Technology In Education Online

I arrived wondering what I will discover during my time here.  The trip down went fairly well.  For those who can relate, my anxiety of getting from school to the airport was happily relieved when I was sitting in the airport reading a book on my Kindle.  It is nice having a Kindle to pull out and easily carry around my book collection without taking up a lot of space in my carry-on backpack.  Also, when going out to dinner once I arrived being able to take it with me to read sure makes it nice! 

Getting ready to go I fine tuned my presentation, The Project-based 2.0 Buffet! Eating it all up!  In presenting in the fall at CECA 2009 conference on this topic, I wanted to refine what I presented to make it a valuable experience for those that will attend the presentation at FETC 2010.  I believe that in any presentation it is imperative to be open to changing directions according to what the audience is looking for.    I think in the presentations I’ve attended in the past, I’ve always worried when the presenter will not move away from their PowerPoint presentation.  It is as if  the audience doesn’t even need to be there for the person to continue their presentation.  I know I’m in trouble when I see the presenter being chained to their laptop.  They dare not venture being arms reach of the laptop.  And to make matters worst, they basically read their bullet points to you. 

So as I get ready for the confercence, I will see how far as stay on my presentation and how far a stray from my initial thinking on what I will present.

Here we were talking about opening up schools to current technologies yet when attempting to go to several sites while here at the high school I was blocked from using them. A couple notes about blocking – YouTube, Ning.com, Web-based email, TeacherTube, SchoolTube.  How are we going to bring this gap between students everyday life experiences and the experience at school?  Alan November gave a great presentation about the use of various Web 2.0 tools. Yet, I’m here at the conference and couldn’t even use them!

It isn’t a knock on the conference location. It is more of a reflection on how restrictive we are in our schools.  It is a subject that we don’t talk about even though it needs to be discussed.  Where you might ask?  Anywhere there are administrators placing restrictions on their use.  It is as if the emperor isn’t wearing clothes and no one wants to say anything.

I think several components come into play regarding Web 2.0 restrictions. One is power and control. The other is fear of the unknown.  Let’s talk about the first one: Power and control.  If I restrict the use of these tools I am in a powerful position.  I am fulfilling my responsibility as an administrator.  And if I don’t know what these Web 2.0 tools do, what would it mean if allowed myself to be vulnerable to the statement “I don’t know what Web 2.0 is.”  The other part of not knowing is it leaves you susceptible to dismissing the use of Web 2.0 tools.  If I don’t know I simply can state that we restrict the use of these tools.

For technology coordinators, I can easily show that I’m doing my job if I can show all of these sites and Web 2.0 tools that are restricted.  See I’m doing my job!  Much easier to explain then if I just leave open the use of these tools.  It helps with job security!

We must open up the dialogue to discuss these issues.  If we don’t teach students how to use these tools appropriately who will?

I’m sitting at the Technology Showcase here in Atlantic City watching the excitement people have shown learning about how using a Moodle and Joomla in their school can open up new opportunities.  The major complaint I’ve heard from people is how restrictive their school districts are when it comes to allowing Web 2.0 tools.

We have to move away from this idea.  Students are leaving us behind when it comes to this technology.  My question is where is the evidence to show that allowing students access to these tools is detrimental?  Instead of restricting students, we should be teaching students how to use these tools responsibly. 

Another thought is how much is this related to not really knowing what all of this about.  Sometimes when people don’t know their first tendency is to lock everything down.  Don’t they understand that it really is OK not knowing everything. In this day and age how can anyone expect to know all of this?

Finally, I think in some instances it really is about power and control. If I dictate what is allowed and what isn’t allowed I am in a very powerful position. This is sometimes the unspoken word behind the reason we become so restrictive. Information is power.

Somehow we must find ways to reach administrators and technology coordinators to break down these barriers.  There needs to be a reeducation of decision makers and a grass-roots effort by educators to change this attitude towards Web 2.0 tools. Those that restrict these tools are missing out on a great opportunity to create a more constructivist approach to education.

I’m ending the first couple days here at the conference. It has been a very busy two days.  I ran a full-day workshop on Mondy, “Getting Started on the Moodle”.  Tuesday, I completed a half-day workshop on Joomla and just finished a presentation, “Moodle and 21st Century DETAILS: A Constructivist Approach to Teaching.”So as I reflect on the first couple of days, what are my thoughts?  Well, after completing these workshops I am more convinced that giving educators the opportunity to participate in the process is critical. My afternoon presentation on reflecting on how you need to take a more constructivist approach while using a Moodle. One interesting point came when I was discussing about the Workshop component whereby students could participate in peer evaluation and grading, following the guidelines of a rubric. One teacher emphatically stated she would never allow students to participate in grading.  The bottom line for me was her not having a level of trust in students to fairly access another students work.  Now here is the rub, why can’t teachers trust their students to be responsible and accountable? The other question is: Is there a power and control issue here?  I think, at times, it is really hard for some teachers to empower their students.  Do they see their role as commander and chief and students don’t have enough expertise to enable to handle the responsibility?  My thought here is, and it may relate or not, we don’t  teach students what is involved in the process of working in groups yet we throw students together a lot of times and expect them to handle the responsibility.   All I’d ask people to do is to reflect back on their own experiences of group work in school and ask the question: how did it work for you?  I’ve heard from educators the thing they disliked most when going back to school was having a class where the instructor would state that there would be group projects during the semester.  Inevitability, i would hear such statements as: “I wound up doing most of the work” or “Person A didn’t do anything. What happened? What went wrong?  The biggest problem is that we never teach, and perhaps because we were never taught our self, what makes up the group process. How group dynamics work. How you look at members or potential members and determine where their strengths and interests are and grouping students based on their strengths and interests.  Why do group members usually get disinterested? Usually, my experience has been due to people in the group being the controllers.  They want the project to go their way.  On the other extreme you have those that simply tune out due to feeling the group wasn’t hearing what they had to say. So how does this relate to peer review, which was the main point in begin with?  In today’s world students are going to be working collaboratively.  They will also have to know how to peer review.  So if we make the same fatal error with not teaching peer review, we are going to repeat the same errors we have made with group projects. We must step away from this thinking that my role as an educator is to hold all power and control in the classroom.  We have to open up our classrooms to be interactive, peer-review, and restructure group dynamics.

I decided to announce my first annual, maybe semi-annual, maybe when I feel like it, technology awards. My awards are based on the 4 catfish system. Four catfish means it rates the highest achievement in technology and it’s uses in the educational sector.

 - Great program, product, or service would recommend highly

- Good program, product, or service would recommend

 - OK, but I’d wait awhile for improvements

 - A real stinker

 My first award and recipient of the four catfish award goes to JingProject. What started out as a free beta download has now become an official TechSmith product.   I’ve used Camtasia Studio and SnagIt for a number of years. Over the past year or two I’ve reconsidered how often I’ve put together tutorials for students and teachers. Now with JingProject, they can do it themselves. On JingProject’s one year anniversity, Techsmith is offering even more storage space (2 GB) plus 2 GB of transfer sound. I can’t wait to see what lessons students put together using JingProject this coming year.

 Another  four catfish award goes to Moodle.org. What started out as a collaboration with three teachers has now taken me around the country promoting the use of Moodle.  Another great free program. Moodle is revolutionizing the way teachers are teaching. And to top it off, the Moodle community is tremendous in their support of users. And it’s all free!!!

   My third four catfish award goes to Joomla! Here is another great free open source web-base program for creating websites. Like Moodle, Joomla offers an array of free extensions (Moodle refers to them as modules).  The Joomla! community is great when it comes to support.  When you look towards creating a collaborative web presence Joomla! is a great choice. It takes the creation of a website out of one person’s hands and makes it a true joint effort.

   A three catfish award goes to Apple’s Garageband. I would probably give a four catfish award if it was available on something other than a Mac.  OK settle down all you Mac devotees out there! Researching the best tool for creating podcast there is no better tool. And this is coming from someone who has been a PC person most of their technology life. I have yet to see a program on the PC side that matches the ease of use.

  A three catfish award goes to Audacity. A free open source program that is available on multiple platforms and can be used for creating podcasts. Not as user friendly as Garageband, but for free you can’t beat it!

 A two catfish award goes to Xobni (inbox spelled backwards). If you’re a Microsoft Outlook user this is a great little plug-in (and it’s free) that makes finding things so much more easier. Great for finding email attachments, previous emails from contacts, phone numbers from emails, and assorted other features. I run it on two computers, one it seems to work fine on and the second one seemed to slow down my system a bit. The other problem I had was sometimes Outlook wouldn’t start-up and I had to reboot to get it working again. However, please note that I run several, and I do me several, Outlook plug-ins along side of Xobni which may contribute to the problem.

 And my dubious one stinkin’ fish award  goes to the scanning technology at conferences in the vendor areas. It sure makes it easier to pass on your information but the amount of phone calls I get after a conference sometimes is unbearable. Look I know people are only doing their jobs and trying to earn a living but to keep calling and calling! The worst part is when you agree to purchase their product(s) and once the sales is complete it is as if you never existed. There goes the phone calls.

So there you have it my first annual, semi-annual, occasional, CATFISH AWARDS!!! If you have a program, hardware, etc that you would like to nominate for the illustrious CATFISH AWARD, please let me know.

OK, here is my frustration…I ‘ve been presenting at conferences on a regular basis for the past couple of years. I’ve setup my website and Moodle. Since setting up my Moodle I’ve had people register from all around the world.  I’ve set up discussion forums, encouraged people to participate, share their ideas, ask questions, etc. The results? Not much participation. So the question becomes (OK, this is where the pity party comes in): How much energy do I put into creating my website and Moodle if I’m having to guess what educators’ needs are? Or, what they would like to see on both sites. I know people are busy with their lives, but I think we need to encourage ourselves, as educators, as much as we encourage our students, to be active participants in our own learning.  If we remain passive receptors of information, how does this encourage learning?  So if there is anyone out there that has some suggestions, I’m listening!

We need to look beyond the factor of what looks good.  Some administrators too often can’t look beyond what appears to be technology integration. What do I mean? Comparing what “we” have with what others have doesn’t equate to being more technologically innovative. Nor does what others have versus what “we” have equate to them being so far ahead of us.  Are we worried about appearance more than content?It becomes a fashion show of hardware. School districts purchase equipment and once it is placed in the classroom it just sits there. Why? Teachers are never trained on how best to use the technology.  Comments such as, “I have five computers in my classroom and twenty-five students. How can I possibly use them?”  Most times these computers wind up being used as a “reward” for students that complete their work quickly.  Or the clamor for interactive white boards and projector units are heard to be a necessary piece of equipment. And what do they wind up being? An expensive overhead projector and transparency unit.

How do you avoid this way of bringing technology into the school? First step is to make a plan whereby teachers are given the opportunity to learn how best to integrate the technology into their classroom.  This step is usually skipped in order to quickly show-off their new equipment.  To exasperate the problem even further in tight budget times, teachers become frustrated because the money is spent on this equipment at the expense of other things including additional teachers to reduce class Until leadership takes a more proactive role in planning, it is inevitable we will repeat this pattern over and over.  We can never move forward until we break this cycle.

How often has this saying been used these days? There comes a time when a cleaver saying becomes more of a cliché than actually having meaning. “Thinking Outside the Box” has now officially entered into my cliché database.  This term is bantered about in education more often than any other saying today.

But here is my thinking. Maybe thinking outside the box isn’t really thinking outside the box. Maybe we’ve got it all wrong and the outside is in and inside is out. We are so locked into educating to perpetuate the status quo that anything outside of teaching to the test is thought of being some type of outside the box experience. And then we wonder later on why people are so enamored with these 30 second sound bites.

It is as if all of those multiple choice, true/false, and fill-in-the blanks tests has prepared us not to question anything. Just get the quick answer and don’t scratch below the surface to explore any further.  We learn that the answer must be a, b, c, or d and then carry this over to adulthood accepting those 30 second sound bites as fact. Never questioning beyond the surface.

So, perhaps we are already thinking outside the box and that is the problem.  If we really want to move education beyond this state, we must move our teaching methods towards a more applicable experience for our students.  Utilizing concepts put forth with Web 2.0 tools is just one avenue to explore in making education a more interactive experience.

Something that has got me thinking lately is how technology is being used today in the classroom. From student management systems to Accelerated Reader, teachers are finding the convenience of technology to beneficial. But the question must be asked, how is this benefiting students and the educational process? It is with a bit of apprehension I raise this question. I don’t want this to be an opportunity to “blame the teacher.” However, more of a reflective questioning of where we are going with technology. The idea of using testing software that comes with some of the text books has also been another technology tool teachers have felt to be beneficial. Or the rationalization that “I’m continuing to use this software because students are used to it or comfortable.” Is it the students or the teacher? Ok, not to get everyone up in arms. Granted teachers have been burdened with more and more responsibilities over the years. However, do we use the technology to reduce the workload regardless of the long term effects? Take for example Accelerated Reader (AR). Teachers will talk about the program boosting students interest in reading. However, how often had the program been used as a convenient tool to dismiss the reflection and analytical aspects of reading. It isn’t to say AR is good or bad, but more on the implementation of the program. As Sadusky and Brem indicate in their study, “The Integration of Renaissance Programs into an Urban Title I Elementary School, and its Effect on School-wide Improvement” , point out “These misconceptions are not the responsibility of any one group or aspect of the program. They are fueled by some program design elements, political pressure over accountability, and misconceptions held by parents, teachers and students. Based upon our surveys, interviews, and focus groups, we believe that the dominant model of assessment at the school is what we term the “high-stakes testing” model, which stresses summative evaluation, striving for perfect performance, little feedback and contextualization, and substantial, long-lasting consequences.” Others, such as Krashen, show that “the results presented here strongly suggest that of the four aspects of AR, access to books, time devoted to reading, tests, and rewards, only the first two are supported by research. If the focus is on competition and rewards for number of points the reading aspect becomes secondary to the need to outpoint peers or win the reward. Can the same be said of other software used in the classroom. After attending numerous conferences and walking through the vendors displays I am too often left with the sense that technology integration is lost in the process. As has been the case in some presentations that I’ve done, teachers will say to me “I don’t have time to do that” when explaining the more constructivist approach toward technology. But give them a good testing software program that complements their textbook and they are all for it! So is it convenience or integration? Perhaps again we need to focus on professional development and the lack there of. If we continually expect teachers to integrate technology then we must give them the opportunity to see how it fits into their everyday classroom. Also, if the administrative focus is on what “looks good” rather than integration then we are fighting an uphill battle. If the opportunity isn’t there to learn then we are simply spending a lot of money on a whole lot for appearances.

What does it take for people to be active members in a learning environment?  Is there a magical answer to this question?  The reason I pose this question is due to my wondering how do you get people involved with technology integration.  For example, I’ve started to build a moodle (<a href=”http://www.techinedonline.com/moodle”>http://www.techinedonline.com/moodle</a>) with various topics being covered. I’ve noticed quite a few people coming to this site, but not a single comment, suggestions, request, etc.  So I’m left to ponder whether building such a site is a worthwhile adventure or is simply providing a repository of information enough.  I enjoy putting this site together and offering information to others.  However, it’s hard to know what direction to take with this site without knowing what peoples’ needs are or what they are looking for.

Now don’t get me wrong, I understand people have other things happening in their lives and taking the time to respond is not a priority. However, this is the same dilemma I’m faced with in my work.  How do you get people to use the knowledge and resources at hand in order to better integrate technology into the classroom? Are expectations too high?  I ran into this situation a couple years ago when I introduced the concept of a discussion forum for teachers to use as a way of communicating with each other, as well as offering their own knowledge to share with others? Guess how many people participated? At first, a few people posted to the forums but those numbers quickly faded within the first couple of months.  I also setup a Tips and Tricks website for teachers. And what was the reaction? Most people stated they would just rather ask me then look at the site.  What strikes me as being somewhat baffling is that we tell our students to look for the answers rather then come to the teacher to give you the answer. Yet, we often do the same thing that we attempt to dissuade our students from doing.

Alan November, last week at the “TechForum Northeast 2007″ talked about how he had peoples’ blogs tied into his course website and still had people adding to it now even though the course ended this past spring.  I think I’ll try that within my moodle and see what happens. His thinking, which I agree with, is that people need to have some connection or feeling of ownership for it to be successful. I also liked his idea of using Skype to open up lines of communications. I’ll continue to offer skypecasts over the next few weeks (look for notices here) to see what kind of responses I get.  I’ll have more to say about last week’s conference later on.