Technology in Education

A few impressive notes on technology:

1.  I knew wikipedia was fast.   I have a passing interest in American Idol.  Mainly because I know all my students are watching it.  So I turn on the show and miss the first few “eliminations”.  I think “hmm…wikipedia?”.  I check in and the INSTANT one of the contestants is eliminated the wikipedia entry is updated.  Do we think Fox has a wikipedia person? 

2. The open classroom project was highlighted by AOL this week.  I took the time to look at the MIT site.  Its amazing.   Universities are putting all the content for their courses online, including the actual lectures.  Some of the lectures are very impressive.  This is obviously first and foremost a marketing tool.  If MIT’s professors start being shown in high school classes around the world they have a huge advantage.   Take the time to look through the content.  Many other schools are doing this as well.

I would love to do this at my school.  Every teacher has at least one lesson that they are great at.  We should post them.  Otherwise they get lost forever.  Also, each school has at least one teacher who is truly exceptional or teaches an exceptional subject.  They should be available to the whole community (local, national, global).

Mike Wesch and Scott McLeod recently posted about anti-teaching.  Stepping away from lecture delivery systems and encouraging more student responsibility in learning.  David Warlick talks about this often.  Creating conversations.

 I think of my own education.  The teachers that I learned from the most were incredibly disciplined, but there was no question that the student was leading the way.  I have a music background.  The best ensemble directors asked us to surprise them.  To create someting new and exciting in a piece of music that had been played countless times before.

In many of our classes the same worksheets are passed out each year.  The lecture on the Civil War is the same lecture that was given in 1980.  The textbooks were written in 1995.  And many of these teachers wonder why their students don’t get excited about the subject they teach.  Many of our schools are not set up for innovation.  Many schools frown upon it.  Many students rebel and think “anti-teaching” is “not-teaching”.

How can we effect change on a level outside of our classroom?  There is study after study about the inability for educational reform to penetrate at the classroom level (the only level that counts).  Will it take a “revolution” by the students?  What if they rebel and just start blogging with their phones, uploading video, creating content during school?  Will students make us change?

After reading posts by Will Richardson (about Barrack Obama creating a social network website) and Vicki Davis taking about youtube I was wondering how many schools, universities, or corporations, are using the power of “many voices” to network together.

Email has done wonders to connect us, but is anyone truly creating a working social network in a  school? I think it would be prudent for schools to invest the time to create in-house networks instead of allowing mySpace and youtube to be the exclusive social networks for our students.  We should be using these networks to improve student learning.

We used a google map tool today that was very easy for the kids to use.  Routebuilder.  Works really well.  Good tool for planning bike routes or runs as well. 

Here is a link to the assignment we did.

Technorati Tags: routebuilder webdesign

I am in a new job this year teaching web design.  I thought it might be productive to talk a little about what we use and maybe people can give suggestions for other hardware/software.

Dreamweaver: Our district uses Macromedia.  In my previous district I used Frontpage.  Both are very similar.  If web design is a class about coding I can see how Dreamweaver would be effective.  If it is about design/communication then I don’t think it really matters.

Synchroneyes:  We purchased this program in December.  I love it.  I can view and control every students screen, I can broadcast any students screen, I can show videos, I can block internet.  I have control of the classroom and I can model work much easier.

Classblogmeister: David Warlick’s blog engine is a bit awkward to use but it is free and he is incredibly responsive when things go wrong.  Kids write a lot!

iPod: Our district blocks podcasts and doesn’t allow iPods in school.  I’m working on it…

teacherease.com : I use this for grading.  Very easy to use and powerful.  Students and parents have password access to grades and report.

Technorati Tags: blogmeister Dreamweaver webdesign synchroneyes Warlick

Reading Tim Lauer’s blog I came across this lecture by Hans Rosling about the gapminder tool.  Absolutely mesmerizing way to look at data.

Click here to look at life expectancy over time.  All the dots are “smart” (you can view what country they represent) and you can play with the years on the bottom.  The effort to make data searchable and presentable is awesome.  Will we need students who have a high level of understanding of geography, graphing, and data manipulations?  Absolutely.

Technorati Tags: TimLauer Rosling gapminder

Education has certainly been a series of trends.  A few things are obvious in the current trends:

1. Racial and ethnic diversity is increasing.  With that comes language diversity.
2. Writing and reading is being profoundly changed by technology.  The whole read/write web idea is becoming the norm for our students.  Except in the classroom.
3. Authentic expereinces are the norm in law, medical, music, etc..schools.  But it is rare to find authentic experience in secondary or elementary schools (and probably most universities).

Are we converting from a largely written tradition back to an oral tradition?  Will youtube profoundly change how we communicate?  Should we be doing much more grading of the conversation, and less grading of the worksheet?

Currently I am taking my classes to be certified as a school administrator.  I am surprised at how little these issues are talked about.  While we talk a lot about diversity we talk little about the profound technological shifts going on.  I am worried that the next generation of administrators will not be prepared for this challenge.