The 25 Hour Day

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I have just found some conference notes from 3 years ago on an external drive that was "lost". It’s interesting reading back over these hastily written snippets from some of the presentations. Here are some of the best bits from two of the better known presenters

Samuel Papert

• We are in a “make the system work” mode rather than change the system.What are we feeding our kids?
• What is a good intellectual diet? No-one is quite sure except it is probably not what it has been up to now.
• A concentration on test scores to prove the benefits of 1:1 slows progress because the tests used are based on doing things related to the “paper methods” developed over the last 200 years.
• The impact of paper on education has been dramatic – forcing students to sit in one place to learn. This suits certain (few) personalities.
• Current curriculums are dictated by how they can be taught in a paper environment (paper maths) – these are not about ideas, they are dictated by the need to write on paper. Current teaching methods (eg Maths) are chosen because they are suited to paper.
• The current education system is similar to the Soviet regime just before it’s downfall – everyone said it would last forever too …..

Angus King (ex- Governor Maine)

• Two quotes that get to the central issues –
• Charles Darwin – the species that survives is the one that is most adaptable to change.
• Wayne Gretsky (when asked why he was so successful) – “It’s easy, I always skate to where I think the puck is going to be, everyone else skates to where it is”.
• The laptop is a two-for-one solution – it covers the classroom and the home environment equally well
• The laptop was essential because it promotes digital literacy (Michael Jordan did not practice for one, 42 min period/week); it is an equity tool (everyone has the same)

All still relevant comment isn’t it?

Are we moving forwards? Have we listened to statements such as these?

Why haven’t we?

I have read a number of posts recently about grading and thought it worthy of comment.

A few weeks ago I was faced with my first PT meeting for my science class, who I had not known long and for whom I had no “formal” marks. I knew the parents would want to know how their daughters were going (compared to everyone else) and so I decided to fall back on the tried and tested method of good, old gut instinct. I listed some of my criteria for good studentship (is that a word?) and gave each kid a score out of 10……. and these I published to our class learning wikis ( which only the student, her parents and me have access to). For example ……

This allowed me to graph each students “performance” within the class based on the sorts of behaviours that I think are relevant to performing well in more formal tests and assessments. The graph that I showed the parents (with names removed) was this one,

So, OK all but two of the parents were happy with this and seemed to grasp what I was getting at in terms of assessing their daughters on what they were actually doing and how they were doing it in class. And I did stress that these were my perceptions only, and that in many cases I was sitting on the fence because some kids were not giving me enough evidence yet. One parent accused me of using “new-fangled learning stuff”, but there’s always one isn’t there?

I have finished marking their first formal assessment task now, so thought it would be interesting to compare the actual performance in this  research task with my perceptions and predictions. The graph now looks like this,

The coloured columns are the ones I got quite wrong ……. but they represent two different things. I got quite a few right, especially at the top and bottom ends, but perhaps they are the easiest to pick ……its that vast middle group that are easily overlooked and misinterpreted.

Anyway, what do you think? Are the assessment grades any more useful than my perceptions (which will get more accurate as the evidence mounts)?

I wonder which “mark” should go on the all important school reports that I have to write later next term.

I was talking with a Principal of a leading independent school, here in Sydney, this week. Although it was not the topic of the discussion, inevitably various models of technology use  came up.

I was told quite firmly that 1:1 programs will not become popular and will have no place in her school, until the HSC goes online.

I cannot see the relationship between the two at all, but this is not the first time such twisted thinking has reared its ugly head within my earshot. Of course I responded, but it is hopeless to try to change the mind of the utterly convinced.

On second thoughts, this Principal, and other administrators have probably recognised that a 1:1 program would seriously impede the rote learning of masses of useless exam-orientated content. Hooray!!

To balance this myopic view of K-12 education, I see that a Catholic College in Sydney has been “told” by the CEO that it will be instituting a 1:1 program next year for all year 9 students, and that this will continue annually until they have a 9-12 program. Needless to say, some people at this college have gone into meltdown as they try to second guess every problem that might occur to ensure a “smooth” roll-out. Sorry guys, it just won’t happen. 1:1 programs are definitely a headache for administrators and IT professionals. But it’s not about them is it?

Three cheers for the CEO in having a better grasp on the situation than the results-focused Principal who raised my hackles earlier.

Following Ben’s example and answering Dan’s call for more sharing of lesson resources, here is an attempt to get more hands-on with a geology topic.

Some months ago, I saw a You Tube video where a rock guy (not music) had big concrete blocks and bungy cords and I figured I could replicate this as a practical experiment in the classroom.

The pic taken with my phone shows the set-up …………

1. a wooden block with medium grade sandpaper glued to its base.

2. a sheet of similar sandpaper taped to the bench

3. a spring balance and an elastic band attached to a hook on the block

4. a ruler to measure displacement

The students were told to pull on the spring balance as slowly as they could, to get the highest possible reading on the scale, before the block jerked forwards. They were to record the force on the scale when the block moved, and then measure the displacement. They did 10 trials using the same equipment, and then graphed the results.

Here is one of the graphs ………

Displacement is shown as x and force as o

The red line represents a reasonably consistent force for each of the 10 trials, but the displacement was very erratic.

The force (provided by the elastic band) represents the pressure on the tectonic plates caused by the convection currents operating in the asthenosphere. I was hoping this would prove to be fairly constant.

However, the displacement was erratic, sometimes the force (approximately 4 newtons) caused a displacement of over 25 cm and other times, less than 10.

Does this mean that earthquakes will sometimes be over 6 on the Richter Scale and sometimes less than 4?

Results seem to support the hypothesis that slippage, caused when a tensional force overcomes friction, is somewhat unpredictable, despite the fact that the force remains relatively constant.

This can be applied to the real situation of earthquakes. Although earthquakes are bound to occur in some parts of the world, the intensity (as governed by the degree of slippage) is unpredictable.

Did this give the students an understanding of why we can’t predict when the next big earthquake will happen? I think so.

There are lots of ways we could vary the set-up from here……… bigger blocks (more surface area), heavier blocks, finer/rougher sandpaper etc,

If anybody wants to try this and some of the variations ………please share your results.

In a previous post at the start of this month I used Aharef’s applet to “graph” this blogsite.

Then it looked like this	Now it has grown to this

How cool is that? Something is happening…….not quite sure how to interpret this but its definitely growing and changing

Source: csaa.typepad.com/

A recent blog of mine talked about the 19th century classroom and I was startled, to wake up this morning and discover that prolific blogger Miguel had picked up the topic.

Miguel observed that

“.. the worst thing is, until students are slowly “unbrainwashed,” detoxified, shown how learning according to a 19th century education just doesn’t get it done anymore, they are going to want to know what they need to succeed. “Don’t tell me what I’m going to need in the future,” they’ll say, “show me NOW how it can get me the ‘A’ I need to move on to the next level of schooling so that I can eventually get to do what I really want to do.” Of course, if you have a student that has problems delaying gratification, you lose them right there”.

Part of my reply, posted at Around the Corner, was

….the “unbrainwashing” is the difficult bit and proving that 21st century learning will “get it done” in a system where traditional testing is still the norm, is the problem, because the talk-and-chalk, teach-to-the-test pedagogy can be seen to be effective when it brings acceptable results. “Don’t fix what ain’t broke” comes to mind. Unfortunately, this perpetuates the process and raises expectations that the same measure of success will occur once they leave the time capsule called High School.

Mark Ahlness joined in with a comment about his experience as a 19th century teacher…..

And yet, every morning at “math time” I become the old 19th century schoolmaster, asking my students to respond to my questions and solve problems on their slates – and then show me. I am not kidding. This is a new, district-wide, mandated curriculum. My computers are never touched at math time. During math the only difference between me and the 19th century teacher is the slates are dry erase whiteboards. The pedagogy is the same. Ugh.

The fact that the kids like doing it does not make it ok. Kids like doing lots of things that are not in their best interests…

I came across this great site  and I noticed this ……

By the 1830’s education leaders were promoting the use of blackboards and slates at every level. The Connecticut Common School Journal of February 1839 recommended that, “In all the operations performed by the pupils . . . blackboards should be used for demonstrations and illustrations.” Texts for teachers on the use of the blackboard began to be written. The teachers themselves were a bit less enthusiastic. In 1839, Henry Barnard reported that, “Blackboards are not uncommon, but are little resorted to by the teacher.”

Seems like the more things change, the more they stay the same!

I’d love to see a book on how to use a blackboard! Seems even back then, the technology was being ignored despite the administrators mandating its use. But how did they make teachers do the necessary PD so they would see the benefits of the new hardware in helping to change the classroom pedagogy?

The same question exists today.

Passed this on the notice board of the local church this morning, and it made  me chuckle. The link here is the cancellation of my planned lesson this afternoon due to continual logging on issues.

We have lots of the latest Cisco a/b/g/n wireless APs, Toshiba M400 and M700 Tablet PC on mobile trolleys,  so the hardware is good stuff. We are using Vista Enterprise and roaming profiles for students.

But after 35mins of a continual Welcome message from Microsoft it was time to shut down and go home.

Not a good end to the week, as we move into our Easter break. And of cause, perfect timing just before the Parent Teacher Event next Wednesday! Not!

Any of you techies out there got any  brilliant ideas?? And before you say it …… dumping Vista is not an option!

“Teachers waste perfectly good tertiary educations on doing a job with pathetic pay, with little opportunity to exercise entrepreneurial skill, bargain individually or get promoted to a fancy sounding position. It is almost as if they have a warped value system which regards community service as more important than personal advancement.”

So says Lisa Pryor in the Opinion section of the weighty tome that has become the Saturday morning newspaper, which I only buy for the cryptic crossword and the careers section. She suggests that

“Teachers are unlikely to be diehard capitalists or economic rationalists: by definition they have chosen a path which is economically irrational.”

In a call to the Young Liberals of NSW, she suggests they stop bleating about the “bearded, sandal-wearing history teachers who spout radical propaganda”, give up their capitalist agendas and join the teaching ranks in an effort to redress the balance!

Ms Pryor goes on to say

“This same argument should be applied to atheists who complain about how there is so much religion in education. If it is the case that it is hard to find a good private school which is not religious, the churches are not to blame for this, atheists are.”

So, I’m thinking of starting up a new school ……only right wing, atheists who refuse to give notes and who promise never to set up class blogs need apply.

I reckon I’d be inundated!!!

Anybody out there smart enough to make a badge like this that we can paste into our sidebars

So OK, I haven’t been blogging for very long so it’s not very extensive, but this is a picture of this blogsite courtesy of Aharef. At his site there are further examples and an explanation of the colours. I don’t really care what they mean ….its a great way of representing what we do. And there are instructions how to get this printed on a T-Shirt. How cool would that be?

Check out your own website pic using his applet and let me see what it looks like.

I have just returned from a very wet Brisbane where I was honoured and excited to be asked to facilitate a 4-day workshop for four schools who are involved in a Tablet PC pilot. Having spent 12 months exploring software from the fabulous Heulab people in Singapore, the focus for this workshop was that scary topic ….pedagogy!

Although there are many learning theories to choose from, I decided to concentrate on Understanding by Design developed a four-day, task based  course, and I had spent some weeks developing the necessary materials on wikispaces.

Despite some early panic, the four days went better than I could have hoped, and my concern about running out of things to talk about dissipated quickly when I realised I could make use of my Google Reader, and grab relevant, as-it-happens conversation. Each night I opened the browser and right on my  iGoogle desktop the most wonderful stuff just kept turning up.

On my first night I discovered two guest writers on Scott McLeod’s most informative site. This caught my eye,

“Looking at Wiggins and McTighe’s ……. approach to curriculum and unit design we liked how big “essential questions” and “enduring understandings” had helped us plan and design units when we were teaching math and social studies. What if this same “best practice” approach could be applied to the way technology was used and talked about in the classroom?”

And how great to see that they were going to keep this discussion going for the period of my workshop. Thanks for sharing your ideas Justin and Dennis. And of course I can’t forget Kim over at Always Learning, who has collaborated with Justin and Dennis to create the model they are developing so nicely. One of Kim’s earlier posts outlined the background for us and clarified it with

“Our goal was not only to show the process for embedding technology, but also to ensure that teams use the backward design process in their unit planning.”

These well-respected references helped to reinforce my efforts and all participants took on tasks associated with backward design of next term’s programs with focus and determination. And then, during the week Miguel popped up with another gem ….A Day at the Zoo – Schooling by Design, allowing us to widen the concept.

Then just for good measure I threw in a discussion starter from Sylvia at GenYes. and add to that the invaluable ideas and advice from  the inspiring LG  who is always one step ahead of me and such an important part of my personal learning network  and you can see that I was far from alone.

Being something of a neophyte at all of this, I took great comfort from the support provided by my ever-widening network …….. and I made this very visible to the participants. I expect we will have some new faces on the edublogscene very soon.