Disrupting Class

What does this all mean for schools?

1. Conflicting mandates in the way we must teach vs. the way students must learn
2. Computers have failed to make a difference because we have crammed them into conventional classrooms. They must initially be deployed against non-consumption (web 2.0?)

We all learn differently

• Multiple Intelligences
• Talents
• Motivations / Interests
• Aptitudes
• Learning Styles
• Different Paces
• All this depends on Subject / Domain
• Ongoing Cognitive Science Research - Functional MRI Scans
• Research in Practice
• No one knows all the differences right now, but we are learning

Standardization vs. Customization

Todays schools were architected on standardization while we know it takes customization to address the needs of learners.

Historically, schools just cram technology in the existing model. It has added cost, but has not delivered the promise of transformation.

The areas on non-consumption in schools are: Horn says these are Prime Examples

• Credit Recovery
  
• Drop-Outs
  
• Advanced Placement
  
• Scheduling Conflicts
  
• Home-Schooled / Homebound
  
• Small, Rural, Urban Schools
  
• Tutoring
  
• Professional Development
  
• Pre-K
  
• After School
  
• In the home
  
• Incarcerated Youth
  
• In-School Suspension
  

The economic downturn is a perfect opportunity to use these disruptive innovations in schools.

On-line learning 45,000 students in 2000 and 1,000,000 students in 2007. Horn confirms that by 2019 research shows 50% of High School courses on-line. 44 states have on-line learning initiatives.

What else can states do? Policy Implications (What have companies done that have survived disruptive innovation)

• Autonomous - Hudson Dept. Stores started Target and put itself out of business. Parent company still exists.
• Self-sustaining funding
• Not beholden by the old metrics - Seat time vs. Mastery, Student / Teacher Ratio, Teacher Certification
• Human Resource pipeline and professional development
• Treatment and use of data

That is it, we are out of time and here comes the questions. The discussion was similar to what I heard in Seattle, but nonetheless it was worth the wait.

Disruptive Innovation is not all about technology. If it is not a new business model then it is not disruptive. The on-line learning referred to the book should not be confused with distance learning. One question was framed almost like the book made a case for computers teaching kids. He is clarifying now. The idea is to leverage the power of the technology in classrooms.

How does a school district reinvent themselves with Disruptive Technologies when being held to old metrics?

A good voice at the states for one. Declining enrollments are driving some states to think differently. Some schools are setting up some disruptions in the typically harder to reach students. They are also giving the students more choices.

Horn comments on how much he has learned at CoSN. He says we wrote a book, but we make it happen. He believes that we are the group that will transform education.

CoSN 2009 is done. Heading back home.

CoSN Video at Closing Keynote

Green Presentation Done, Time to Get Disruptive

Michael Horn and Clay Christensen Keynote (Disrupting Class) coming up.  If you tweet, tweet me and I will let you know the key points.

Empowering the 21st Century Superintendent

David Plymale - Superintendent, Waelder ISD

• Started at 1 to 1 Laptop program
• Professional development is the key in any implementation
• Technology stimulates learning, interest and engagement

Jerry Vaughn - Superintendent, Floydada ISD

• In year 5 of a 1 to 1 laptop initiative
• It is not a technology initiative it is a learning initiative
• 70 miles from the closest community college
• Have tripled the number of students attending college
• The info should be available in the method, mode and time-frame kids need it in
• Anytime anywhere
• One teachers theme is to get out of the students way.  They will learn.
• Floydada is giving up the cell phone battle starting next year.
• Adapt and move forward with our kids for our kids.

Steve Waddell - Superintendent, Birdville ISD

• Has invested a lot in infrastructure and management systems
• Set standards for teacher proficiency with technology
• Have Integration Specialists like us
• Technology (web 2.0) is an imperative for systems change and transformation
• The role of the teacher is changing to facilitator and coach
• Unblocked YouTube and Facebook in Birdville, they are recognizing that these things exist
• We make a lot of mistakes, but we are trying to do the right thing for the right reasons
• Put the power in the kids hands and harness it
• South Africa uses Wikis for textbooks

Jesus Chavez - Round Rock ISD

• Have lots of advanced equipment, but consider themselves behind.  Very similar to us.
• Technology fluency is important, but a number of students already come with it
• Quoted the Visioning Institute document, so did Steve Waddell
• Are schools teaching Good Digital Citizenship.  This is what business leaders are asking in Round Rock
• Are we doing a good job of embedding technology in the curriculum?
• Through policy we are banning students from valuable information.

Five Leadership Themes

• Strengthen district leadership and communications
• Raise the bar with 21st century skills
• Transform pedagogy with compelling learning environments
• Support professional development and communities of practice
• Create balanced assessments

I'm up in 20 minutes for my presentation so I'll shut this post down.  Good to hear from these TX Superintendents.

My Top Ten List from CoSN

With the keynote from Clay Christensen and Michael Horn still to come in a few hours, I decided to write a synopsis of what I have learned / gained / validated at CoSN so far.  These are in no particular order.

1. Being a learner is better than being an expert.  Webster defines expert as a person who has special skill or knowledge in some particular field.  On the other hand a learner is someone who gains knowledge, comprehension, or mastery of through experience or study.  The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn.
2. When looking at technology goals, students should be producers of information not recipients of information.
3. We can have all the technology in the world and if we do not change pedagogy our schools will not be transformed.  Revolution does not happen when society adopts new technology, it happens when society adapts new behavior.
4. Right now there is a difference between how students learn and live with regards to technology.  We must work to close this gap.
5. We need to strive to move formal learning to informal and informal learning to formal.  This is an interesting concept when you really sit back and reflect on it.
6. We need to focus on how web 2.0 can be used to effect systemic change in schools and not focus so much on web 2.0 as a tool itself.
7. Any serious technology generates both negative and positive consequences.
8. You can learn a lot from doing.  I have gone from a one time "tweeter" to a big Twitter fan.  My conference experience was greatly enhanced by this web 2.0 technology and I would not have learned as much if it were not for my new found on-line colleagues.  The tool is great, the collaboration it fosters is transforming.
9. The Generation Lap - It is not so much of a gap as it is the fact that students are lapping us in terms of technology use.  It is not that we do not use the same tools, but the students figure out ways to use them faster and better than us.
10. Back to learning, we are in a knowledge economy.  In the past there was institutions of learning and institutions of work.  In today's world you have to reinvent yourself constantly and learn always.

One other side note is that this has been a validating conference in the sense that I know that our organization is on the right track, we have a big vision and that we are willing to take risks.  It is certainly an exciting time to be an educator.

Googlizing a District

This is an interesting presentation on how the 18th largest school district in the nation went completely to Google Apps.  Check out Prince George's County Public Schools.  Very interesting project.

Breakfast Conversation

Thanks to Representatives Rob Eissler and Mark Strama for their service to Texas and some good Educational Technology conversation.  Here are some of the highlights:

Rob Eissler

He was struck by Disrupting Class and is using the concepts in developing policy

Wants to focus on what works and what doesn't  (What I call Strategic Abandonment)

Interesting fact:  Changing the student to teacher ratio in the U.S. by one student would cost $7 Billion

If they work to fund digital textbooks, they will not forget about the devices to deliver them

They are looking at purchasing on-line courses for schools

The post-secondary readiness topic seems to be the way things are going in this session

They know that on-line testing is still a reach for many Texas school districts and are considering revising it

In House Bill 3 High Stakes Tests are not the only measure of schools

They are considering legislation for a Authorization Election Bill, this would help with the rollback election issues

Mark Strama

Education is the most important endeavor society engages in

Had a goal coming into office to modernize education

Wants to focus state on items like software that have a longer shelf life.  (i.e. Hardware becomes obsolete, but software can be maintained at a lower cost to district after the initial investment)

Made a good point that if you have 1 to 1 computing with good software that gives a transparent view into the student's work you get assessment everyday (Good technology could eliminate the need of the tests)

Economies of scale is an interesting concept at the state level they have to weigh local control vs. using the buying power of the state to help schools

I am now in a session working to wordsmith the new NETS for Administrators for ISTE.  I have suggested more goals related to modeling.  We are working on it.

Web 2.0 in American Schools: Administrator Perspectives

Sponsored by MacArthur Foundation in Cooperation with ASCD & Common Sense Media and Conducted by Metiri.

77% of district administrators agreed or strongly agreed with the statement "Web 2.0 has value for teaching and learning."

Yet only 44% reported taking full responsibility for the restructuring of schools to accommodate Web 2.0

Stratified Random Sample to represent all U.S. School Districts

Top priority for respondents was to keep students engaged and interested in school.  The second was to meet the needs of different types of learners and third was to develop critical thinking skills.

4.  Develop capabilities in students that can't be acquired through traditional methods

5.  Provide alternative learning environments for students

6.  Extend learning beyond the school day

7.  Prepare students to be lifelong learners

Global Awareness did not come up in the top seven, but when they dug deeper into the data it was for Superintendents.

85% of administrators surveyed said web 2.0 should be used on approved educational sites or all use should be allowed.  

When looking at the question regarding web 2.0's use in teaching and learning, the social collaborative tools were lowest, sharing visual media and polling topped the list.  That is interesting, but not that surprising.  I feel like we always adopt the tools that we understand first for our kids.  This is why they are lapping us.

School district administrators acknowledged the critical need to use web 2.0 to transform teaching and learning, and to change the structure of high schools over the next decade.  And yet, few had systemically begun to research, plan, or implement effective uses of web 2.0, nor had they restructured their schools to enable participatory reform.

ASCD, it is essential to model and they will be requiring members to be on their new social networking page on their site.  Interesting.  They believe that the negative stance that most administrators have on web 2.0 hurts adoption (i.e. we can't control it, cyber-bullying, the kids won't pay attention, etc. etc. etc.)  I would note that like it or not these issues are real and we must address them while showing the massive benefit of web 2.0 in relation to the risk.

I think when this full report comes out in April 2009 that it will be a nice planning tool for our district.  The numbers are interesting.  I would be curious to see the validity and reliability of the survey.

I am signing off for the day...  See you on-line tomorrow

Hot off the Web: NMC K-12 Horizon Report

This is the first Horizons report done for K-12 by The New Media Consortium.  It has been going on for a while in Higher Ed.

Side Note on Cool Technology.  The guy in front of me is streaming this on a UStream.TV.

Horizon Report K-12

1 year or less

Collaborative Environments

On-line Communication Tools

2-3 Years

Mobiles

Cloud Computing

4-5 Years

Smart Objects

The Personal Web

This document is going to be a great tool for planning.  It is written for non-technologists.  I like this and I think it will be very useful.  It is nice to know that the first few horizons are on our radar.

Don Tapscott

In the .com era, it was all about html and the web being a platform for presentation (web 1.0).  The new internet is a platform for computation (web 2.0), one big global computer.  It is an interesting concept to think of the web as the global computer, a unified platform for collaboration.

Don showed his video on YouTube.  The audience enjoyed it, I did not know that there was a book call The Dumbest Generation.  This might be a good counterpoint book to read.  

Students are the powerful new force in school transformation.  Tapscott brought up the pop culture topic again, like yesterday's key note.  It seems that several experts in this area are touching on the complexity of what kids "digest" today.  

The Generation Lap - Tapscott discussed that the kids are lapping their parents in terms of the use of web 2.o.  He suggests there is not as much of a gap and that there is overlap in a students and parents digital content like never before.  (i.e. Kids and parents have music overlap on their iPods now.  This did not happen as much in the past.)  I would suggest that this is similar to teachers.  We have technology using teachers, but the kids do more with  the same technology faster (e4).

Wikinomics - He is telling a story about how fast you can get a global audience.  His kid created a community on Facebook on Thanksgiving morning about the book.  By the time they ate the turkey they had members to the community in seven countries with 130 people.  Note, that this was nearly impossible to organize something like this in the past.  Certainly organizing a community across multiple countries would take a major investment of time and money.  It can happen now in mere hours.

The Dark Side of Web 2.0

Safety

Balance

Schools Failing

Digital Divide

Generational Firewall

Privacy

New Zealand hired 80 students into the Department of Education to teach teachers how to use the internet.

Taking It Global web page is developed by a student that once worked for Tapscott.

The NET Generation Norms

• Freedom
  
• Customization - Everything can be customized
  
• Scrutiny - The question things that they see
  
• Integrity
  
• Collaboration - They have huge networks
  
• Entertainment - Learning should be fun, people learn better when they are conscious
  
• Speed - Everything is instant for them
  
• Innovation - They want the latest

Closing Remarks

This is a knowledge economy, you have to always be a learner.  It used to be institutions of learning and institutions of work.  Now a days you have to reinvent your knowledge base almost immediately out of school.  "It is not just about being able to do well on the test." Learning is going from broadcast learning to interactive learning.

Good story about Joe O'Shea, I found some of the info Tapscott just discussed in this article.

Tips from Don moving forward

• Focus on relationships
  
• Cut back on lecturing
  
• Collaborate
  
• Focus on life-long learning
  
• Use technology to know students
  
• Design programs around norms (above)
  
• Reinvent yourself
  

If we do not reinvent the schools to address these issues, someone will.  The stakes are high.

The Net Generation Educational Challenge  - This is a great site where kids are posting videos and self organizing into communities around the idea of 21st Century Learning.  The site will be up for only about 6 weeks.

Long post, but a really great experience to hear Don Tapscott.  Hope you enjoy it.

Good 21st Century Quote

The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn.

- Alvin Toffler

Next up, Don Tapscott

Web 2.0... More Useful Everday

Just have to share that I have been "tweeting" and following several tweets here at CoSN.  It is interesting to communicate and collaborate real-time during a keynote.  I found one group on-line that was sharing virtual notes on Google docs.  What a great use of web 2.o.  Imagine how useful this document will be in the end with all of these tweeters notes on it.

Good Morning

Getting excited about the Don Tapscott Keynote this morning.  Yesterday was a great day learning about how schools around the world are attacking web 2.0.  Hopefully you get a chance to read about the keynote as I blog this morning.

Closing Keynote

Everything Bad is Good for You - Steven Johnson 

Are video games bad when they are becoming increasingly complex and complicated?  Johnson makes the argument that pop culture is and can be a good thing.  Okay I am channeling my childhood.  Remember the first few football games on computers / video games.  Can't remember the one before Tecmo Bowl.  Anyway when compared to Madden 2009 it is not even in the same conversation in terms of complexity.  Now you have to manage the salary cap, deal with concessions, stadium upgrades, interpersonal relations with players, free agency, etc.  If kids are playing this game at the same age that I was playing Tecmo Bowl there is no doubt they are thinking more than I was.

I think this speaker makes some valid points.  

Three types of Complexity

1. Content
2. Collaboration
3. Interfaces - Yahoo to YouTube

SIMPLE

New acronym I just learned:

Share

Innovate

Motivate

Participate

Learn

Exchange

New term I just learned:  e-Confidence

How can we measure our teacher's e-confidence?

Any serious technology generates both negative and positive consequences.  Web 2.0 is no different.

Panel for this session:

Marc Durando - Executive Director, European Schoolnet

Kathryn Moyle - Director, Secretariat of the Australian ICT in Education Committee

Vanessa Pittard - Director, E-Strategy, British Educational Communications and Technology Agency

Stephen Waddell - Superintendent of Birdville ISD, Texas

Dr. Waddell

Important question is what role web 2.0 plays in systemic change.  It is not a matter of will it work or not.  It is a matter of trying different things and getting started.  

My collaboration is falling victim to a low battery.  I'll be back.

Three Countries of Innovation

Web 2.0 Global Perspectives

United Kingdom - Stephen Breslin

• 3 Things I Didn't Learn at School
• The Power of Organization, Groups and Networks (These are essential to all of our careers)
• Most of what you learn in the workplace is from colleagues, is this true in schools?
• Depth and Breadth of your Network is important and related to your ability to work
• Web 2.0 Defined - It is made of people not content, Jeff Jarvis
• Barriers & Issues Web 2.0
• Tension between collaborative learning and current assessment system
• Current system measures individuals and not your ability to collaborate.
• e-safety, some of these issues are polarizing
• Teachers need the support, time and space to develop skills and practices

"Revolution does not happen when society adopts new technology, it happens when society adapts new behavior."

Clay Shirky

Singapore - Horn Mun Cheah

• Motivation, Harnessing & Looking Ahead
• Singapore is focused on fostering self-directed and collaborative learners
• Moving formal learning to informal and informal learning to formal (interesting concept)
• Learning outcomes are becoming very difficult to define
• Enhanced oral skills through podcasting, witting skills through blogs and wikis, video blogs, storyboards
• Focused on building capacity (school leaders, teachers, and Learning communities) and system-wide issues (interoperability if Learning Management System and pedagogy) moving forward
• Cyberwellness - New term for me (It is about access, discernment and ethical use)
• Key Questions:  How do informal and formal learning environments interact?

Australia - Garry Putland

• Concentrating on the teacher - teacher gap, and not as much on the student - teacher gap
• The best education systems have quality teachers, that is the reason for the teacher focus
• They are also putting an emphasis on administrator technology training with regards to web 2.0
• Interesting that the government is fueling money into a 1 to 1 program currently
• The government in Australia feels that education is critical to their success and is investing in it
• The shift is changing from what we do to kids with curriculum, to what are kids entitled to with regards to curriculum
• Students view Social Networking as a place without authority.  If schools try to go in there the students will leave.  Interesting argument...
• Why do we ban things that could be an educational tool... they grapple with this also
• Knowledge building is as much about connections as it is about resources
• Kids are producers
• Locus of control is shifting, we must share and manage risk
• News travel faster on Twitter, Google is better for old news (classic)

Every time that I attend an International event I am reminded that kids are kids.  We as an International education community face so man of the same challenges.  This is both validating and concerning.  Validating in the sense that we are not behind, concerning in the fact that this is a global issue that educators do not have an answer for yet.

So far in this morning's sessions the questions are leading the answers by a landslide...

Teacher Movie

This is one of the pieces of media that Marco used in his presentation.  Not sure if everyone has seen this, but I wanted to share.

Teacher Movie

Benefit vs. Risk

The question that seems to keep coming up is does the benefit of web 2.0 outweigh the risk.  I think I know the answer, it can if used properly.  My concern is that the first time we step outside the Great Firewall and a mistake is made our progress could be derailed.  We have to educate and present a unified front to web 2.0 and it's advantages.  This is our challenge.

Digital Disconnect is Alive and Well, there is a difference between how students learn and live.  Students are interested in defining their own educational destiny and technology allows them to do this.  What role do we play in helping them to define this?

It was just noted that research says over 50% of school districts in the U.S. do not have addressed policy related to these technologies.  This speaker from the Metiri Group is interesting.   It would be good to get a hold of the data from this presentation.  The change has already come outside of schools.  The research showed that school administrators overwhelmingly agreed that this was coming, but a large percentage are not planning for it.  If it becomes an issue it gets banned.

It seems that CoSN is putting lots of emphasis on this.  A large report is due out in April, I can't wait.

Other presenters:

Common Sense Media

Project Tomorrow

Pew Internet and Life Project

Closing Ideas

Regardless of how you learn there is a way.  The kids are teaching us about differentiated instruction.  He gave an example of how kids are teaching each other to play guitar on YouTube.  This student posted himself playing classical music and other kids "challenged" him to do more difficult songs.  The hits to his video is greater than the population of California.  He ended up on stage with Joe Satriani, one of the most famous guitar players in the world.

Break Time!

www.readpages1-10.com

The history of "Stuff Driven" Education

Overhead - Read Pages 1-10

Chalkboard - Read Pages 1-10

Whiteboard (with colered ink) - Read Pages 1-10

PowerPoint - Read Pages 1-10

This was actually a very interesting way of showing the idea of how tools can progress, but if we don't change the pedagogy regardless of tools learning will not be transformed.

By the way if you go to Twitter search feature there are some good live tweets of this session right now.

Yoda in Your Network

"Hopefully you have lots of Yoda's in your network."  Being connected is very important not only socially, but for learning.  

Thoughts on Technology Planning from Marco

• Are students the recipients of information or producers of information.  
• Are students accumulators of nouns?
  

Think of all the mediums for students to produce, share and broadcast information.  

Interesting research:

The average age of decision makers in schools is 52.  When they were 16 what did school look like compared to 16 year olds of today?  Note:  These were cool slides if we can get a hold of them.

Opening Keynote

Marco Torres is the opening keynote. Schooling vs. Learning Today: Learning and Learning for Now not Tomorrow. Here are some of his key points:

• One plan teachers should have is to make kids want to come back tomorrow.
• "My job [as a teacher] is to infect enough kids with curiosity to make them want to come back tomorrow."
• What makes an expert, if you are an expert because you have a bank of information what does that mean? The definition of expert is changing.
• If you can look it up, don't ask.

This is an interesting point as we look at expert vs. learner. Marco makes the argument that experts do not have much room for error. Being a learner is the better stance to take. This fits into the idea we have been discussing with regards to modeling technology. If you attack it as "I want to be an expert" you may never start, because with the new Web 2.0 tools it is almost impossible to be an expert. If you are a learner you just dive in, like I am doing right now.

Blogging CoSN 8th Annual International Symposium

I am excited about the 8th Annual International Symposium. The agenda looks great and I am hoping to bring that learning back to Creek via this Web 2.0 tool. I welcome your comments and feel free to pass on the URL.