Wednesday, December 26, 2012

Revolutionizing Education through NPR

Over break I'm taking some time to Build capacity.  To find ways to plant seeds of ideas so that when I return to the educational system I can find ways to improve our systems.


I had a chance to listen to the TED Radio hour.  This is a new show on NPR that takes a TED talk and combines it with dialog and conversation.

This radio show with Sir Ken Robinson is where he gets a chance to expand on his famous TED talk on how Schools are killing creativity.  Awesome stuff!



Sunday, December 16, 2012

What am I to do?

In the wake of the Newtown shootings I've been in a state of unrest.  Much like the rest of the educators in the world I'm sure.  

Today's homily at my church (link coming soon) gave me focus.  The topic being, "What is mine to do?"

In light of the recent upheaval I feel it's time to think, reflect and refocus.  What am I to do in light of such a horrific tragedy?

I am to:

  • cherish every moment with ever student. Especially the tough moments.

  • care deeply about ever student. Go beyond the surface.

  • provide the best opportunity, using the talents I am given, to learn, grow, and share.

  • provide safety and security at all times.

  • provide a shoulder to lean on when a student or colleague needs it.

  • leave every day having done everything I can for every person I meet.

  • meet every day with a "YES!" and provide that same answer when asked if I can help.

  • build strong relationships with students.

  • build strong relationships with parents.

  • realize the curriculum is important, but more important is the time I spend with each of my students and colleagues.

  • ensure that my classroom is a place where teachers/students can take risks, learn from mistakes, and develop their passion.

  • share my passion with my students and colleagues.

  • approach life with love, everyday.


Monday, December 10, 2012

Check Yo'Self Before You Wreck Yourself!

Our district is continuing it's look at Marzano's Art and Science of Teaching.  This post is a look at Chapter 7 entitled:  What will I do to recognize and acknowledge adherence and lack of adherence to classroom rules and procedures?

The more schools I walk through the more I see "respect," "honesty," and "perseverance" posters and hallways.  I always laugh at these posters simply because what do they really do?  Do students look at them and think: "You know what, I was going to give up, but now that I saw that poster.  I'm going to try my best."  No, that never happens.  The posters the PBIS programs, all those things don't mean near as much as effective classroom management and supervision.

All of the suggestions given in Marzano's chapter 7 depend on one thing.  They depend on the teacher's ability to build strong, lasting relationships with students.  If students know you care about them, then the following strategies will work for your room.  If you don't care about them, none of these will work.

The BEST thing in this chapter is the very last action step:

Design an Overall Plan for Disciplinary Problems.

This action step asks teachers to design a predetermined plan for how you will deal with typical classroom behaviors, both when there is a disruption and when every things goes as planned.  WHat will you do?!

Plan for it, as the saying goes:
"If you fail to plan, then you are planning to fail."

Here are the rest of the takeaways from the chapter:


  • Students adherence to classroom rules should be recognized and acknowledged
  • Reinforcement - straight positive consequences
  • Punishment - negative consequences
  • no immediate consequences - as it says
  • punishment and reinforcement - combination of consequences both positive and negative
  • Data shows that interventions reduce disruptive behavior work in public schools
  • Teachers should seek a healthy balance in rewards and punishment
  • Don't reward people for doing the things they are suppose to do
  • Don't let students focus on the reward
  • Rewards and punishment should BOTH enhance student learning.
  • Token economies are a way to rate and reward positive behavior
  • Teacher reaction can be an intervention
  • "Withitness" is used to describe the teacher that knows what's happening in ALL parts of the room.
  • Notes to Parents that can include email or phone calls work to celebrate success and to redirect poor behavior
  • Drastic situations and interventions can include a teacher and parent conversation.  
    • Consider taking it to their house at night.  
    • That'll redirect the behavior or give you, the teacher, a better perspective on why a behavior is happening.
  • Tangible recognition is any recognition of student adherence to rules and procedures
  • Color coding behavior is typical in elementary schools.  Use a card on the desk to note student performance.
  • Be Proactive - know if something is going on and head situations off before they happen
  • Occupy the Room - Walk around, make eye contact, get to every student, every day!
  • Notice potential problems - Like being proactive, head them off before they happen.
  • Use a series of gradual actions
    • Notice the problem
    • Look at the students
    • Move closer
    • speak directly to/at them
  • Use group contingency - "We're all in this together"
  • Recognize when a student is out of control
    • Step back
    • Calm yourself
    • Listen actively
    • Calm student
    • Repeat simple requests
    • isolate the student from the room

Friday, November 30, 2012

WAR, What is it good for? Absolutely EVERYTHING?

W.A.R. in baseball stands for "Wins above replacement."  It's a baseball statistic described by wikipedia as: 

Wins Above Replacement, commonly known as WAR, is a non-standardized sabermetric baseball statistic that is used to show how many more wins a player would give a team as opposed to a "replacement level", or minor league/bench player at that position.  
From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wins_above_replacement


Edwin Star believes has his own belief about War.  He asks "War, what is it good for?"  
He claims "Absolutely nothing."


I could not disagree more!

When we think of WAR, wins above replacement this makes me think of education.  Wins above replacement (a sub).  When I walk into a class are you providing a learning experience unlike any other.  What is your WAR?

When I first started teaching I always strived for a classroom that "ran itself."  When I work with teachers and talk about "flipteaching"  teachers always ask "Well, what will they need me for then?"  


If you think a video can replace you, then it should!

The environment you provide, the relationship you create with a student, the desire to learn you grow, collaborating and connecting with students families and the community impact your WAR.

When you think about what you provide every day for students.  Are you providing an environment, an experience, a lesson that is statistically better than a replacement could give?  What added benefits are you bringing to the table?  

Challenge yourself every day in your school to provide a unique opportunity that is special.  Build lasting, compassionate relationships with students and families.  Ensure that your connection and experience you provide is without replacement.

They always say:




That may be true for the next warm body to fill the space.  But I guarantee their WAR won't be as high as mine.

So you ask, "WAR, good God y'all, What is it good for?"  Possibly EVERYTHING?!

Mad props to @mrsenorhill, @ideaguy42, @ahintofcinnamon, and @desertdiver for the idea for this post.

Tuesday, November 20, 2012

What is the next chapter for edcuation?

Today I had the opportunity to watch Bill Rankin's discussion on the next page of education:




My takeaways:


Amazing technological changes don't do a thing to culture.
  • The problem with education is us...
  • "We use to do it this way, now we'll do it a slightly different way..."
  • We've seen the enemy and it is us.  
  • I want to see my students learn more, then in-turn don't I need to learn more?
  • Letting other people move ahead gives us an excuse to not to.

We cannot focus on the technology without focusing on the culture.

  • It's time for everyone to be involved.
  • All contributions are important.
  • New technologies allow us to localize education.

SHIFT in education must move the students to the center:

  • Customizing education to fit YOUR needs.
  • Getting the tool "I" need means we cannot have a one-size-fits-all solution.
  • When will we realize we are teachers first and content specialists second?
Engagement

  • How are we ALL connected?  Why aren't we capitalizing on it?
  • Increasing anytime and anywhere learning.
  • How long until the tools become invisible?
  • The days with the single teacher in front of the class with the book has passed.
  • Teachers are becoming CO-LEARNERS.
  • How can kids get prepared outside of class to go in-depth inside of class.
  • Every child needs to have THEIR OWN personal device.
We are at the beginning of the SHIFT to ubiquity of access.  

  • We are heading to a mobile environment.
  • Kids are significantly ahead of us as teachers. (we often get in their way)
  • Kids have games and life apps on their mobile device.  We are missing the opportunity to design GREAT apps to engage students in learning.
Instead of letting technology influence the classroom, let's think about what we want our classroom to look like.  

  • Keep the outcomes in mind!
  • Technology is focused and supportive to the goal.
  • Funding is an issue.  You've got to "bring your own."
  • Assessments need to be embedded.
WOW! as we continue to discuss curating our own textbook.  I continue to wonder.....

  • Will a Digital resource or really anything technology related change the culture?
  • How do you change the culture of education in your building or district?
  • How can we SHIFT the focus from the teacher to the learner?

Sunday, November 11, 2012

Reflecting on EdcampKC

Educators Never Cease to Amaze me....

I recently got back from #EdcampKC and I am refresher, recharged, and excited about education as whole.

EdcampKC was held November 10th at Lee Summit North High School.  The entire event was led and organized by Kyle Pace, Steve J. Moore, and Laura Gilchrist.

The event is an "unconference" and is designed to be entirely led by the people in attendance.  The sessions presented are decided the day of and people are charged to collaborate and share their passions, ideas, questions and conversations.

Here are some resources I found from the day:




When I got home I used http://searchhash.com/ to download all the tweets and read through them:

TOP TWEETERS: @Mrskmpeters= 67 @usamimi74 = 53 ME! = 43 @ELanghorst = 40@stevejmoore = 39 J

Capturing the day:

Images from the day: http://www.flickr.com/photos/gilchristlaura/sets/72157631980875287/

Who Tweeted:


What did they say in their tweet?



Wednesday, November 7, 2012

Reading Levels for Everyone!

So I was discussing with a group of teachers how easy it is these days to take ANYthing you come across and determine it's reading level.  Differentiating for even the most struggling readers has never been this easy.

First of all, let's talk about finding resources:

To find great resources.

Did you know that you can use Google search to search by reading level for a student, Here's how:
GREAT!

Now, what if you already have something and want to evaluate it's reading level.  Not that hard either.

1.  Copy and paste the document or website into microsoft word.
Click Tools, Grammer and Spelling, Options












Then Click "show readability statistics"




Nice!

What about resources for Online.  

Online Resources:

Book title, Author or ISBN number into: http://lexile.com/
Also Lexile has an analyzer that's pretty good but you have to register: http://lexile.com/analyzer/

Copy and paste the web address, paste text, or embed this into your webpage of something you find here: http://www.read-able.com/

Test a book using Scholastic Book wizard: http://www.scholastic.com/bookwizard/


DIY Method

CAUTION: Math involved!

You can use a formula to calculate Flesch-Kincaid reading level on your own. This is a good tool to determine whether a book is going to challenge you.
1. Select a few paragraphs to use as your base.
2. Calculate the average number of words per sentence. Multiply the result by 0.39
3. Calculate the average number of syllables in words (count and divide). Multiply the result by 11.8
4. Add the two results together
5. Subtract 15.59
The result will be a number that equates to a grade level. For example, a 6.5 is a sixth grade reading level result.

Mad props and thanks to great educators on twitter:
I love having  Professional Learning Network (PLN) to rely on!
and of course

Have any other resources you love?  Add them in the comments section:

Thursday, November 1, 2012

Never Work Harder Than Your Students: Chapter 3

We are doing a book club with our 2nd and 3rd year teachers in our district and reading the book Never Work Harder than your students.

Chapter 3 could be summed up as:

If you don't believe in yourself, who can you believe in?


Some of the main Take-aways I have from chapter 3 are as follows:


  • We drag kids through curriculum
  • We need to look at the expectations we have for ourselves before we can expect things from kids
  • The difference between the expectation and the standard is:
    • Standard is the bar
    • Expectation is your belief that the students can reach the bar
  • Just because you raised the standard doesn't mean that you have also altered your belief that kids can reach those standards.
  • If you believe students won't meet the standard, then that belief will play out in your classroom.
  • An expectation is the confidence that something will happen
An expectation is what you get when you multiply the probability of an occurrence and the value of that occurrence.

  • Beliefs are what we think is true
  • Values are what we think something is worth
  • Our expectations are the intersection between what we believe about our teaching situation and our own abilities to handle it and what we believe is important.


  • Blind belief in our own talent
  • Bet to take anything and turn it into something better
Teachers go to work believing they will end up with a masterpiece, not because the raw material they are working with has some innate potential but because of the power of their own ability to create a masterpiece.




It's about you...
  • Students pick up on our expectations fairly quickly.  They then formulate judgements about the kind of teacher we are and decide how hard they will work in our classroom
  • If we believe in the student, we will pull out all the stops.
  • If we are not confident in our ability, we will lower our expectations
  • lowered expectations is a self-protective measure
  • You want to raise expectations of your students, you first have to raise your expectations of yourself
  • Rather than focus on the problem, focus on how to solve the problem
Stockdale Paradox
  • Optimism creates despair
  • Never confuse faith that you will prevail in the end with the discipline to confront the most difficult of reality.
Have faith in yourself
  • If we believe what we are doing is important, we are more likely there is a way to prevail
  • Faith based on your ideals, what you believe is important
  • Do you value your students following your rules, being quiet and cooperative?
  • Do you value engaging activities with the material and learn to be critical thinkers and effective communication.
  • What do you value?  When you determine what you value, you will determine your faith...
Confront your reality
  • The way we decide what to focus on is what we value.
Our beliefs function as a filter through which we sift our reality.
  • Our decisions are based on our beliefs and the magnitude of our teaching task as well as our own abilities.
  • Asking the right questions will grant you the opportunity to change your beliefs or let them be challenged.
  • Be humble enough to know that you don't have all the answers
  • Be willing to "stop" doing something you are doing...
  • When you get data or information do you use it as an opportunity to blame someone or to improve?
Whole Equation
  • Balance your focus on both sides of the paradox
  • What can I do today to move toward my goal despite the reality of my circumstances?
  • How do you see your individual reality?

Wrap it up...

If a student is failing, then it means that I haven't found the right way to get through to them.

Qantas model of edcuation


Today I got to attend a Keynote presentation by Joel Davies (more on Joel) from Apple.  He was presenting on "Flipping the classroom: Sticking the landing."

He made me laugh out loud on this thought:

Education today is the Qantas Model:

  • Sit down
  • Face forward
  • Strap in
  • Turn of all portable electronic devices
  • If you're lucky your trip will be relevant
  • You may resume your life in a few hours
Work hard today and tomorrow to break that mold...

DING!

You are now free to revolutionize education...

Monday, October 29, 2012

We Sit'n here talk'n bout practice...Not a game, not a game, Practice!

Our district is currently doing a book study on the Art and Science of Teaching.


See other posts here:

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 6
Chapter 8

This chapter is on giving students opportunities to deepen their understanding.

Or as Allen Iverson would say, We're going to use the Blog post to talk about PRACTICE!


MISCONCEPTION ALERT!
Deepening your understanding does not mean doing the same thing to the same depth that was done before.  That is just practicing, which is fine for somethings.  Deepening means going to the next depth of knowledge.

My take-aways are:

  • Students need opportunities to practice new skills and deepen their understanding of new information.
  • Students need time to extend their thinking
  • Part of this process is students recognizing their own misconceptions
  • "Students need a sound foundation to build new awareness."
  • Determine what kind of learning they need it is skill based (procedural) or knowledge based (declarative)
  • Assign tasks as determined by kind of learning they are doing...
Building new awareness:
  • Schema Development
    • linking old learning and new
    • challenge existing perceptions
  • Procedural knowledge
    • the "do" of a learning goal
    • develops from declarative knowledge
    • involves adding, editing, and delting steps
    • fully developed seems automatic
    • also termed as "fluency"
    • Need for practice to make this automatic
    • guided practice involves "gradual shaping of a procedure facilitated by teacher guidance"
    • OVER TIME PROCEDURAL KNOWLEDGE IS SHAPED BY THE LEARNER.
  • Developing Declarative Knowledge
    • reviewing and revision are key
    • Students need at least 4 exposures to integrate something into their existing knowledge base. (Rovee-Collier, Nuthall)
    • No more than 2 days between exposures (Think about this as it relates to Professional development)
    • Ways to improve declarative knowledge
      • revision - as in writing
      • error analysis - revising ones own thinking
      • Similarities and differences - think Venn Diagram, classification also work
      • homework - extends learning opportunities that are limited byt he school day
Facts about homework (Don't shoot the messenger, I don't like homework either)
  • Relationship between amount of homework students do and their achievement level were found positive and statistically significant.
  • No clear benefits of homework at the lower levels (below grade 6)
  • Homework should:
    • Foster good study habits
    • foster positive attitude toward school
  • There is no correlation between time spent on homework and student achievement
  • For secondary students there are benefits to homework up to one to two hours a night, after that it diminishes greatly.
  • It's not the time spent on homework but the proportion completed that impacts achievement
  • Parent involvement with homework is positive when:
    • There are clear roles
    • Parents are not experts
    • Parents can ask clarifying questions to help students summarize
  • Give students practice, but make it focused, and meaningful
Action steps for your classroom:

1.  Let students find similarities and differences often (compare, classify, create metaphors, analogies)
2.  Help students identify errors in thinking (faulty logic, attacks, weak reference, misinformation)
3.  Practice, Practice, Practice.... Structure practice, gradual release, develop fluency)
4.  Use Cooperative groups with a focused intent
5.  Assign PURPOSEFUL homework
6.  Allow students time to make corrections in their notebooks/journals/blogposts/googledoc files.


Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Textbooks: They Just Don't Add Up

I'm going to be blunt: I hate textbooks.

I've been in my new position now for a couple months and I have heard so much discussion about textbooks that really frustrates me.  I'm working on how to have this conversation and here are my selling points:


First off, I read a Genius post by Tom Whitby @tomwhitby:
http://tomwhitby.wordpress.com/2012/03/20/we-dont-need-no-stinkn-textbooks-beyondthetextbook/

Second, I borrowed the technique of the math from Tony DiLaura @anthonydilaura


Now, here's some math I'm going to use to have conversations with my colleagues:

Buying 40 books per 4 teacher team:

$67/book x 160 books =
$10,720



So let's work with that budget:


What if teacher’s made the “book”?

4 teachers = $100/day (for subs) = $400/day


At $400/day we could take 4 teachers out of the classroom for 26.8 days and create a textbook of our own.


Can we make a better book in 26.8 days?

That's not ideal AT ALL, but at least it seems doable.

Now imagine if we "paid" teachers to do it outside of the work day.....


If we assumed $15-$20 per hour in the summer/after school time x 4 teachers/grade level for a total of $60-$80 per hour....

the $10,720 budget to pay teachers would mean we could have anywhere from 134 to 178 hours of work to pay (dare I say invest in) teachers to make their own book.

Can we do it better? Can we do a better job of keeping it updated? Allow it to be ours?

What if we "OPEN SOURCED" our learning?


Can you believe that video is from 2006!!!!!!!!!!!! And we are still having this conversation.


I mean let's be crazy:

What if we published it and sold it online? To schools and homeschool organizations?


I know I drank the "apple Kool-Aid," but
Let's be honest, they do it better...

There are many pieces of technology available to help us.  What if we purchased 4 Macbook Airs ($4000) and downloaded the iBooks Author Software (FREE) (Tony's How to) as well as the pages app ($40) that leaves us with over $6000 to pay teachers or subs to make our own book....

I just don't get it, let's just face it, purchasing textbooks just doesn't add up...

Thursday, October 11, 2012

Overcoming Apathy

One of my favorite shirt on Mental floss is

As I have been learning and growing in my new position I have noticed an interesting trend.

One trend of interest to me is complaining.  Now I have been lucky that being the new guy nobody complains to me, yet....

Here's my thinking about complaining:

We all experience problems through out our day.  Being able to have the initiative to overcome that problem and make the decision to find/provide a solution in not natural to everyone.  A lot of this relates back to chemistry and activation energy required to begin a chemical reaction.

I realize that some teachers just need to vent and complain, getting from problem to solution is not easy:
Some teachers complain because they just need help getting from point A to point B:



Many teachers see a problem and immediate begin working toward solutions, they are always the "do-ers" and immediately work toward solutions.
People are much like reactants in a chemical reaction.  When I work with teachers I am striving, in my new position, to get from problem to solution and to be that catalyst:



I very much see my job as being the person to lower the activation energy.  Helping teachers to solve problems and achieve their goals.

How can we all see ourself as catalysts and work together to overcome the activation energy?

At the beginning of the year I show my students this video:



I use it for the remainder of the year when a kid sees a problem, I ask them if they are stuck on an escalator and if they are working to solve their problems.  Sometimes they just need me to lower that activation energy and help in any way I can to assist them in achieving their goals.

Saturday, October 6, 2012

Cornerstone Tasks


I've been working hard at Understanding the CCSS and it's implications for Curriculum development in my role as facilitator (coordinator).  People ask me questions everyday about how it will impact our curriculum.  

I've been saying in a nutshell it will cause us to rewrite and rethink.

Read my post on CCSS here then check this out:

Cornerstone tasks are opportunities for student to USE knowledge and skill they have learned throughout a unit or duration of study in order to INDEPENDENTLY demonstrate their learning.

These tasks are REALISTIC in nature.  Have an authentic audience (See Ron Berger, An Ethic of Excellence)

Cornerstone Tasks involve MANY:
  • CCSS
  • Content standards
  • 21st century skills (creativity, technology use, teamwork, etc.)
These cornerstone tasks "honor the intent of the standard within and across subject areas."

This SCREAMS Project, Problem, Passion and Game-based learning. 


See my post here on Curriculum Models throughout time....

Cornerstone tasks are designed to reoccur from grade-level to grade-level progressing from simpler to more sophisticated.  From more scaffolded to more autonomous in nature.

As we continue down the road of learning about the CCSS and begin looking at other standards, outcomes and expectations from areas such as NCSS, NCHE, NGSS, and others we MUST be so moved to revision items that impact our alignment:

1.  Our grading practices from points to standards based
2.  Our summative assessments from paper/pencil to something more authentic
3.  Out schedule from math only happens from 8:47 - 9:33 to when it's needed for the project
4.  Our role as educators from holder of knowledge to advocator of learning
5.  Our training of new teachers
6.  Our model of checklists and scope and sequences to Cornerstone Tasks

We will not be able to meet the myriad of tasks and performance outcomes simply by making a list and checking it off.  We MUST throw the goals and outcomes off the table, start fresh with these cornerstone tasks (project, problems, games, and passions) and pull in standards when and where they fit.


The CCSS will eventually cause us to change our thinking from:


Scope and sequence/step by step/1st hour, 2nd hour, 3rd hour


to this:

Theme/Project/Student-Centered/Passion-Driven/Cornerstone Task centered


Support and resources:



Images from:
Cornerstone - http://www.stonehouseconsulting.com/Benchmarking/Cornerstone_files/cornerstone-altered.jpg
Dominos - http://datejesus.com/falling_dominoes.jpg