Small Changes; BIG RETURNS

 

My word I can be long winded!  In preparation for the Horizons Conference on Friday, I thought it would be a good idea to get the rest of our Freepath interview posted. Congratulations to any of you who read it all the way through! I guess the value for me has been in the writing and crystallizing of my own thoughts as I have been preparing for these 2 conferences and sending in proposals for others.  

Read on, MacDuff!  I hope some of it has been helpful. If you nave a moment, leave me a comment below. I'd love to hear back from some of you.

FINAL FREEPATH INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: 

In your session, you discuss the idea of ‘blended learning’; what does this teaching model look like?

 

At its simplest, blended learning is a custom approach that mixes a variety of content delivery and student response options to get the best fit for the student (in our case) or for the class.  We know that particularly with learning packages, it’s difficult to get the students off the bottom couple of steps of Bloom’s cognitive model (above) . Projects like making posters may offer a more creative, less ‘word bound’ way for students to respond -- but really -- how many posters can one student make in their high school careers? How many will they ever do in their work or family life (except when helping their own kids with their homework)? And do posters really reach up the lowest steps of the above model and engage learners in application, analysis, synthesis, or evaluations -- or are they just more basic knowledge presented in a visual way?

Here's what our new teaching model looks like:

I. Trigger Activity : Each new section or unit begins with an activity that serves 2 functions: (1) to generate student interest; & (2) to get the student and teacher to connect so the teacher can assess ability, prior knowledge, and interest levels of the student.

In my new Earth Science program this will be a mind map introducing the key topics of the unit but that will also be loaded with interesting links that will connect back to old learning, stimulate conversation about current events, amuse, surprise, or pique curiosity.

II. Content Acquistion :  This is where we can save time. Typically with the current learning packages, our students spend so much time acquiring the information in a course we don’t push them to do much higher order thinking or truly creative projects.  By setting out the learning objectives in a simple form right at the beginning, and using Freepath to package the learning materials, students will be able to accelerate their progress through this material, work non-sequentially if they wish, and have some measure of control over how much time they spend acquiring the required content and skills.

III.  PEL -- Project Enhanced Learning:   (I think I may have coined a new term!) Students will use a new web-based tool or resource together with what they have learned to solve a problem, answer a bigger question, make a connection, do the review, create a presentation, or fulfill the learning objectives. This requirement can be built into the body of the unit or done after the basic content has been covered.  It is possible that a well- constructed project may become the vehicle for the content acquisition -- that’s the neat thing about finding these tools.

 
How do you see social media impacting students in the 21st century? How does it impact teachers and where do you see the intersection?

Marshall McLuhan created the slogan "Reach out and touch someone" for the Bell system in 1979.   I think he’d be delighted by the way technology has so shaped our lives in the nearly 30 years since his death.

Clearly many students are wrapped up in a web of connections -- whether it’s as simple as passing notes by texting each other or participating in Facebook or Second Life. Contrary to school rules, their phones are always on. We can either fight this or, in the parlance of the 60’s and 70’s, co-opt it. We may not be able to ‘out-tech’ our kids but we can certainly outsmart them and harness their desire to be connected and use it for our own purposes.

Students with their phones out on their desks, accessing the internet and completing tasks using these as a primary learning tool can’t be texting each other under the table.  Students who are using the wealth of the internet as their primary learning resource and who are more engaged in their learning don’t have time in class to manage their Facebook files and keep up with their Tweeting friends.

Regarding how social networking impacts teachers:  I’m of the “Be wary because Big Brother is watching” generation, and I still have a lot of distrust for living so publically, but I will say that finding how willing people “out there” are to make time to help each other completely took me by surprise.

I can find a bit of software, get into trouble trying to make it work, e-mail out a request for help and then get back a response -- I find that totally amazing.  I am so used to waiting for hours on the phone or weeks for a serviceperson to come to the house or even in line at the bank or at the market -- this online world of people who want to connect, to help, to dialogue, and to learn form each other is a delight.

However, trying to fit the hours it can consume into an already crowded day and still find time for relaxation, my husband, and sleep is a challenge.  Perhaps the question on balancing time should have been asked in this context. It’s what I am truly grappling with right now.

 

 
Your presentation at the upcoming CUEBC Conference is entitled Small Changes; Big Returns: integrating Web-based Tools and Resources. Can you give us an idea of what we'll be seeing?

Debra and I have put a lot of thought into how education at the White Rock Learning Center can be taken from ‘pen and paper’ to more engaging delivery and improved student achievement.

The two of us collectively have been teaching for more than 50 years, and although we know that education should be a dynamic process, it is very easy for seasoned teachers to become complacent about the design and delivery of new educational material. Years of marking, large numbers of students in classes, and textbook upgrading can often squelch the teacher’s passion for the profession.  

With our students’ lack of self-directedness and our own need for professional renewal converging, Debra and I decided to start making some “small changes” in our classroom delivery --  i.e. incorporate a Powerpoint activity, try an essay template set up like a fillable form, add links to video files and animations, and use the Google research engine to find information in all content areas.

The small changes had BIG RETURNS.  A young man who had been struggling on and off to complete Geography 12 started attending regularly because the Powerpoint Jeopardy task we had set him was both manageable and intriguing.  Students no longer complained about not knowing what Deb wanted when reading the essay assignments. The structure and her voice were there on the page.  Some life was breathed into the deadly Earth Science course  when the students could see animations of processes and get video instruction.

Then, with the discovery of Freepath it all came together.  It became the delivery tool that would enable us incorporate these changes into a well designed lesson plans and package the new lessons up for the students.

Freepath is meets the criteria for our ‘tools of choice’ because it’s so easy to use and the company support is so good. With simple drag and drop moves, lessons can be created that allow students to work independently in a medium they are used to while at the same time allowing Debra and me to help those students who require direct instruction. The students benefit because they are involved more effectively in their own learning process, and Debra and I benefit because our passion has once again ignited.

“Small Changes; BIG RETURNS” is the core of our philosophy -- we invest in making small changes to our work to get BIG RETURNS with the students

 

Filed under  //   blended learning   Bloom   cartoon   Connect the Dots soup   CUEBC   enhance learning   Freepath   Horizons   Marshall McLuhan   model ot learning   recipe   social learning   tools   using technology   Web 2.0  

The point of all this is that it took me right up to the last few minutes before the presentation at San Jose to get it all just right -- so there was no more time for blog posts.

To those of you who came to see us there, we hope some part of our presentation resonated with you. We'd love you to give us some feedback.  Perhaps you'll email me with the answers to the following 4 questions and any comments or suggestions you'd like to add:

    (a) Which part of the presentation was the most interesting to you?

    (b) Which part held your interest the least?

    (c) Will you be trying Freeapth?

    (d) Which of our other tools might you try?

Also, if you'd like to receive this blog regularly, please send me your email address. I'm trying to find out from the team at Posterous how I can send you all an update notice.

To the 2 people from Toronto -- I'm so glad you found us!!! Did we say/show anything that particularly interested you? I'm thinking of setting up a network of Canadian educators who use Freepath. I know of at least one person in Alberta. Are you interested?

This is one of our students, Syd G-B, using Freepath to research photos for her PowerPoint for Peace project slide.

NEXT 2 FREEPATH QUESTIONS:

How do you balance the use of "leading edge" tools with the normal time requirements as teachers?

Simply put, the flexible structure of the learning environment in our alternate school allows Debra and me to have the luxury of being able to make the time needed to learn and implement “leading edge” tools.  Working with individualized programs relieves us of the need to live within strict timelines.  Our kids keep working on a subject until they finish.  For some students this can be accomplished in a few weeks; for others a few months.  The self-paced instruction gives us the time to breathe, to think, to collaborate, and to learn new and interesting technology in a non-frantic, non-stressful manner, and to launch centre-wide projects like Powerpoint for Peace and our Earthcast’08 presentation.

How does Freepath fit into your classroom?

Freepath happens to be the tool I found and Deb agrees that is capable of helping us address a number of challenges, such as: how to easily combine different kinds of resources in one lesson; how to provide instruction that provides for different learning styles, multiple intelligences, and varying abilities; how to work around the limited bandwidth in our school; and how to maximize student on-task time in our individualized setting. 

Here’s what I envision:

Students will load up their thumbdrives (we can’t yet depend on fast or consistent internet connection) and they will be able to work on our material 24/7.  Many of them are night owls working on their computers at home anyway -- we might as well capitalize on this.  They can do the assignments right on the Freepath screen or print and work by hand if they wish.  The files can be deleted and replaced when the work is completed.  Their most interesting work samples can be stored in student portfolios at myFreepath.

A unit built in Freepath can truly get us away from traditional learning centre content packages -- duotangs with fading photocopied text material and lists of questions or written assignments.  Once we have loaded a playlist with the relevant text pages, idea diagrams, Powerpoints, pod- or vod-casts, other multimedia materials, and response form templates, we can let the students loose.  

Units constructed this way enable us to more easily differentiate learning by customizing activities to meet the needs of the student, and they ‘free‘ the student to negotiate the ‘path’way to learning.

For a stronger student, we can leave the completion of work required to meet the objectives more open-ended.  Whereas a special sequence of activities can be selected and arranged by just shifting the cues (frames) for students who need more direction or who have trouble with reading or grasping concepts. The neat thing here is that we don’t have to rely on print and long videos. We can dole the concepts out in smaller chunks and the students can go back as many times as is needed to really get the answers. We’re trying to minimize the hours spent reading content material they really don’t understand and answering questions by trying to match words and copy the ‘right stuff’.

The material can be easily reshaped over time as we listen to the students’ feedback and add new resources and remove others.   A case in point -- my mum sent me an article about a recent discovery of the oldest rock in the world (4.28 billion years) in northern Quebec. All my old stuff has the oldest rock in the North West Territories (4.03 billion years).  Right now I have to amend the old package, recopy it and toss out the old ones. Once it’s all in Freepath I’ll be able to change a couple of cues and be totally up to date. I may even have a student do that as part of a learning activity -- to reinforce the notion that scientific knowledge is always growing.

 

Filed under  //   blended learning   California   Freepath   ILC 2008   San Jose  

I have set up 3 playlists for the bigreturns group (just my profile is available here as of tonight)  at myFreepath . When you download Freepath and sign up for myFP at the same time, ask to be invited to my group and you'll be able to see a comprehensive tools list (with homepages and student work if we've used them already); a sample unit in Social Studies 10 showing how leading edge tools can be integrated, and a general pot of other stuff I thought would be of interest to people at the conference.

QUESTION: What are your beliefs about of the integration of new tools into your work in the classroom?

In our Learning Centre all students work individually on a variety of subjects in a large classroom area. Debra and I share this large storefront-type open room with all the distractions of two different classes going on simultaneously.

When there are fewer than 10 kids in our groups, keeping the kids on task is fairly straight forward.  However, we both can have upwards of 17-20 on our lists. Debra tends to get a younger group -- mostly grade 10’s -- many of whom have been recently ejected by their mainstream schools because they are difficult to manage. I teach math and science -- the 2 subjects that students find the most difficult to work on without constant help.

When our kids can’t work independently, we turn to better-crafted instructional packages to keep them interested and engaged.  It’s a matter of day-to-day survival for us. Therefore, we believe that keeping the students engaged, on task, and working independently requires us to put enough actual instruction into the packages so that they can understand the concepts without continual teacher input. This way they’ll be interested in and capable of working on their own for longer periods.

“Why everything old is new again, but better” (borrowed from Caroline Gray; see references below) is the banner we’re working under. We have no time or interest really in throwing out everything we’ve always done and starting over -- not after the more than 30 years it took to get good at what we do!

What really interests us is that there are a lot of smart young people out there developing easy-to-use tools to make tech-challenged people like us look good.  With such tools we can get students to perform tasks on the computer that we’ve always had them do by hand -- draw idea diagrams, work out time lines, collect research, make posters, build bibliographies, work through lesson packages. These tools enable our kids to produce work they can be proud of and that they can share with the world.  Such tools eliminate a lot of the struggle they used to endure to get the job done.  They can concentrate on the message rather than on the construction.

We want students to unplug their headphones, logoff Facebook, and get out of MySpace for a while. As shown in the affective domain model diagram above, no learning can occur until students are (a) receiving us and (b) have a willingness to give us their attention. We want students to give more of their 'brainspace' to schoolwork -- not just the bit left unfilled by loud music and text messaging. However, the 2 pre-requisites for engagement in learning -- i.e. receiving and willingness to pay attention -- are seldom elicited by our just insisting that the students turn off their devices when they pass through our doors.

To take them where we want them to go, teachers have to start from where they are -- but not just in the academic sense.

Students learn more from teachers they know care enough to forge a connection. We need to be willing to make ourselves vulnerable by taking some steps into their technological world and then guide them confidently into our world from a place at their side.

You must have flash to see this embedded document.

Filed under  //   blended learning   Bloom   Caroline Gray   enhance learning   Freepath   ILC 2008   model of engagement   myFreepath   San Jose   tools   using technology  

“Blended learning is a custom approach that applies a mix of training delivery options to teach, support, and sustain the skills needed for top . . .  performance. With blended learning, the tried-and-true traditional learning methods are combined with new technology to create a synergistic, dynamic learning structure that can propel learning to new heights.”

The title of her article, Why Everything Old Is New Again -- But Better , has become the theme for my life and my career, for my day-to-day work and how I feel technology ought to be used to enhance learning. For more about this, please take a look at my workshop lens in Squidoo à Small Changes; BIG RETURNS.  

When I first started teaching and used to imagine how I'd end up, I'd myself working as a teacher trainer -- perhaps teaching in university or as a faculty associate helping student teachers learn how to work in the classroom. Now I think that goal may be within reach, but with a different twist, because I'm getting enormous pleasure from helping colleagues -- many near dinosaurs like I almost was -- renew, refresh and re-energize their work.

                                                                                                                       

Filed under  //   blended learning   Caroline Gray