K12 learning responses

Huge variety and range of scope seems to describe wikis – to be used for a multitude of reasons – from small to large groups…with little information or expansive thinking.  It depends on the purpose of the wiki.  What fascinates me most is the collaborative outcome for students, definitely meshing with thinkers such as Daniel Pink (Whole New Mind)  and projections about the kind of workplace our students will be entering.  I wonder what difference there might have been in my own learning had tools such as a wiki been accessible.  Cliff’s Notes were accessible, which I noticed were linked in one of the wikis; that did feel like simply a different way of accessing Cliff”s Notes…a parent did not have to drive to the bookstore to purchase them.  But some good old standard resources never die!

I was moved by http://www.ahistoryteacher.com/~ahistory/apwhreview/index.php?title=Holocaust_Wiki_Project Done by AP History students, the wiki is exceptionally well organized and seamless to navigate in terms of the actual project pages.  The students have made this time in history feel close and the wiki invites one to keep reading.  The navigation bar to the left, however, was limited and several headings I clicked on did not have any information available.  That did not dampen my enthusiasm for the wiki…perhaps simply leave off any heading that is not going to have content. 

Working with young children of course drew me to want to explore http://kcountingbook.wetpaint.com/ This did not excite me at all, even though I have no doubt the children enjoyed taking the photos.  It is not a project that carries any uniqueness, “draw,” or difference from how we count 100 objects minus wikis. The page itself has peripheral content that is very non-kindergarten appropriate in some cases. I would prefer finding other ways for children to collaborate around collections of 100. I would, perhaps, have them go outside and collaborate together in the fresh air to find 100 sticks or stones and bring them together to create a design, joining nature with math. I still have fundamental questions about how much we need to use these tools with young children; I don’t doubt that they will learn and use them but at what age and at what cost to not being able to do other kinds of activities due to time choices. It is not about the activities per se…for me it is a question of what anyone else would get from this wiki…100 is 100 is 100 and there is no unique side to 100 in this wiki. 

http://discoveryutopias.wikispaces.com/ is a fascinating wiki and a far cry from the first wiki I viewed about making a camping list.  Well organized, attractive and far reaching it gives middle school students the opportunity to grapple with utopian living…a concept that doesn’t disappear.  The wiki has clearly reached many readers with lively comments and it allows students to be creative while at the same time studying history and philosophy.  

My first and third choices are where I see the wisdom of wiki work…and I need to ponder at what point the introduction happens or much time is given. 

 Will I ever create one?  I don’t know.  I will need to think about what my topic would be, though I guess I have a bit of one coming in Thing 8, don’t I! 

One step forward…ten steps back…though maybe not.  Maybe I really do take 10 steps forward and only 1 step back.  It just feels like the world is surrounding me with the message that I have to be on my computer or some other technology device all the time when that is not where I want to be.  I’m actually very happy with life as it is…with a little bit of technology that intrigues, teaches, nudges, keeps me a tad current (though that’s part of 10 steps back since just when I think I am getting current I realize that the buzz of new things is passing me by), and forces me to admit that I do stumble across amazing resources I otherwise would not know about. 

I feel like I am spinning round and round, not knowing where to stop, and not knowing if I stop whether I will be able to absorb that with which I am confronted.  I was in the Verizon store yesterday simply to get a new battery for my phone, which I only want as a phone.  I don’t want email, music downloads, GPS, Internet, movies and all other offerings that seem to be the standard fare when someone purchases a new device.  I don’t event text message.   How will I ever choose a new phone when this one needs to be replaced?  It is somewhat the same with Thing 6, which has taken me an eternity to complete, partly because of other responsibilities but to a great extent because I am overwhelmed by the amount of information accessible.  It is way too much information for me; I doubt that I am a lone voice.  I feel like I cannot carry that much in my mind, my heart and my soul.  It seems like it needs to be divided up among all of us in the world, each of  us attending to that which we are called…whether technology related or face to face.  The news feeds make me realize how very tiny I am in relationship to the whole world.  I certainly do not want to be naive and ignorant, but just today, as I looked at my feeds again, and at only 10:30 in the morning, I realized in most cases that the information is not meaningless…it is information that touches me, haunts me, makes me angry, makes me happy,  calls me to action, prompts ideas for writing, and gives me an awareness of myriad emotions and thoughts around the world.  And it is definitely overwhelming…perhaps because while I can dismiss ome of what I come across as irrelevant to my interests, there is much I stumble on that can’t be condensed into only black and white information with no face. 

Today I deleted a lot of feeds that I either don’t care for or simply won’t access daily.  As I sifted and sorted and rthought about the blog assignment, I was particlarly drawn to the one from Joanna Young, The Confident Writing Coach.  I love the photo of the two elephants talking across the fence that comes with today’s feed:  http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/ConfidentWriting/~3/260638990/tune-into-the-c.html  as well as: http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/ConfidentWriting/~3/259525261/how-intention-a.html , a piece about writing with intention.  I was inspired by her comments that nd my writing must be, too. Writing intentionally means that it has to be my voice, not a voice that needs affirmation by others.  Writing intentionally means that I want to put out there what I think and it does not truly matter if others read it…I am giving voice to what comes from inside of me in that moment.  It is somewhat like a painting or a sculpture…it is finished for that piece.  It does no mean that I can’t revise, rethink, change my mind; intention, however, calls me to not cave in and water down the thoughts of my soul because I am afraid of what others will think of the ways I sift and sort life in all of its many categories.  Checking Joanna’s feed may not happen daily or even weekly, but I will keep it and I know I will learn from it.

Tell me…now that I am finally able to check off Thing 6…does half the population stay up 24/7 in order to cover a millionth of the information that is accessible, much less join a virtual community? How does one work full time and, without saying goodbye to gardening, reading books, exercise, writing by hand in a journal, talking with friends, cooking and doing general household tasks, have time to take in all that is even part of this course? 

I am relaxing a bit more as I go through this course.  I had conjured up the notion that the RSS task would be terribly daunting.  As with other pieces of technology I am learning along the way, it turned out to be very doable and now I have a wealth of things to read when there is the time.  The challenge for me is to continually practice accessing what I learn how to do so that while I may not quite claim it as second nature, I do rid myself of the notion that it is beyond me. 

Do I remember all the dates I learned during my school year history classes?  Do I remember all events that were read about and how they influenced our country and the world?  I admit that I do not.  It is not my memory bank forte.  However, I do have a sense of the flow of history and generally learn and retain it best through novels and biographies I read rather than rote teaching with tests. 

As an administrator engaged in frequent conversations about curriculum, I often ponder the fact that since I was in school a half a century of history has been added to the curriculum.  That means a half a century of names, dates, places, and addtional events to get to know.  How do we fit that many new years into the teaching scheme? The additions will be infininte; how do we pick and choose from all the years that came before what to keep and what to take away in terms of the formal teaching?

New literature is spilling into our lives every day.  Are the “classics” that were read when I was in high school still what students should be reading today?  Or do we move with the times as we do in so many other ways and examine literature that may be more relevant, interesting, thought provoking and blog worthy?  That does not mean that literature of any era is not worthy of being read; but is there fluidity in the choices?

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/27/us/27history.html?ex=1361854800&en=ffdf4dbf8a68ba28&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss talks about a survey that finds teenagers ignorant of basic history and literature questions.  That may be so; certainly there were some history questions that were general enough to hope students would have responded correctly.  On the other hand, the survey was one developed in 1986 rather than 2006.  Perhaps there are pieces of current history that they would have excelled in because they have lived that history, yet are not being given credit for that.  Perhaps literature they are reading is newer and speaks more to them than the literature of earlier years.  Kids do not seem to be reading nearly as much as we would like them to; however, I do hope that recognition will be given to free choice of literature.  What is deemed one person’s favorite or “classic” my not be another person’s. 

I believe that the direction taken in the public school curriculum and intense focus on proficiency tests at the expense of breadth of exposure, creative teaching, developing critical thinking skills, and evaluating teachers based on how many of their students passed a test is a sad commentary on public education in America today, regardless of the worthy goal of ensuring that all children receive an education of sound basics.  How can we teach all of the subjects in ways that will help chidlren retain information?  How do we truly teach to diverse styles of learning, offering a potpourri of ways to gather and make meaning out of information?  The research shows that for the future it is not going to be remembering specific facts; it is, rather, going to be about being a conceptual thinker and gobal team member in the workplace.  I forget dates and names of events;  I sympathize with the students surveyed because it doesn’t mean that many of them missed meaning about the events even if they cannot recall the event lable. Fortuantely, for those of us have struggled over the years, that information is available at the click of a button.

An interesting “thing” for me to think about…when I began blogging at another site I talked with several people about the fact that rather than blogging, I feel like I am writing a reflection, but not necessarily based on something I have read.  My blog is often generated by an observation of life around me, a memory, or a random thought.  Now I am thinking that the actual blogging part is not what I write, but what others write about what I write…that a person’s initial post is often what begins the true blogging…or not.  I find it is often harder for me to post a comment than it is for me to write my own blog.

I view most blogs I read as opinions, including questions and explorations, but coming from a person’s unique vantage point.  I am one who loves to read essays, novels, books on spirituality, educational writing and numerou other things and I like the way they take me on a journey over time.  I so not feel the need for the “instant” in most cases and blogging often seems like the shortened version with short responses.  Partly that is just me and partly it is our culture of short bites and bytes.  I need to explore blogs much more before I deciding how attached or not I am to spending my time reading blogs and blogging.  These lessons, and I am grateful I am doing them, are keeping me from some things I love to do more, not simply because they feel like homework and having to be done on a timeline, but because I ultimately have to think about my own priorities and whether blogging even serves me as well in the workplace as other forms of communication.  I will probably say in every blog…all in balance.  In terms of how blogging affects the way we read and write, I think it serves a purpose when looking for short and succinct, and even being the spark that begins a flame of dialogue, but I also think that extended writing, with attention to expanded details, defense of one’s thoughts, etc. is critical for students to practice… though I agree it should be without the traditional constraints with which we are all too familiar.

http://www.missbakersbiologyclass.com/blog/2007/10/07/imagine-turning-the-faucetand-nothing-coming-out was the first blogI read today and yes, I think there is a very real question of what is needed in order to sustain the availablitity of water during this long drought in GA.  The amount of water to save the sturgeon is only one of many challenges that will demand dialogue beyond blogging!  However, the blogging may prompt more people to think seriously about what we are facing in the future should the drought continue.

Reading http://anne.teachesme.com/2007/01/17/rationale-for-educational-blogging/ did give me pause to think about the new literacies that are no longer static and I am grateful that this will be a conversation with teachers as a piece of how we work with children on their literacy skills.  It may be that for each student the timing of when to blog is different and I do think we need to, with care, prepare children adequately for the world of blogging.  Some points made are not unique to blogging, however, such as blogs fostering ownership and choice.  A good teacher will foster that regardles of how a student is writing.  Also blogging is one way of engaing students in conversation and learning…one of hundreds of ways…a new way to add to the menu.

I enjoyed the blog about teaching brevity http://students2oh.org/2007/12/16http:/teaching-brevity in that it is a challenge for me to practice that.  I completely agree that the quality of assignments and writing should not be measured by a certain length.

http://weblogg-ed.com/2008/an-environmental-break-why-can’t-we-do-this/ is a blog to which I say Amen!!!  It is high time that we stop wasting small plastic bags that do hold so little and that cut into one’s hands when there are too many to carry and all adopt the practice of green bags.  Loved the statistics and at the same time they are sobering.

I loved reading http://wanderingink.com/2007/05/23/how-to-prevent-another-leonardo-da-vinci/ I could not agree more and this is not a brief blog!  It absolutely spells out qualities we need to be attending to in all of us, but especially with children.  I will keep this blog visible and will share it with my faculty.

As an aside, even after watching the video on linking, I had a very difficult time doing so for this particular task. 

Dizzying is the word that comes to mind!  I observed cup stacking yesterday, not having seen it before, a skill that requires ferocious speed and deft hands.  Watching the students and our faculty member, who is remarkable, I was awed. I would love to try it someday, but I am also very aware of my challenges of coordination. 

 I am awed by the capacities of Web 2.0. I want to keep trying to learn how to use the myriad options connected to it and challenge myself; at the same time I am very aware of my own technological challenges along with priorities of my life that incorporate technology, but in much simpler ways. 

I do love the discovery by Ms. L that students think and write in more depth when blogging rather than being asked to do the traditional essays and short answers.  As I reflected on that paragraph, I knew that my own days as a young student may have proven to be much more affirming had I had that option because I always think a little bit “off” the norm; the opporutnity was rarely afforded me in test and classroom situations to veer in a direction other than the “pat” answer.

I was also taken with students learning the protocols and capacities to respond to their peers…to do so thoughtfully and tactfully.  It is a practice that will strengthen their ability to particpate in effective communication throughout their lives.  As I read this part I wished the political candidates might behave in such a manner!

From that point on in the article I began to feel overwhelmed and intimidated; I felt tired just reading by the time I got to the end.  I do recognize that each description is of an individual or small groups actions of a moment, all converging for a certain purpose.  I also know that this is the way of not only the present but the future…there is no going back.  Young students today are already living a different kind of technological existence than I ever will, even with my best efforts. 

At the same time, as one who has worked with independent schools around the country to talk about the need for more reflective time in children’s lives, both inside our schools and outside of them, I always come back to the question, “How do we allow time for independent, solitary reflection and exploration in the life of children and adults…time where they do not have to be ”connected?”  How do we help them experience life beyond the cup stacking, mouse clicking, instant messaging pace? 

Long before we could even imagine the capabilities we now have, I was in a school where we decided to give the students a few moments of quiet at the beginning of the day.  A third grade girl said to her teacher, ” Do you really mean that I get to think about just me right now?”  I will never forget that comment.

In this world of global connections and the marvels of Web 2.0 I will always be looking for the balance. I don’t want us to forget that child’s words because when all is said and done, just as Oriah Mountain Dreamer says in her poem “The Invitation,” each of us needs to be happy with who we are when we are alone and ”disconnected.”  

The term lifelong learner is one of recent years and used in almost all school mission statements.  I do sometimes wonder why we need to articulate this and why it has become such a focal point.  It seems to me that we are lifelong learners at all times and that people around the world always have been.  Did Thoreau talk about lifelong learning?  Did Emily Dickinson talk about lifelong learning?  Did Einstein talk about lifelong learning?  Or did they show us that they were lifelong learners by their habits without ever having to say it out loud?  I am simply curious as to why we have had to locate it, so to speak, in our lives, almost as if there are too many things that will prevent us from what is such a natural adventure and one that can take place in so many ways. 

 Having now shared some of my own question about why we feel we need to define this in our culture and time, I turn to the 7 1/2 habits shared for the purpose of this course.

For the weeks ahead, as I explore the “23 things,” I know that it will be a challenge to have confidence in myself as a competent effective learner as it regards the field of technology.  One reason I chose to take this course is to attempt to build my competency and not simply sit back and say that the pace of technology is so fast that I will never catch up, even though deep down inside I do feel that way.  I also tend to be quite happy, not merely satisfied, with life as I live it and with my own patterns of communication and learning, so I have to force myself to open these new doors, realizing that when I do feel more confident and competent I might move in some directions that aren’t currently in my own top 10.  I want to be open; I feel an obligation to become more aware of the tools and ways in which students, parents, teachers and educators around the world will be connecting.  However, since I am not naturally inclined to spend a great deal of time with technology, I know that having confidence will be a challenge each step of the way.

Secondly, using technology to my advantage will also be a challenge as I tend not to use technology except to write and do research.  I know intellectually that it can serve me well but I have combat my satisfaction with leaving it to those who love it.  I need to try using it in more expanded ways.

That brings me to taking responsibility for my learning, which is one of the reasons I am taking this course and have made technology a goal for myself this year.  I am very able to incorporate this habit and forge ahead.  I am also better at forging ahead when I have deadlines and the specific coursework…it is a good catalyst to keep me going.  If I am going to be an effective administrator with young children, it is imperative that I keep myself informed, even if I do not choose to pursue a more technological life of my own. 

While using technology to my advantage is a challenge, it is, for the purpose of why I have chosen to engage in this class, the habit that is most imporant to me.  Trinity is moving rapidly to bring many of the contents of the 23 things into the regular practices of our tudents.  While I may want to be oblivious, it is important that I learn and make efforts to incorporate new tools into my own work at the school, especially in relationship to the website.  I keep the phrase “to my advantage” in the forefront of my mind whenever I see what the next “thing” is as I look forward to having the aha moment of realizing that is true.

If I consider it play I know I will wonder in the end where the 10 weeks went!