Edubloggers!

Trying to decide on edubloggers to respond to was rather daunting. Simply Googling "edublogs" was overwhelming; I had no idea where to start. Also, I felt like every time I came across someone promising, the blog hadn't been updated in 2 or more years. While that doesn't negate the quality of the existing content, if I'm going to become invested in a blogger enough to follow them semi-regularly, I'd like them to be someone who updates more than once in a blue moon...

(Visual representation of updating frequency)

After some searching, I came across some edubloggers that I think are worth checking out. The first is Shelley Wright, from Wright's Room. She's a high school teacher from Canada, and shares some interesting perspectives from teaching in all grades K-12. I particularly liked her most recent post, about the importance of "Why," and why it is that we should always make our lessons purposeful and challenging. She offers some "As a Teacher" goals, including striving to be less helpful to students. And I see where she's coming from on that. Constantly giving students the answer doesn't really help them learn. It's ok for students to struggle a little bit in the process of coming to an answer. Not automatically offering assistance doesn't mean you're a bad teacher. Obviously, there's a time and place for all strategies, but in the case of the unchallenged high schooler that Mrs. Wright details in this post, NOT being given the answers is what leads to more involvement on the part of the student. 

So far in this program, I've read countless articles and posts and whole books on policy and strategy and method. And they're all incredibly valuable. But, it was refreshing to look through Mrs. Mimi's "It's not all Flowers and Sausages"blog. She's an elementary school teacher, but a lot of the issues she encounters are applicable across all grade levels. While I don't think it's productive to always be complaining about things out of your control, it's nice to read from someone who is being "real" about her practice. She talks about "classroom juju," which means that for every bad day you have, there is almost guaranteed to be a better day around the corner. Because, let's face it: in the classroom, you WILL have bad days. The lesson you carefully crafted might fall flat, the internet might go down and ruin the chance for you to lead with some great clips, etc, etc. We're all in this because we love teaching and want to be the best educators that we can be, but I think it's also useful to be reminded that it's ok if things don't always go perfectly. Also, as someone who is still student teaching, it's nice to hear that even experienced teachers have "one of those days." All that matters is how you bounce back from them.

Webinar Night

Heading into our webinar assignment, I was a little apprehensive, mostly just because it seemed like a lot of little technological things to keep straight, and I wasn't sure if I'd be able to. However, having made it to the other side, I am pleasantly surprised with how well everything went. My group and I were able to work the Blackboard Collaborate site without much trouble, and we seemed to have got a lot of positive feedback from classmates.
First, a word on Blackboard Collaborate. At first glance (from watching an old webinar), it seemed kind of complicated, and seemed like there was a lot to keep track of. But, with minimal run-through time, our webinar went off without many complications. The controls for the site are pretty intuitive and straight-forward, and any time we had an issue it was pretty easy to figure out. For example, we wondered how to mute everyone else's microphones in our room without going through and manually disabling each permission. Turns out, there's a button for that. Our only issue came with turning the mic on and off, which we overlooked at the beginning of the webinar. Additionally, I hit "stop recording" at the end of our session, but did not turn the mic back off, so the listeners still in the room heard us chatting for a minute or two before we realized what was happening. (My bad, guys!) Overall, I'd consider working with the Blackboard platform again, because it was pretty easy to use and can be shared easily with others.
The tool we presented on was Google Classroom. I won't go too in-depth about it here, in part because I've already talked about it a fair amount in the last week. Basically, it is easily customizable and be as much or as little as you need it to be. I think this was a good tool to share with our classmates, because it can be used across all disciplines in a number of different ways. I'd also like to think that the high turnout for our webinar was because this is such a great tool, but I also realize we had a fairly convenient time slot... This presentation was valuable for me as well becuase it allowed me more time to play around with Google Classroom and gain familiarity with the site, which I can definitely see myself using in the future. I'm not sure what the tech situation in my future job(s) will be like, so I can't speak to in-class use right now, but I think the site is really great for organization outside of class time.
On one last note, I wanted to say how much fun I had with this project. Part of that was just because I was working with two clowns, but being in the Brandon Center with everyone prepping and listening to each others' webinars was a really nice experience. It was fun to see what everyone else had come up with, and having everyone together working on the same thing was a great vibe. Yay dolphilians!

Call Me, Beep Me

Where would our favorite crime fighter have been if she didn't have her cellie on her 24/7, even in the classroom...?

But really, the use of cell phones in schools has come up several times over our time in this course, and it was Liz Kolb's recent presentation to our class that put a spotlight on the issue. She is an advocate for using cell phones and other portable devices in the classroom, as a way to encourage greater student interaction with the material.

One point that she raised was related to why more schools aren't adopting a pro-cell phone policy (though, as she noted in her presentation, the number of schools that are cell-friendly has grown dramatically over the last several years). In an interview on the subject, she notes that most administrators in charge of making technology decisions did not grow up with the same kind of devices (or in some cases, any devices) that students today are using. They simply aren't familiar with them, and thus have a hard time envisioning their place in the classroom. While I can understand where such administrators are coming from, I also think that maybe they aren't considering the issue carefully enough. I mean, look at most smartphones today. They do practically everything for you. And most administrators that I've met so far are at least familiar with what an iPhone is/what it can do, if they don't already have one themselves. To some extent, how can you NOT think up at least one use for it in schools?

In terms of classroom use, I really like the polling sites that Liz introduced us to. In my methods class we've been working on writing lesson plans, and one of the trickiest areas to find activities for seems to be formative assessments. Tools for this need to be direct and easy to implement in a short amount of time in order for them to be really effective, and letting students take a poll with their phones strikes me as a really simple way to get student feedback in real-time, without taking up too much instructional time.

Of course, there are drawbacks, which I think have been pretty heavily outlined. One solution that Liz points to in terms of making students more responsible with their technology is the need for some kind of appropriate use education. It's one thing for students to sign an appropriate use "contract" at the beginning of the year and leave it at that, but I think (and have probably mentioned before in other posts) that it's important to teach students WHY they need to be responsible and HOW to go about doing this. Digital native students have for the most part always had technology and social media as a part of their lives, and treat it as an extension of their being. Liz brings up an important point when she notes that just because you send something using your personal device, doesn't mean it's personal to you. Educating students on the vast and interconnected nature of the internet, and the power that is held in their devices, is essentially for creating citizens who will responsibly and sensibly utilize the technological opportunities in front of them.

Tech Tools

All of the "Tech Tools in Use" presentations thus far have been really interesting (WHAT UP FAKEBOOK!?), but I was especially intrigued by the podcasting presentation. Podcasts are something that I've looked at a handful of times before, but I'm not even sure I've ever listened to one all the way through... That being said, I wasn't exactly sure how I'd use this tool in my classroom, but now I think I have a few ideas forming.
Probably the most obvious use would be to either play podcasts in class, or assign listening to one as homework (or provide something like Grammar Girl as a resource for students who wanted extra clarification). To be honest, I'm not sure HOW often I'd do this, but if I came across something especially relevant, I'd certainly be open to working it into a lesson.
Of the many resources that that Laura, Kelsey, Greg, and Nathan presented, the ones that really stuck with me were the voice recording ones like Google Voice and Vocaroo. Before this presentation, I knew that Google Voice was a thing that existed and that people used, but that was about it. Now, I would definitely consider getting a Google Voice account specifically for my classes. That way, I could give my students a way to reach me with questions, without running the risk of being woken up in the middle of the night by someone who waited to 1 am to start their project (though, let's be honest, I'm not in bed by 1 am these days...). I also know that calling a teacher can seem kind of intimidating, and this would give students the option of texting me, with me being able to check those texts right from my computer. That seems just way more convenient in general to me.
I also like Vocaroo's recording capabilities. I think it could be interesting to use for grading feedback as well. While I still prefer pen-and-paper grading for student papers (sorry trees), I could see sending student recordings of feedback for group projects, or as kind of mid-term progress report update. I'm not sure yet how I'd base assessments off Vocaroo (maybe poetry readings? Maybe?), but I could probably think of something.

Tech in MY Placement

Everything that we've been talking about technology in the classrooms has really started to come together after these first few weeks in the field. More specifically, it's started to become more clear the challenges that most of will face in our future schools.
What has struck me the most so far are the "age limits," so to speak, that seem to come as a footnote to technology availability and use. I'm placed at a middle school, and just from looking at the options on our tech surveys and talking to my classmates, I've begun to notice some differences in what is available for the students at my school.
Some things can be attributed to legal reasons; most sites don't allow students under 13 to sign up for accounts. That's about 3/4 of our school population. Of course, that doesn't mean students DON'T have accounts on sites like Facebook and Twitter, just that they aren't technically SUPPOSED to...
Similarly, the use of technology in the school is very heavily monitored. The acceptable use policy for middle schoolers in AAPS (which is different from the high school/faculty policy) has explicit instructions for how students are supposed to pick up, carry, and in general handle laptops from the portable carts. This isn't to say high schoolers don't get the same warnings, just that I sense that middle schoolers really need some extra instruction when it comes to how to properly carry a laptop across the room. Similarly, our first day in the computer lab came with a 5-minute debriefing from the media specialist about what NOT to do with the computers. My school just got a new lab full of Macs, and within the first 2 weeks of school one of the keyboards had already been broken.
In terms of what is available, I noticed I left several boxes unchecked on the survey. Software is installed pretty equally across the district, I believe, but my school doesn't have all the same hardware that I expect a lot of high schools to have. There aren't digital cameras or camcorders for students to check out, and scanners are reserved for teacher use/ special permission only. Part of this is most likely due to the fact that most middle schools don't have the same elective classes that high schools do that would require such devices. Also, we still rely heavily on written work, and only have used the computers for online testing or image searching for poster-making. This leads me to wonder if my students would have trouble utilizing more technology, or if they just aren't given much opportunity.
Have any of my fellow middle school homies noticed any similar differences?

Digital Footprints

Our discussion about online assessments last class got me thinking. I was in the first batch of high school juniors subjected to the MME/ACT/combined three days of insanity testing. Actually, I don't remember it being so bad. They gave us free food. And at the time, I didn't realize the ACT was that big of a deal, so I didn't study or anything. So all in all pretty low stress.

When I took the MME/ACT, it was all on paper. But everything is digital nowadays, right? I mean, does the high school class of 2014 even request for paper copies of scores to be sent...? Some quick Googling took me to the ACT's website, where some quick trial-and-error of old potential usernames (ohhh, blondie73) told me that I had, at some point, actually made an account with the ACT. And my score report from the 2007 MME/ACT is still available. Crazy.

This brings me to my point of a digital footprint, albeit on a smaller scale. We've talked about this before in class, but looking up my old scores really hammered it home. People not that much older than myself have a box of papers in their parent's basement to turn to if they ever were curious about their own long-forgotten tests. And, really, there's no reason I can think of where I'd need to know my ACT Writing subscore ever again, but it slightly blows my mind that I can call from any computer if the whim ever arises. And that says nothing of the students now who will be taking exclusively online standardized tests. Their records will probably ONLY be available online, for who knows how long past when they'd reasonably need to access them. 

This all, in my opinion, is a separate scenario from the "online footprint" associated with embarrassing statuses, corny photos, and other social media evidence gathered over the years. What I'm thinking of here is specifically this accumulation of records and other information scattered across different sites. Just off the top of my head I know I have accounts with the ACT, SAT, AP, GRE, MTTC, and probably various other ones that I'm forgetting. This is an academic online footprint, a curation of your educational progress, digitized and preserved so that you can prove to your grandchildren that you got a 35 on the science subtest in 2007. (That's just hypothetical - there are many reasons I'm an English concentrator, and my science subscores may be one of them).

 I know police records and the like have been online for years, but what I'm thinking about here is more the "box in the basement" stuff - the forgotten tests and report cards you sift through maybe once a decade. I know I still have my K-12 records somewhere, complete with gold stickers and crumple marks from where the reports were shoved in my backpack. Maybe I'm focusing too much on just a tiny part of online learning, but this idea of an academic digital footprint kind of amazes me. I'm not sure I'll ever look at my ACT score again, but it's there, in case I ever want to. I wonder how long it will take before report cards, test scores, everything, are all just uploaded somewhere instead of being sent home. Or maybe they already are... UM does pretty much all scoring online, but at least when I was in high school, we still had paper report cards mailed home. 

Will this change the way we approach the grades and tests? Would you care more if you knew every score of yours was preserved indefinitely somewhere on a server? Could we better analyze progress and setbacks? Would this help? Would this detract? Would it make no difference? And, what does that mean for us?

Bloggity Blog Blog

(Coming up with titles is not my forte)

Thanks to Jeff's helpful list of edubloggers, I was directed to Larry's Opinion Drive-Thru, an educational tech blog manned by Mr. Larry Baker, a high school English and government teacher). At just a few posts in, I began to notice some similarities between the issues Mr. Baker focuses on, and the same ideas we've been discussing in class.

For example, Mr. Baker sheds some interesting light on the technology-in-the-classroom discussion by directing readers to this article about the future of technology in education. In his own post, Mr. Baker gives a very neat summary of what he thinks is essential for the future of technology in schools: infrastructure. He raises a very good point that all the advanced gagets in the world won't do much good unless the school invests the time and money to support them. This includes a high-speed internet connection and ample storage space for students to use. This interested me because in all of our discussions, I'm not sure this point even came up. We jumped so far ahead that we didn't think about the foundations (or scaffolding, if you'd prefer?) that would be needed to sustain such grand ideas.
Additionally, it was cool to see Mr. Baker's thoughts on Evernote, the same organizational tool I looked at for our 504 class (he also later touches on Pinterest, another 504-studied tool). Mr. Baker links to another blog that offers quite the helpful run-down of Evernote (that quite frankly, puts mine to shame). Mr. Baker gives his own brief thoughts about how much more organized the Evernote service has made him. Both of these points were placed within a larger post about classroom technology, and how it is changing.

Furthermore, I loved Mr. Baker's mention of of penmanship and how the Common Core does not have any cursive component. He mentions this particular New York Times article, which examines the fate of cursive handwriting. As a calligraphy and penmanship enthusiast, the idea that no one really writes in cursive anymore kind of bums me out. I realize that few people use signature past grade school for anything other than offering up their signatures, but Mr. Baker raises a good point about how cursive advocates note its cognitive and academic benefits. Truth be told, I usually write in a print-cursive hybrid myself, and I don't know that I would make it an absolute requirement for my students, but I would definitely not discourage assignments being turned in in cursive.

Overall, I really appreciated Mr. Baker's overall scheme for his blog. He talks about issues of technology, but is not overly technological. He focuses on English and Government, but I feel like the topics he tackles could be beneficial to many different disciplines. He's been blogging since 2008, so it's really nice to see an educator who's made such a commitment to not only expanding his own knowledge, but is offering up his own tid-bits (or, opinions as his title suggests) for the benefit of other teachers everywhere.

All Fun and Games

The question Rory posed in class today was definitely a tough one: is it possible to structure an entire class to be like a game? As I've already admitted, I'm not exactly a gamer, so I'm probably going to overlook some connections that an individual more well-versed in game culture would pick up on. And I don't really have an answer as to how to transform the whole curriculum. But a few smaller strategies came to mind...

1. I'll start this idea off by saying that it's far from perfect. But what about a point system? I realize that a. most classes are structured around some form of a point system anyway, and b. we've already been taught to avoid unnecessary extrinsic motivators. But hear me out... Many video games are structured around a kind of award system, right? Like, complete this level in x amount of time and you'll get y amount of bonus points? So maybe this isn't so much a revolutionary concept, so much as it is just a reframing of practices already in place? Say, for example, you allow 3 tardies before you start deducting participation points. Could you call those "HP" instead, and explain that you don't want to get down to 0 HP or else points start coming off?

2. It seems like your students really like the collaboration that comes with a lot of video games. For group projects, why not structure them to mimic "quests" or whatever they're being called in games nowadays. Give "Objectives" and "Checkpoints" to turn in along the way, and have fun with the instruction wording.

3. I feel like I've mentioned this a few times in various classes already, but I'm a BIG fan of simulations.  These tend to work best in social studies classes, but I can see them being adapted easily for English (to explore a literary time period, for example). In 9th grade we had to re-create the Rosenberg Trial, with all class members assigned a role (witness, prosecution, defense, reporters, etc.). Everyone was given an information packet for their specific role (i.e. each witness got information relevant to what their witness would contribute), and then over the course of 3 or 4 days we carried out a mock trial (2ish days for witness interviews, drawing up strategies and speeches, etc, and then 2 days to carry out the actual trial). We were pretty much left to figure it out on our own after the initial explanation, so you had "lawyers" trying to make sure they'd talked to every witness, "witnesses" formulating statements, and "reporters" trying to piece together info from different witnesses to "break a story." For a group of 9th graders, we were surprisingly organized and invested in this, and it was very much like a game, with everyone assigned a position and trying to work together (or in the cases of the opposing law teams, in opposition to each other) in order to have everything prepared to carry out our mock trial. It must have been at least somewhat effective, because here I am bringing it up some 8 years later...

I know I haven't put together a complete curriculum in any way, but I guess I'm still having trouble visualizing a class that is ENTIRELY game-based. Probably because this keeps coming up as the first thing I think of:

Video Game

I should probably preface this post by saying the last video game I played was Spyro the Dragon on PS2. In 2002. Not much since then, unless you count my brief Bubble Shooter addiction when I first got a smartphone. I've watched countless games of dorm-room Halo and procrastinatory rounds of Mario Kart, but I'm usually the observer, not the participator. I have a hard time figuring out the controllers...

That being said, I do like online games. They just have to be simple enough for me to figure out. I clicked through the BrainPop English site, but most of the "games" were more of video tutorials about different parts of grammar or select classic novels. Even as an English major... *yawn*. Then I decided to check out the BBC game site - I loved it. My teaching minor is history, and while I took more classes on American history than anything else, I just have always been interested by British history.

I got a perfect score on the "Tudors and Victorians: Dressing Up" game the first time I played. Heck yes, I know the different styles of corsets, and the difference between a petticoat and a farthingdale.

I also tried out the "Whose House" game, which asks you to identify famous figures based on clues in a room of their house (ex. William the Conquerer has a map of Normandy on his desk). The "Elizabethan Spying Game" was also fun, and had you decode an intercepted message by answering questions about Elizabeth I, Mary I, and Mary, Queen of Scots. That one came with a pretty funny graphic if you answered a question wrong:

The games I tried out were mainly centered around Tudor-era history, which I've always found pretty interesting (SIDE NOTE: If you like this time period, and can handle a few historical inaccuracies in the name of entertainment, this show is tops). However, the site offers a variety of different topics and time periods to focus on, if ruffs and ecclesiastical struggles aren't your thing.

In terms of working games into the classroom, I could definitely see myself utilizing a source such as this. BBC also had a fun "Roots of English" game, that was like magnetic poetry in that it gave you a bunch of single words that you could drag and combine to create your own poem. Once you're finished, it tells you the origins of the words you used. I've taken a couple history of English classes, and it's really cool to see how common words we use today come from all over the place. For an English class, this would be especially fun, and brings to mind the saying that "English is a language who beats up other languages in dark alleys and riffles through their pockets for spare vocabulary." So true.

Overall, in an educational context, I'm all for games as supplements to class learning. I would probably assign them as homework, or in a designated computer lab hour, to try to cut down on lack of attention in class. Still, with the BBC games, it was fun to quiz myself and see how much I remember from all the random historical fictions I've read. I don't think they in any way can replace instruction, but are a fun way to get students to connect more with the material.

Why Should I Believe You?

Our discussion in class about the "truthiness" of online information put me in mind of a few things. To better appeal to all of us Millenials, here's a list-icle:

1. 20 Questions with 20+ people is difficult. All my bets were on Ned Stark.

2. Snopes! This is a pretty good source for verifying online rumors/"repost this to show your account is active otherwise Mark Zuckerburg will deactivate it" scams. (Not like ever fallen prey to one of those or anything...) It can't check all facts for you, but it can keep you from looking silly and forwawarding the wrong thing.

3. I was involved in a similarly-minded activity in elementary school. The idea of being cautious about information online isn't a new one, apparently. I can remember when my school first got computers when I was in about 4th grade. They put in a computer lab and everything - it was quite a big deal. Anyway, for our first ever media class, we were placed in front of computers and given a worksheet on the "Bolivian Mountain Dog." We were told it was meant to teach us online research skills, and included such questions as breed size, typical weight, and standard coat colors. We were given a website to go to (how did we even get there before Google??) where we were told we'd find all the information we needed. I, being the diligent student I was, finished in no time, and sat smugly waiting for my classmates to catch up. After all the worksheets had been handed in, our media teacher informed us that we'd just completed an assignment on a breed of dog that didn't actually exist. Touche.

My conclusion from all of this is that being appropriately wary is a skill all students, at all levels, need to be reminded of. This lesson can clearly be taught in several ways, but it definitely should be taught. It's something that I think will serve students well for much of their lives, and that's not even considering the fact that I really would rather not grade 30 research essays with "www.fax-about-shakespeer.com" listed as a reference...
( :
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Let's Get Organized

"Organizing my Online Life" was harder than I thought it would be. This might have been due in part to the the site I was investigating - Evernote, itself a kind of app, offers its own app store site full of OTHER Evernote add-ons. Obviously there was going to be no way I could even touch on all of those, so I tried to just stick with the basics.
The part that I found most difficult was finding the right level of instruction to use. I consider myself to be squarely middle-of-the-road in terms of technology competence - I'm not especially tech savvy, but I know how to get things done (eventually). You'd think I'd just write from that perspective when making my how-to guide and everything would be fine. But, I found myself wondering if I was being too basic for all the whizzes out there, or assuming too much for anyone who might have trouble just composing an email. I think I managed to find a balance in the end, but it was much trickier than I thought.
That, then, got me thinking about ways to teach technology in the future. We talk a lot about how today's kids are born with a device in their hands, but I figure there has to be SOME form of learning curve. The chances that my entire class is going to come in knowing how to code are pretty slim. So, how do I reach a similar balance with my students? How can I explain how to use online tools for them without coming across condescending while still remembering that not everyone automatically knows how to upload things for me to grade (I know I still don't know all the intricacies of M+Box).
With that being said, I think my resource, Evernote, is one of those things that get get overwhelming really quickly. I'm not sure how in-depth I'll ever get with its usage, but I can see myself offering it as an option to my students. I don't think I'd ever REQUIRE anyone to use it... I'm still pretty partial to the leaving-myself-sticky-notes-on-my-binder method of organization myself. I know it's not tidy or foolproof, but old habits die hard. I'll probably just stick with the basic note-writing capabilities of Evernote for my own usage, but it's nice to know that it offers more in-depth options for those of us more capable to managing this whole online life thing.

TechBabies

Rory's story about finding his student's tweets got me wondering about how aware people REALLY are about their "online lives." It's funny, because we talk about kids 10-15 years younger than us as being the ones who really are the "plugged in generation" - I can still remember when my family got our first desktop computer in '98 or so, and then I turn around and see kindergarteners with iPads today. I consider my age group to be on that bubble of tech-savvy-ness: technology has been present most of our lives, but it's almost been growing with us. And yet, (not to sound like a typical self-absorbed millenial), I think maybe we're a bit wiser about its use than the younger, born-into-it age group below us.
Don't get me wrong, I'm sure I posted some really regrettable stuff on my Facebook in high school (not to mention my Xanga - yikes). But that was more along the lines of obnoxious song lyrics, not "poundin a fifth of jose with ma gurls xx." Granted, I wasn't really doing those things in high school, let alone posting about them, but still... My Facebook account has always been private. My Twitter is private. I think my Instagram is private? I mostly just post pictures of my dog though, so it's not too scandalous. (UPDATE: I checked. It's set to private). What I mean to say is that it's always seemed to be a kind of "well, duh" thing to me, to keep an eye on this stuff. Most of my friends are the same way. In a way, at least among the people I know, it's kind of frowned upon to not be at least a little responsible about your online image. If there was someone we knew of who was constantly posting pictures swigging from handles at frat parties, there was almost a bit of a backlash for doing that. The thought wasn't "oh, look how many parties this cool person goes to," it was "wow, s/he is going to have a hard time getting a job." That doesn't mean your profile has to be completely sanitized, just, ya know, keep it classy.
I guess I don't have online contact with anyone much younger than me, so I never really see these tendencies, but just from the time I've spent working with the middle school crowd, I can totally see how there might not be as much of a filter. But can we blame them? Part of what I think makes my age group a tinnnnnny bit savvier is that we have witnessed the birth and growth of sites like Facebook and Twitter. We were there when they started, and we understand (mostly) how they work. Do today's middle schoolers remember a time WITHOUT the dominance of social media? They've been thrust into this realm that they think they know how to navigate, but it's not exactly that simple. In addition, what 12-17-year-old is REALLY thinking about the implications their posts might have 5 years from now? It's so instantaneous, just one click and you've shared that picture that 20-year-old, internship-hunting you is going to regret. But that's a problem for Future You to worry about.
So what, then? How do we make our students more aware of these issues? DO we make them more aware of these issues? Or should they figure it out on their own? Is this just another pratfall of growing up in the digital age? Do we need a class for incoming 9th graders: "Managing Your Online Life"? Is that excessive? I mean, maybe when our parents were in school, the idea of something like D.A.R.E seemed unnecessary: "Do we really need a whole program to tell kids not to get addicted to crack?" (All arguments on D.A.R.E's effectiveness aside...) Or maybe just a mini-course? I'm not sure I have the answer. But I think it would be my job as a teacher to try to help.

The Society of School

When we think about school as a social realm, I think a lot of us (myself included) are reminded of the intense, Mean Girls-esque stratified structure of the stereotypical American high school. Whether or not this reflects your own personal experience, I think we can agree that adolescence is a tough time, and that throwing a bunch of hormonal young adults together for 7 or so hours a day doesn't always leave everyone feeling warm and fuzzy.
However, I think Dewey raises some important points when he defines what exactly a school is. While I might not go so far as to say that schools need to distill the world down to an "embryonic" representation of itself, I do think that he raises some good points about how we should not just create learning institutions, but learning communities.  We have to see schools as a here-and-now representation of society, of something that the students can connect to. As Dewey explains, "I believe that the school must represent present life - life as real and vital to the child as that which he carries on in the home, in the neighborhood, or on the play-ground." Schools can too easily become separated from what we consider the "real world," where we go, sit in class for a few hours, and promptly disengage as soon as the last bell rings. I think what Dewey is trying to get at here is that if we truly want to create lifelong learners, we need to make sure school isn't seen as this disconnected sphere of existence, but rather as a continuation of society as a whole.
So what would this mean for our future classrooms? How do we make our classrooms extensions of society when, in many respects, we are living in an imperfect society? Dewey was writing these ideas in 1897, at a time when it made sense to want schools to "build out of home life," because that was considered one of the most stable and sacred institutions. How do we reconcile this idea with students who may have home lives that are anything but?
I don't think I have all the answers to this, but I do think I can take the core of Dewey's argument and try to make it work today. I want my classroom to be a community. I want my students to socialize as equals within this community, and I want them to see themselves as budding members of society. I don't want there to be a line between learning and being, and I don't want education to just be seen as a means to an end. I DO want my students to foster a community and stretch their interpersonal wings. No, you don't have to be best buddies with all of your classmates, just as you don't have to feel that way about everyone you meet in the community. But you DO have to treat everyone with respect, and you DO have to learn to work and cooperate together.
Unless you plan on becoming a recluse after graduation, you'll be living in working in society for the rest of your life. That's why we need to look to Dewey and ensure that education "is a process of living and not [just] a preparation for future living."

Classrooms & Technology - How Would it Work?

My artistic skills leave something to be desired, but I did manage to get down some version of what my ideal classroom would be. At the top, as a possible alternative for a whiteboard, I have written "Or a clear Iron Man touchscreen. Whichever." That's probably a little ambitious, but it would certainly be fun.
On a more practical note, something that you can't tell from my drawing is that the desks are two-person tables with wheels. This would allow for ease of movement in different classroom layouts, while also giving everyone a partner for class activities. iClickers and tablets for each student would be nice, though I think instead of an iPad or similar, I would go with a Nook or Kindle Paperwhite - something without unlimited internet access (at least I'm pretty sure they don't have web browsers). Along the lines of what was discussed in class, I would also love to use iClickers as a way to keep students engaged in each class. Additionally, they could be useful to me as a teacher because they would allow me to check progress and understanding as we go along, and go back and clarify as needed.
Technology in the classroom is something I struggle with. On one hand, it DOES open up a ton of new possibilities for connecting with the material. There are definitely issues with making sure students stay on task and aren't abusing technology, but to me, there seems to be something even more than that. For an English class, there really is something about picking up a physical novel, turning the pages, and (gasp) writing in the margins. There's something about filling a 3-ring notebook with ideas from each semester. There's something about triumphantly printing out all 15 pages of a final essay the night before it's due, and actually holding weeks of hard work in your hands.
I'm probably waxing way too poetic here, and I don't mean to dismiss classroom technology. Looking up research resources online, or sending a last-minute clarification email can be real lifesavers (not to mention the number of times spellcheck has stepped in for me in this post alone). I guess what I think is that technology definitely has its place in the classroom, but it can't be the be-all and end-all of our learning experiences. And "advanced technology" is relative, anyway (remember when mechanical pencils were a novelty?). I think it's up to each teacher to decide what technological aspects would work best with their specific curriculum, and to implement them as they see fit. Hopefully, this is something that I just started to touch on in the sketches we did today.