away that I wanted my presentation to have a global focus. Thinking back over the course of my ten years of living overseas, I realized that in many ways my exposure to new ways of thinking about technology has been paralleled by some similar learning experiences in the real world. I wanted to explore those links between virtual and real-world perspective shifts, and in the process try to share what I feel is an interesting and unique perspective in the expat mindset.

I’ve also decided to try to practice what I preach and make this presentation a true global collaboration, and although I will be putting together and presenting the final product, I really wanted to make it based on group input. Thankfully, my personal learning network includes a number of outstanding international school educators who’ve been willing to help me in preparing my presentation (thank you!). Right now I’ve gotten a lot of great input and material from (in no particular order):

• Jabiz Raisdana in Qatar
• Sara Patterson and 3 of her fabulous students in Korea
• Susan Sedro in Singapore
• Julie Lindsay, Jeff Plaman (and several of his fantastic students) and Tod Baker in China
• Clint Hamada and one of his wonderful students in Vietnam
• Maria Gomez in Saudi Arabia
• Steve Katz and 2 of his amazing students in Costa Rica
• Brandon Hoover in the Philipines
• Justin Hardman and Ryan Skardal in Hong Kong
• Brian Lockwood, Genki U. and Christine U. in Japan
• Darby Sinclair in Taiwan
• Dennis Harter in Thailand

While these teachers have already sent me fantastic material, I would love to include other perspectives as well. Knowing that the deadline is just over a month away, I’m beginning to put the final pieces together, and would love to hear your thoughts, include your perspectives, and emphasize the power of global collaboration in the final product.

Here’s the presentation overview:

Going Global: Culture Shock, Convergence, and the Future of Education

Everything I need to know about the future of education I learned, not from kindergarten, but from living overseas. Looking at daily life in foreign lands reveals a colorful spectrum of inspiring metaphors for the shifts we need to make in education. Featuring voices from students and teachers from around the globe, this presentation will start with a look through an expatriate’s eyes at some vibrant details of daily life in many lands. Often what we may find initially chaotic, disorienting and strange in other countries can actually spark new ways of thinking about teaching and learning.

Then, again through the voices and viewpoints of teachers and students from all around the world, we’ll examine the unique aptitudes which allow successful expats to thrive in any environment: adaptability, flexibility, the ability to understand differing viewpoints and constructs, and the communications skills to collaborate across cultural, religious and linguistic barriers. These are exactly the skills that future students and teachers will need to confidently enter the digital, global, converging, collaborative world of tomorrow – wherever they might be physically located.

What do you think? Does this sound interesting to you? Are you an expat or Third Culture Kid? Have you or your students participated in a global collaboration? What did you gain from that experience?

One of the things I’m enjoying most about being on our coaching team here at ISB is the opportunity to openly share our challenges so that we can all work together to improve our practice. This week we had our first book club meeting to discuss the first chapter of Coaching: Approaches and Perspectives edited by Jim Knight.

To facilitate our conversation, we followed the Final Word protocol. Each of us selected a particular section of the text which stood out during our reading, and following the protocol process, discussed what was so important about that statement in a round-robin format. Although we all selected different sections, they seemed to have a common element: how to move beyond simply supporting teachers to increase their comfort level within our curricular areas to implementing changed practices with all faculty members to improve student learning.

The section of the book that we ended up focusing on the most was about Coaching Heavy and Coaching Light. The author of this chapter, Joellen Killion

assert[s] that there are two kinds of coaching – coaching light and coaching heavy. The difference essentially is the coaches’ perspective, beliefs, role decisions, and goals, rather than what coaches do… Coaching light occurs when coaches want to build and maintain relationships more than they want to improve teaching and learning. From this perspective, coaches act to increase their perceived value to teachers by providing resources and avoiding challenging conversations. (p. 22)

Coaching heavy, on the other hand, includes high-stakes interactions between coaches and teachers, such as curriculum analysis, data analysis, instruction, assessment, and personal and professional beliefs and how they influence practice… Coaching heavy requires coaches to say “no” to trivial requests for support and to turn their attention to those high-leverage services that have the greatest potential for teaching and learning. Coaching heavy requires coaches to work with all teachers in a school, not just those who volunteer for coaching services. Coaching heavy requires coaches to seek and use data about their work and regularly analyze their decisions about time allocation, services and impact. (p. 23 -24)

Reading this section I realized that often times I am coaching light, but not always because of a decision I’ve consciously made. I am hyper-aware of the anxiety level most teachers have when dealing with technology, which often results in focusing more on making teachers comfortable with the tools than initiating difficult conversations about changing practice. I wonder if this issue is specific to those of us working in the technology area, or if it’s really just the same as coaches helping to implement a new math, reading or science program?

I do believe that those difficult conversations are much easier once you’ve developed a trusting relationship and that only happens when teachers feel supported. Killion mentions that it often takes coaches a whole year to move from coaching light to coaching heavy because of all the ground-work required to build trusting relationships, but that they can also get trapped into coaching light indefinitely if they are not careful.

I’m wondering now, how can coaches tell when it’s time to move from coaching light to coaching heavy? I’m also conscious of the fact that those deeper conversations don’t always have to happen in a formal setting, they can be quick snippets in the hallway that build upon previous sessions or discussions over lunch or even in a social setting. Do coaches keep track of where they are with each teacher, as you would with a class of students, so that you have a running record of what step to take next?

The other issue that jumped out at me was that coaches are required and expected to work with all teachers. This directly contradicts my long-held belief in working with the willing. Perhaps I simply need to adjust that to: we should start with the willing, but know that eventually we do have to work with everyone. I do still firmly believe that to work with everyone, with the focus on improving student learning (which may entail changing teaching practice), requires clear and transparent communication from administrators about our roles and purpose.

Perhaps the most reassuring sentence (for me) in this particular set of paragraphs is that coaching heavy requires coaches to say “no” to trivial requests for support in favor of more meaningful actions that will have a deeper impact on student learning. One of the biggest challenges for me has always been saying no. I like to believe I can do everything, and that I can make everyone’s job easier by supporting everyone, everywhere at any time. It’s important for me to remind myself that this only ends up diluting the impact I can make on both student and teacher learning. I need to remember that I am in control of my time and that I need to prioritize which tasks I undertake on a daily basis. Letting my day get carried away with the little things is not fulfilling my role, and it’s not helping my school move forward. (Maybe I should post this above my desk?).

Saying that a coach’s role is to support teachers misleads teachers. A coach’s primary responsibility is to improve student learning. (p. 27, point #3)

Reading this, I wonder what most teachers would think. I know that I have often been referred to as a “support” person or a “resource” person, and to be honest, I never felt the term was quite right, but I didn’t know why. Now I do. A “resource” is something to be used (or not) and then tossed aside. A “resource” is not something that might cause you to change deeply held beliefs or to re-evaluate your practice. A “resource” is not challenging. If teachers see us as “resources” or “support” people, they will not understand the work we are trying to do or how we fit into the school’s vision and purpose.

By making observations, stating their point of view, and inquiring into practice, coaches erode stagnant practice and unchallenged routines to spark analysis, reflection, and appropriate change. In this role, a coach is not about change for change sake, but rather for continuous improvement and fine-tuning to meet clearly articulated goals. (p. 13)

All too often it feels like teachers view technology as yet another swing in the pendulum of education, something they have to adopt because it’s the “cool new thing,” but not because they really believe in the impact it can have on student learning. It’s reassuring to me to see that other instructional coaches face this same dilemma.

One of the most difficult conversations that seems to come along frequently in technology is when teachers want to replicate what they always do (for example, a poster) “on the computer” because it will look cooler to the parents (or to their administrators) – not because of the potential that technology might have to offer. I’m thinking that effective questioning strategies, as part of coaching heavy, are what can move the conversation along from substitution to transformation. I’m also wondering if distributing a LOTI survey can help begin to plant the seeds in teachers’ minds about the different levels of technology implementation?

Final Thoughts

Once again, I am impressed by the value of looking at other, more established, fields in education to understand more deeply and improve my practice in the area of technology facilitation. Considering we’re only on the first chapter of the book, I’m sure coaching is going to provide a lot of room for growth!

Cross-posted on the Tech Learning Advisors Blog

Only one month into the new school year and almost every middle school student has their own blog hosted at ISB (plus all of our grade 5s, and quite a few high school students)!

Thanks to our fantastic middle school Humanities and Modern Language teachers, who spent their class time helping students create their own blog, we are off and running in record time! In fact, the process was so easy that almost all of our students had their blogs set up before we formalized our student blogging guidelines. So last week, I met with the Humanities department (and other interested teachers) to determine a set of basic guidelines for our students.

To get us started, we took a look at the blogging guidelines our elementary students developed last school year during their first experiences blogging. Interestingly, the guidelines our grade 4 students created last year were just as applicable to middle (and high) school as they were for elementary. We ended up using almost all of the guidelines from last year, with just a few minor re-phrasing issues and consolidation.

Given that the elementary students created these guidelines after a series of thoughtful lessons and meaningful class discussions, we see these them as prompts for deeper dialogue across classes, not simply a list of rules to follow. In order to help students make the best decisions, we’ve also followed each guideline with a question (also developed by our elementary students last year) they can ask themselves before they hit publish.

Here’s what we came up with:

Student Blogging Guidelines

As a student blogger at ISB, you are expected to follow these blogging guidelines below. Use the questions in italics to help you decide what is appropriate to post on your blog.

1. Only post things that you would want everyone (in school, at home, in other countries) to know.
Ask yourself: Is this something I want everyone to see?

2. Do not share personal information.
Ask yourself: Could someone find me (in real life) based on this information?

3. Think before you post.
Ask yourself: What could be the consequences of this post?

4. Know who you’re communicating with.
Ask yourself: Who is going to look at this, and how are they going to interpret my words?

5. Consider your audience and that you’re representing ISB.
Ask yourself: Do I have a good reason/purpose to do this?

6. Know how to give constructive feedback.
Ask yourself: What will I cause by writing this post?

7. Treat other people the way you want to be treated.
Ask yourself: Would I want someone to say this to me?

8. Use appropriate language and proper grammar and spelling.
Ask yourself: Would I want this post to be graded for proper grammar and spelling?

9. Only post information that you can verify is true (no gossiping).
Ask yourself: Is this inappropriate, immature or bullying?

10. Anytime you use media from another source, be sure to properly cite the creator of the original work.
Ask yourself: Who is the original creator of this work?

Commenting Guidelines

As a blogger, you will be commenting on other people’s work regularly. Good comments:

• are constructive, but not hurtful;
• consider the author and the purpose of the post;
• are always related to the content of the post;
• include personal connections to what the author wrote;
• answer a question, or add meaningful information to the content topic;
• follow the writing process. Comments are a published piece of writing.

Final Thoughts

I’m so impressed with the depth of thought shown by our elementary students! Being able to start this conversation with our middle school teachers using resources developed by 3rd, 4th and 5th grade students, clearly demonstrates that even our younger students really do understand both the power and the responsibilities of communicating to a global audience.

It’s also great to see that our ISB21 team vision of developing enduring understandings that are not grade-level specific, but rather provide a through-line for all divisions, has helped us focus on the bigger understandings and mindsets that students really will need to carry with them from year to year.

When discussing blogging safety and responsibility with the 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders last year, we did it in such a way that what they came up with were skills and essential questions that would help digital students no matter what grade level they’re in.

Once again, I’m reassured that elementary school is the place to begin this kind of dialogue so that we can provide a solid foundation for 21st century learning that students can continue to build upon year after year.

These guidelines have now been adopted by our elementary and high schools as well, so that we have a common expectation for all students at ISB, no matter what the age or grade level.

It will certainly be interesting to see what develops at all grade levels now that all of our students have their own blog hosted at ISB. We’re hoping that these blogs become their digital portfolio for their entire time with us. Being able to track their growth and learning over the years will be such a powerful tool for the students, teachers and parents.

Does your school have common guidelines for student blogging? What do they include? Are we missing anything here?

Cross-posted on the TechLearning Advisors Blog

What’s your job title? Yesterday I asked my twitter network the following question:

And received a lot of interesting responses:

Most of us share similar responsibilities, yet we have a wide variety of titles. Just looking back at my own experience over the last ten years in three different schools, my job titles have ranged from Technology Facilitator to Academic IT Coordinator, to 21st Century Literacy Specialist, to Technology Coach, to Technology and Learning Coordinator.

What is it about technology in education that makes it so difficult to define roles that everyone can agree on and understand? Even though we’ve had technology in schools for decades, it still seems like we’re making it up as we go along.

For the last few years I’ve been wondering if there are more established roles, that already exist (and are well-understood) in many schools, which could provide a model for this type of support position. Just because technology often deals with new ways of thinking about education, doesn’t mean that the process of supporting those new ways of thinking has to be different.

Looking at Librarians

When I first arrived at ISB two years ago, I realized just how much librarians have in common with technology facilitators. What impressed me most was the extensive research in the field of librarianship about the process (and effect) of collaboration among colleagues. Although the day-to-day tasks of a librarian versus a technology facilitator might be very different; the established, research-based process of collaboration, which librarians have been refining for decades, certainly provides an interesting inspiration for technology facilitation.

Considering Coaching

With the change in my position this school year, I’ve been thinking a lot about what another established educational role might have to offer technology facilitators: the Instructional Coach. This week, our fabulous visiting consultant, and experienced Literacy Coach, Maggie Moon, attended our Coaching team meeting. She shared an overview of her successes and pitfalls to avoid as a coach:

• A coach’s 3 major tasks in order of priority are: in the classroom (with teachers & kids, 1:1 or with groups of teachers), out of the classroom (with teachers, 1:1 or with groups of teachers), prep & planning.
• As a coach, begin with a vision of what you think teachers should/could do. What does the “ideal” teacher look like? How will we see the evidence that our teachers are meeting these expectations?
• Teaching teachers is just like teaching students: always explain things clearly & succinctly, and remember to show not just tell.
• Always focus more on the process of teaching well, rather than the content that needs to be taught. Let the content come through as you model best practice instruction.
• Be sure to track teacher progress by using a conferring notebook with items you’ve been trying to teach, times you are going in to see the teachers doing it (checklist), quality of what teachers are doing – use this to plan more in-classroom work.
• Have teachers bring student work with them during meeting time so there is evidence of what they are doing and students are learning.
• Getting started: keep it small, cycle through grade levels (work with 2 grade levels a month, go into classrooms and check in 1:1 with the other grade levels).  Sometimes it makes sense to start with groups to plant seeds, and then continue 1:1.

3 Phases of coaching (rotate through these phases – always possible to return to any of the previous stages):

1. Modeling: in the classroom, you’re teaching the class while the teacher is watching.

• Pre-conference: Be clear about setting up, discuss with the teacher beforehand what you’re doing & what to watch for and notice. Strategy: use guide sheets which gives structure of how lesson will go and the main components to keep teachers active during lessons
• In the classroom: Model best practice
• Post-conference: You reflect at the end of the lesson on what you felt went well, what you would change, to model reflection – reinforcement & refinement. Then, ask teachers what they notice (what questions does this raise?). Then discuss: “how does what you saw me do, differ from what you do?” (what’s different?). Finally, ask “whatever you just saw, how will that change what you do in your classroom?”

2. Coaching: in the classroom, the teacher teaches & you watch (next to them) – give feedback in the moment

• Start with a reflection with the teacher, ask them what they felt went well, always focus on the positive and be complimentary (any issues, record them and save them for later).
• If there are content issues (incorrect information), share this right away; issues with methods should be saved for later.

3. Co-teaching (good when you’ve planned a unit over time, building relationships)

Looking over Maggie’s coaching suggestions, I can easily see how all of them are relevant to technology facilitation. From the goal of being in the classroom as a top priority, to focusing on the process not the content, to starting small; everything Maggie shared fit closely with my experience and understanding of technology facilitation.

It’s particularly interesting to me that the process of coaching can be expressed in such concrete steps, so no matter what the grade level or content, Maggie follows a clear process that results in quality collaboration and teaching.

Although I like to think I follow a “process” myself, I feel that, in practice, technology facilitation is often far less systematic. Because it’s so organic, technology facilition can tend to be more individualized – different for each project and teacher. Although I love the fact that everything I do is tailored for each teacher, it’s possible that, as facilitators, we end up re-inventing the wheel each time, simply because we don’t have a systematic approach.

In fact, as Maggie was sharing her tips, our science and math coaches were nodding along with the terminology and processes she described, demonstrating that instructional coaching across content areas shares a vocabulary and philosophy that is worth investigating.

Final Thoughts

Although I can appreciate how much both librarians and coaches have to offer technology facilitators, I still feel that there is something different about technology. When Literacy Coaches are helping teachers learn how to teach reading better, those teachers still know something about teaching reading, they know how to read a book, they know how to spell, and how to write, because the tools of the subject are familiar to them. Technology doesn’t share the same tradition in schools. So what happens when the content area is just as new to the teacher as the best practice teaching?

And then of course, the technological support has to be considered. It would be great to focus solely on the pedagogy, but who deals with the broken projector and the students that can’t log in? I’m sure these are some of the reasons why we have so many different job titles and descriptions.

Clearly, while we can definitely benifit from the extensive experience of librarians and coaches in schools, there is more to a technology support role that needs to be included. So, I’m left wondering:

• What is still undefined in our conception of the role of a technology facilitator/coach/coordinator?
• How can we start building consensus on our roles in schools?
• What can’t we find that’s relevant to technology support when examining more established positions in schools?
• What does your job description include?

Cross-posted on the TechLearning Advisors Blog

It’s hard to believe that our summer holidays are officially over today and we start back to school bright and early tomorrow morning! I must admit, I’ve had a wonderful holiday: a week on Koh Racha in the south of Thailand, a few weeks in the United States spending time with family and friends – including a quick trip to St. Louis to lead a one-day session for MICDS Summer Learning (thanks to Elizabeth, Pat and Greg for taking such good care of me while I was there), and finally a luxurious week in the Maldives to celebrate my 5-year wedding anniversary. So, I can definitely say that I’m well-rested and ready to start the new year!

This school year is shaping up to be an especially exciting one for me. I’m still at the same school, but my position has changed in 2 very different ways.

• First, I’ll be a Technology Coach in the elementary school, shifting my position from 21st Century Literacy Specialist to be part of a larger coaching team which includes our Math, Science, and Literacy Coaches. I could not be more excited about expanding this part of my job and working with such a knowledgeable group of people on a regular basis.
• Secondly, part of my job will be the Middle School Technology and Learning Coordinator. These last 2 years have been my first working full-time in an elementary school and as much as I’ve loved the experience (and learned so much), I know that I’m a middle school teacher at heart. I’m so looking forward to spending part of my time working with the age group that I love and getting back into the middle school vibe!

Although I’m not sure what this configuration is going to look like in practice, I’ve been thinking a lot about the last two years and all that I’ve learned about starting a new job – not as a classroom teacher, but as a non-teaching support person. Having been both a subject-area teacher (e.g. middle school technology) and a support person (e.g. technology facilitator), I’ve realized that there are different challenges to each type of position.

In the interest of starting the year off right, here are the top five things I’ve learned about starting a new job in a non-teaching, support role:

It’s all about relationships! As my friend Chrissy likes to tell me, I’m a fixer. I like to solve problems, preferably on the spot, and get working on the solution immediately. Which can be great when you’re teaching your own classes and making improvements, but when you’re working in partnership with others (especially those you haven’t worked with before) it’s more important that you spend the early part of the year building a trusting relationship. It doesn’t matter how much (or how little) technology a teacher  might be using in their classroom, what does matter is that they see you as approachable, dependable, collaborative, friendly, and above all, willing and able to support their needs. It those personal relationship that you form early on that end up leading to positive and successful collaboration later on. After all, it doesn’t matter how good you are at your job if no one is interested in working with you!

Start small! As tempting as it is to start the year off with a bang, developing large-scale, amazing projects with as many teachers as possible, it’s almost always more successful (and more sustainable) to start small and begin with simple, easy-to-succeed-at, projects that teachers and students will enjoy. Small successes breed continued risk-taking and trust. It’s better to leave teachers and students wanting more collaboration than finding themselves exhausted from an over-ambitious, all-consuming project, thinking “I’ll never do that again!”

Celebrate, praise and publicize! We all know our colleagues are doing amazing things in their classroom, but we rarely hear about it outside of individual grade levels or departments. Make the effort and take the time to find ways to celebrate and share those experiences across the faculty. Teachers will appreciate knowing what others are doing in their classroom and what their students are experiencing in other subjects or grade levels. Plus, the best way to spread the use of technology in the classroom is virally – once teachers see the success of others, they will be more willing to try something similar in their classroom, especially knowing that they will have a colleague they can count on for advice and assistance (thereby building their own support network).

Be there! Be visible: in the classroom, on the team, in the hallway. Teachers are busy people, they don’t always have time to find you to ask an emergency question, or they might not have a moment to spare to send an e-mail. If you’re always holed up in your office, you’re going to get a reputation for being unavailable, or worse, a slacker. The more time you spend with your colleagues and their students, the more you will learn about them, their curriculum, their needs and their experiences. A support person is not supportive if they’re invisible.

Don’t be a pusher! Everyone knows you were hired to spread the technology love, you don’t need to be ramming it down your colleagues’ throats every second of the day. Listen and learn what, how, when, and where you can help. Of course, you want to move your faculty and your school forward, but you can do that by supporting others and helping build their understanding of the power of technology. Sure, you will probably need to “sell” your ideas here and there (and everywhere), but it doesn’t have to be constant and it should never start with you – the students and the curriculum are the backbone of your success. When you can demonstrate how technology tools enhance learning by meeting the needs of the school, you won’t have to “sell” anything anymore.

Final Thoughts

One of the biggest challeges for me, when reading over my own advice, is how to balance my own needs (what I see as critical for student, teacher, parent and administrator learning) with being supportive of others.

I can’t assume that all of my colleagues will have the same passions, interests and beliefs that I do, so if my job is entirely to support them, how do I move forward with my own learning and meet my own personal and professional goals for the year?

One of the only drawbacks I can see to being a facilitator, coach, or support person, is that I don’t have my own group of students to try new things with, I can’t experiment or test out someting new without affecting another teacher. This makes it all the more important to try to find a balance between helping others and feeling that you’re moving forward professionally.

What other advice do you have for a new teacher starting this year in a non-teaching support role?