Going Public: Yes, people are eager to read and view!

It was not long ago that the only way anybody would know about the powerful, amazing, creative work happening in our classrooms was if they would physically talk to  us.  While face-to-face connections are powerful, the ideas shared in those conversations only spread as far as the humans wish to take them.

Many of us have at least signed up for a social network like Google+ or Twitter, but are we really leveraging it to share our work, our students thinking, and our classrooms with the world?  Should we be?

A few weeks ago I spoke with a parent that was very impressed with one of the videos she found on an SDW teacher's YouTube channel.  "It is so nice to see what is happening in the classroom."  As a parent myself, it feels like the events of my children's school days are somewhat of a mystery -- 8 hours of school summed up into a ten minute conversation hardly seems to cover the scope of what they experienced throughout the day.  Parents are looking for some insight into what their children experience each day and the important work they are doing. Using these social networks and media outlets to share what is happening in our classroom is just one way we can offer parents a chance to investigate the great things that are happening instructionally.

Equally true, educators are scouring these social networks for ideas and examples of what is being done in other classrooms.  I regularly search the archives of Google+ to see how we, as educators, are "going public" with our thinking, using the tools placed in our hands, and giving our students a voice that can be shared with the world.  This was one of the great focal points of our summer institute work surrounding literacy -- giving students an authentic audience to share their thinking (making it visible).  Like it or not, we carry this responsibility.  Our students have plenty of opportunities to share "socially" with the world in informal settings online.  This is our chance to show them how to productively use these media outlets to share academically, professionally, formally, and respectfully in order to make a difference!

Finding a new, authentic audience is not as time consuming as it once was -- we no longer have to gather an audience of parents or community/business leaders in advance, or make connections with teachers from across the country weeks before the unit of study.  

These social networks are bringing an audience right to us.  The devices in our hands, available in our classrooms, are built specifically with the intent of sharing with these audiences.

The question is not about who will read our thinking or view our students' work.  

More importantly the question is:  What will you and your students share?  How will you "Go Public" with your thinking?

I Am Tech Fluent. Are You?

In his last post on Getting Tech Into Ed, Dale asked readers when we can stop treating technology like it is an add-on to our work as educators.  The point is well made and has caused me to reflect on why this "tech first" mindset dominates the conversation when we talk about innovation and new instructional practices.

My experience as a student learning Spanish fits well here.  I took four years of Spanish in high school. I even spent two weeks in Mexico surrounded by native Spanish speakers.  Yet, when I arrived to college and realized I had to take Spanish to earn my teaching degree, I freaked out.  I knew very well that I could not understand, speak, read, or write Spanish.  I bombed my introductory Spanish class and narrowly escaped my summer re-take of the exact same course.  (This, by the way, is NOT reflective of my academic story in any other coursework I completed.)

How is it that I could have invested that much time into learning a language and yet walked away with nothing more than a dwarfed vocabulary of random words and a few notable catch phrases that I probably am not using in the appropriate context?

The reality is I was not striving to become fluent in Spanish. My goal was simply to pass; to jump through the hoops to get to my goal of going on a trip, graduating, and earning a degree.  The Spanish coursework was simply a stepping stone to where I wanted to be, not an opportunity to learn a second language, grow culturally, and open an avenue for communicating with a whole world of people who speak a language other than English.

Something in the answer to this question ties closely to my thoughts on why so many educators struggle to move beyond the view of technology as an add-on to educating students.  

Learning to utilize technology for any purpose, including for instructional use, can be a lot like that learning a foreign langague.  In our district we spend a significant amount of time sharing the SAMR Framework with our teachers.  We celebrate movement and growth as it relates to the use of technology to push innovative instructional practice in the classroom.  However, the use of technology for the sake of using technology (categorized as Substitution in SAMR) is not a practice or mindset we encourage teachers to commit to long-term.  Using technology to do things you could very well do without technology is a necessary first step, a place where the journey to more meaningful uses of technology begins. (Kind of like learning to say things to friends in Spanish that I could just as easily say to them in our native language wasn't the real purpose for learning the language.)

It is in the Substitution and early Augmentation phases where users become increasingly "tech fluent."  They start building basic vocabulary, exploring the structure of software and apps, developing confidence, finding some minor successes, and asking questions about what is possible.  They begin to learn lessons of what works and what to avoid when it comes to using technology.  They begin to experience the early advantages of their commitment to become fluent in the language.

This stage of learning a new language or skill set is delicate.  This is where patience, support, and guidance become so important.  It is in these early stages where technology users can gain momentum or lose a sense of purpose entirely.  This is the point where we can help people to see that once they become proficient in their use of technology (as well as their willingness to take risks and try new practices), the possibilities are boundless for them and their students.  It is also the point where we can allow them to flounder, lose focus, and begin to view the use of technology as just another way to do what they have always done.

In this light, I acknowledge that my acquisition of a second language has been stunted in Substitution for well over a decade.  By this point in my journey I should be fluently conversing with parents and students in my district who are English Language Learners.  I should be confidently planning trips to Spanish speaking nations with little concern about a language barrier.  I am not doing this today, though, because I did not commit to meaningfully learning the basics so that I could access the full advantages of being fluent.

In a world where technology has impacted every facet of life, where opportunity and possibility have few limits for those who are fluent in the use of technology, and where the use of technology is flooding academic institutions and experiences across the world, what will your story of "tech fluency" be in just a few years?  If you invest the time to learn to meaningfully use the technology today, what possibilities will exist for you and your students once you have "learned the language?"  It is worth the investment of time and energy today, but not for the purpose of jumping through hoops or fulfilling PD requirements.  Instead, make the investment because you and your students deserve to have all of the amazing educational opportunities that exist (both with and without the use of technology).

In making this commitment, find supportive people who will aid you in your journey.  If you do, I guarantee that  in relatively short order you will become "tech fluent" and you will be able to see well beyond the technology.  You will instead start focusing entirely on what matters and what we all care most about: student learning!

Quick Turn Around: Already Reaping Key Benefits of Attending Google Summit

We were fortunate to send a team of 30 educators from across Waukesha to the Google Midwest Summit 2013.  This talented group, made up of educators and coordinators from across the district, was nominated  by building administrators to make the trip.

As always, aside from finding inspiration and adding some new tools to our bag of tricks, the focus is about bringing the message and learning of the power of these tools back to our colleagues and students in Waukesha.  We are so pleased to see this happening already, and we wanted to highlight the headway these attendees have made in the week that they have been back since the conference took place.

• Using the YouTube editor, one attendee was able to capture a magical moment as one of our students with unique challenges at the elementary level demonstrated incredible growth since her teachers began working with her in fall.  Through the use of the YouTube editor (learned about at the conference), the teacher was able to pinpoint key moments during the student's performance that highlighted each learning target (something that could easily be overlooked without the context)
• Inspired by the wealth of digital tools that are available and the necessity to simply put the information learned at the conference to use, one teacher/attendee is making a commitment to attempting the use of Blackboard in several classes as a means of getting started.  This is a risk that the teacher has embraced because of inspiration gained from networking with other motivated educators at the Summit.
• One teacher/attendee has already set up the first Google Hangout (utilizing Google+) to connect with colleagues across the district without having to schedule an after school meeting and spend time driving across town.  The goal is to gain greater efficiency while staying connected.
• Using the Google+ social network, one attendee has set up a Google+ community at his school and is actively recruiting teachers in the building to join in order to have a common sharing/social place in which to share ideas, articles, resources, etc.  As educators feel the constraints and demands of time, the use of a community like this maintains our connection with others, develops a platform in which we can share and collaboratively learn/reflect, and does so in a way that is asynchronous, meaning it is accessible to teachers when they are ready to digest the information available there.
• Several attendees are actively talking about how to share their gained knowledge at upcoming professional development dates to spread the wealth of inspiration and information to a much wider group of colleagues.

This in no way captures all of the momentum sparked by sending attendees to this and other conferences, but it gives us perspective on what becomes possible when people are inspired with new ideas and introduced to powerful tools!  Remember, it has been literally less than a week since these folks have returned to the district.

We encourage you to connect with the representative from your building to pick their brain, hear more about the conference, and get inspired.  However, they are not the only source of knowledge.

Resources for the entire conference, for nearly every session presented, are available here:  https://sites.google.com/site/gapsmidwestsummit/2013-ses

We encourage you to take a look and dig in.  These resources are a generous gift provided by the conference presenters to any instructor who may have wished to attend the Summit but were unable to.