Mr Bass Online

One year ago I was selected to be a Google Certified Teacher and off I went to Chicago to spend a day at Google’s offices.  Aside from all the terrific people I met and the network that I acquired through that process, I was in awe of the Google Goodness.  Let me be clear, I use Google tools but I wouldn’t say that I’m a Google fanboy.  There are concerns there that don’t belong in this post.  However, throughout the day, we had the opportunity to interact with some of the folks who work at Google and got a little peek into their philosophy. After a year, the one phrase that sticks out most in my mind is, “Great isn’t good enough”.  I don’t remember who said it or really even the context in which I heard it but I remember distinctly the fire that it stirred in me.  The want to do things big.  To not be satisfied with “good enough” or even “great” but to push past that to another level yet undefined.

Great isn’t good enough.  How would that philosophy play out in education?  Is it about students making the “perfect” project?  Is it about making AYP year after year?  Is it high scores on standardized tests?  It could be, but I look at it not in terms of measuring oneself against a set bar or in comparison to another district/state/program etc., but rather, I think it has to do more with internal motivation.  Everyday when I go to work, my hope is that I’ve made my building, my district and education as a whole a little better than it was the day before.  It could be the culmination of a 6 month project, or it could be as simple as showing a teacher how to use a tool, but whatever it is, I want every interaction that I have with teachers and students to be meaningful and “great”.  As my own kids have started school, I want every day to be beyond great for them.  I want them to discover and grow.  I want them to have that internal drive to strive for their best and to know that there’s always room for improvement.  Yes, in some case, “great” will have to do and it others “good” or “good enough” will work.  But, when it comes to my work and the importance that education plays in the lives of students everywhere I don’t know that “great” will ever be “good enough” for me.

Education, Google Certified Teacher, PLN, kids good enough, Google

One week ago today I reported back to work after summer break. This was really the first summer I have “taken off” in what seems like forever. I use the phrase “taken off” very loosely because did spend a few days planning and teaching but the vast majority of my time was spent with my 5 year olds during their last summer before they started “big kid school”, and let me say for the record, it was time well spent.

My kids, Max and Molly, are twins who have been in daycare since infancy. Because my wife and I both work, after the maternity leave was over, our 8 week olds began having someone else take care of them. It was difficult to accept that we might not be the biggest influence in their lives but, truly, we were just glad to have help. Our family had doubled in the course of a day and, this being our first child/children, we weren’t really prepared for the torture that sleep deprivation brings. So, off they went to Tutor time and thus began their (and our) educational experiences. After about four months we moved them to the YMCA daycare center. It was a great move for them and us and we’ve been advocates of the center ever since.

When we took them out of the Y I remember talking to their last teacher who assured me that “they’ll be fine in kindergarten”. They are well behaved, intelligent, sensitive and curious and they “thirst for information”. Needless to say, I’m proud of them.

A few weeks ago I took them for their kindergarten screening so they could be evaluated as to their kindergarten readiness. I wasn’t surprised when I was told that they were ready. They had been to summer school in the same building in a jumpstart to kindergarten program, been in childcare their entire lives and had always been interested in learning. (Go figure since their dad is a teacher.)

At the end of the screening I talked to both of the teachers who had worked with them and they had passed with flying colors. Again, I wasn’t surprised but I was still haunted by the phrase, “they’ll be fine.” This may make me a “high-maintenance parent”, but I don’t want them to be “fine”. I want them to be challenged. I want them to learn to ask questions. I want them to learn how to problem solve. Now I’m not suggesting that they won’t be. But, in my limited elementary experience, I see far more time spent on learning how to walk in a line and be quiet and behave. While these are all important skills and I understand that they must be included, especially as students start their educational journey, it concerns me that the things that I find so charming about them (their songs, made up stories and, well…. spirit) will be unacceptable in the classroom. Yes, they need to learn when and where different behavior is appropriate, but, for me, “fine” isn’t good enough. Like all parents I want my kids to change the world. Who knows, they just might. It’s just hard to be a teacher when you’re kids are in school.

Finally, let me be clear, I think that their school and their teachers are AWESOME!!!! Under no circumstances do I want to be misunderstood. I’m proud of where they are and I’m excited for their future and I wouldn’t change that for anything. But… more than anything, I question the educational process as a whole. I do believe in public education, but I also understand what it’s like to be a teacher and trying to help all students. Now I’m learning what it’s like to be a parent of a student in the current educational landscape and it’s not a comfortable place for me right now. Truly, I hope that I don’t get comfortable. I want to help my kids and all the students that I work with to be challenged, ask meaningful questions and learn how to problem solve.

Is it really OK for us to make sure our students are “fine” or should we strive for something greater than that? I know my answer. What’s yours?

Education, kids

I’m currently in a workshop with Communication Arts teachers in my district and we have been studying the book Reinventing Project-Based Learning by Suzie Boss and Jane Krauss.  Our task was to identify one idea that we got from the book and use the “Save the Last Word for Me” discussion protocol in which we did kind of a round robin in which three people are grouped together, speaker 1 shares a valuable idea naming the page and reading the text and commenting on it.  Speakers 2 and 3 respond separately with no cross talk or further explanation from speaker 1.  This is not a time for questions but a time for commenting and listening.  Speaker 1 speaks last reflecting on the comments of speaker 2 and 3 and telling where his or her current thinking lies.

As we were working through this protocol, I began to think about how students can learn from each other in the classroom.  Using this protocol, students must honor the voices of each other as the purpose is listening to each other, sharing ideas, and reflecting on them.   It allows students to create their thoughts and give information to help another’s thinking.  While not used alone, I think it has substance for the classroom.  There are many examples of this protocol on the net, but here’s a starting point.

Education, Reflections, Technology, leadership

As I’ve written before, I was the coordinator of a Film Festival in my district this last spring.  While the night went exceedingly well, upon looking back on it, there are several things that I’ve been looking at for next year. A friend of mine, asked me to reflect on the program through the lens of the NCTE 21st Century Curriculum and Assessment Framework.  Because there were so many different types of entries in the program and such a range of curricular areas involved, it’s tough to really bring all of it together so I’ll be general and we’ll see how this goes.

Develop proficiency with the tools of technology

In many cases, one of the main goals that teachers had when they started their film festival projects was to get students familiar with the tools of technology.  Focusing on the tools is a starting point in many cases, but once we got beyond how to edit video and where to begin a project, we started to focus more on the evaluating the sources that were found.  The process became as important as the final product.  We looked at the literary skills that were involved in working through the problems, evaluating possible solutions and working together to become creators rather than simply consumers of information.

Build relationships with others to pose and solve problems collaboratively and cross-culturally

One of the biggest successes of the film festival process was the collaborative nature of the work. While some were individual submissions, the vast majority were done as a group.  They worked thorough many problems and found solutions that were acceptable for all involved.  Additionally, many came away with a new understanding of the possibilities of working together.  When talking with students about what they learned, they weren’t just focused on their own part of the project.  They were learning from each other and, in many cases, stopped relying on their teachers as the sole people with the correct answers.

Design and share information for global communities that have a variety of purposes

Students who participated in the film festival were creating content that would be viewed by a greater audience.  The students were expanding their realm and evaluating the purpose of their films and the response their films would have on the audience both in the festival and later online as they were archived in a gallery.

Manage, analyze, and synthesize multiple streams of simultaneously presented information

Again, because of the nature of this project, information came from internet sites, databases, books, video, interviews, etc.  This proved to be beneficial for teachers as they asked their students to evaluate the reliability of the informaiton they found as they worked through their research process. Then, in most cases, students took that information and created their own meaning from it.  This new meaning resulted in a transformational experience in which students were not simply consumers of the information, but made it relevant to their own world and work.  Through those projects, students had a far deeper understanding of the material, had exercised their higher-order thinking skills, and created a relevant product that they were proud of.  One example of this is “The Great Car Robbery” created by a group of high school students who were studying the Niobe Myth.

Create, critique, analyze, and evaluate multimedia texts

One of the things that we’ve asked some of the students to do is to reflect on the experience.  We’ve gotten a variety of responses but mostly, because of our medium, students talked about the challenges of technology and  video editing.  However, when pushed, those who’s projects were of high quality realized that they learned a great deal through their projects that had nothing to do with the technical process of making the video.  They were working with concepts, solving problems and working together as they analyzed and reconstituted the information in a meaningful format.

Attend to the ethical responsibilities required by complex environments

Probably one of the biggest questions that students and teachers had when working with the materials had to do with copywrite and fair use.  Because the films that would be shown at the festival would also be shown on the Higher Educagtion Channel, we worked to compile a list of resources teachers could use that wouldn’t violate copywrite.  This was tough for many teachers who believe in and use fair use in their classrooms.  However, it was a great opportunity to model real world methods and have conversations about the implications of using the work of others.  This is something that we’re still trying to work out right now.  One of the things that I hope to accomplish this year is to provide other ways to find music, pictures and video for use in films.  I’m not sure what this will look like, but I want to show students that there are a number of places that provide royalty-free materials that we can use.  This was a learning experience for both student and teacher.  Truly, some didn’t think it was worth it.  However, I think it’s important to model ethical use of information as we work with students.  The film festival was a great vehicle to do just that.

I’ve been meaning to write about the Film Festival for awhile now and just haven’t made myself do it.  Looking at the NCTE Framework as a tool to think through the process and the projects provides some insight into how effective it might be in the classroom.  There are many changes that will be made this year and the framework will help to work through some of the issues that might be important.

21st Century Education, Education, Film Festival, NCTE, Reflections, Technology, Uncategorized

A couple weeks ago I was given a copy of the book Reinventing Comics by Scott McCloud so that I might be able to participate in a professional development group that is being offered by the Communication Arts Coordinator in my district.  The purpose behind the group is to explore a variety of media and explore how it is changing the reading and communication patterns of those in society.  With the popularity of graphic novels in the English classroom and with my interest in media literacy as a whole, the topic intriques me.

One of the comics that McCloud brings up is Maus by Art Spiegelman as a turning point comics in our society.  I read Maus many years ago and was completely enthralled by the retelling of a Holocaust survivors story in the form of a graphic novel.  However, until reading McClouds book, I didn’t realize how much symbolism and purposeful placement went into the creation of the work.  Through the use of pictures and text, the medium itself can engage in ways that have, in my opinion, not been explored by most teachers of literature and reading.  In many ways, the techniques that I used to teach in my media classes regarding video production, also lend themselves to comics and graphic novels.

The book itself is a little meta in that, in order to analyze comics and the industry, McCloud explains his thoughts through the use of a traditional comic book.  It’s interesting to see the book evolve as he changes topics and gives insight into the world of the comic artist.

While I don’t feel as though I came away with anything revolutionary from the book, I do have a better appreciation and am starting to look at comics and graphic novels as a real possibility for teaching media literacy.  McCloud’s premise that computers and the Internet have the ability to change the way people read comics has great possibilities for both the creation and consumption of comics in and out of the classroom.

Reflections, authors

Yesterday, a few of my colleagues and I took a trip to Effingham, Illinois to see the 6th Annual AHA Film Festival.  This festival has grown over the years from 150 to around 1500 attendees and incorporates two different school districts.  Essentially, two English teachers, Joe Fatheree and Craig Lindvahl, have collaborated on a multimedia class and decided to recognize their student’s work in a public forum.  As Joe described his classroom, it reminded me of the project based classroom that I had a few years ago.  Just as in Joe’s class, my students created films and told their story.  We talked about and studied cinematic techniques and tried to create an avenue in which students who weren’t strong writers could still tell their stories.  They wrote, rewrote, filmed, refilmed, edited and reedited before they came away with a product that they could be proud of.

We went so that we could get some pointers and ideas on how to run our own festival happening in about one month.  While our scope is different (ours is grades K-12 and district wide, while AHA encompasses two high school classes) and we are not awarding prizes for our festival, the meaning is still the same, we want to celebrate student work through video.  I learned a lot yesterday and, as I was driving home (and laying in bed awake thinking about the day) I began to think about the quality of the films that the students in Effingham had created.  To be frank… they were outstanding.  They were still student films and they are definitely still learning, but as I thought about many of the student films that I’ve seen in my years teaching, I think these are among the best.  Not because of the equipment that they used, nor because of the fact that Joe and Craig are both film makers. No, these students understood that film making is really storytelling.  They were telling a story and that was the focus of the entire class.

The technical capacity to make films is getting significantly lower.  With cell phones capable of capturing video to Flip cameras to more traditional video cameras, the equipment is getting cheaper.  Nearly every computer out there has a video editing application built into the operating system and now there are even online video creation tools that can be used.  The rules have changed when it comes to the tools.  However, the methods of storytelling remains very much unchanged.  So that makes me wonder (yet again) do the tools really matter?  There will always be technical obstacles that must be addressed, but does learning what to click on in Movie Maker, iMovie, Premiere or Final Cut Pro really what we should be teaching, or should we be more focused on the process of storytelling?  Yes, learning the program has it’s place, but when you’re telling a story, what do you focus on, the tool or the process?  For me it’s always been process.  Technical details can be worked out and many times, I’m not the one to figure it out.  If I can teach the process, regardless of what tool is chosen, the story can be told.  It just makes me wonder, how many districts are teaching the tool rather than the process when it comes to digital storytelling?  And for those that are, how can that mindset be changed?

Additional information about the AHA Film Festival can be found here:

• Online Student Film Festival
• AHA YouTube Channel
• Main AHA Film Festival Page

21st Century Education, Education, English, Film Festival, Reflections, Technology

I just found out that Google added a new feature in Google Docs. You can now create drawings that may just simulate graphic organizers. I don’t think that it will replace tools like Inspiration, but it will create another option for those teachers using Google Docs with their students. It’s as simple as selecting “Insert” –> “Drawing”. For more information, visit the Google Docs Blog.

21st Century Education, Education, Google Tools, Online Apps, Technology

I was surprised, excited and a little disappointed when I found out that Malcolm Gladwell was going to be a keynote speaker for NECC this year in Washington D.C.  Surprised because I was just finishing his book, The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference; excited because I was becoming more familiar with his work and disappointed because I don’t think I will be fortunate enough to be able to attend NECC this year.

Lately I have been thinking, planning and attending meetings concerning teacher development in regards to technology.  How can we most effectively help teachers consider their practice and try to use technology to enhance their classrooms.  We have multiple solutions and are still very much at the thinking, talking and planning stages.  However, after reading Gladwell’s book, I think that one of the things we might want to consider is how might we most effectively use the people who are most directly impacting kids — teachers who are in the classroom.  So, as a part of our planning process, maybe we need to look at the Connectors, Mavens and Salesmen so that we might create our own “epidemic” of technology integration.  According to Gladwell, each of the groups has their own strengths and roles in the spreading of an idea or concept.  If we could identify and harness the potential of these people, would an epidemic follow?  I’m not sure.  However, from my time in the classroom, I do know a few things when it comes to teachers.

1. Connectors are vital to spreading the word.  Teachers talk to each other about practice, about students, about challenges and about successes.  As educators, we come to our classrooms to help students.  That help takes on many forms, but overall, we have the same goal.  We spend countless hours being developed but until a connection is made and it’s something that has been proven to work, we are reluctant to change our approach.  If Connectors can see results in their own practice, the word will spread about what is happening in their classes.

2. Mavens are also vital to spreading the word, but they look for ways to help their colleagues.  When Maven teachers finds something that works, they will learn as much about it so that they might help others.  I would consider myself a Maven in that aspect.  As a classroom teacher I was often called upon by my fellow teachers, administrators in my building and at the district level and even parents and students to help them work through technology problems that they might be having.  I wanted to help make their lives easier and knew enough about technology to help them.  What this prompted was a learning revolution for me as I attempted to solve their technological woes.  It was fun for me but it also had a greater purpose in that I was helping others for the betterment of education.  There are Mavens all over the district that want to help just as I did, but I think we need a method in which to identify them so that we can give them the support they need as they help their colleagues.

3.  Finally, we need Salespeople to help “sell it” to our teachers.  To create an “epidemic”, we need to have buy-in from those who are reluctant.

We are all at different places in our learning and have different needs, but I have made a commitment to help teachers (not just in my district) use technology in their classrooms.  I just wonder what the little things are that can help us reach that tipping point and where can we find them.  Do we want an instructional technology epidemic?  Is that even feasible with the amount of content that is crammed into the curricular offerings of our public schools?  Can we afford not to have technology in the hands of our students?

As I continue to think about the plans in my own district, I will continue to think back to and make connections with this book and Gladwell’s ideas.  Is there something there?  I’m not sure, but maybe as I follow my Twitter friends and find a backchannel for the keynote, I’ll find some clarity.

21st Century Education, Education, Reflections, Technology, authors, leadership, projects

For a number of years, I posted Bloom’s Taxonomy on the wall of my classroom as a discussion point for my students and I as we began our CyberEnglish journey.  It became part of our studies and really set the tone for the semester.  Because we started talking about learning from day one, we had a basis for talking about their education and the work that we would be doing that semester.

Today on Twitter I ran across A Visual Representation of Bloom’s Taxonomic Hierarchy with a 21st Century Skills Frame.  I think it offers a good starting point for those who may not be familiar with all of the tools and gives a common frame of reference as to how some of these tools might be used in the classroom.

Image from http://csessums.tumblr.com/

21st Century Education, Education, English, Technology 21st Century Education, blooms taxonomy

I woke up this morning at 3:30 unable to sleep.  Tossing and turning for about 45 minutes, I finally got up to check on my kids which always calms me down.  In my son’s room I began to think about the day we found out we were having twins and how at that moment, everything changed for me.  Suddenly, my wife nor I were the most important people in our lives.  It was a sobering experience.

I had just finished my Master’s degree and was doing corporate training for Executrain of St. Louis.  I enjoyed the job but something didn’t seem right and, after lots of discussion and fretting over what to do, I reentered the educational arena and went back to the high school I had left a few years earlier to teach kids.  This wasn’t an altruistic type of career change and it wasn’t because I thought that I’d enjoy it more.  My return to the classroom was for purely selfish reasons.  I wanted more time with my kids and I wanted make education better for them.  Since then, every move that I make has been dictated by that goal.  My involvement on the NCTE Executive Committee, my work with NotK12Online, my move to my current school district (where my kids will also attend) was all based on my desire for their educational experience to be as rich and productive as possible.

Five years ago that seemed like a great reason, but it was a reason that I couldn’t really see and actually picture.  I can see it now.  This fall my children will be starting Kindergarten.  They will be starting on their edcuational experience.  It makes me wonder whether, in the last year and a half, I’ve made enough of an impact on the teachers in my district.  Will their creativity be stifled by walking in single file lines or will they thrive in an environment in which they have choice and are taught to question?  Unfortunately I can’t say for sure.  But I now have a different lens.  One through which I look at every teacher I work with and ask myself whether I would be satisfied with my kids in their classroom.

My reasons for being in education today are selfish.  I want the best for my kids.  I recognize that and have come to terms with it because if it’s good enough for my kids, then, in my mind, it’s good enough for everyone else’s kids.  Would I have approached the classroom differently if I had had kids when I began my career?  Absolutely.  Now, as I work with teachers, I have a completely different (and I think better) approach than I would have had before my kids were born.  It’s a perspective that keeps me up at night, but one that makes me work harder.  Hopefully, my work is making a difference, not just for my kids, but for all kids.

21st Century Education, Education, NCTE, Notk12onlineconference, Reflections, kids SIUE