Cell phones can do what?

 My Tuesday professor (who is younger than your average college professor by a lot and shows it through her technical prowess) gave me a magazine that features articles by people who are at the forefront of educational technology. I'm paging through it and I find a link to this site:

http://www.polleverywhere.com/

Basically, it's a poll creation tool that allows you to text your answers to a pre-determined generic text number and then the results are displayed real time on a SMART board or a computer screen. Students are able to see what the rest of the class thinks about a particular topic and best of all- it's anonymous. Everyone can participate without the usual fear of getting the "wrong" answer.  It's also free for groups of under 30.

Let's talk about why I love this. First off, most students are unnaturally attached to their cell phones. However, when they come to school every morning their phones are suddenly a criminal object. We take their phones, tell them its wrong to use them and then wonder why there's so much backlash. Put yourself in their shoes. We adults are also in fact, addicted to our phones- but who takes them away from us? People will argue it's because we've learned "acceptable use policies", but judging by the general public that's simply not true.

  If you're using this tool, your students get a chance to use their phone for an educational purpose.
Also, what a way to get class participation up! I know students that are afraid to answer questions simply because of peer pressure, or because they don't want to look "wrong". A poll that tracks answers anonymously is the answer to that. You have the whole classes' opinion and then that turns into a great springboard for discussion. I can see this having practical applications in a health unit (for the tricky sex-ed questions no one wants to talk about), a social studies unit, a science unit, and heck, even in an English unit for controversial text.

  The only downside I can see is really drilling home acceptable use policies for your students. After you've "decriminalized" (as it were) cell phones for classroom use, how do you make sure they stay away? Also, if you're going to implement this tool I think an administrative check would be necessary as well.

Long story short, this is a great way to integrate an every day technology tool into classroom instruction. Kudos to the person who thought of it!

The second wave of the budget crisis:

Let's start with this: 

Affluent schools feel the crunch

 One of the things I find so interesting about the state budget crisis is how it's hitting in different waves. Some lower income districts (such as CPS) have been in crisis mode  for awhile-cutting jobs, consolidating positions, not renewing positions and finding creative ways to still educate the students.
  Now these schools discussed are some of the most well funded and arguably "best" schools in the state. I am amazed at the difference between the administration of these schools and some of the other districts in the state. The Wilmette schools have been planning for two years to lessen the impact? That's awesome. Where is that leadership in other districts? 
   Another interesting thing (that I kind of have a soft spot for) is couching the budget crisis in terms of the music program. They mention that the music programs are staying (pending an increase in rental fees) but the teachers aren't going to have the budget for purchasing and repairs that they used to, and in a music program that's pretty important. I'll be interested to see what actually happens to their music program and if they can function on limited repairs/music library.
  Anyways, I'm glad to see that some districts have capable financial people in charge who clearly care about their students enough to raise class sizes as a last resort. It's nice to see administrators who are able to balance a budget so well that this is the first tax increase they need to ask for in 30 years. However, this is definitely the exception rather than the rule.

Are single gender schools a good idea?

  Today's musing comes from a  question and answer session between Mayor Rahmbo and some high school students at a forum.  As always, the question of reform comes up.
    Basically, Rahm tells the kids that he'd like to see more single sex high schools such as Urban Prep Academy, a High school in Chicago's Engelwood neighborhood. There are two notable things about Urban Prep. First, it sends 100% of its' students to a four year college on graduation. Second, it's an all male school.
    For a school in one of the toughest neighborhoods of Chicago, those are some great statistics. However, I think that one thing that Rahm (and other educational leaders) forget it is the great teaching and mentoring that comes with those statistics. It feels like whenever this school gets brought up, most of the focus is on the fact that it's a single gender school and that becomes the reason it succeeds.
  What doesn't often get mentioned is that each student in the school has a mentor from the time they enter the door. The mentor is on call 24 hours a day and often takes care of the student. They have academically rigorous classes, extra tutoring, after school activities and trips to keep them off the street. The reason all these kids succeed? Not because they're in a single gender environment (although that has something to do with it) , but because the Charter operator has time and money to really invest in the kids-something the CPS district at large cannot do.
  I'm at a loss about what to think. I think it's awesome what Urban Prep has been doing. I don't know how I feel about same sex schools in general and I don't know if they're necessarily the thing to push when there are so many greater educational problems. What do you think?


Link to Article:
Single Gender Schools?

My new addiction:

And it actually ties in with the theme of this blog. Behold, Reddit's Ask Me Anything feature:

Ask me anything.


What is this? It's one part an expression of a community, one part creepy stalker and the other part just hilarious. The basic premise is this: Reddit users start a post with "I am a...(champion scrabble player, writer, director, mental patient, soldier)....ask me anything. They then invite people to ask them questions. The questions are serious, sometimes hilarious and sometimes inappropriate. And as a bonus, the community learns about your life and you get to play expert for a day.


Now, why do I like this? Because I'm curious, because I like to know what makes people tick and I love somewhat creepily looking into other people's lives. I think that this feature is one of the things that makes the Internet so great- everyone gets to be an expert and just as important as the next person, regardless of real life social status. It's the ultimate  class leveler. You're not learning about Tourette's syndrome or the ins and outs of Scrabble tournaments from an expert or a text book, it's from a real life person. And that's powerful.

Plus, who doesn't love to play stalker now and then? You get to hear what people's lives are like without ever leaving the comfort of your own home. Additionally, if the stories are really ridiculous you get to play spot the fake.

It's all part of the Internet leveling people and bringing us closer together. Below, find some of the links to my favorite Ask me Anythings:

Ken Jennings
The Old Spice Guy
A four year old
The Flying Spaghetti Monster Church founder

Everyone loves a little NCLB, now potentially revamped!

Oh my god, am I ever sick of hearing about this law. Obama has set his sights on re-vamping the scourge of the Bush administration (according to some educators). The changes are just in talks now, but Obama is calling on Congress to push these through before the start of the 2011-2012 school year. 

Here's what Obama and Secretary Duncan want to happen:

1. 100% proficiency in reading and math by 2014 is now changed to a goal of "College and Career Readiness" by 2020. 

I like this. Career readiness encompasses taking students to technical/trade/two year colleges as well. Arne Duncan likes to say "Post Secondary Education is Post Secondary Education". It doesn't matter what you get as long as you have it and you can support yourself. The world doesn't need a whole country full of over-educated people and let's face it- sometimes college isn't for everyone. I think as educators, we need to float the idea of college past our students. But if our student's strengths don't lie in that area? Career and technical school is just as good. The idea is to have people off the streets and into jobs.

2. Student's progress will be measured by achievement in the other core subjects, not just reading and math. 

Some of the other core subjects listed? Foreign Language, Science, and.....THE ARTS. Yes, you head me right. Obama and Duncan want to have a core competency in place for all students in the arts. My music and other arts teacher  friends should be rejoicing at this point. If Congress can get this law through (here's hoping), you might all have federally mandated positions. Part of me says this is a great idea and then the other part of me says where is the money coming from? So many districts are cutting their arts programs because of funding and now he wants to introduce a competency for an under-funded subject? I'd like to see how that plays out.  I'm also a little upset that we now have to assign a test or evaluation to a subject in this country to make schools and administrators focus on it.

3. Evaluation will shift to being less punitive and more rewards.

  So instead of closing schools that are failing and not giving them any recourse or resources, they're going to help schools get back on track. They want to make sure a school is given the resources they need to start to make gains on their tests again. Obama and Duncan also want to reward schools that consistently make their yearly benchmarks. Again, this is a great idea.  Again, I am skeptical as to where the money would be coming from to actually a) help the schools and b) give the monetary rewards their blueprint outlines to the schools.


4. More federal funding would be switched from formula-based allocations to competitive grants

 We're finally moving away from arbitrary number federal funding and into real need federal funding. I'm still undecided on the competitive aspect of grants. Schools who adopt the new programs get the funding but what happens to schools who have a huge bureaucracy in place and adopt policies after the grant money runs out? (I'm thinking CPS on this one). I'd like to see an equitable distribution of available federal funds. If what Obama really means to do with this revamp is start to reduce the achievement gap and boost high school graduation rates in cities, the schools with the greatest need need the cash. 


5. Schools that miss certain targets would not be required by the federal government to provide students with tutoring or with the option to transfer.

 So for as much talk as there's been about the Obama administration being on the side of the families in the great education debate, this doesn't show it. Schools who are failing now don't have to provide tutoring OR give the students an option to go to a better school. I cry foul. Let's keep a kid in a school that's failing, that doesn't have any other resources for them and make their parents spend extra money to take them to outside tutoring or enrichment? Great idea. Way to help the middle class you keep trying to save. The amount of money that parents of a high achieving kid in a failing school spend on enrichment activities and tutoring probably could have paid for the in school tutor in the first place.


So those are just five of the points that the new blueprint raises. I've included the link to the actual plan below, as well as an article that really breaks down the changes quite well. I'm going to monitor this closely, especially for the changes to the standardized tests and student measures of progress.

Links for the interested:

CSM's article on the changes: Overhaul
The actual "blueprint" of changes: Department of Education

Bullying, Cyber or Otherwise

   Ask anyone even tangentially related to the education profession what one of the hottest topics is these days and they'll tell you it's bullying or cyber bullying. It seems like every where we turn, there's a new campaign, a new slogan or a new summit talking about the consequences, reasons why and effects of bullying. One of the questions that most educators end up asking is "When did it get so bad?".

I submit that it was always this bad, it just took the advent of the Internet to make it public and give it another dimension. Here's why:

I was bullied as a kid in junior high and elementary school. I was called a nerd, fat, a dyke...etc. In sixth grade, there was a girl who used to throw my jacket down the hall every morning. Upsetting? You bet. When you were called names on a regular basis in school, you just took it. You didn't want to risk being seen as the snitch and therefore opening yourself up to the very thing you were trying to avoid.  Did it make school terrible? Absolutely. But this was before the internet was rampant, before the advent of Facebook and Myspace and whatever else. I could go home at the end of the day and be free of all those kids. And because I never told anyone, my torment was private. It was bad and no one knew unless I told them.

Now, kids who are bullied don't have a choice to go home and be free. They have to field personal attacks on their web pages, through text messages and through emails. There is literally nowhere these bullied kids can go and be free of their attackers.

But, you say, why can't they just unplug? Well, if you're a kid that doesn't have many friends to begin with, the internet opens all these doors where you can meet like minded people and actually be on the inside of a group instead of on the outside. So these kids, seeking refuge from their tormentors, now have to deal with them in the only safe space they know.

A side note about the tormentors: I think that cyberbullying has become the drug of choice for so many students these days because of the nature of the Internet. When we're on the Internet, it's very hard to imagine there's actually a person on the other end of those words. You tend to disconnect the actual person from the scrolling words and text stops having meaning. That's a dangerous disconnect and I think one that we really need to be pushing home to our students. Words have consequences. Even if it's someone you'll never meet, only see once a day or have never met but are trashing because it's the cool thing to do-your words have consequences.

And now since all of that is visibly documented on the Net, parents and administrators have the ability to see how kids are talking to each other and the problem becomes more apparent. I submit that digital children have a hard time comprehending how public things are on the Net. To them, (and this is a little bit of child psychology) the world revolves around what they percieve and the big picture is almost unobtainable. The idea of anyone being able to see the hateful things they put on other people's profiles is so foregin, educator might as well be speaking a different language.

How do we fix it? I honestly don't know. But I know that it starts in the classroom. It starts with the teacher being a good model of respectful behavior, not tolerating those who are mean, and encourages parents to get involved at home. It starts with parents actually monitoring their children's online activity and contacting administrators and authorities when they feel something is wrong. It does not start with the same old platitudes kids have been hearing. It does not start with ignoring the Internet's influence on this. It also does not start with limiting kid's access to the Internet. Teach them to be smart, teach them that their actions have consequences and that the Net is nowhere near as anonymous as they think it is.


Helpful Links:

The It Gets Better Project: http://www.itgetsbetter.org
The Trevor Project: http://www.thetrevorproject.org/
President Obama's recent summit on bullying: White House Summit

More on why the CPS system is screwed:

  The Chicago Public School system is a bit of an enigma (wrapped in a mystery) that sometimes makes me scratch my head and wonder what wonderful, possibly illegal substances the people in charge might be ingesting. Case in point: Roger Mazany,  interim chief wants to put a moratorium on all new charter schools for the next year.

His reason? There are 65,000 unclaimed seats in the district. The reason there are that many unclaimed seats? Kids are moving to charter schools because they offer a superior alternative to the local neighborhood school.

The problem with this supposed moratorium? The man who wants it to happen is going to only be in power for another month or so. Another problem? The network of Charter Schools are one of the few things keeping CPS alive. Parents put their kids on the waiting lists for the schools on a hope they'll eventually get access to better education, if only for a year.  And the Interim Chief wants to crush that hope? 

Charter schools (at least in Chicago) are student choice, non tuition schools. You apply, and your application is considered. Some have a focus- academic rigor, cultural experiences, arts, or science and technology. Whatever the focus is, there is no debating that it works. Overall High School graduation rate in the non-charter schools of CPS is somewhere around 50%. Charter schools average 60-75%, which is still not great, but something is better than nothing.

Charter Schools have longer school days, more options for extracurricular for students to participate in and extra staff development. Parents are required to sign contracts that detail their involvement in parent teacher conferences, reading to their kid at night and limiting TV and video games. In some cases, they host parent teacher conferences in the parent's first language so that the language barrier isn't a problem.

I ask again, how does proposing a moratorium on these schools help students? It doesn't. Once again, it comes down to the money. More Charter schools equals more buildings open and more of the administration's precious money spent. I think it's time we think of the kids in all this and maybe do something right for children who are at a disadvantage to begin with.


Helpful Links:

Sun Times Article:  CPS should freeze Charter Schools

The two most successful network's reactions:  More harmful than good

Chat Rooms: Interacting with a bunch of strangers isn't necessarily a bad thing.

Confession time: for a good chunk of my high school/early college years, I was a regular in a Lord of the Rings chat room (Link for the interested: http://www.theonering.net/torwp/java-chat/)

Now before you cry nerd, hear me out. I think that sometimes, spending hours a day talking to people on the Internet is a good thing.

I was shy, a little awkward and going through some personal stuff at the time I found my particular chat room. I found a community of like minded people and from a a shared love of a particular subject blossomed a lot of friendships that I still maintain.

When I hear people wonder why their children spend so much time talking to people on the Internet, here's what I wonder: How did they themselves make friends? Chances are, it was finding a group of people that shared a common interest and then the friendship developed out of said  common interest. The only difference is the Internet makes finding those people a heck of a lot easier.

Thats exactly what your kids are doing. Finding people with a common interest. Granted, I'm not advocating giving kids free reign to find chat rooms. But cut them some slack. If you see children or students spending time in a particular room or forum, let them.  It's not wrong, it's not weird: it's a new way of forming social interactions that actually last.

How Red Tape hurts students: Now with Graphs!

A friend pointed this graphic out to me the other day, which comes from the Chicago Tribune Editorial Page, as well as a post by Rich over at CapitolFax (which is a brilliant blog for all things Illinois) http://capitolfax.com/2011/03/07/bad-teachers-or-bad-administrators/

Keep in mind, this only applies to Chicago Public Schools. Don’t get antsy yet.

Now I want you to look at this graphic and let it sink in. Had enough time? Good. Now, what seems to be the major problem? Is it that it takes almost a year to get a terrible teacher out of a classroom? Could be. Is it that you have to go through about a billion steps to even start a Remediation plan? That could be it too. 

But that’s not my major issue. My major issue is that throughout this time, while the principal and the teacher are basically playing the bureaucratic equivalent of whack-a-mole you have kids who are at a disadvantage.  You have kids who aren’t being taught because a) the teacher’s terrible and b) the teacher’s stressed out because they’re about to lose their jobs.

Also what the graphic doesn’t show you is that there could be serious interruptions to this process. Almost all of the CPS principals I’ve known have spent more time in meetings than actually in the school building.

I guess what I’m trying to say is it appears the tenure system (at least within CPS) is kind of screwed. Maybe we should look at that before we start to place the blame other places?  It seems to me by the time an incompetent teacher is fired, the principal could have hired any number of teachers who are fresh, passionate and ready to do the work plus extra to make sure the students succeed.

Anyways, this made me mad and a little sad at the same time. The Chicago Public Schools system has a great need for change and it makes me sad to see the all this red tape blocking the change.

Trolls, or why NOU might actually be useful:

The word “troll” conjures up many interesting images. If you’re a child of the 80’s you picture a plastic doll with neon hair and a jeweled belly button. If you’re a player of a popular online game, it conjures up tusks and a Jamaican accent.  But if you’re anywhere on the Internet it probably conjures up that one person you hate on a forum you go to, a newsgroup you post on or a blog you like to visit.

You know who I’m talking about: The one guy who ALWAYS has to argue, regardless of what the topic is. It appears his whole life is built around being contrary. If you’re pro abortion? He’s anti. Although watch out, he could change his stance in two weeks if it fits his argument. You try and argue but the argument eventually devolves into the Internet version of a shouting match. Your mom jokes and the ever present “NOU” start flying.

Then there’s the other guy. The guy who just acts dumb to illicit a reaction. He types in all caps, uses the most obnoxious short hand, and has an army of special phrases. This is the kind of troll people are more likely to love- he may even gain a little cult of personality following.

What drives people to do these things? This is something I’ve really wondered throughout my tenure on this weird and wonderful place known as the net.  I’ve known some people who act like trolls just for a day and Clark Kent themselves back to their normal selves the next day.

Conversely, I’ve also known people who are so invested in their troll personalities that they’re only known for their defining characteristics as a troll. I think its part of the anonymous nature of the net that allows people to really do this.  If you know there’s going to be no repercussions, you might as well act overly obnoxious. You know you’re never going to see the person you’re insulting, what’s the point in sparing their feelings?

Now, I’m not usually one for the touchy-feely aspect of the Internet. I think people need to learn to cope and develop appropriate rhetorical strategies. However, when you’re a 14-year-old kid whose print model is a hostile environment, think of how that translates into every day life. If your primary mode of literate communication is to snipe at people and attack their beliefs and then you have to sit down in class and write a well-balanced persuasive essay? I’m not sure that’s going to go too well.

I think it’s important not to de-value the experience of learning to argue over the Internet.  Don’t dismiss the trolls- some of them are actually amazingly clever. Some of them can make more comments than just your mom jokes and “NOU”.

  I think that teachers could spend time in class  talking about trolls and the comebacks that some people use, even formulating new ones. What if you were to spend a day with your students analyzing a popular forum and identifying the people who were genuinely arguing because it was their conviction or the people who argued just for the sake of arguing the opposite point?  I feel like this could be interesting, informative, and show your students you really care about what they do in their spare time.

The "Crisis" in Adolescent Literacy

I’d like to talk about the supposed “crisis” in Adolescent literacy. One of the things that I’ve consistently heard throughout my degree is that children from ages 10-18 don’t read. They have trouble reading, they have less advanced vocabularies, they can’t comprehend basic texts…the list goes on and on.

   Surveys done of High School juniors and seniors reveal that our students feel less prepared to go on to college. They feel like they haven’t learned the skills they need with regards to reading and writing to really succeed. On the other end of the spectrum, most students (particularly boys) hit a slump in fourth grade. Formerly voracious readers throw down their books and say “This just isn’t fun for me anymore.” Some of them pick it back up, and some of them don’t. For many educators, this is a source of concern and a topic to devote an entire conference to. I feel the same way, but for different reasons.

     Some of you may be familiar with Lisa Delpit’s landmark work Other People’s Children. If you’re not, seriously- go read it. It changes your life. In the book, she suggests that the reason African American Students aren’t succeeding is because the education system marginalizes their home language by insisting that the cultural  norms of standard English are the only correct way to think, talk, and write. She suggests that schools and educators who give credence to other cultures in the classroom by studying how the student’s native dialect is different from Standard English actually boosts achievement and encourages students to buy into the educational process. She also believes that allowing students to sometimes write in their native dialect/language gives them more of a “voice.”

   Why is this important, you ask? Well, let’s go back to the supposed “crisis” in adolescent literacy. We have students that aren’t reading our district’s curriculums (be they basals, novels, etc) instead, they’re reading scrolling text in video games, blogs, twitter feeds, facebook updates and text messages. Each one of these digital texts requires a different schema, new story grammar and a new form of English. Our students have adapted to this quite nicely. One might even say they are fluent in a new dialect of English. 

  Then they come to school and in a lot of cases are reading stories from a curriculum that has been in place for 7-10 years.  Instead of reading screens, they’re picking up books- which to them seems terribly old fashioned. If you’re a child who has been raised on screens, where’s your motivation to pick up a paper book? If I’m reading the Great Gatsby in freshman English (which for some reason persists in being taught, purely on the fact that it’s a classic, even though it has no relevance to today’s students) am I going to page through a book or go look at it online? 

     I believe that the reason students are feeling less prepared for college these days is precisely because Universities have made the move to technologically based instruction while our grade schools and high schools are lagging behind. Students see the curriculum of “classics” as a barrier, and this is why reading is termed boring.

    My solution? Start integrating digital texts. There are plenty of curriculums out there that have digital components. Students can read on the computer, play phonics games and improve their fluency in a digital world. High School kids could be encouraged to read relevant “new classics” by young adult authors. Start talking about graphic novels. Talk about crictical media literacy (which is a subject for a another post). Students need to know that their experiences outside of the classroom are valued and the best way we can show that is by integrating them in. Thoughts?

   

First Post

If I was on a forum right now, I'd be one of those obnoxious people screaming "FIRSSSSST". But I'm not on a forum, and I own the place. So yeah.

Welcome to my new brain child. I'm a teacher and an internet addict and am often curious about how those things interact. Posts on this blog are going to encompass one of three categories:

1) Straight up musings on particular features of the wide, crazy world of the internet

2) How the internet fits in with today's classroom and how to integrate it well. (Pro-tip: having your kids pull research off of Wikipedia is NOT one of the ways).

3) News articles on education that I feel deserve a comment or two. 

As far as my background goes, I'm a Music Educator turned Literacy Educator. I've taught in semi-rural and urban environments. I get a little passionate when it comes to education reform, defending my profession and of course, the internet.


Enjoy!