Magnify the Universe
This is so cool! Go from the observable universe to a hydrogen’s proton!
Copyright 2012. Magnifying the Universe by Number Sleuth.
How to Make Social Networking Work
I’ve had mixed results using social networking media for class discussions. Because of that I haven’t even tried to have students use it for backchanneling. It’s hard enough to get them to listen as I give instructions and I don’t lecture all that much anyway. I’ve had this vision of engaging more students in class discussions, especially the quiet ones, by using chats, Twitter, or other social media, so that we didn’t have to call on raised hands or shush kids or talk one at a time. I sure could use some help getting ideas on how to make it work.
Two years ago I tried using my moodle to create a chat room to have a class discussion. I thought I gave kids enough time to “play” and get the hi’s and silly typing out of their system. They never did so it was very difficult to follow any thread of on topic conversation. I even had one class where an inappropriate word popped up on the screen so I shut it down. The user was anonymous so we never got the guilty party to cop to it. Yes, I know. I shouldn’t take the easy way out and have students be able to join anonymously but I always trust first. If something bad happens I use it as a teachable moment. Still sucks, though.
Then last year I tried using Twitter. With Twitter I couldn’t get the kids to tweet! They just never got into it so they wouldn’t tweet during discussions. They also wouldn’t tweet to share resources or links or ideas. Along those same lines, they wouldn’t even check their Twitter accounts! I don’t know if it was just that group of students (two classes of 8th graders) or if this is common. What should I have done?
So this year I went a different route. I was deciding between using Edmodo or Collaborize Classroom. I had read over the summer that Edmodo didn’t have threaded discussions so I went with Collaborize. I made the graphic on this post as the logo for our class Collaborize Classroom network, which I made a closed network just for our classes. (Our class blogs are open to the world.) Now kids asked me why we didn’t just use Facebook. I then asked what they mostly do on Facebook. They said, “socialize,” to which I responded, “exactly.” Yet, by my own doing, I created such a network in my classroom! Here’s how.
With Collaborize students get to start discussion topics of their own. I thought that was great because they would get tired of always responding to topics that I chose for them. I set the permissions such that I had to approve topics before they went live. Students started to play. They posted fun questions and polls for their fellow classmates and even across to my other classes. I encouraged it because I saw them engaging with our network. I couldn’t keep up. They were coming so fast and so frequently that I took off the permission thing. They were now free to post topics all they wanted. I couldn’t get one of my topics looked at because so many more exciting, fun topics flooded my Science topics before and after I’d post them. I felt like I was forcing kids to respond to my posted topics and I was.
I ended up letting the excitement wane and kids stopped posting topics to our network. I turned our network into a Facebook-like, fun, social space not the Science learning/discussion space I had intended. I am still new at this and I’m at the point where I’ve given up on this year. I’m going to try again next year and am wondering what others do. How do teachers create a functioning class social network? How do you get kids to engage with the network without having it turn into a Facebook?
Ronnie Burt wrote a blog post about a debate he’s been having with Sue Waters, Edublogger Debate: Scaffolding vs. Struggling – Can You Be Too Helpful? I found the topic quite intriguing as it fits perfectly into what I spend a majority of my time worrying about, Student Engagement and Student Discipline.
So the question is whether to let students struggle with concepts and new ideas or to provide as much scaffolding as possible? Ronnie made the point that, “to some extent this will depend on the learner, content, environment, and more. But there is a general philosophy at play.”
I don’t have any research that I can think of on which to base my opinions, but my opinions stem from 21 years of working with 9 to 14 year olds. Unfortunately, I can’t agree with one way over the other. I tend to go with the middle-of-the-road philosophy and for this debate I think it fits rather well. See I also believe that struggling with concepts and new ideas helps us learn. But I’ve seen many a student shut down when the struggle seems pointless. For many students the struggle seems insurmountable because they don’t have the skills necessary to move on or they can’t see how to move on. Scaffolding helps many students stay on target.
So my middle-of-the-road philosophy is to provide just enough scaffolding that students will be able to engage with the concepts or new ideas enough to struggle. Your highly skilled students will breeze through the scaffolds but if they can persevere they may reach a point of struggle. The right feedback will help them through if they get stuck, otherwise there will be aha’s and learning in the struggle.
For those kids who lack skills the scaffolding should provide them enough help to get past any early struggles so they don’t shut down but it shouldn’t keep them from struggling.
Kids that have learning disabilities will need more scaffolding for they can shut down early and often. They tend to struggle all the time.
None of this is easy. It requires creativity, imagination and constant reassessment. In answer to the question, “Can you be too helpful?” I say yes. That is why we have to constantly reassess our scaffolding, to make sure we aren’t too helpful and take away our students’ opportunities to struggle. It’s easy to do as we come to our students rescue way to often. I think kids, all kids, quit too easily. They aren’t used to struggling so we have to provide them with those opportunities. So I’m choosing struggle with some scaffolding so that students don’t quit. Since feedback could be just the right scaffolding for some I think we’re doing that already anyway.
Reading Ability
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I struggle with reading. It’s not that I can’t decode or that I am dyslexic or anything like that. It’s not even that my first language was Spanish and now I’m fluent in English (I can barely get out a complete thought in Spanish without having to switch to English, so English is my dominant language now). Nope, it’s just that I read slowly. When I read I say the words in my head as if I was saying them out loud. My mental reading speed is as fast as my slow out loud reading speed. I also need to stop and process often. Highlighting is very helpful for me otherwise I forget what I read or I have to keep coming back to it (well, I have to do that anyway). It always seemed like a problem to me, to be a slow reader. So I’ve been giving it some thought after reading John Spencer’s I’m Slow blog. It’s been very recent that I have been working on convincing myself that there’s nothing wrong with being a slow reader. That wording doesn’t quite sound right. It’s not that I thought there was anything “wrong” with reading slowly, it’s just that I’ve limited myself because of my slow reading.
Why has being a slow reader been such a struggle for me? It has made reading a tedious task for me. I want the information but when there’s a lot of text I get anxious and give up. It’s almost like a block. I just can’t read anymore after a while. So I prefer short passages, which is why Twitter and blogs have been such great media for me. Before Twitter and my RSS feed I didn’t read much. When I was a teenager I enjoyed reading fantasy novels, Piers Anthony was my favorite author, and comic books and graphic novels. At school though I couldn’t read a whole book and no way could I keep up with the reading pace. Cliff’s Notes helped with that.
After Cliff’s Notes, movies and documentaries were my saving grace. Sure, the movie is never as good as the book but at least I get the gist of stories I may never read! I love history but couldn’t get through a whole history textbook. I couldn’t keep up with the reading pace so I watched historical movies. I relished finding the inaccuracies in historical piece films. When the Internet came out I loved it because I didn’t have to be daunted by a huge textbook and could look through several sources to see what was historically accurate. Why wasn’t there Internet when I was a kid?!
Because reading is a struggle for me I was never as well read as many of my friends and acquaintances. I’ve even been labeled a non-reader as an adult! I actually believed it until I thought that just because I don’t read as much as other people or just because I read snippets or shorter versions or just because I sometimes, yes, watch the movie and never read the book, I’m NOT a non-reader. It just isn’t a strength of mine and I don’t read as much but I do read! I do learn better by watching movies or discussing a topic with people than by reading about it. Reading about something is never enough for me to get it. Yes, in part because finishing was so tedious and because I often never finished the whole thing but also because I need to discuss it or somehow wrestle with the topic or content before I truly get it or feel confident that I get it. When I was in UCLA I jumped at the chance to take a Shakespeare class where we watched the plays’ movies instead of reading them. We were to visit the video library, watch a play, then discuss it in class. That was awesome but only one class out of all the classes I took offered that opportunity. Often I’d show up to class discussions not having done all, or any, of the reading. So I’d get all I needed to pass the class from the lectures and class discussions. I read very little of what I was required to read. And yet I passed. I’m not so sure that’s bad because I have many more options to learn something now besides JUST reading about it and it’s not like I’m illiterate or anything like that. I’ve earned my place in society and in my career. Plus there are many different media for me to read now.
As an adult I avoid book shares because I can never keep up with the reading pace. There isn’t enough time in a day for me to read a whole chapter or chapters. Even when I read fantasy novels it takes me a long time. So I catch up on my reading over the summer. I can read only about one or two books depending on how tedious it becomes and it’s way easier if everyone in my family is reading. The only entire series I’ve read as an adult is the Harry Potter series. When I attend workshops and we’re given an article to read I’m always last and I rarely get to finish it. I get so distracted when more and more people start talking, snacking and visiting the restroom because they’re done! Sometimes the group just starts discussing the article before I’m done. At least I highlighted and took notes on what I read, but so did everyone else! When I was a kid I bought speed reading books to try to learn how to speed read but I just couldn’t do it. I have to read every single word in my head to understand. And yet I can’t concentrate when books are read aloud to me. It’s like I have to be the one reading it aloud to myself. Is that weird that I can’t concentrate when being read to?
So before Twitter I barely read. As a kid, encyclopedias were great because there was lots of information in short snippets. As an adult I use the Internet to learn because it’s like the encyclopedias I loved as a youth. I love getting to type anything into Google and learning about it quickly! Yes, quickly! I can get a good idea about something by reading some of the websites I find. And sometimes I don’t even read the entire website! Currently, I read the blogs on my RSS feed and read through tweets every day in the morning and before bed. That’s more reading than I’ve ever done! And it makes me feel better about myself as a reader.
So how does this affect me as a teacher. I never really thought about it because when I prepare for a class or topic I’m teaching I learn it enough to help my students if it’s a new topic to me. Then, frankly, I often learn with my kids. Many times I am really a side-by-side learner with my students. I guess I never suffered from know-it-all syndrome. One time though I wasn’t rehired to teach a 7th grade language arts/social studies position I taught on a one-year replacement contract in part because one of the teachers on the hiring committee expressed concern about me as a language arts teacher even though I struggled with reading. Wow, I guess you can’t trust some people (I used to joke and say, “why read the book when there’s a movie?”). The joke was on me. I never thought of sharing my struggles with reading with my students. Maybe I can be a role model for those like me who struggle with reading for one reason or another. I bet none of my students would expect that I struggle with reading. It just never seemed to be a problem (except for losing that job, but I don’t think I really stood a chance of getting rehired because I was going up against the vice principal’s wife! And I did get a much better job in a way better school).
So yea, I’m a slow reader. I struggle with reading large amounts of text because I get anxious and lose interest thereby feeling it impossible to continue. So I read fewer books than many of my colleagues. And during the school year I can’t even get through one book (I’ve been stuck on p. 70 of a formative assessment book and I started it in October of 2011!!). In order to cope with this I save my reading for summer. I also give myself time and space. I can’t force it so I don’t. And I celebrate what I do read like my daily blog and Twitter reading. Maybe I’ll get better. I’m not dead yet. 
iPads vs Netbooks
It’s not like I have the money to buy any more iPads or any more Netbooks but I’ve been thinking about which one to recommend if the question comes up at our district tech meetings. I’m basing this pro and con comparison on my classroom. I have 14 first generation iPads and I’m borrowing five Dell Inspiron Minis (netbooks). I also have 10 iMacs but they’re desktops so don’t fit well under the mobile device category. So here’s what I’ve come up with so far:
iPad pros -
1. Mobile
2. Fast start
3. Potential of interactive apps
4. Motivating
5. Long Battery Life (thanks, Ian!)
iPad cons -
1. Can’t use any Flash-based Web 2.0 sites.
2. Typing is not easy.
3. Google Apps services is a tremendous pain.
4. I have 1st gen iPads so NO camera!!!
Netbook pros -
1. Mobile
2. Ability to create multiple accounts (for each period)
3. Able to use any Web 2.0 website.
4. Easy to use FTP
5. Webcam
6. Typing is easier.
7. Can work on school network so that students can access their own accounts.
Netbook cons -
1. Slow, sometimes terribly so.
2. Will be as expensive as an iPad in order to have hard drive space.
3. Short battery life (often not a full day)
What else should we consider?
Student Discipline
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Classroom management is not an easy thing. If something works one day it won’t necessarily work the next day. Sometimes blowing the beginning of the year sets the stage for a difficult year. Sometimes no matter how bad things get there are still good times. In 21 years of working with kids ages 9 to 14 I have found no absolutes. I’ve tried Lee Canter’s assertive discipline. I’ve tried Fay’s love and logic. I’ve tried Greene’s collaborative problem solving. Honestly, I don’t think I’ve done any of those very well.
If I had to pinpoint what I do now it would have to be a combination of the three main strategies I’ve been trained in or learned. I’ve read many blogs about this topic lately and I have to say that it all makes my head spin. So much so that I’m writing about it now trying to understand my own thinking around this hot topic. Why hot? Because the classroom climate, how the kids all work together and with the teacher, determines whether kids will be successful and learn. So a lot rides of classroom management.
So here’s where I struggle, keeping my management style away from rewards and punishments. Assertive discipline was all about the rewards and punishment. I hated how it was like training dogs. I took a dog training class and trained a dog once and that’s what assertive discipline reminds me of. With love and logic and collaborative problem solving at least there is conversation with the kids. That’s how I naturally deal with problems in my classroom. When conversation fails I run out of tools and go into life saving mode, which usually entails relocation of a child.
The biggest problems in my classroom are problems that I have heard teachers say are my fault, student engagement. I’ve written a bunch about engaging students and what it boils down to is that I should make what they are learning so fun and relevant that they will want to work on it. I go back and forth on that one. I often talk with colleagues about students meeting us half way. If I bring iPads into my classroom so that students can blog, use social networking, create, connect and communicate I expect them to use those tools and ideas to do work. If students come to me with different ideas I hear them out and let them go with it. I try to give them choice within the topics we are studying. I teach Science so we get to do hands-on labs. Typically, there is a reflection part after a lab that looks less exciting than the lab. I don’t expect students to be on task, working every single minute of an entire class period. I’m flexible. Middle school kids are social so they need to be able to socialize but they should be able to make progress on their work every single day.
When I start to rely on assertive discipline and send kids on a time out is when nothing I’ve put in place works. If a kid isn’t getting any work done after I’ve explained it or gotten them started, I’ll ask that kid how I can help. If the kid needs help, I provide it. If that doesn’t work or the kid didn’t need help I ask what’s going on. If talking to the kid leads nowhere and that kid still refuses to do any kind of work that’s when I decide it’s time for something different. I give the kid the choice, you’re welcome to stay in here as long as you are working and learning. If that still doesn’t work then I send the kid for a time out or to give the kid a different space to work.
I just cannot talk to parents and tell them that I allowed their child to come to my class every day and do nothing. At least I can tell parents what I have done. I don’t like it when it turns into punishments because I know punishments are not the best way to change behavior. I don’t know if it’s hard because I only see kids for 50 or so minutes a day but I also owe it to the other kids in the room. For those who are working or for those who are easily distracted by those not working I have to do something. Maybe it would be best to just keep talking with kids everyday until I find out what will motivate them to learn Science and do some work, but I can’t bring myself to do that. What if it takes days, or weeks, or months? What will the other kids think? Or what will they do if they see that it’s acceptable in my room to just socialize and goof around every day during Science? Am I too old school? Don’t I owe their parents more?
I don’t know. I would love to abolish all rewards and punishments from my classroom. But there’s still that part of me that wants kids to sometimes work even when it’s not that motivating or even when it’s boring just because it’s not boring all the time. If I had the tools my students have when I was a kid I would have loved school and I would have loved working on projects. I value hard work and effort and all I’m asking is for students to make progress on their work every, single day. I can’t let go of that. So maybe it’s my fault. Maybe it’s their fault. Either way, my expectations are not going to change.
Time Spent on Test Prep
Online testing can look like this.
Last year our middle school standardized tests went online. The test changed from being called the WASL (Washington Assessment of Student Learning) to the MSP (Measure of Student Progress). A huge change from the WASL to the MSP was cutting out the four point extended response questions. They were actually pretty good questions asking our kids to, for example, design labs or write conclusions on the Science test. They cut those out because they were too difficult and expensive to score. Of course. Luckily, the MSP still has two point, short answer questions where students can share their thinking through writing. The rest of the test questions are the same, old multiple guess questions that many kids dread. So besides cutting out the extended response questions the test went completely online. Okay.
I teach 6th graders and 8th graders. All our 6th graders will spend a few hours taking a Reading test and a few hours taking a Math test. The 8th graders will take a similar Reading test and Math test. Eighth graders will also take a Science test. From 3rd to 8th grade WA state kids take a Reading and Math test every year. They take a writing test in 4th grade and in 7th grade. They take a Science test in 5th and 8th grade. Then they get tested again in 10th grade in Reading, Math, and Science (writing must be too difficult to score). The 10th grade tests need to be passed in order for kids to graduate. High school teachers feel the pressure of those tests so much so that they spend a majority of their school year and their energy on preparing their students for this test. Even if preparing students for the test isn’t the best way to educate or the best way for students to learn they still choose test prep methods to ensure that their kids have the best chances to graduate.
One example in Math of test prep education that isn’t the best way to teach Math is rushing through many concepts to cover them all so that kids will be exposed to anything they’ll find on the test. In reality we know that rushing for coverage results in such shallow learning that it is forgotten after the test. What a waste of a year. In Science if one Science is tested over the others, in WA it’s a Biology End of Course Exam, then the other Sciences don’t get taught. In some WA high schools physics and chemistry classes are being dropped and replaced with Biology End of Course Exam Prep classes. I kid you not.
In elementary and middle school the tests aren’t so high stakes. If kids fail their test every year it really doesn’t matter as long as they pass the 10th grade tests. How many kids do we see mature in high school and finally start succeeding in school? It makes you wonder how much time and energy should we spend preparing them for a test that they will spend a few hours taking once a year. Unless you see each test as a preparation for the high school test. Elementary and middle school teachers who spend a lot of time and energy preparing their kids for a standardized test are trying to give their kids practice so that when they take their 10th grade tests they are prepared and have the best chance of passing. I’m not so sure that is the best way to go. I would rather spend my time and energy, for example in Math, helping kids learn how to think Mathematically and how to solve problems instead of preparing them all for a test that might be easy for some and impossible for others to pass.
For me in my Science classes I spend all my time and energy providing the opportunity for my students to learn and do Science. If that means that some kids want to take the curriculum in a different direction or if a class needs to spend more time on a topic then I have the flexibility to do that. I’m not expected to cover a certain amount of curriculum or to be on a certain “page” at any point and time. I’m very fortunate to be able to do what my students need. When it comes to preparing my 8th graders for the Science test (6th graders don’t have a Science test) I do spend some class time having them practice. This year I took each one of my 8th grade Science classes into the computer twice. One the first day students took the online practice test working mostly on their own. I say mostly because I heard some kids helping each other and it sounded great. It made me feel bad that they can’t work together like that during an actual standardized test. On the second we went through each of the 15 questions together. We actually had great discussions and kids shared great ideas for how they answered each of the questions.
What that enough? I don’t know. Kids now know what types of questions they’ll be asked. Questions about content has kids worried because this year we have been learning about Life Science. If the test has any Earth Science questions they learned about that last year. If the test has any Environmental Science or Physical Science questions they learned about those in 6th grade. They know they don’t remember much of what they did last year and in 6th grade so I focused on the two point, short answer questions where they have a better chance of showing the Science they know.
It seems like more of a crap shoot to me than a measure of student progress but nonetheless what goes on in my Science classes will be judged by those scores. My 8th graders will spend one day taking their Science test, really two to three hours, and they spent two class periods, out of 180, practicing for that test. Seems just about right to me.
Two Sides to Testing
Actual Graph from the WA State Report Card
It’s testing time. That one time each year that should not be a big deal. I mean, really, it’s just a test. Well, that’s the way it should be. It should just be a test. One more, little bit of data added to the data we collect all year to determine how our students are learning. There are those of us who are against using this test to gauge if students are learning our content to the point where we don’t even want our students to take this test. Then there are those who can make use of the data collected from these tests. I think we’re all on board when it comes to whether these tests should be high stakes. They should not. To use the scores from these tests to determine how many students can answer the test questions is fine, but to decide if a kid can graduate or if a teacher is effective based on a standardized test score is something that I oppose very strongly.
I did have a good conversation on Twitter with a fellow Washington Teacher, Todd Hausman on just this topic. It started with @Maren_Johnson and me retweeting something about parents opting their kids out of standardized tests. I copied the tweets because I don’t really know know to archive a specific conversation on Twitter, I’ve never used any Twitter archiving tools. I asked Todd if he would be okay if I shared our conversation on this blog and he was so here it is (sorry for the plain copying and pasting):
RT
@maren_johnson Disgusted with standardized tests, group of#WAedu parents shunning them. http://bit.ly/HIVDjc Seattle Times.@educatoral @maren_johnson The problem with shunning tests is that schools are punished when participation is < 95%. bit.ly/HIVDjc
@educatoral @maren_johnson There are ways to influence policy that don’t punish schools and put kids in the middle. bit.ly/HIVDjc
@thausman @educatoral We need assessments which promote learning,not narrow curriculum.Tchrs, parents, schools should work together for this
@maren_johnson @educatoral Agreed, but refusal to participate only punishes schools. It certainly does not promote collaboration.
@thausman@maren_johnson It might just work. When writing letters & testifying before leg doesn’t work a stronger message needs to be sent.@educatoral @maren_johnson Reminds me of Mothers Against WASL. How’d that turn out? We just changed the name of the test!
@educatoral @maren_johnson I find it ironic that these parents are complaining about the expense. Quality tests cost more to produce.
@thausman@maren_johnson Portfolios are cheaper.@educatoral @maren_johnson Portfolios are great, but extremely hard to standardize. Isn’t there value in having a common state assessment?
@educatoral @maren_johnson I find the MSP to be a valuable indicator of my performance. It’s not the only gauge, but a reliable measure.
@thausman@maren_johnson Standards can be useful. But in 21 years of teaching I have found little value in standardized testing.
@thausman@maren_johnson What performance of yours does a one day a year mostly multiple choice test measure?@educatoral @maren_johnson Seriously? I have to answer that? You don’t think there is any validity in standardized tests?
@thausman I wasn’t kidding when I said that I find little value in MSP scores. And I seriously wonder how the MSP measures my teaching.
@thausman I see students taking the MSP. If they’re in a bad mood, hungry, disinterested, confused they won’t score well. No make-ups …
@thausman No asking their peers for help, no Googling, no class discussion, no debates, no testing hypotheses. How is that a measure of my
@thausman class? And multiple confusion questions? How do you know what they understand from multiple choice answers? It NOT authentic.
@thausman The Sci MSP tells me if they scored low on inquiry, applications, or systems but I find out when they’re gone. By 8th grade all I
@thausman have is their 5th grade Sci MSP scores. They are of little help to me. Sixth graders, maybe I can use the info but I learn more
@thausman from working with my kids. And if their reading and writing skills are low, forget their Sci scores! Yet they still understand.
@thausman I agree w/ formative assessment. As 4 reliable & valid, well yes, at determining how well kids take tests. Not something I value.
@educatoral The MSP is a summative assessment, it wasn’t really designed to inform instruction. bit.ly/IhNoth
@educatoral Teachers should be constantly assessing their students. The MSP is just a snapshot in time, but a valid and reliable one.
@educatoral On that point we disagree. I think there is value in both formative and summative tests. Different purposes, different data.
@educatoral I won’t pretend to be an expert on EOC tests. I was speaking mainly about the role of MSP in K-8.
@thausman I’m not familiar with the reading or the math MSP’s. I do know that math is benchmark testing our kids to death. They hate it.
@thausman Yes, we’ll just have to disagree on the summative one.
@educatoral I will say the science MSP is my least favorite of all the tests. The reading and math assessments are pretty good.
@educatoral I think the math MSP is a really good indicator of performance. The test is not the reason #WA students struggle.
@educatoral That’s fair. We’re not going to agree on everything. I appreciate knowing if my students have mastered skills and concepts.
So we ended up agreeing to disagree. Where do you fit in on standardized testing? Is it a valuable and reliable measure of your teaching?
Beyond the Textbook?
Students, teachers, and schools can have access to cell phones, smart phones, iPods, tablets, netbooks, or even laptops to learn. Any of the aforementioned devices allow for learning on the move, which means anytime, anywhere learning. The technologies have the power to expand the classroom and transform learning and education to something it has never been before. Take fractal geometry. Fractal geometry became a workable math when technology made it possible to “see” shapes such as the Mandelbrot Set (see the history section). In the 21st century technology has the power to make many education traditions obsolete. Even something like cheating is no longer clear cut because if I can look something up on my iPhone, why shouldn’t I? Tests clearly have to be rewritten because if your answers are so easily Googled then maybe they aren’t very good questions!
One area of education that is being explored recently is the textbook. The textbook is a hallmark of traditional education and schooling. The textbook, much like grades, is one of those things in education that people hold on to as completely necessary to educate children. But is it? Or better yet, is it really necessary in its traditional, bound form?
If someone were to ask me what my students use instead of textbooks, it’s the web. When my students need to learn something they use Google to look it up or I put together a list of specific websites for them. The websites provide text with hyperlinks for more information (or to go off on tangents), youtube videoes, or interactive websites where kids can test things out virtually that we can’t do physically. I haven’t even considered anything like an ebook mostly because we don’t have much of a budget. If I can’t buy it then I’ll use something else and free what I need!
In order to expand my limited view of what textbooks can evolve into I’ve been reading some great blogs from folks who have been discussing how we can transform textbooks. This movement has been called Beyond the Textbook (#beyondthetextbook) and here are some great resources:
- Here’s a #beyondthetextbook infographic that Richard Byrneshared. Richard brought this whole beyond the textbook thing to my attention on his What Would You Have Me Say to Discovery About Textbooks? blog. Here’s his follow up: Podcast and Reflections on Beyond the Textbook
- Here’s a piece by Audrey Watters on Beyond the Textbook
- David Warlick has written a few blogs on his journey with this whole topic:
- Here’s one by Tom Whitby: “We Don’t Need No Stink’n Textbooks” #Beyondthetextbook
- Here’s one by Dean Shareski: Beyond the Textbook
- My Diigo textbook bookmarks
There’s a lot to read and digest but it’s worth it to keep abreast of what could be possible. So enjoy those great blogs and see what you think about the future of our textbooks. And if you can’t get to your computer lab and you don’t have computers in the classroom find out how many of your students currently have a cell phone, smart phone, iPod, or some other mobile device that they can use anytime in your room. Even if half of your students have a device then imagine all the things they could do in pairs!
A Plea for Education
As the Washington State Legislature continues to meet to decide the fate of our state many educators are writing emails and making phone calls urging legislators to make the best decisions for our kids. Maren Johnson, a high school Science teacher in my district, has been taking the lead in communicating with our legislature to help them make decisions that are in the best interest of our children. Maren testified against an end of course, high stakes Biology test that would force high schools to teach mainly biology and Maren is the biology and AP biology teacher in the high school! She clearly cares about what is best for kids. Maren blogs at the Big Rock Blog and can be followed on Twitter.
Urging the rest of us to write our legislators Maren has helped us stay on top of what our state is doing because laws are being written and laws are being considered that would decide how our new teacher evaluation plan is going to be implemented, laws that would add charter schools to our state, laws that would take away our choices with regard to health insurance, as well as more cuts to education, which would, among other things, cut National Board certification pay and increase class sizes.
By continuing to write and call our legislators we are standing unified in what we believe will best help our children and what will best support education. So Maren wrote another letter to one of our state senators and this time instead of having us do the same she had National Board Certified Teachers in our legislative district sign on to the one letter. So one letter was sent that was 38 strong with many signatures.
Letter that was sent to Washington State Senator:
Dear Senator Hargrove,
We, National Board Certified Teachers in the 24th Legislative district, would like to thank you again for your support of high quality teaching and learning in our state. We truly appreciate your sponsorship of an amendment to support the National Board program, and your willingness to stand up and speak so powerfully for accomplished teaching on the Senate floor on the night of March 2.
We have worked hard in our classrooms to create innovative educational opportunities and to improve conditions for student learning. Now we are asking you to stand with us against the aspects of the latest Senate Republican budget proposal that are so harmful to education in our state. Specifically, we are asking you to:
Oppose charter schools which divert money from existing public schools. We need to provide an outstanding education to every student in our state, not just those students who might attend a charter school.
Oppose 6442. This change to educational employee health insurance would cost taxpayers $45 million and eliminate private sector competition. It would reduce benefits while costing employees more.
Support smaller class sizes for our students! The Senate Republican budget does nothing to restore funding for smaller class sizes. Individual attention from a teacher is so important for the learning of so many our students, and this simply doesn’t happen in large classes.
Thank you for your support!
Sincerely,
38 National Board Certified Teachers of the 24th Legislative District
Maren Johnson, NBCT, Chimacum
Brian Berg, NBCT, Sequim
Patti Smith, NBCT, Chimacum
John Henry, NBCT, Port Angeles
Paul Zurybida, NBCT, Hoquiam
Al Gonzalez, NBCT, Chimacum
Tom Gambill, NBCT, Port Townsend
Maria Kays, NBCT, Port Angeles
Tricia Billes, NBCT, Sequim
Gretchen Ray, NBCT, Montesano
Lois Sherwood, NBCT, Port Townsend
Ione Marcy, NBCT, Sequim
Jolene Powell, NBCT, Aberdeen
Laurie Day, NBCT, Port Angeles
Jennifer Van De Wege, NBCT, Sequim
Renee Mullikin, NBCT, Sequim
Leslie Shively, NBCT, Port Townsend
Suzanne Duscha, NBCT, Chimacum
Debbie Erickson, NBCT, Port Angeles
Lisa Deen, NBCT, Port Townsend
Becky Stanton, NBCT, Sequim
Mimi Tiderman, NBCT, Port Angeles
Mandy Biggs, NBCT, McCleary
Shannon Lowrie, NBCT, Chimacum
Jennifer Stankus, NBCT, Port Townsend
Denise Williamson, NBCT, Quilcene
Stuart Marcy, NBCT, Sequim
Peter Braden, NBCT, Port Townsend
Jim Weller, NBCT, Quilcene
Stacy Swinhart, NBCT, Montesano
Jeff Youde, NBCT, Quilcene
Charles Kleinberg, NBCT, Sequim
Dorothy Stengel, NBCT, Port Townsend
Chelsea Reichner, NBCT, Sequim
Karen Brown, NBCT, Aberdeen
Laura Gould, NBCT, Sequim
Diane Frame, NBCT, Port Townsend
Christy Ditlefsen, NBCT, Sequim
We are fighting for a strong public education here in Washington by asking that our legislature fully fund education. We also will continue to impress upon our legislature the importance of using alternative methods to evaluate teachers, principals and students. This includes NOT using a one-day-a-year, standardized, mostly-multiple-choice test scores to determine what our students know or are learning, and NOT using those test scores to determine if a teacher or a principal or a school is educating our youth. So I’m publishing Maren’s letter here in case it will help anyone else to reach out to those who are entrusted with deciding what is best for education.
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