Sorry about the ghost post, something went terrible wrong when I tried to publish yesterday.  Anyway…

Is it possible that the blur of school is on us already?  I don’t mean school itself, I mean the endless cycle of Monday, garbage day, Friday, NFL game, Monday…I am guilty.  I have a fascination with crossing off dates.  But sometimes that’s not good enough.  I cross off months, weeks, days, and I even find myself crossing off class periods.  You can become so consumed with time that time dictates your teaching. 

How will I fill this time?  Where will I find the time?  Let’s not do that because there is not enough time.  You and your students could be missing out on great experiences when teaching becomes consumed with time.  My unqualified advice, let go.  It will get done or it won’t.   The odds of deep understanding are actually better if you fully explore an idea than if you scratch the surface of 100.  If you model the thinking and learning process well, then you can put ownership of the rest of the content into their hands.        

That said, I want to be better this year.  I myself want to let go of education being a function of time.  I want to be a more thoughtful, more reflective learner and I hope by being conscious of that, I will help others around me do the same. 

Have a great year,

I’ll tell you the Russian story next time I get a moment to type.  It has to do with 21st century tech and one student placed here in good ol’ DuBois PA, that only speaks Russian.  Let the wackiness ensue.

Great conversations today about changing instructional practices.  Similar to the conversation about technology integration, we often think of best practices or effective strategies as activities with a certain outcome.  “Today I am going to do…think, pair, share” or “to cover this novel I’ll put the kids in lit circles.”  Think, pair, share, the activity has now become the focus where if tool or tools are used effectively they are seamless part of the instruction.

An important realization for me relates to daily objectives.  I can put part of the blame on pre-service, but my objectives have largely been content or outcome based.  I focus too much on the product at the expense of the process.  I see now that teaching to a content goal is actually a more difficult method to cover material.  With content there are different interpretations, pov’s, tools, basically a thousand ways to cover content, whereas a focus on thinking skills, such as drawing inferences, lets the learner create there own understanding of the content.

Heady stuff for most of us.

I see so many connections in what we have accomplished over the last four days and what I have explored this summer.  It echoes that change is needed in instructional delivery and not in the student’s attitude toward education.  It is a move to get teachers to teach the thinking and processing skills that will benefit students throughout their lives.  Finally, and if you buy into connectivism most importantly, the group made excellent connections to one another, to the information, and to the world of education.  The next logical step is to connect to and share this with the students. 

I am excited to see the potential of this cohort realized.  I believe it will be a positive change for all parties involved. 

We interviewed 100 (okay 81 so far) teachers, top 6 answers are on the board.  The question is, what would excite/encourage you to participate in PD more often?

Here are some interesting responses from real teachers across the US. 

1.  If we could select ourselves what areas we believe would help us in doing a better job on a day to day basis. While I always like to learn, at times, some of the programs we must attend are not able to be used in a day to day basis. If could have a “salad bar” of PD would be nice.

2.  Direct relevance to the field of online learning. Opportunities to share as well as learn. Doing more than sitting there and listen to/watch someone present something.

3.  If it were differentiated and ongoing. Too much “spray and pray” happens in districts–I give you a too much info in one sitting and pray you implement it

4.  I would like to be offered more choices. Also, when we receive training, that is as far as it goes. There is no opportunity later to discuss what we learned or how we are using it. If something I learned fails, I have no chance of receiving insight from others as to what might have happened or what might make it work in the future. Therefore, I am more likely to try it and give up than I would be if I had an opportunity to discuss it.

5.  If there were more options and not everyone had to attend the same PD opportunities within the school district. For example, I may feel that I need to learn more about behavior management so I could choose that and another person might choose reading, and another person might choose technology in the classroom. Outside of school there are many PD opportunities and it is nice that the school district often helps with or covers the cost of these opportunities.

6.  Having release time after a PD session to reflect on and build the new learning into the classroom programme. Too often we attend PD but then get sucked up into the business of our class to be able to properly internalise the PD experience.

Bonus: To provide balance 1.  I don’t know

Honestly the last answer is one of the best.  Jim Gates brought up an excellent point when we discussed the fact that 50% of the participants said they were happy with the PD provided them.  Jim said, people are happy because they are unaware of what is possible.  How can we expect folks to want change who don’t know it exists?  Needless to say I felt like I was pushed all the way back to go.

Thus far, and I am far from finished, I find that there is a need to begin breaking PD up into smaller and smaller groups.  I like the conference approach to summer PD where a teacher/staffer can choose from a list, but how does that work during the year.  There is a need for ongoing PD, but will the current system of both school and union make it difficult for teachers to progress.  As one person said, “PROGRESS!!!..being allowed to progress and affect the changes that need to be made.” 

Will the majority of our efforts be blocked by business as usual?

(Note: I made no attempt to correct or alter any of the responses except “Progress”.  They are word for word.)

So far an impressive 68 educators have participated in a short professional development survey I put together.  52 from PA (I did email all 200 of my co-workers) and a few from as far away as California and Washington.  Needless to say I am pleased and I do have ample data to make some broad conclusions about professional development as it is currently provided.

One anomaly that puzzles me is in the response to questions #3:  What types of training is provided most often?  Behavioral, Pedagogical, Adminstrative, Technological

It is entirely possible that this question is poor, but if 70% of the participants feel they are being provided with pedagogical training then where is the disconnect?  My district is obsessed with behavioral issues.  We do not have a behavior problem per say, but we often find ourselves in program after program focusing on the “proper” way to “deal” with the children of today.  In no way am I discounting any of these programs.  Some of them have teachers raving; I am just trying to illustrating my point.  My district spent the entire 2006-2007 school year on behavioral issues and, in my mind, sacrificed teaching skills.  (I suppose were supposed to already have that down already, right?)

I do find some clues in the 5th question that was an open ended response to:  What would encourage you to participate in more PD?  The answers range from more money to small group collaboration, but the common thread that runs throughout 90% of the responses is relevance.  Relevance to “my” classroom, “my” situation, or dealing “real” classroom issues.  I believe these teachers are asking for more pedagogical training and, of course, that coincides with the overwhelming feeling the 75% of of feel disconnected from the professional development process. 

Although, quick and dirty, I feel this survey has merit.  Teachers are not engaged in professional development the way it is offered today.  They want choice, they want personal relevance, and this should be to know one’s surprise, they want more. 

I look forward to taking this information and applying it to my situation as a new technology integrator at my district.  I will differentiate, I will use small groups and online collaboration, but most of all I heed the words of one participant and provide refreshments, numerous breaks…and treat you like adults.        

Punch and pie anyone?

Wanna find out how big your network is?  Ask a question. 

Eliciting participation is the key to a having a reliable network.  Without participation you have a stagnate web space full of old pictures and fragmented comments.  My question is how do you gain prolonged interest and participation without constantly going to hot button issues?  I believe anyone can gain a spark of interest by publishing an angry rant about teacher salaries, or internet nerds killingAmerica, but what keeps an individual engaged and willing to spend time deep in conversation with others?

Over the past few weeks I have been actively engaged in action research.  My subject is professional development.  I see a huge contradiction in the way we are asked to teach (MI) and they way we are taught (in-service).  I envision a future of on-demand PD that is available to the teacher when they need it, at the time of their choosing, but I digress.  It is summer and in order to gather necessary data I needed a different approach.  I called upon my network.  I have access to 1000’s of teachers across the country.  Granted the majority of them are tech savvy, progressive, educators, but I thought that I could gain a relatively large and diverse sample for the simple needs of my paper.  I was wrong.

This is in no way intended to be mean or angry and I want to thank, from the bottom of my heart those of you that have helped me.    It simply raises a point that I am sure others have toyed with before.  How is it possible that one person posts a picture of an airport and receives 30 comments while another asks a serious academic question and receives 4?  I blame it on blog ADD.  Very few stick to one topic (including me) and explore it in the depth that it deserves.  Or could it be that the 3% (on a good day) of people that are willing to participate force us to change topics on a weekly basis just to gain interest?  I don’t know.   

I have to think seriously about these matters because I am introducing a professional network to my teachers in August.  And while the initial excitement will prove fruitful how will we manage to prolong serious discussion over a period of time?  Projects?  Action research?  Do I have to constantly have something prepared to make sure everyone is participating? 

I am sorry if this has offended anyone, but I get a real sense of a hierarchical structure to edublogging and it is off putting.  I do want to take time to thank my personal network that I now believe only consists of a few handfuls of people but those people are amazing.  You folks truly inspire me and always make me feel welcome.  I suppose it’s my fault for drastically over estimating the size of the network, but optimism got the best of me.  I urge you all to take the time and go answer a question.  After all there are no stupid ones, right?

Okay, back to the paper.  I will fill you in on the data when it is complete.  I believe you will find it interesting.

I am finding it may be difficult to put into words what exactly is needed in professional development.  Please take a moment to finish this 6 question, anonymous survey.  Thanks, Ken

The data will be used in a graduate research paper for Walden University.

Click Here to take survey

I am in the midst of an ACTION RESEARCH PROJECT…

I would love to hear any thoughts and feelings you all have reguarding professional development and they way it is provided in your district.

Please provide me with name, experience (yrs), and location. 

Here is my problem statement:

Educators in the DuBois area school district need to provide a relevant education to their students.  Currently, few teachers are demonstrating 21^st century applications or skills in their classroom.  We believe that this is a result of inconsistent professional development and a lack of technical support.

Therefore, we will make a concerted effort to provide quality in-service training that is relevant to the educator’s aptitude and follow up with consistent skill reinforcement.  Furthermore we will make a concerted effort to provide adequate resources to educators whenever and where ever they choose to use the new knowledge or skill they have acquired.  

Research Questions:

1.  What are the 21^st century skills we want our teachers to model?

2.  How can we provide consistent and relevant training to 200 teachers?

3.  Will adequate resources encourage teachers to integrate technology into their curriculum?

I believe that feelings are relevant to atmosphere or environment so I encourage you to let it out.  If you would like to keep anything private, please note it so that I do not publish the comment or include you name on the paper. 

Thank you network.

Take Care.

Blizzard Edition

Yeah! It’s finally here and I can open my mouth.  Pageflakes, the RSS aggregator and now so much more, has released it’s new edition.  I had the distinct honor, and advantage to be among the first group to demo the Blizzard Edition.  I gotta tell you it was a blast.  Dan and the pageflakes team were absolutely dedicated to getting it right.  So much so, they delayed the release by close to a month.  Was it because they were slow and unprepared?  No, it was because they took every piece of feedback we gave them and addressed it. 

Enough smoke, check out my pagecasts and play with it yourself.  I think you will find a huge amount of personalization that is only limited by your imagination.  Be sure to use the anything flake and the web page flake.  It may become your one stop on the web.

Be Good

Cross posted at The Bloggers’ Cafe

     In my effort to explore connectivism as a learning theory (see Conduit is King) I immediately find myself wondering, what is the most difficult part in shifting practice.  I am a child of the 20^th century.  I can’t help organizing and structuring information.  I shop with a grocery list for crying out loud.  I personally begin with the most difficult, leaving items or ideas that I consider easy(er) for last.  In the case of redefining knowledge and the learning process I am drawn to the idea of recombination.  Recombination is the act of taking anything (information, web pages, videos, ect.) and manipulating it to fit you and your specific need.  Personalization causes concern for us “industrial learners.”  (I am using industrial learner in the context of 20^th century folks who experienced a linear education from “the experts.”)   
     To us, recombination is frightening, recombination is letting go of ownership.  Industrial education had/has a structure.  We were taught there was a beginning and an end to things and that there is a specific place to go to receive information.  Set information was/is chunked up in to periods of time only to be reviled when you are ready.  It had nothing to do with you as individual it was/is a function of time.  Unfortunately for those of us with one foot in the past and one in the present, a flood of information and tools made personalization both an option and a necessity.  Teachers and schools have become white noise in the competition for a child’s attention largely because a child still has no ownership.  I believe that getting teachers to let go of content and to encourage exploration could be hurdle number one on the path to education reform.  Siemens says, the ability to connect, recombine, and recreate have become hallmarks of knowledge today (p. 82, Knowing Knowledge)  For educators to foster those abilities they will need to offer up information (possible unfamiliar information) and ideas that are intended to spark connection, individual recombination, and unique creation.
     But what will they talk about, what will they learn, and what will they create?  Predictably followed by, how will I assess it?  Those questions are indicative of a person concerned with their perceived authority.   My questions are, how do you tell a person that has been teaching a subject for any length of time that content is secondary, if not completely irrelevant to process?  Content and its mastery is the measuring stick of our profession.  I could not be considered a practicing professional until I passes a multiple choice test on communication models.  (Those have come in real handy)  Also, do they know how they themselves learn let alone how 150 students learn?  Finally, is it the responsibility of professional development to take on such an undertaking or must it be an individual choice?
 

Inbox (1) PD Opportunity: from kpruitt
You are cordially invited to a professional development workshop that will explore the process of learning.
 

Re:  From: teacherx
Are you kidding?  I have been teaching for 10 years!  What are you going to tell me about learning?  My kids learn, look at the scores!  PS.  Quit spamming my inbox, I am busy making sure kids know about the Fertile Crescent!
 

     Even now, knowing what I know, it is a little unnerving to let this post go.  I know that others are much farther along in this line of thinking and to them this is just the 1000^th definition of the same problem.  What causes even more trepidation is that this information will be posted where anyone can accept it, reject it, mix it, mash it and recreate it as they see fit.  I can only imagine what it must be like for educators who spent decades achieving the goal of content mastery. 
 

To accept recombination, you have to let go of ego.  Who among us is willing to do that? 
    
On a personal note I want to thank Jen, Ryan, and Darren for their efforts.  I look forward to participating in a growing network of change.

Ken Pruitt/DuBois, PA/Tech Integration Specialist

It’s 80 degrees, sunny, and there is a slight breeze that keeps the drapes flowing in the room.  I should be outside.  Instead I have a wrist cramp, a tight back, and my eyes feel like they are filled with sand.  Yep, chronic laptop use syndrome and I blame Jeff Utecht… this time.

In Jeff’s post, Pedagogy Defines School 2.0 (revisited) he speaks of connectivism, a theory that, I must admit, I had never heard of.  In fact, I just had a conversation with my super about using technologies to support constructivist practices.   Oh boy…

Fortunately, George Siemens, the mind behind connectivism (Jeff please correct me if I am wrong) acknowledges that it is impossible to know every angle on a given piece of information.  Even better for us, he advocates just letting some things be until all of the connections can be made to achieve a perspective. 

George Siemens authored Knowing Knowledge in 2006.  I haven’t finished the e-book (pdf download), nor have I been able to get a good grasp on how to articulate the information it contains, so I suppose this is more of an advertisement than an original thought.  

E-books, like Knowing Knowledge (Siemens) and Coming of Age (Freedman et all), represent an interesting shift in what is considered text.  These “books” are authored by experts, but they are not products.  The authors are setting up the content so that it can be current and continue to flow.  By attaching blogs, wikis, and in Terry’s case a ning, the authors have started the learning process from their point of view and are allowing the information to evolve as more perspective is introduced.

Is this the responsibility of the expert in our age of information?  You present information, allow others (trusted individuals) to process it, re-define ideas based on new perspective and present again.  Meanwhile ”the others” are presenting the information in their networks allowing their members to add perspective.  (Okay, I am working it out, I think.)

Bottom line in a world flooded with content, the process becomes more important than the content. 

Here are some interesting quotes or ideas from Knowing Knowledge.

“The problem rests largely in the view that learning is a managed process, not a fostered process.” 

“Conversation is the ultimate personalization experience.”

“A product is a stopped process.”

“We have become the filter, the mediator, and the weaver.” 
 

Okay, I need a break.  I will come back to this as I mull through it…hopefully with Jeff’s help and now yours.  Connectivism anyone?