always learning

Last weekend I had the honor of co-leading the Flat Classroom Workshop (pictures here) with Julie Lindsay at the 21st Century Learning Conference in Hong Kong. I have to admit that although I knew it would be amazing after everything I had heard about the Flat Classroom Conference in Doha earlier this year, I had no idea just how amazing the whole experience would turn out to be!

Workshop Structure

The flat classroom workshop is a 2.5-day project-based learning experience for both students and teachers. We had about 30 high-school students and 10 teachers participating face-to-face, and about 20 registered virtual participants. The goal of the workshop is to allow participating students and teachers to experience a flat classroom project in a condensed amount of time. Basically, in the 2.5 days of the workshop, the students and teachers go through almost the entire process of a flat classroom project that might normally take six to nine weeks.

The students and teachers in the workshop are given a challenge (in this case, to develop and propose a solution to the problem of the digital divide). Students and teachers worked in separate teams of 5 (i.e.: teachers worked with only other teachers, and students worked only with other students). All teams had members from a variety of schools, including official virtual participants.

Over the course of the 2.5 days, teams had to research the digital divide, propose and pitch a solution to a small group of conference participants, present more formal pitches to all workshop participants and a virtual uStream audience at the end of the first full day, and then finally the three most-likely-to-succeed ideas were presented to the entire 21st-century learning conference as the final plenary session.

What was amazing to me about this process was the fact that not only did the teams have little to no understanding of the digital divide before the conference started, but most had never met their team members, and most of them were working in a different school with different equipment than they were used to, and they had to work together with virtual participants as team members, yet they jumped in with both feet, producing finished presentations that were absolutely outstanding.

Here’s what really stood out to me over the 2.5 days:

Project-Based Learning Works

It is absolutely amazing what students can do when you give them an authentic and achievable task and then get out of their way. We provided several focus sessions on pitching an idea, a basic overview of the digital divide, the power of visual imagery, and an introduction to digital storytelling, but for the most part the teams were on their own. Of course, Julie and I were facilitating the process, but watching students learn how to learn together and seeing the results of their cooperation was a great reminder for me that this is the way a classroom should be run.

Third Culture Kids

When the students first met each other, it was interesting see that they started their introductions with their ethnic background first. Once they established their cultural history they were able to bond about similar experiences (most of them were 3rd culture kids and many of them had never lived in their “home” country)  and work together in an open and accepting environment. It was interesting for me to see how important it was for them to acknowledge their cultural history and experiences before beginning the process of working together.

These Tools Are Still New

I’ve been working with web 2.0 tools for a few years now and they are starting to seem “old hat” to me, but for most of these students (and teachers), even though were particularly interested in technology, many of these tools were new or they hadn’t used them in this way. Of course, they all have Facebook accounts  and they regularly Skype with their extended families, they really didn’t have an understanding of how to use these tools for an academic purpose, and it was exciting to them to discover new ways to use them. It was a good reminder that the use of web 2.0 tools in education is nowhere near as prevalent as it can seem here in the edublogosphere.

Learning to Listen

One strong difference Julie and I noticed when we were presenting was that I will occasionally ask students to close their laptop lids to listen, while Julie doesn’t. I don’t think that one way is better than the other, but it’s made me wonder: do we need to teach (and model for) students how to stop and listen? I know when I’m working on my laptop and listening to something else at the same time, I am able to stop and listen when I need to, but I wonder if that’s a skill that needs to be taught and learned (not an innate ability that all people just naturally have). Can some students naturally pay attention while others are distracted by the laptop? I know that many of our teachers in the CoETaIL course find it very distracting to have their laptop lids open throughout our face-to-face sessions, but it didn’t bother the students at all, could it be a generational thing?

It’s all about Inquiry and Individualization

When I think of the digital divide, I automatically think about those who have access to technology versus those who don’t. What was interesting to me was that while watching the students try to develop a solution to this global problem, almost none of them tackled the issue of the haves and have-nots. They almost all chose to work on the problem of the “analog” generation versus the “digital” generation. They drew on their own experiences, for example: their grandparents who have difficulty communicating with them online. They focused on the problems of one generation not communicating the same way as another generation.

I was impressed to see that they were not only concerned about the older generation staying in touch with their families, but also about learning from their elders and valuing the input and perspective they have on the world in a format the younger generation understands. The fact that the topic and project given them were broad enough that they were able to find a perspective on it that they were passionate about clearly helped them to be motivated to find solutions that could actually be implemented in their lives.

The Power of Peer Grouping

When Julie organized the groups, she made sure that students and teachers were in separate groups – there were no mixed groups. At first, I wasn’t sure what I thought about that grouping, because I was interested to see how students and teachers might work together to use media, collaborate and find solutions. However, on the final day, when a little more than half of the participants (students and teachers) were working together to produce the final plenary session for the conference, it was amazing to see how quickly the traditional student-teacher dynamic returned. Literally the instant the student and teacher teams were mixed, the students stopped talking and the teachers took over.

After a few minutes, we split the groups, and the teachers and I debriefed for a few minutes about what had been happening and how quickly it happened. Although none of us were surprised to see it, all of the teachers had been consciously trying to step back and not take control, but it happened nonetheless. It was almost as if it were involuntary.

Process Over Product

I started out in an MYP school, and perhaps that’s why my approaches to teaching and learning have usually tended to match that philosophy. Seeing the MYP Design Cycle in action again at the Workshop (after working in Elementary for the last two years) really reminded me that students can tackle almost any technology project, even when starting with little or no previous knowledge, and work their way through it following that process. All the teacher needs to do is provide the framework for the students to lead them through that process of learning. It isn’t about the content, but about the process of learning with technology, and that process can be adapted to fit any content.

Virtual Audience and Virtual Team Members

The authentic task and opportunity for choice were great motivators, but it was especially interesting to see how the students reacted when we emphasized our virtual participants. As soon as a virtual team member was in the chatroom, students would jump in and talk to them, when they presented in front of their virtual audience on the uStream the students seemed to sit up straighter, and when we announced the global (online) vote the students wanted to watch the percentages changing in real time. It seems like this generation is so used to sharing so much of their lives with a (potentially) global audience that doing things without public interaction might not be worth it for them. I’m not sure if this is a good or bad thing, but it certainly makes me wonder what they must think when faced with a pencil-and-paper task to be read only by the teacher – when they’re already used to sharing their lives and their work with the world.

Participant Feedback

We’ve asked all of the participants to share their thoughts via an anonymous survey and their blog on the Flat Classroom Conference Ning. You can read all of their blog posts on the Ning, but I thought I’d include a few highlights here as well.

Chris Smith was also very generous with his time and spent quite a while with our participants recording their thoughts and experiences with his handy Flip. All of the videos are available on the 21st Century Learning Conference Ning – they’re all short clips and well worth watching.

From Beatrice (student):

It was a life-changing experience to connect, communicate, and cooperate with people from various cultures. I interacted with people I’ve never met before, and even spoke in front of a large audience; if you know how shy I am, you will understand how meaningful it was to me.

I think that the ultimate goal of Flat Classroom wasn’t to learn about technology, or to bridge the digital divide (although those were very, VERY important objectives!)– It was to Flatten the World.

I believe that when we broke down the walls of the classroom, a small crack was made on the walls of the world. Starting from flattening the classroom through technology, we shall flatten the whole world step by step.  I’m looking forward to the day I’ll be attending a “Flat World Conference.”

From Saundra (teacher):

The flat classroom project is not about creating a flat sameness from the peaks of diversity. It is about recognizing diversity and weaving it into a shared vision of how a problem can be solved. It is learning what it means to be even in understanding and experience and use that to create something new and uneven.

From Toby (student):

Our team has bonded over the past few days and we’re über tight. The tasks have been challenging yet rewarding. What we learned about our cultural differences will stay with us always. Hopefully we’ll be visiting Seoul soon! XD The time limits tortured us yet brought out the best in us. It was the first time we learned the concept of digital divide and we learned much about this through the workshop. We also learned a lot of teamwork and collaboration skills, as well as the secrets to creating a creative, memorable presentation.

From Sara (teacher):

The process that we engaged in over the last 48 hours at the 21st Century Learning Conference Hong Kong is what happens in reality. It’s not a lecture, it’s not passive (nor is it aggressive, thank goodness), it’s a genuinely tangible manifestation of real life. It’s a real problem, it’s a real solution, and it’s real time.

From Wu Ming (student):

This is my first time participating in some activities with someone from foreign countries and international schools. I found my language skills not as good as my teammates. My English is not fluent enough to fit the pace of the conference. I spent most of the time catching up with my teammates but not thinking of ideas. Though, I am glad that I was allocated into a team with friendly mates. They gave chance for me to try presenting and improve by time. I am comparatively bad in speaking English, but I am gaining confidence in speaking English after this activity.

On the other hand, the activity is fascinating. This is my first time (again) to attend lessons with a notebook all along. I enjoy computer lessons before since I can use the computer, not just sitting in the classroom and listen to what the teacher say. This activity provided a great chance for me to use computer without the need to worry about the timing due to the insufficient amount if computer. Other schoolmates from our school enjoyed this activity too. There are also many snacks provided so that we wouldn’t get too bored or sleepy. This is a nice learning environment for me, and I like to have this at my school.

Finished Products

If you’re interested in seeing the final products, check the Workshop wiki for embedded multimedia on each team page. You’ll also find the video archieves for our uStreamed sessions, including the final plenary.

Final Thoughts

I’m still on cloud nine a week later! The students and teachers that participated are absolutely amazing in every way. Seeing such a large group of students and teachers so passionate about learning, communicating and collaborating, and so committed to making a difference was a life changing experience. I sincerely hope that our FaceBook group, and our various Nings and wikis, will keep us connected – I, for one, want to keep learning with everyone who participated!

I owe Julie and Vicki a huge thank you for continuing to push boundaries, for connecting me (and so many others) through the Flat Classroom project so many years ago, and for giving me the opportunity to co-lead this workshop with Julie. I can not wait to do it again!

And I must admit, I’m kind of wishing I was still seeing this stunning view every day:

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?

One of my favorite projects of the year is beginning soon!

The 1001 Flat World Tales project was initiated by Clay Burell in Korea over three years ago and has been going strong ever since. I first started working on this project at the middle school level, but this will be my second year working with elementary school students. No matter what grade level you’re working with, this is a great, easy to implement, collaborative writing project that students love!

This year the wonderful Jeff Whipple is helping me coordinate the Elementary School section and he’s also coordinating the Middle School section. Anyone interested in taking on a High School workshop?

We are looking for elementary classrooms at all levels to participate in this writing workshop. The project will last about a month and we’ll set up small grade-level based groups to create collaborative groups for our peer editing process (following the planning process we started last year). If the suggested time frame doesn’t work for you, feel free to start your own workshop later or earlier in the year – our goal is to bring together teachers that would like to embed collaborative writing and authentic audience into their classroom experiences.

As part of the project, students will:

• experience writing for an authentic audience
• work collaboratively with peer reviewers around the world
• follow the writing process to build an understanding of your selected style of writing
• utilize a wiki for writing, editing, forum discussion, and revision history
• understand how to connect information through hyperlinks
• create and embed multimedia elements to bring a story to life

Here in Bangkok, I’ll be working with one of our fantastic grade 4 teachers, Sonja Merrell, and we’ll be using the workshop to build our understanding of persuasive writing. Sonja and I worked together last year as well and found the project to be a great venue for establishing authentic audience and for really grounding students in the writing process.

One of the best things about doing this project for the second time with the same teacher is that we’re able to make the improvements we thought about during our reflections last year. Looking back at our reflective conversation, I’m pleased to note that we do have a class blog up and running and students are very familiar with the web 2.0 world: writing for a global audience, commenting on others’ work, and looking for connections within our network of learners.

Our plans are to ensure that we have a clear and consistent focus on the concept of persuasive writing through a slightly revised layout of our pages and by providing a checklist for students to follow. Hopefully the improvements we make this year will lead us to other ideas for next year’s project! I love the fact that the learning is never done and these projects are so easy to evolve and revise that we can keep making them better and better.

We would absolutely love to have you join this project with your class! Fill out the online form and you’re in! All materials, resources, rubrics and related information can be found on the wiki. Feel free to leave questions here or on the discussion tab of the wiki.

One of the most interesting aspects of my job is figuring out how to best support teachers – everyone is at a different comfort and experience level with technology, and most are uncomfortable admitting what they don’t know. Building individual relationships with new colleagues, as well as getting to know team, department and faculty dynamics are a critical factor to my success as a 21st Century Literacy Specialist (or as a Technology Facilitator, for that matter).

Over the past few weeks, one thing has really stood out for me: Just like I believe I need to get to know a class and their teacher when working on a collaborative project, getting to know the team is essential to deeper, more authentic and appropriate support, for both the curricular needs and the needs of the individual teachers on the team.

Towards the end of last year I realized that I was able to make connections with a number of individual staff members, and therefore help shift those teachers through projects at every grade level. But, I realized I still wasn’t starting the shift with any groups of teachers.  Most of the teachers were at different grade levels and didn’t regularly cross paths with the other teachers I was working with. The momentum was with individuals only.

As powerful as that momentum had been, I started to realize that teachers truly appreciate support and common goals with their team. If they can try something new with their team members, they have a built-in support structure that fits easily into their daily practice of teaching and learning that also conveniently slots right into the existing infrastructure of the school. Plus the added benefits of a safety-net: everyone participates, everyone helps, everyone agrees that this is the path to take. Convenience, comfort and accessibility are all be strong benefits to working through the process as a team.

So, this year I started my quest to find a team at ISB that would allow me to be a mostly-silent, but always willing to help, member. Luckily the wonderful and welcoming grade 4 team allowed me to join, sit in on their weekly team meetings, and offer my two cents when appropriate. It has truly been a valuable learning experience.

Working with an entire team has helped me understand each individual member of the team better through their interactions with others. I also have a deeper understanding of their needs for curricular support, as well as the challenges they are facing in their classrooms. I hope that, by being there for them, they also see me as a productive and contributing member of their team. I try to offer ideas that will streamline their daily tasks, help engage their students, and add a digital literacy component to their units of study.

One of the most powerful experiences has been over the past week and a half while the team has been discussing their current social studies unit, Influence. The team had previously decided on their Enduring Understandings and Essential Questions, but were not sure how they wanted to assess student learning.

As a member of the team, I was part of all of the discussions about how the unit went last year, struggles and successes, ideas for improvement, concerns and how it all fits into the bigger picture of student learning in grade four. Because I had all of that background, I was able to share an idea for a final assessment that (hopefully) will meet the needs for this unit, adding in a 21st century-style approach, and also take into consideration time factors, other units of study that need to be completed, technical resources, and teacher and student comfort level with technology tools.

Without being a participant in all of those discussions I would have only had a one-sided view of the need at hand, and certainly would not have been able to put the curricular needs of the unit into the context of the entire grade level. Just stepping in to offer my ideas for a quick 10-minute discussion once in a while would not have prepared me to truly meet the needs of the team. I have also been able to spend dedicated time with some of the team members and our Curriculum Coordinator to fully flesh out this unit so that it meets the needs of the teachers and the students. Now this unit will be part of the grade 4 curriculum for years to come.

To truly collaborate with teachers, I am starting to believe that we, as resource people, need to be part of their team environment. I can certainly work individually with teachers to help them with their specific classroom needs, but to make any major shifts in the thinking of the school or to effect change in the curriculum, the collaboration needs to come at the team level.

What do you think? How are you best supporting your teams or departments at your school?

Move Over Clematis by neon.mamcita
Seedling from twenty-questions

I’ve been thinking a lot about professional development lately, especially about its critical role in shifting a school or shifting a community of teachers within a school, and then sustaining that change.

I’m thinking about how to support the vastly different needs of my colleagues across the school, but also to build in opportunities for connection, collaboration and communication across, between and among all of those different teachers. I’m thinking about professional development as a self-sustaining opportunity for learning – based on individual need and interest, but also allowing for cross-pollination of ideas and experience. I’m thinking about modeling professional development after my experiences with a personal learning network.

There are two models of professional development I’ve been delivering throughout my career, individual and whole school:

Individual PD

This is the type of support I offer on a daily basis:

• Working one-on-one with teachers who are ready and willing to co-plan, co-teach, and co-assess units of inquiry in their classroom.
• Setting up one-on-one meetings with teachers to help them learn new tools, or figure out how to work best with the ones they already have.
• Casual conversations in the hallway that turn into inspirations for ideas to use in the classroom.
• After school technology support for tasks that have to be done, but could be made even easier through the use of technology.

This model of support helps deepen learning by providing enough time on a regular basis, grounded in curricular needs, to build individual understanding.

Although this is great way to support an individual teacher’s personal professional development, it can sometimes feel very disjointed. Having enough time to work with all of the different individuals in one school can be challenging, and/or discussing the same ideas with several different people or not being able to cross pollinate ideas because it’s always a “private” discussion can be isolating.

School Wide PD

This is the traditional model of PD we’re all used to:

• Whole-school or divisional presentations where a message is mass-marketed and delivered in one session (or if you’re lucky one or two day workshops).
• When you bring in expert voices to build enthusiasm, share ideas from the “outside world” and kick start a new initiative or support a teaching and learning goal.
• Sending a group of teachers to a conference and expecting them to share their new learning with the rest of the school when they return to campus.

As valuable as these experiences are, they are often a “one off”- offered once and never heard from again.

Keeping both of these models in mind, I’m thinking that there might be a place for something in-between. Something that taps into the power of community, but also supports the individual.

Group PD

This is, I think, the next step to building a community of learners in an institution, and one that can be especially enhanced by new web 2.0 tools like social networking. I feel like I’m at the verge of understanding how to help facilitate this experience, but I’m just figuring things out as I go.

During yesterday’s K12Online LAN party with Heather, Sara, Ali, Chrissy, Silvia (via Skype), Diane, Susan and Joanie, here in my apartment, we discussed how empowering it was to be with a cross divisional group (elementary and middle schools represented) where we could all share ideas, ask questions and receive needed support. It felt like something more than just the one-on-one meetings where the ideas are limited to just the two brains in the room.

Being able to tap into a diverse group of experiences, knowledge and imagination means that we can learn even more, and everyone feels both needed and supported. We’ve already agreed to have another LAN party because this one was so useful! There goes that feeling of being a one-off. That’s the energy and enthusiasm I would like to tap into, and to spread throughout the school.

We also talked about adding an online component to our group – to help facilitate discussion, share ideas and inspiration, and to provide a repository for information. We talked about setting up a Ning so we could encourage outside educators to join to help continue and expand our discussions (just like Julie is doing in Qatar). Plus this would give us the added advantage of having a welcoming space to demonstrate what we’re doing to other interested colleagues across the school.

We want to make the group open to any and all that are interested, centered around a common purpose. We want to tap into each individual’s desire to learn, but also their desire to be part of a group, to be supported and to be needed.

I just watched Seth Godin give a talk about his recent book, Tribes (thanks to @roybot for the link), and one of his points was that it is human nature to want to belong to a group and to be identified as a member of that group. If there are groups of people at your school who want to learn about technology, why not create that group? Why not help facilitate a place/time/space for coming together and learning together?

This is all going to be an opt-in experience – only the people that are interested will join, but I honestly can’t wait to see how far we can go when we’re all working together.

Just being able to have a number of people (perhaps shifting and changing over time) to look to for support and inspiration makes it feel more sustainable (no longer reliant on the individual PD model). Plus, knowing that a group can continue to exist beyond the tenure of specific individuals at a specific school means that PD will be “just in time” whenever it’s needed, instead of a “one-off” experience. Finally, spending regular time communicating and connecting, and knowing that only those that are truly interested will invest their time means that the learning will be deeper than your standard afternoon session of PD.

We’re only just getting started, but I have that positive feeling, those excited butterflies in my stomach, that there is something to this idea. That, especially in conjunction with the other two types of PD we regularly experience, this could add a whole new dimension to our professional learning and that it could be just what we need to shift our school.

What do you think? Have you had any experience with this kind of PD? What are the critical factors to think about while we’re in the begining stages?

Over the past two and a half years I’ve been focusing on helping teachers make connections with other classes around the world. For the most part, our collaborations have been about general topics – book reports, water, persuasive writing, enhancing oral language, things that almost any classroom teacher would be able to connect with, and they’ve been great!

But this year, inspired by Clarence Fisher’s ThinWalls project, I’m looking for something new, something deeper. A real connection based on shared goals and common assessments. Something that will last longer than your average globally collaborative project. A classroom connection, based on specific curricular needs, that will last an entire school year.

I’m fortunate to be working with so many wonderful teachers at ISB and around the world that are willing to be patient and wait until we find just the right classes with just the right needs. They are willing to build these collaborations from the ground up, focusing on student learning, and taking the time to plan meaningful and authentic experiences for all involved.

One of these projects is our fifth grade Students Teaching Students podcasting and blogging collaboration around the Lucy Caulkin’s Readers and Writer’s Workshop.

In order to ensure that all classrooms involved share the same goal for the project, we are following the Understanding by Design model of curriculum planning. And to make sure that we’re all in it from the ground up, we’re planning via a Google Doc. Although I’ve used Google Docs at school with team members a lot, I haven’t yet used them for curriculum planning across time zones and schools. I’m looking forward to seeing how it works out.

So far, all of the project participants are listed on the Doc, with contact info and class details carefully noted. We have determined the basic focus of the unit and are starting to share tips and advice with each other. Over time, I’d love to use the Doc (or a Calendar) to plan common events or activities.

For example, here is what we have so far for this project (all a work in progress):

Enduring Understandings:

• Good readers use strategies to deepen their understanding.
• Good readers read fluently and with expression, paying particular attention to the conventions of grammar.
• Authentic audiences encourage good reading and writing.
• Collaboration and communication both inside and outside the classroom will prepare students for being productive citizens within our global society.

Essential Questions:

• How do I use reading strategies to deepen my understanding?
• Why is fluency important?
• How does my audience influence or affect my reading and writing?
• How does collaborating with others help me to learn?

Assessment:

• Student self reflection
• Teacher self reflection
• Class blog as portfolio

GRASPS Task:

Goal: Your goal is to entertain your audience with personal stories about reading strategies
Role: Broadcasting team: On-Air Personality/Show Host, Producer, Writers, Mixing Team, Manager
Audience: Peers at ISB, both younger and same-age, partner classes around the world
Situation: You need to teach your audience effective reading strategies
Purpose: To collaborate with your  team to effectively communicate reading strategies to a wide audience

Supporting activities ideas to build understanding (brainstorm):

• commenting quality – rubric for commenting
• specific points in the year where you pick an earlier piece of writing that you rework and link back to old version to see the growth

Planned activities to support learning (brainstorm):

• Introduction to online safety
• Introduction to blogging
• Introduction to GarageBand/Audacity
• Podcasting a written piece for fluency
• Posting a podcast
• Read a story from a book for practicing fluency to be podcast later
• Developing quality commenting skills
• Collaborative teaming to develop a podcast focused on reading strategies
• Reflective pieces of writing on the blog

I love the idea of being able to plan a curricular unit for several classes all from one Google Doc. This is my idea of collaboration – everyone literally on the same page and working towards the same goals. Although I’ve done quite a few of these projects before, I usually ended coordinating via e-mail and never really “flattening” the planning process – I inadvertently usually had all planning go through me.

This type of process, with the project clearly outlined, is the way I would normally plan a project with a classroom teacher face-to-face. How amazing and easy it is to now do the same thing, anytime, anywhere, with a Google Doc!

I’m hoping that this transparency in planning, and the clarity in goals for the unit, will help us stay focused throughout the year and enable us to dig deeper with our students.

What do you think? Have you ever used a Google Doc to plan this way? Have you ever had shared curricular goals that are ongoing throughout the year with another class, in another country? How did it go?

After spending a year getting to know elementary students and elementary teachers (it’s definitely quite a switch from middle school), I’m finally starting to feel like I know what kinds of projects are appropriate and achievable in the elementary classroom. All of the projects I completed with our amazing teachers last year really helped me focus and refine my goals for this year – keeping things simple is definitely the key.

For this year we’re looking at staying small and making consistent connections with global partners. Ideally, we would like to find classroom partners that are willing to connect with us on a regular basis over the course of the entire school year (Sept 08 – June 09).

We would like to develop personal learning networks for our students where we can deepen understanding of classroom curriculum while learning how to communicate authentically and appropriately online. We want to make sure that the use of web 2.0 tools deepens their understanding of classroom content and also helps them feel connected to the world around them. Sound interesting? Read on! And if you’d like to participate in one of these projects, please leave a comment!

Amazingly, I have a willing and enthusiastic teacher on almost every grade level ready to fully collaborate with me this year. We are planning to go deep with the students and to really focus on building 21st century literacy skills in a consistent and authentic approach.

Here’s what we’ve gotten started so far:

Grade 5: Students Teaching Students

The wonderful Chrissy Hellyer and her fellow new ISB teacher, Aly McAloon, will be kicking off the school with a classroom blogging project that will eventually include a regular podcast focused on the Lucy Caulkins Readers Workshop.

We’re starting simple with a whole class blog and students as contributing authors (like Betsy and I did last year in the Grade 3 BlogPals project). Once the students start feeling comfortable in their blogging as a class, we’re going to link Chrissy & Aly’s class to start making connections across the grade 5 quad, and eventually they will connect with other classes internationally (Jane Lowe’s class is already on board!).

Our next step will be rotating groups in each class podcasting about their reading strategies to help teach their younger classmates how to be good readers (Melanie Holtsman and her teachers are ready to connect with us, thankfully, since they are total experts in the world of Lucy Caulkins).

I love the idea of embedding multiple tools into one class project and developing a classroom routine where students are not only in charge of their own learning, but also sharing that learning with others.

We would love to connect with another grade 5 class (or two) that would be interested in becoming co-learners along with our students for the entire school year (Sept 08 – June 09)!

Grade 5: Student Portfolios in Spanish

Our Spanish teacher, James, has been experimenting with tons of fantastic web tools over the last school year and now that he’s on the report card committee, he’s looking to find alternate ways of assessing student learning. So, we’re piloting electronic portfolios (in the form of blogs, for now) with one of his grade 5 classes.

James has already been embedding multiple tools into the class blog he’s been running for a year now, and now he’s ready to let the students be the authors on some of those posts. The goal is to keep track of student learning throughout the school year by creating a category for each student. Each time the students have a piece of work for their portfolio, they will post it on the class blog (as contributing authors). By the end of the year, parents will be able to click on their child’s category and see the progression of their work over the course of the year.

Grade 5: Our Online ESL Classroom

Our wonderful grade 5 ESL teacher, Diane, began blogging and podcasting with her students last year. We saw such an amazing leap in their oral and written language as soon as they realized they had an authentic audience for their work that she wants to continue to provide that opportunity this year.

Although Diane only sees her students for short lessons every other day (we run a Sheltered Immersion ESL program), we have been able to organize specific collaboration projects that focus on issues ESL students are concerned about. We have set up a few open ended blog posts to get them writing and connected with other classes (including Anne Mirtschin’s) about moving on to sixth grade.

This will probably be a more infrequent collaboration, on a topic-by-topic basis, but it would be great for our ESL students to connect with other language learners (or native English speakers) on topics that are important to them.

Grade 4: BlogPals

My fantastic colleague Sonja Merrell, who participated in the 1001 Flat World Tales last year, is back for more 21st century learning this year! She has decided to start the school year off with a class blog, which she will use as a communication portal for her students and their parents. There are a few students in her class that participated in the BlogPals project with me last year, so they will make great student leaders as we venture further into blogging with Sonja’s class.

We’re going to start off the year using the blog as a discussion tool, to build the school-home connection and to get her students thinking about their learning in a more interactive way. Over time we will have each student as a contributing author to the blog, just like we did with BlogPals last year.

We are looking for one or two grade 4 classrooms that would like to participate in this type of year-long adventure with us!

Grade 2: A Window to Our World

Another amazing colleague, Susan, who took a huge leap with me last year when we had our grade 2 class connect to another grade 2 class in the US via a Ning, is back in action this year! She loved the idea of working with a Ning and found the  “walled garden” concept perfect for her second graders. It was amazing to see how quickly they took to this new learning environment – posting questions and answers, commenting on individual student pages, and sharing their learning as a class – all in second grade!

This year Susan would like to do something very similar, but preferably with another international school class, if we can find one. She wants to focus on intercultural understanding and connecting with class that would have a greater mix of nationalities (she’s not limited to an international school, but we thought we might have better luck at getting a very diverse class if we were able to find another international school interested). Last year she had 20 nationalities in her class of 23 students, so finding a class with a similar makeup would be ideal for her.

Grade 1: ESL Learners Speak English

Our enthusiastic grade 1 ESL teacher, Erin, started using VoiceThread in her classroom last year as a way for her begining ESL students to practice their English in an authentic environment. We had a great time connecting to another international school in Spain, thanks to Nancy von Wahlde, and we’re planning to re-connect again this year.

Erin maintains a class blog, mostly to communicate with the parents, where she posts her VoiceThreads that the students create based on their classroom units of inquiry. We’re planning to start out with an introduction to each student so that our partner class can really get to know each person as an individual. Over time the students share a bit about their lives in Thailand, the school, and other grade 1 favorites.

Ideally, we would love to connect with a classroom that is able to communicate with us on a regular basis – maybe once a month – and that would be willing to continue these conversations over the course of the year.

Kindergarten: Kids Draw!

We have one set of co-teachers in Kindergarten this year. Sandy and Akiko are team-teaching one class of 24 kindergarten students all year – and what a class they have! It’s amazing to see the way Sandy and Akiko build on each other’s streagnths as we begin working with these little students and technology.

We started out the year with a short unit on drawing, where the students were asked to draw a picture of themselves on paper (for a unit entitled “All About Me”) and then draw the same picture on the computer (using KidPix). We discussed what was the same and what was different about drawing on paper and drawing on the computer. Interestingly, although almost all of them though drawing on the computer was more difficult (we still need to work on those fine motor skills), most of them liked drawing on the computer better.

After this short unit, Sandy, Akiko and I realized we have lots of room to grow with drawing and technology. We’d like to revisit the concept of drawing on the computer over the course of the year and build in some thoughtful reflection, ideally with VoiceThread, where students can talk about the context of the picture, and the skills they learned while drawing.

It would be great to partner up with another kindergarten class that’s interested in sharing learning through drawing!

What do you think? Are you interested in collaborating with one of our classes?

Eureka! I think I’ve got it! Thanks to all of your fantastic feedback on my previous posts, I realized that the Collaboration Continuum I started this weekend isn’t really a continuum at all – it’s a cycle:

To me, the cycle idea makes much more sense than a continuum. For starters, I really didn’t like the idea that teachers would feel that they should be at one end of the continuum – the pressure to “figure out” where you are on the path and how you compare to others is just too tempting (and intimidating).  I also didn’t like the visual impression that it was a finite process, appearing as if once you make it to the mentoring stage you’re done.

So, I went back to the drawing board, and came up with the concept of a cycle.

I love the fact that there’s no definite beginning or end, which acknowledges the fact that all teachers come to a school with different history and different needs. Not everyone will need to start with “full collaboration” when they come to ISB because they might have already done something like that at a previous school.

I also like the idea that the cycle builds in a support infrastructure for continuing this process indefinitely – once a teacher has been through the process and reaches the mentoring stage, s/he will go on to be a fully collaborative with another teacher who’s ready on their team, and then that teacher will do the same for another member of the team. This way the learning and experience of one teacher turn into the learning and experience of many – especially important in international schools where we tend to have lots of staff turnover.

What do you think? Is this better? More approachable and less intimidating to staff? Any other ideas for improvement?

Just out of curiosity, could/would you use this at your school? Do you have someone who could be responsible for implementing this process and begin the collaboration cycle with a group of willing teachers?

After some very helpful comments on my last post, I have revised my collaboration continuum to reflect the need for some pre- and post-assessments, as well as consistent professional development and an emphasis on learning and assessment:

I still couldn’t think of different terms to define the continuum, although I don’t like the fact that “dependence” could have a negative connotation even though “full collaboration” is a good thing – we want to have more collaboration, more teaming, and more sharing of strengths. Any ideas?

What else is missing or needs to be revised? I’m definitely liking how this is starting to look…

Today Jeff and I also talked about the LOTI in relation to this collaboration continuum. Once we do a pre-assessment of where we’re at, we can look at using this model to help us move to higher levels of technology implementation. So, I made a nifty little graphic for that one too:

As I was browsing the site, I also came across this article about effective 21st Century leadership which I also plan on sharing with my admin team tomorrow.

What do you think? Do these work together well or am I off track here?

As part of our organizational goal this year, all teams are participating in an action research project. Although each team is focusing in slightly different areas based on their needs and observations over the past year, the ultimate goal for all of us is improving student learning. We’re following a standard action research process:

Lucky for me, I’m on a team with my amazing new colleagues, Tara Ethridge and Jeff Utecht. Although we’ve only been working together for about a month, we were immediately on the same page about where to start: how to best support teachers that are willing to embed technology into classroom experiences – no matter what their level of technology proficiency might be.

After some thoughtful discussion, we settled on our focus question:

Does collaborating with teachers build the confidence needed to take the next step towards independently implementing future projects?

Along with the question, we thought some clarification might be needed about the world “collaboration,” as well as the term “next steps” and “independence,” so we came up with this continuum:

Of course, this is still a work in progress. What do you think? Would this be an interesting action research project? Does our continuum accurately represent the basic stages of growing independence with technology integration? Are we missing anything key?