The most amazing commercial...

A friend of mine sent this video to me in an attachment. I just had to post it and I'm sure we can figure out the literacy connections later...

Web 2.0 Video

To Facebook or NOT to Facebook...

It's a whopper of a question, not mention a major bone of contention. Like everyone else, more and more teachers are participating in social networking sites like Facebook for the same reasons everyone else is. Where things start to get a bit murky is when we start talking about teacher conduct on these sites. The infamous 'Blue Pages' in Professionally Speaking have been bulking up these days, with increasing reports of teacher misconduct using technology and web-based applications. Look, adults behaved badly long before they had access to technology, so let's no vilify Facebook or Twitter and MySpace. There is endless research that supports integrating these applications in instruction for educational purpose. There is a real value to them.

One of the items I'm currently working on is a review of our Board's technology policies, including appropriate use by staff and students. I've begun to draft a list of considerations for teachers:

Content on Profiles or Sites
-refrain from including any content that conflicts with the teachings of the Catholic Church
-avoid posting any content that calls your professionalism and integrity into question
-this includes offensive or obscene language used on your profile page or site and questionable photographs and video

Privacy Settings
-whenever possible, restrict access to personal websites, blogs and wikis
-if the application allows, limit who can find you in the site’s search engine
-“invite” those with whom you have familial or social relationships to join your sites

Accepting Students as “Friends” or “Followers”
-do not accept current students in the system as “Friends” or “Followers”; the relationship between teachers and their students should be strictly a formal and professional one for the protection of both the educator and the student
-do not initiate friendships with students
-accept students who have since graduated as “Friends” or “Followers”
-limit access to your personal information as much as possible
-do not allow students to view personal contact information, photographs, etc.
-keep all communication with former students strictly to the public communication spaces on your site; avoid personal messaging

We have a professional image to uphold, and like it or not, we are held to a much higher standard when it comes to our behaviour after the school day is over. The idea of a teacher as a role model isn't a cheesy, outdated cliche. If we want the respect that so many of us think we're entitled to then we have to conduct ourselves accordingly, even when we're online in our own free time. When I'm getting sick and tired of is the misinformation teachers continue to get from local units of our unions. Our provincial association fully supports the ethical and responsible use of this sort of technology in our schools, but locally, teachers are being told to shut down Facebook accounts and avoid any sort of online interaction. I think there is a severe lack of understanding and knowledge and that is the only way I can even begin to rationalize all of this unnecessary fear-mongering. Are there teachers behaving badly? Sure. They're emailing students. They have inaapropriate and immoral content on their social networking sites. Not every teacher is like that and as I mentioned, it's not so much the technology as it is the teacher who is using it. Trust me, bad behaviour always manifests itself eventually, and you don't alway need a computer for that to happen.

Teachers should out Social Networking Best Practices. I also came across a Teacher's Guide to Using Facebook on a fellow blogger's site. It's quite good and thorough. I strongly recommend teachers giving this a whirl.

A Vision of the 21st Century Learner

One of the predominant themes in my blog has been learning in the 21st century. Recently, I was involved in a meeting about how we can truly begin to prepare staff and students in our system for what this means in terms of access to technology, in particular, web-based technologies. When I watched this clip on YouTube, I thought that it speaks volumes about what is really at the heart of the conversation, and that's our kids. Have a look...

New Dove Commercial

I absolutely love the new Dove commercial. Lots of media literacy learning here...



Also a great clip - an oldie but a goodie!

I Really Needed This...

For the last couple of days I had been working with a colleague to prepare for a co-teaching opportunity with a Grade 11 World Religion class, working at the workplace level. The first day was spent exclusively with the teacher, ensuring her comfort with blogging that she so enthusiastically wanted to introduce her class to. I had worked with her on a previous occasion to build the blog and in between our meeting tims, she and her class spent some time getting comfortable interfacing with Blogger and the kids practiced responding to postings. (The teacher remarked how engaged the kids were when they were writing for the blog. She couldn't bribe them to do pencil-paper tasks, but the kids apparently took to the blog like ducks to water. Attendance is up and deadlines are being met on a regular basis. How about that!!!)I had also shown her how to upload documents using Slideshare. In the meantime, I had taken the CPT for the course and made it "bloggable". I chunked the summative and creative organizational checklists that the kids could use when they were blogging. I replicated the expectations of the original task so that the students could produce it virtually. I had also included a metacognitive piece, as well as a component that asked students to provided their peers with feedback. The teacher decided to augment the writing by including an artistic/creative component. Lots of good work happening!

When I met with her yesterday, we reviewed the basics so she could more confidently relay information to her students and we also planned for the today's class. The students had completed the first part of the CPT - the writing and the artistic piece. She wanted me to teach her and the kids how to take digital photos and edit them and upload them to the class blog. As well, we got the students started on the next part of the CPT, which was the class' study of Judaism. And that's what we did! The kids had created some truly beautiful artistic pieces to represent their learning about Christianity. A former student of mine had hand-crafted a wooden sconce in the shape of a dynamic cross which held a tea light. Another picked up water colour paint for the first time and painted an absolutely lovely cross. A boy in the class came up with his own clay recipe and created relief of a chalice and grapes. It was just amazing... We took pictures with the digital camera and uploaded them to a photo management program. We cropped,adjusted brightness and contrast until everyone was happy and uploaded them to the class blog. Were those kids ever proud.

This is a special class. Like I mentioned, it's a workplace level class with quite the profile. There are only 8 students in the class but EVERY SINGLE student is on an IEP and has varying degrees of exceptionalities from an array of LDs, to a young girl with severe vision impairment in addition to MID to a boy with autism. A number of students in this class have had problems with behaviour, and having taught some of them, I am aware of the reputations they have been given. In this class, when the kids were posting and creating, none of that mattered. Every students was present, every student was on task and every students was engaged. I truly believe that half the battle is figuring out what these kids respond to. The reality is that these kids are using real world tools to access the curriculum. They are using skills that EVERYONE should be taught. I would argue they've got something of a technical edge on some of their friends who aren't doing this sort of work. The teacher doesn't have behaviour problems because she knew that the kids would respond to this medium. The kids understand what is expected and they keep themselves in check to make sure no one steps out of line with regards to how the blog is used. It's quite remarkable. This is what differentiated instruction is all about, believing that every student can learn given the appropriate challenge and support and meeting kids where they are. I felt so privileged to be a part of this, even if it was for only two days.

Another Year, Another Test

For the past two years, I have been supporting teachers who have been preparing students to write the OSSLT. I have encountered the expected beligerance concerning the nature of standardized testing and how unfair and punitive it is. I have been shocked on occasion at the number of teachers who themselves have struggled to complete some of the tasks that students are asked to complete on the test, which according to my colleagues, tell us absolutely nothing about what students can do. I'm not quite so sure...

The OSSLT is a BASIC FUNCTIONAL LITERACY TEST. In fact, students should be able to complete it by the end of their grade 9 year. Granted, it is crafted in such a way that it isn't a total cake-walk. The instructions require students to read and re-read what is expected of them. The tasks themselves reflect work that students have been working on for the large majority of their academic career. The problem is that we don't teach our kids to name what they are doing. Admittedly, where the kids are disadvantaged is in the language of the test. What's particularly comical about that is that the test highly reflects the typical language of assessment in the Ontario classroom. Think about it: summarize, compare, list, describe, define, determine, explain your thinking, identify, justify, support your answer... I have often asked teachers, "do you teach your students EXPLICITLY what is expected of them when you asked them to do any of these tasks?" Typically, the response includes the assumptions that by grade 10, students should know what is expected of them. Do I really have address what happens when we assume? Let's face it, when it comes to preparing kids for this test, we spend more time blaming our colleagues in the elementary panel for not teaching the kids well enough instead of being accountable for our failure to be thorough enough in our on-going assessment, that is, if we ARE in fact assessing on an on-going basis. Another posting for another time...

As far as I'm concerned, this test demonstrates if our kids can read and write at a level where they can simply function in the world. Sometimes, the results force us to look really hard at what we are doing and NOT doing in our schools. Trust me, I know the limitations of analyzing this sort of statistical data. It does not present a complete picture. But our schools have those missing pieces. Our schools have access to attendance records and credit accumulation reports that can give some indication as to how some kids could potentially fare on this test. Instead of looking at the data after the fact, we should be using it to be proactive. The reality is that this test is not going anywhere. We can blame the previous administrations all we want about bringing this testing into the province but it seems that their predecessors don't have much of a problem with keeping it around. Funny, we never hear about that. I'll admit that I vote for Mike Harris. I liked how he thought and frankly I think he's been given a bum rap for the work he did in attempting to clean up a disaster area of a system. I'll take the heat for my politics, but I won't make excuses when kids can read and write at a basic level when they still manage to graduate from high school.

Yesterday, thousands of students across the province were dry-heaving inside while they wrote the OSSLT. My heart goes out to them, really. I appreciate the stress that goes along with writing this test. They're told that it's a high-stakes situation, and it's true. This is the one thing that technically stands in the way of graduation. I would assert, however, that the daily work in the classroom in becoming even more high-stakes. Again, another posting for another time...

It's a Done Deal

It's official. I've decided to go back to the classroom after two years in my role as a Program Resource Teacher. I figure a couple of things:

1. It'll get me back to working with kids - which I love above all things.

2. This decision will prevent me from becoming increasingly cynical about the prospects for change. I have met and worked with so many great teachers who are doing really fantastic work and I want to be an active part of affecting real change.

3. I'll have the chance to put into practice all the good stuff I've been working on and researching about over the last couple of years.

My only dilemma is whether or not I go back to an elementary or secondary classroom. At this point, I've exercised my right to return to my former school, a secondary posting, but I plan to put in for an elementary transfer. Two principals whom I respect very much are opening new schools in September and I would love the opportunity to work for either of them and to start in a brand new school. It excites to think about being in a teaching scenario that allowed me the most flexibility with my teaching and creativity. We'll see what happens. Regardless, I'm really happy with my decision. Working with adult learners is just not my cup of tea.