McREL Blog

Learning Uninterrupted

A growing trend in education over the last two decades has been exploring ways to use educational technology to maximize classroom time and extend learning opportunities beyond the classroom. The idea of a “ubiquitous learning environment,” where students can learn at any time and in any place, has long been a dream of many educators and goes back over one hundred years—correspondence courses, phonographs, radio, filmstrips, and television have all been re-purposed for learning.

Today, with high-speed Internet and devices like smart phones and tablet computers more commonly in the hands of students, educators are closer than ever to realizing the dream of the anytime/anyplace classroom. Despite the (very real) digital divide, schools increasingly are providing students with mobile computing devices to take learning from the school into the home.

Many teachers already take advantage of free online services that provide rich and engaging educational opportunities. For example, the Khan Academy provides video vignettes on a plethora of educational topics, and MIT hosts a wide selection of online courses. But today’s educators are not just looking to capitalize on these types of resources, but also to transform homework time into an extended classroom experience. McREL’s own research in the areas of Homework and Practice supports the idea that learning outside of the classroom has a high (and measurable) impact on student learning and achievement.

Most recently, the ubiquitous classroom has been getting attention due to the “flipped classroom” movement started by two Colorado teachers, Jonathan Bergmann and Aaron Sams, from Woodland Park High School in Woodland Park, Colorado. Their flipped classroom began by first recording live lectures for students who missed their classes, but it evolved to recording lectures for homework use, and then for class-time projects and group discussions. While their version (http://www.flippedclassroom.com) is predominantly vodcasting, it also incorporates using Nonlinguistic Representation, an instructional strategy that research has shown to increase student understanding of concepts and processes.  

The new expectation is that teachers with access to rich educational technology resources are using valuable face-to-face class time to expand learning opportunities, and that homework is truly becoming an extension of school work. While parents and teachers might need convincing that flipping the traditional classroom is valid, students won’t. This way of learning capitalizes on the 21^st Century skills that students are already using (with or without us), which allows them to not only be along for the journey, but able to give input and guide the process, too.

What have you done in the area of ubiquitous learning? Tell us your story about moving your classroom into anytime/anyplace learning.

To read more about what research and ubiquitous classrooms have in common, check out the new McREL-ASCD publication, Classroom Instruction that Works, Second Edition.

Written by Andy Kerr, Lead Consultant

Online Instruction that Works: The environment is different, but the strategies still deliver

Learning with computers isn’t what it used to be. Most of us knew them as a classroom tool; now, they are the classroom. A total of 1,500,000 K−12 students enrolled in online courses in 2009, almost double the number in 2006, according to the International Association for K−12 Online Learning. Alabama, Michigan, and Florida require online learning for students to graduate, and others, like Idaho and Utah, are considering similar changes. Students, parents, and teachers alike appear to be embracing online learning. In a fall 2011 EducationNext article, students report better engagement when learning is differentiated and accessible through multiple venues, and teachers often report better relationships with students and the ability to provide one-on-one guidance that face-to-face classrooms cannot afford (“The Highs and Lows of Virtual School: One Teacher’s View”).

But knowing how to instruct online effectively is not automatic. The first time I delivered professional development virtually, in spite of knowing better, I lectured more, used fewer multimedia resources, and did not provide ample time for participants to interact with one another. It seemed that all the lessons I had mastered in face-to-face instruction suddenly had to be relearned in an online environment. I didn’t have the physical cues (e.g., eye contact, facial expressions, off-task conversations) to help me adjust my lessons accordingly.

So I went back to the nine research-based strategies of Classroom Instruction that Works (CITW) that I know so well and realized that, tweaked for virtual application, they still provide the framework I need for effective instruction. They reminded me to do the following in an online classroom:

• State explicit objectives for each session and make them accessible to all.
• Provide feedback to each participant and allow them opportunities to give their peers feedback and self-reflect.
• Offer multiple avenues to help participants develop understanding of new concepts.
• Provide ample opportunities for participants to interact in groups.
• Provide opportunities for participants to apply what they learned in real-world situations.

Time and again, we have received feedback from readers and workshop participants that the CITW strategies provide clarity and purpose for how to create an environment conducive to learning and how to scaffold student learning from initial understanding to deep knowledge (see figure below)—whether they’re teaching science or social studies, in an urban or rural setting, or in an ELL or mainstream classroom. Though the delivery method of online learning is different, we have every reason to believe the CITW strategies will deliver for teachers in virtual classrooms like they do for teachers everywhere who want to be the most effective they can be.

Elizabeth Ross Hubbell is an educational technology consultant at McREL

Top 12 Priorities for Implementing a One-to-One Program

It's one thing for school to have technology and a very different thing to implement it—and do so effectively. As McREL's Howard Pitler wrote recently in THE Journal, data gathered from observations in 60,000 schools showed that, even in classrooms with numerous technology devices available, 63 percent of teachers used no technology at all.

So, before you embark on a one-to-one laptop initiative, here are some tips for getting the most out of your school's program.

1. Do your homework. Read up on lessons learned from Maine’s one-to-one initiative, for example, and what the NSF-funded study of Henrico County Public School’s one-to-one program found.
2. Decide if the school has the funding to purchase all of the computing devices or will allow a mixture of school- and student-owned computers. Student-owned computers will save you some money but will require a technical services department with the capacity and skill to support multiple devices. 
3. Decide upon a nucleus of cloud computing services and software tools that will be consistent across the school. This will help teachers spend their time teaching content not software applications. Look for free, high-quality services such as Google Apps for Education.
4. Integrate the school’s curriculum with instructional technology applications and 21st century pedagogy. Identify research-based software/applications/games that can support learning in core content areas. They need to be compatible with the operating system on the computing devices and supported by technical staff.
5. Plan for regular, specific, mandatory professional development. Integrating instructional technology is an ongoing learning curve that never ends. Teachers need help in learning how to use and integrate effective technology tools into the curriculum. 
6. Monitor and evaluate progress. Teachers will pay attention to what their leaders pay attention to. If leaders keep a close eye on the types and frequencies of instructional techniques, data-driven decisions can be made that will focus the school, teams, and individuals on what is working and what needs to change.
7. Decide how much access students will have to the network. Internet filters are essential, but they should not inhibit real-time learning. Trust the teachers to block/unblock resources under the oversight of the school/district technical staff/leadership. Sanction misbehaving individuals rather than taking access away from the masses. 
8. Plan for obsolescence of software and hardware. It is critical to have a plan to replace or update computers and software as they age. This plan should include the development of a way to assign financial and technical resources. Sometimes long-term leases are more cost effective than hardware purchases. 
9. Develop a plan to repair and replace broken equipment, batteries, and printers. A good insurance plan goes a long way.  
10. Provide other technology to supplement the core devices. These include presentation devices and peripherals such as headsets, microphones, etc. 
11. Plan for a robust wifi network. You must assume that all devices will be on the network at the same time. When you think you have a good estimate of the bandwidth needed, double it so it will last into the future.
12. Last but certainly not least, have on-site technical support. A lack of support will be the biggest complaint of teachers and will negatively impact the learning program. This can include a mix of school staff and student volunteers.

What priorities have we missed? Do you have lessons to share from your one-to-one experience?

Matt Kuhn is an instructional technologist with McREL.

Turning classroom instruction on its head

The classroom lecture. It’s been criticized, despised, even lampooned. An entire generation  can probably recite the lines to Ben Stein’s dead-pan, droning lecture in the 1986 film, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. (“Anyone?... Anyone?”)

 

But lectures aren’t necessarily bad. In fact , they can be an efficient way to help students acquire new knowledge. The problem with lectures, though, is often a matter of pacing. For some students, the information may come too slowly or repeat information they already know. Result: boredom. 

For others, a lecture may provide too much information too rapidly or presume prior knowledge students don’t have. If students zone out for a moment, they may miss important content and be lost for the rest of the lecture. Result: confusion. 

After a hit-or-miss lecture, teachers often give homework assignments, which students perform in what may be a private hell of frustration and confusion. What did my teacher said about cross-multiplying? Comma use in compound sentences? The Laffer Curve?

A new generation of enterprising teachers is beginning to turn this classroom model on its head, creating what are called “flipped” or “inverted" classrooms. Using simple web software, they record and post their lectures online, creating mini-lectures similar to what Salman Khan has created with his Khan Academy collection of more than 2,000 online lessons. (Click here to view Khan’s recent TED talk). 

In these inverted classrooms, students watch the lectures at home, where they’re able to speed up content they already understand or stop and review content they don’t get the first time around (and might be too embarrassed to ask their teachers to repeat in class). The online lecture also incorporates visual representation, such as animated graphs or photos of important historical events. 

Now, when students come to class, they can ask their teachers clarifying questions about the previous night’s lesson and engage in guided practice on problems they might otherwise have struggled with at home in tormented isolation. During class time, teachers can provide students with real-time feedback and correct misperceptions before they become deeply ingrained.

Jamie Yoos, last year’s teacher of the year in Washington state has created his own “inverted classroom” (see below). 

 

Click here to view some of Yoos' lectures on TeacherTube. 

Similarly, two Colorado teachers, Jonathan Bergman and Aaron Sams, have also “flipped” their classrooms with vodcasting (i.e., online broadcasting of videos).

Students of these innovative teachers say they love the new format and are more engaged in class. Sure, there may be a few students out there who still delight in a 50-minute lecture, but for the rest, inverted classrooms just seem to make … anyone? … anyone? … perfect sense.

Can we predict the future of education?

“It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future.” ~ Yogi Berra.

Clearly, change is in the air these days in education, whether we’re Waiting for Superman, racing to the top, dotting our three i’s, or wondering how tea party politics may change the face of Washington.

In light of all these changes and uncertainties, the question on many minds is likely, where is it all leading?

The most truthful answer anyone can give to that question is this one: nobody knows for sure.

It’s simply not possible to predict how all of these various trends will come together to shape a new future. That doesn’t mean, though, that we can’t prepare ourselves for it. The trick is to consider multiple, alternative futures and begin to envision how we—or our districts, schools, or students—might flourish in each.

In a new book from McREL to be released this month by Solution Tree Press, we analyze current and emerging trends in a wide array of areas, including politics, the economy, technology, and society. After analyzing these trends, we offer, not a prediction of the future, but four, very different scenarios for what the future may hold.

The scenarios in the book, titled The Future of Schooling: Educating America in 2020, are designed to provoke readers to ponder many “what if,” questions, including:

• What if the current, multibillion-dollar federal investment in education succeeds in identifying and scaling up numerous innovations that transform schooling as we know it?
• What if, on the other hand, investing billions of new dollars fails to create dramatic improvements in education? Will the public continue to support public schools as we know them?
• What if online learning becomes as commonplace in the schools of tomorrow as chalkboards were in the schools of yesterday?
• What if technology allows students to proceed at their own pace along individualized pathways, measuring their progress in real time at each step of the way?
• What if the world’s best teachers are able to broadcast their lessons to thousands of students each day?

The reality is that the world of education is changing rapidly. While we don’t know exactly what lies ahead, it’s nearly impossible to imagine the world standing still and education in 10 years looking exactly the same as it does today.

The good news is that when confronted with this uncertainty, we don’t have to throw up our hands in hopeless desperation (or stick our heads in the sand). Rather, we can begin preparing today for what tomorrow may bring.

Learn more or purchase a copy of the book on the Solution Tree website here: http://www.solution-tree.com/Public/Media.aspx?ShowDetail=true&ProductID=BKF433

Bryan Goodwin is McREL's Vice President of Communications and Marketing.

Catch a glimpse of real 21st century skills

Last week, I caught a glimpse of the future and realized that, like my own parents, I’ll probably have no idea what my kids actually do at work when they grow up.

This glimpse came courtesy of a Minnesota Public Radio story, which covered McREL’s NSF-supported “nanoteach” initiative to bring instruction in nanotechnology to high school classrooms nationwide.

In case you’re not familiar with nanotechnology (I’ve only recently learned about it myself), it’s the science of creating structures and manipulating matter at the molecular level. It promises breakthrough innovations for “everything from improved cancer treatments to more effective sunscreen,” reports MPR’s Dan Gunderson.

If that sounds farfetched or like something out of Star Trek, consider this other tidbit from Gunderson's story: “the government predicts nanotech will create hundreds of thousands of new jobs in the next five years.”

The challenge, then, is getting today’s student students prepared for these jobs of the not-so-distant future. Moreover, nanotechnology will likely change our world. That means that students, even those who have no interest in pursuing nanotech careers, should understand both the promise and peril of this rapidly emerging technology.

Read the MPR story.

Visit the Nanoteach Website.

Bryan Goodwin is McREL’s Vice President of Communications and Marketing.

Technology Literacy Assessment

Recently McREL assisted Wyoming’s Department of Education in determining how their districts and other states assess the technology literacy of 8^th graders as required by No Child Left Behind. The requirement to assess technology literacy does not specify how or by what criteria. Therefore, states are all defining it in different ways and using various assessment instruments. Some states have put a lot of effort into the assessment while others have given it little attention. Below is a summary of what we found. We know it is not a complete picture. What have we left off? Does your state have a different method of technology literacy assessment? Are there errors below? We welcome your comments.

 

State/Organization: Colorado

Link to Criteria: Levels were not found. Grade band profiles are found here.

Standards Basis: 2007 ISTE NETS-S

Assessment Instrument: TLAP

Strengths: Recently pilot tested and revised. Free to Colorado districts.

Weaknesses: Grant funded for Colorado only.

 

State/Organization: North Dakota

Link to Criteria: Unknown – you have to purchase the assessments to get the rubrics.

Standards Basis: 2007 ISTE NETS-S

Assessment Instrument: Atomic Learning - Tech Skills Student Assessment

Strengths: Focuses on how to use technology and how to apply it and allows easy identification of areas of greatest instructional need. Includes customizable curriculum projects to target technology gaps.

Weaknesses:  Unknown

 

State/Organization: Montana-based but used nationwide

Link to Criteria: Unknown

Standards Basis: 2002 ISTE NETS-S

Assessment Instrument: TAGLIT

Strengths: Includes assessments for administrators and teacher as well as students.

Weaknesses: Needs updating to the newest NETS-S.

 

State/Organization: South Dakota, Arizona, South Carolina, Georgia, Wisconsin, and other states

Link to Criteria: Technology skill set for 5th grade and 8th grade

Standards Basis: 2007 ISTE NETS-S

Assessment Instrument: Learning.com

Strengths: NETS-Aligned Resource. Blend of interactive, performance-based questions and multiple choice, knowledge-based questions to measure and report technology literacy and skills for elementary and middle school students.

Weaknesses: Does not seem to support portfolio assessments.

 

State/Organization: New York (south central)

Link to Criteria: Unknown

Standards Basis: Unknown

Assessment Instrument: Tech Literacy

Strengths: This is a good example of what a Regional Education Service Center can accomplish.

Weaknesses: Small in scope with little background information.

 

State/Organization: Florida

Link to Criteria: Criteria found here.

Standards Basis: 2007 ISTE NETS-S modified for Florida.

Assessment Instrument: Student Tools for Technology Literacy

Strengths: After extensive feedback, indicators were modified. In April 2008, the complete tool was field tested with over 1300 8th graders in several representative districts resulting in minor revisions prior to its availability statewide.

Weaknesses: Unknown – Florida only

 

State/Organization: Washington

Link to Criteria: Tiers of 8^th Grade Technology Literacy Indicators  

Standards Basis: 2007 ISTE NETS-S

Assessment Instrument: Washington Assessments for Education Technology

Strengths: Project based and integrated across content areas.

Weaknesses: Only social studies and the arts at this time.

 

State/Organization: North Carolina

Link to Criteria: Little found. Example report with some criteria found here.

Standards Basis: 2004 Computer/ Technology Skills North Carolina Standard Course of Study

Assessment Instrument: Test of Computer Skills

Strengths: Strong development process.

Weaknesses: Does not seem to incorporate project learning.

 

State/Organization: New Jersey

Link to Criteria: NJTAP-IN Rubric

Standards Basis: New Jersey Educational Technology Standards 8.1.

Assessment Instrument: No specific instrument has been identified, but the state has issued an RFI for one.

Strengths: Integrated with state planning and support structures found here.

Weaknesses: No specific instrument has been identified.

 

Other assessment sources used by schools:

 

State/Organization: InfoSource Learning

Link to Criteria: Unknown

Standards Basis: 2007 ISTE NETS-S

Assessment Instrument: Simple Assessments

Strengths: Used in over 1,200 districts nationwide. Free and easy to use.

Weaknesses: Seems oversimplified.

 

State/Organization: Intel

Link to Criteria: Each project has a rubric on the specific project guide page. An example can be found here.

Standards Basis: 2007 ISTE NETS-S

Assessment Instrument: Technology Literacy

Strengths: NETS-Aligned Resource.

Weaknesses: Unknown

 

State/Organization: State Educational Technology Directors Association (SETDA)

Link to Criteria: Framework for Assessment of Technology Literacy

Standards Basis: 2007 ISTE NETS-S

Assessment Instrument: No specific recommendation. Analysis can be found here.

Strengths: A larger group of stakeholders from multiple states designed the toolkit.

Weaknesses: Based on older NETS-S standards.

 

State/Organization: National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP)

Link to Criteria: 2014 NAEP Technology and Engineering Literacy Framework - Pre-Publication Edition

Standards Basis: NAEP Standards developed by four cooperating organizations.

Assessment Instrument: NAEP Technology and Engineering Literacy Assessment (TELA)

Strengths: Large effort by national experts with collaboration from the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) International Technology and Engineering Educators Association (ITEEA), Partnership for 21^st Century Skills (P21), and the State Educational Technology Directors Association (SETDA).

Weaknesses: Incorporates Engineering from STEM. (Some would consider this a strength)

 

RESEARCH NOTES:

In a report entitled Tech Tally: Approaches to Assessing Technological Literacy (Gamire & Pearson, 2006) it was determined that "doing" is central to students gaining technological literacy, traditional assessments will not work; technological literacy must be assessed in ways that are more authentic. According to the State Educational Technology Directors Association (SETDA), a knowledge-based assessment is insufficient on its own. If such an assessment is used, it should be used as a base in combination with a performance-based, portfolio-based or project-based assessment. The report developed six principles for guiding the development of assessments of technological literacy:

1. Assessments should be designed with a clear purpose in mind.
2. Assessment developers should take into account research findings related to how children and adults learn, including how they learn about technology.
3. The content of an assessment should be based on rigorously developed learning standards.
4. Assessments should provide information about all three dimensions of technological literacy— knowledge, capabilities, and critical thinking and decision making.
5. Assessments should not reflect gender, culture, or socioeconomic bias.
6. Assessments should be accessible to people with mental or physical disabilities.

Educational Technology Standards for Administrators (NETS-A)

McREL recently presented at the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) Conference in Denver, CO. It appeared that not many attendees knew about ISTE’s newest National Educational Technology Standards for Administrators (NETS-A).  Take a look at them below and tell us where you think leaders in your schools are strong and where more focus in needed in a comment to this posting. The NETS-A include:

1. Visionary Leadership. Educational Administrators inspire and lead development and implementation of a shared vision for comprehensive integration of technology to promote excellence and support transformation throughout the organization.
2. Digital-Age Learning Culture. Educational Administrators create, promote, and sustain a dynamic, digital-age learning culture that provides a rigorous, relevant, and engaging education for all students.
3. Excellence in Professional Practice. Educational Administrators promote an environment of professional learning and innovation that empowers educators to enhance student learning through the infusion of contemporary technologies and digital resources.
4. Systemic Improvement. Educational Administrators provide digital-age leadership and management to continuously improve the organization through the effective use of information and technology resources.
5. Digital Citizenship. Educational Administrators model and facilitate understanding of social, ethical, and legal issues and responsibilities related to an evolving digital culture.

You can find the detailed version of NETS-A here.

Using BrainPOP with Summarizing & Notetaking

by Elizabeth Hubbell, Educational Technology Consultant at McREL, and Allisyn Levy, Director of BrainPOP Educators
(*Note: this post is the second of a series of collaborative posts between BrainPOP Educators and McREL's Using Technology with Classroom Instruction that Works. These articles will be cross-posted on the McREL Blog and on BrainPOP Educators Blog.)

Think back to your K-12 years. Did someone actually teach you how to take notes? If so, in which grade were you? 

My earliest memory of actually being taught how to take useful notes (formal outlining aside) was in my biology class in high school. Our teacher had her trusty overhead projector and would stop during her lecture to capture key points of what she had just said. She didn't use Roman numerals or capital letters, but rather a series of bullet points, arrows, stars, etc. She would ask us to jot down these items along with her and to draw small sketches out to the side to help us remember processes and concepts. 

I remember her stating at the end of the lecture, "By the end of this unit, I don't want your notes to look just as they do now. I want to see underlines, highlights, arrows...I want to know that you actually used them to help you study."

Little did she realize that she was following the classroom recommendations that would eventually be published in Classroom Instruction that Works:

1. Give students teacher-prepared notes.

2. Teach students a variety of note-taking formats. (She demonstrated informal outlining, webbing, and using pictures, knowing that different students would prefer different styles of notetaking.)

3. Use combination notes. (She combined linguistic and non-linguistic representation of what we were learning.)

Students even as young as kindergarten learn to draw pictures to help them remember what they've studied. By upper elementary, students can, and should, have opportunities to see what good notes look like, for example, how to indent to show subordinate details.

BrainPOP movies and features include great resources to teach notetaking. They provide introductions to a wide variety of subjects and explain key vocabulary terms for students (using images, animations, audio, and print). They can also serve to review a topic already covered. All of BrainPOP's movies have closed captioning. This feature, with any student, is an excellent literacy and visual reinforcement. Pausing at a key concept during a movie and inviting students to put the concept in their own words, or drawing a quick sketch to represent the concept, gives students the support they need to successfully learn and remember concepts. Each of BrainPOP's short, animated videos offers ample opportunities to pause for discussions and time for students to take notes. 

For example, a teacher may wish for her students to watch the movie on Franklin D. Roosevelt as they begin their unit on the Great Depression. Before watching the movie, she provides her students with a skeletal outline (see below). She may also choose to model notetaking on the typeable BrainPOP Vocabulary page, or do some shared writing with the class before handing out copies. Teachers may pick and choose notetaking tools provided on BrainPOP (closed captioning, graphic organizers, vocabulary) and use these to scaffold student learning during the movie. 

Franklin Delano Roosevelt  

• Which number president? _________
• Served 19__ - 19__
• served ______ terms
• The Great __________ was happening when FDR took office
• "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself." What do you think this means?

• Four key points of the New Deal in the movie
• Unemployed ____________
• Farmers _____________________
• The stock market ________________
• The banking system ____________
• Vocabulary terms to know
• Social Security ____________
• fireside chats ____________
• Eleanor Roosevelt ____________
• isolationism ____________
• United Nations ____________

 

By using a resource such as BrainPOP, students can watch a segment as often as they need in order to capture the main ideas. BrainPOP provides graphic organizers and activities that can serve to scaffold the process of summarizing, paraphrasing, and notetaking. Eventually, students will not need these scaffolding tools, but will be able to capture key ideas on their own. Instilling strong notetaking skills is a lifelong gift we can give to students. 

For more information about McREL's workshop on Using Technology with Classroom Instruction that Works, click here or contact Elizabeth Hubbell at ehubbell [at] mcrel [dot] org.

Are you a BrainPOP Educator? Sign up today for BrainPOP Educators, our free professional community, where teachers can find and share innovative lesson plans, graphic organizers, video tutorials, and best classroom practices. You may contact Allisyn Levy at allisynl [at] brainpop [dot] com

Creating Demand for Educational Technology Integration

In our work at McREL, we get a lot of inquires about creating demand for educational technology integration. Some school leaders struggle with how to get their teachers to utilize technology to its full potential. Often they are just missing a few pieces of the puzzle that if put in place, would change their schools into 21st century learning environments. Below are seven steps in creating demand for educational technology integration and the support needed to sustain it.

1. Intellectual Stimulation – they have to be convinced over time that it is the right thing to do. For example, use research and articles from http://delicious.com/mattscottkuhn/Research%26News-EdTech and other sources to discuss for 10 minutes each month. This can be done at a staff meeting or in an online environment such as moodle or an internal blog.
2. Functionality – Technical assistance and support in using the equipment and software are often inadequate in many schools. If teachers feel that they cannot depend on the technology to work, they will not trust it. If they do not trust a pedagogical tool, they will not use it as part of regular instruction. Instructional Technology (IT) support needs to view their job from the eyes of the teacher. Therefore, filters should work, but not hinder real-time instruction. Computers and software should be kept up-to-date with all browser plug-ins for IE and Firefox including java, flash, and shockwave. Within reason, real-time and long-term technical support should be available and effective. IT should empower and instruct teachers in fixing the most common and harmless technical problems.
3. Access – teachers need access to adequate electrical power and computers inside the regular classroom. Signing up to use computers (or laptop carts) should not be overly time consuming or burdensome. Teachers need a formalized and relatively fast way of requesting access to blocked websites, services, software, and hardware.
4. Bandwidth – why buy a Lamborghini if you have no fast roads to drive it on? Some schools have bought lots of great hardware only to find that their internet bandwidth does not support robust use. This is a disaster. It creates lots of frustration and bad attitudes. Plan for twice as much bandwidth as you think you will need.
5. Professional Development – Integrating educational technology is an ongoing learning curve that never ends. Teachers need help in learning how to use and integrate effective technology tools into the curriculum. A regular schedule of general and specific PD should be offered (and required) every school year. See www.mcrel.org/technology for options.
6. Monitor and Evaluate – Teachers will pay attention to what their leaders pay attention to. If the leaders keep a close eye on the types and frequencies of instructional techniques, than data driven decisions can be made that will focus the school, teams, and individuals on their strengths and weaknesses. This will make the use of PD and technology resources more efficient and create a desire for positive change.
7. Manage Transitions – Some staff members will be overwhelmed with the changes educational technology integration brings. For instance, where they once felt that they were a pedagogical expert with clout, now they feel like a beginner. Furthermore, they may not be convinced that this is right thing to do or that it is worth the time and effort needed. Leaders must seek out these individuals and manage their transition to a new way of doing things. This requires a differentiated approach to instructional leadership and mentorship.

Technology Makes Differentiation Practical

by Matt Kuhn – McREL Lead Consultant

One would be hard-pressed to find a teacher who doesn’t espouse the virtues of differentiation. Yet finding good examples of differentiation actually occurring in the classroom can also be hard to find. When we do find it, we often see a teacher employing educational technology. The recent book Differentiating Instruction with Technology in Middle School Classrooms by Grace E. Smith & Stephanie Throne highlights the power of technology to make differentiation more possible than ever before.

Teachers differentiate using three criteria to decide the appropriate type of instruction as shown below.
 

For example, mathematics teachers can differentiate by content by using software that is diagnostic, prescriptive, interactive, and adaptive according to students’ readiness. One such software is Cognitive Tutor®. It diagnoses the holes in a student’s mathematical understanding. Then it prescribes interactive lessons to fill those “holes.” Using a sophisticated monitoring system, it adapts the sequence and difficulty of the lessons according to the student’s input and progress. The teacher’s role is to facilitate the use of the software, pose and answer questions, and to analyze the robust progress reports the software provides to continue to adjust the instruction for the students.

Technology can also lend a hand to differentiation in other subjects such as social studies. Students could be required to present their research and proposed solutions to one of the United Nations Priorities for Action. This already allows for differentiation by content. Process can also be differentiated by using a Google site to collect the student work in an online portfolio. Students create the work in the medium of their choice, such as SlideShare, Photo Story, Voice Thread, Windows Movie Maker, iMovie and others. All of which can be embedded on a Google site set up by the teacher or students.

Differentiation by product is possible by using different types of technology. For instance, student groups could be asked to do a science inquiry on photosynthesis. The presentation of the inquiry and results could be given in a variety of ways including movies simply made with a Flip Video™, presentations using PowerPoint, graphics made with Inspiration, reports using Comic Live, and others. Students can propose the medium in which to show what they know for teacher approval.

Most agree that technology makes learning more engaging for many of today’s students. Perhaps this is because by nature, educational technology allows for greater differentiation. Do you have some examples of how technology has increased your abilities to differentiate? If so, please share in a comment to this posting.

What's so different about Literacy 2.0?

The "2.0" buzzword has gotten a lot of hype in recent years, and deservedly so. Whatever word we could have used to describe these new tools, the emergence of the term indicated a social, even anthropological, shift in how we use the web.



Defining what qualifies as "web 2.0" or "literacy 2.0," has become more difficult as the term has become more ubiquitous and trendy. According to Knobel & Wilber (2009), "a Web 2.0 ethos values and promotes three interlocking functions or practices: participation, collaboration, and distribution." In other words, you know a web 2.0 resource if it helps you collaborate with others and share what you have gathered, learned, or created. Examples are wikis (i.e. PBWorks), social bookmarking tools (i.e. Diigo), and sites for users to share pictures and video (such as Flickr and YouTube).



For educators, the emergence of these tools has led directly to discussions about what skills students need in order to manage and utilize such tools. Termed "Literacy 2.0," many teachers have come to the understanding that past protocols for researching, reading, and writing are woefully outdated in a world where students and adults are not only encouraged, but expected to collaborate and contribute to group projects and where learners must efficiently and effectively sift through vast amounts of information.



Perhaps this latter point presents the biggest challenge of the shift that has happened in education. When schools as we know them were conceptualized, information was relatively scarce. We went to school because that was where the resources were that had information. School was staffed by someone (or multiple people) who could help us use those resources and learn (memorize) that information for later access.



Information, however, is no longer a scarcity. If anything, there is an overabundance of information that our students must learn to vet. They must learn to recognize bias, understand an author's motivation and background, and add this to his/her ever-changing understanding of a concept (Richardson, 2009). As Knobel & Wilber (2009) affirmed in their article, "Let's Talk 2.0," this new literacy "doesn't mesh well with such practices as book reports, comprehension questions, leveled reading tasks, and weekly spelling tests that students are asked to do in school."



I vividly recall my own fledgling attempts to help students learn these new skills. I was working with sixth graders on a primary sources history project, when I realized one day that they had not yet been taught how to vet and scrutinize information they found on the web. The next week, I started their class by launching into a short lecture about the dire state of California's velcro crop and how this plight of velcro shortage may affect us all. I showed a web site with information and data to illustrate my concern. I recall finishing my lesson, then a long silence following. I asked for reactions or questions about what they'd just learned. Finally, one student raised her hand with great uncertainty and asked, "Are we talking about velcro? Like... (pointing to someone's velcro on their jacket sleeve) ....velcro?" When I affirmed, there was more silence before another student voiced, "I guess I didn't know that velcro grew." Laughter. Then realization.

This conversation led to an entire unit where students learned to compare many different sources, both online and off, to see if they agree or conflict, to look at who owns the site using a source such as http://whois.com, to consider the suffix of a web site (i.e. .k12, .gov, .com, .org) and what that might indicate, and finally (perhaps most importantly) to compare what you are reading with what you already knew or thought you knew. (Note: if I were to do this same activity today, I would consider using the Tree Octopus site as my teaching tool.)

Perhaps Will Richardson best captures the concept of Literacy 2.0 in the March 2009 issue of Educational Leadership, which focused entirely on this subject: "Students will need to build their own curriculums, create their own projects, and assess their own products and their contribution in creating them. In short, they must be self-directed, self-motivated, lifelong learners who are network-literate in their creation and participation in these spaces."

Later, he states, "If we continue to simply pass paper back and forth in our classrooms, we are not preparing students for the world they are entering."

Well said.

Do IWBs Change Instruction?

There seems to be a lot of controversy lately over the impact that Interactive Whiteboards have on instruction. Some say that they increase student engagement and achievement and help to create a 21st-century classroom. Others argue that they are simply a modern tool for an outdated method of learning and that they only promote teacher-directed lecture & instruction.



I left the classroom in 2004, several years before IWBs were common tools in school buildings, so I never experienced actually integrating one into my instruction. I wanted to find out for myself: Do Interactive Whiteboards change instruction? When Bud the Teacher Tweeted about his district's upcoming Flipchartapalooza,  I knew this would be an ideal opportunity to see how teachers integrate both the hardware and the software into their instruction. Bud and his fellow teachers in St. Vrain were gracious enough to let me come and observe and ask questions. (And I thank all of you!)



What I saw were teachers learning simple, but vital, programming and scripting language as they created interactive activities for students. I saw teachers realizing that the ultimate goal was having students use these tools. One teacher even stated, "My goal this year is to have students at the board more. [My first year using it], I was the one at the board." I saw professionals collaborating, teaching, and learning together. If technology and learning are going to morph the way I think they are (fingers crossed), teachers are going to have a plethora of tools that they can use to script & program to create individual games & learning modules for students. Having a basic understanding of this level of tech know-how now will be paramount if this comes to fruition.



What I hope to see in the future are students using interactive white tables (of which I've seen prototypes), manipulating and building interactive learning modules to increase their own understanding and to demonstrate learning. Where we are now with IWBs is simply a stepping stone to a more differentiated, authentic, interactive classroom.



In other words, it isn't really about having a big interactive board up in front of the classroom to do your usual thing. It is about creating activities for students to increase their knowledge and understanding.

And, yes, having something that looks like it was invented sometime after the 1970s can't hurt the engagement factor, either. ;-)

Disrupting News: How Social Networking is Changing How We Get Our News

Whenever I start talking about Twitter with any group of teachers or administrators, I can count on at least one person scoffing at the idea of answering the question, “What are you doing?” Many of us only know Twitter from celebrity-type tweets, which, while may be exciting for some, have little educational value for the rest of us.

To explain how I use Twitter in an educational sense, however, I often ask participants if they remember movies and shows from the 1970s such as Cannonball Run, Smokey and the Bandit, or Dukes of Hazzard. During this particular era of American pop culture, there existed a very strong CB radio culture. People would use their “Citizens’ Band” radio to ask where the closest mechanic or gas station was located. Others would warn fellow listeners about traffic jams in an area. An entire virtual community helped and entertained each other using this technology.

My Twitter community serves a similar purpose. When I’m trying to figure out a new resource or troubleshoot an issue on a computer, I can send out a Tweet to my “Twitterverse” and will, more often than not, receive several suggestions for solving my problem. When I read an exceptionally good book, news article, or blog post, I’ll Tweet about it to spread the news. If it’s something that other Twitterers also find useful, they will even “ReTweet” it by putting “RT @erhubbell” before their post.

What’s even nicer is that Twitter allows you to use hash tags to denote a specific topic of interest. For example, when I and many fellow educators were in Copper Mountain for Colorado’s Technology in Education (TIE) conference, we used the hash tags #cotie09 and #tie09 with our Tweets so that folks could follow what was happening at the conference. Likewise, when I wasn’t able to attend ISTE’s NECC conference, I searched the hash tag #necc09 to follow events as they happened. Other teachers actually use Twitter in the classroom with their students to help foster conversations and collaboration.

Perhaps no event has brought more attention to “micro-blogging” sites such as Twitter lately than the recent Iran elections and the aftermath following. Suddenly, the world had much more limited access to news and events due to government constraints on internet activity in Iran. Instead, many of us communicated what news we could find by using the hash tag #iranelection. While incoming news was sometimes unclear or debatable, it was better than the complete isolation that Iranian citizens would have experienced prior to the invention of tools such as Twitter and cell phones. (See the Common Craft videos for a great explanation on how Twitter and TwitterSearch work.)

Which brings up an interesting point from Clay Christensen’s Disrupting Class: that a disruptive technology first is embraced, however imperfect, by current “non-consumers.” While very few, if any, of us would rely on Twitter for our daily local or world news, it was the perfect solution when suddenly there was no news coming out of Iran. In the meantime, according to Christensen, the technology continues to improve and evolve until it is, indeed, preferable over the status quo.

If this is true, and yet blogging, Tweeting, and other forms of social networking are very often blocked in schools, how can we possibly teach our students to access, broadcast, and vet information that is coming at a faster and faster rate? Perhaps a better question is this: are YOU using 21st century forms of accessing and broadcasting information? Are you preparing yourself for the future of communication?

To start, consider creating a Twitter account and simply following Twitters with common interests. You may wish to start by following me (http://www.twitter.com/erhubbell) or Howard Pitler (http://www.twitter.com/hpitler). See who we are following, then follow and Tweet at will. I also suggest reading 25 Ways to Teach with Twitter from www.techlearning.com. You will be amazed at how quickly Twitter can become a large part of your personal learning network. We hope to see you in the Twitterverse!

Going Paperless

I’ve lately become intrigued with the idea of going paperless. I have certainly cut back in paper use over the years, mostly without really trying, as technology made printing less and less necessary. A few things have happened recently, though, that really have me thinking about the possibilities of a paperless office and (eventually) paperless schools.

I was recently working on two large projects that, just a few years ago, would have resulted in my printing reams of paper. One was a technology audit that we had conducted which included interview transcripts from dozens of teachers. My job was to go through and code their responses to look for patterns. On another project, we were conducting a literature review for effective pedagogy. Both of these required me to read hundreds of pages of documents and to annotate them with key findings. Instead of printing them out and grabbing the ol’ highlighter, I found an online resource that allows me to upload documents, highlight and tag key phrases, then sort by tags. I not only saved money and trees, but was actually able to get my work done much more efficiently.

More recently, I was packing my office in preparation for a move to another floor at McREL. As I began cleaning out my file cabinet, I was aghast at some of the documents that I’d saved. A meeting agenda from 2006…countless articles that are now saved on my Delicious site…a to-do list from last November. Most embarrassing for me personally was a folder labeled “Web 2.0.” (How very Web 1.0!) If I had wanted to access most of this material, the first thing I would do is search online or use my bookmarks – I certainly wouldn’t thumb through countless files in my file cabinet!

I think there are several reasons why both schools and businesses should start thinking about the possibility of a paperless (or at least paper-reduced) future:

1. If we don’t force ourselves to rethink how we read, write, and communicate, we are ill prepared to teach and work with a generation that already embraces technology as its primary tool for these tasks. At McREL, we are experimenting with new ways to support our professional development sessions. For example, our Using Technology with Classroom Instruction that Works workshop no longer has a Participant’s Manual, but instead uses a wiki to provide key points, graphics, and links.

2. Schools currently spend upwards of $20,000 per year on paper & printers, even more on textbooks.

3. Even with recycling efforts, less paper means fewer trees are cut down, fewer trucks are needed to transport trees to a pulp mill, less pollution is spewed into the air (I grew up near a pulp mill…lessening that smell for future generations would be a very kind thing to do), and less gas is needed to transport paper to stores & offices.

So here’s my challenge: throughout the next month, question yourself whenever you start to print something. Ask if you can access or provide the same information using email, wikis, your intranet site, Delicious, or other means. Try having a meeting where bringing a laptop is encouraged. Find other ways to get information across during workshops other than printing out your PowerPoint slides. I’d love to hear what efforts you made and the ideas you came up with for going paperless.

(For more information on this topic, see the Teach Paperless blog at http://teachpaperless.blogspot.com or follow his Tweets @teachpaperless.)

Using Web 2.0 to Counter the “Pedagogy of Poverty”

One of my favorite blogs to read is Brian Crosby’s Learning is Messy. Brian teaches in a school with a 90% free/reduced lunch rate. Over half of his students have parents who did not graduate from elementary school. Many of his students are English Language Learners. And yet, this class of 6th graders is well-versed in Skyping with learners around the world, blogging about their learning, and creating videos about their classroom. The rich learning experiences and critical thinking in which these students are engaged rival classrooms with exponentially more resources and funds.

Many researchers and educators, including Haberman, Waxman, Songer and others, have written about the “pedagogy of poverty;” that is, the tendency of classrooms in high-poverty areas to focus on teacher-directed instruction with drill-and-practice being the primary activity of the learners. This learner-passive environment all too often leads to student disinterest, high drop-out rates, and teacher burn-out.

According to Waxman et al. (1995), three instructional approaches have been found to be successful with students at risk of failure: 1) cognitively-guided instruction, 2) critical or responsive teaching, and 3) technology-enriched instruction. However, studies show that, even when technology is integrated into traditional, teacher-led classrooms, it is most often used for practice and review activities rather than with opportunities that require higher-order thinking and problem solving (Songer et al, 2002).

For schools and districts struggling with these issues, Web 2.0 tools offer the means for dynamic, collaborative learning experiences, provided that the teacher has been given sufficient professional development in using these tools. Unlike skills-based software and games that simply provide opportunities for students to practice getting the “right answer,” tools such as wikis, blogs, video conferencing, and social networking sites can be used to foster deep conversations, cooperative learning projects, and a higher understanding of concepts beyond the memorization level. McREL’s workshop on Using Technology with Classroom Instruction that Works can be one option to get teachers started in using the read/write Web to create higher-order learning experiences with their students.

For those of you who use technology in your classrooms or schools, how do you see it being used beyond "skill and practice" mode? How is it used to foster creative conversations and deep understanding?

Making a Difference

Working as a consultant, there are many aspects of my job. I travel across the country to big cities and tiny towns to facilitate professional development sessions with teachers. I conduct technology audits to help districts align their mission and vision with the tools that teachers and students have available. There are other times, as with any job, where I’m sitting at an airport late on a Friday evening or filling out a time sheet, that feel a little less grand, however necessary they may be.

Sometimes, though, you have those BIG moments…the ones that give you chills, remind you why you go into the office or board tiny planes for a living…the ones you know you will take home and share with your family at the dinner table that evening. I had one of those moments the other day that I know I will remember forever. I was in North Dakota, working with a group of early childhood teachers, helping them to create accounts on our online community. Some of them were extremely comfortable with the process, having joined numerous other Ning, Moodle, and other such sites before. Others needed a little more assistance. One older Native American woman, I noticed, didn’t seem to be typing anything. I went over to see if I could help.

As it turned out, she didn’t have an email address to enter into the registration form. She had never created an email account before. Finding the right person at her district who may have been able to give us her email account and password would have been too time-consuming, so we quickly created a Gmail account for her.  She turned to me, pointing to the new address she’d carefully written down. “So this is my email address?” she asked. “That’s your email address,” I confirmed. She laughed a big, hearty laugh. “I can give this to my grandkids! They can email me!”

Later that afternoon on the flight home, I thought about that woman and all the doors that had just opened up for her.  I pictured her sharing her email address with family members and friends and the excitement when she receives her first few responses.  In a tiny, tiny, way, I made a difference in this person’s life. Moments like these are why I love what I do.

Come to think of it, I have a person I need to go email. ☺

Modernizing Pedagogy

The combination of past classroom experiences and traditional university training conspire to keep many teachers behind the curve of new pedagogical techniques.  Another impediment often occurs as new teachers are assimilated into a school’s culture. They frequently find that many innovative techniques they do want to try rub against the grain of the schools establishment.

For instance, many students learn about parts of speech in the same way I did when I went to school in the 1970s and 1980s by doing worksheets like the one below.

While this worksheet works fine for students with strong verbal/linguistic learning abilities, it does not work as well for student with other learning styles such as visual learners. Many graphic organizers are available online to complement or replace this activity. However, there is something even better. Dynamic or interactive web applications can allow students to evaluate multiple language connections and differentiates the learning in terms of both style and level of proficiency. One such resource is Visuwords at www.visuwords.com. Visuwords™ uses Princeton University’s WordNet, an opensource database built by University students and language researchers. Combined with a visualization tool and user interface built from a combination of modern web technologies, Visuwords™ is available as a free resource to all patrons of the web.” It allows students to check their own understanding of the parts of speech, edify their own writing, and see how language is a web of infinitely connected concepts. As you can see below, I entered the word “sophistication” and found the verb “edify,” which I just used to describe how students can benefit from using visuword.  

I think one answer to better instruction is to combine proven instructional strategies like nonlinguistic representation- graphic organizer with interactive technological tools. Now I have two questions for you:

• What other modern tools can be combined with tried and true instructional strategies?
• What can be done to speed up the adoption of these tools by today's teachers?