Learning through a Rear-View Mirror

"You mean I can get free wireless at school?"

These were the words that came shortly from the mouth of a student before a big smile crossed her face when I hooked up her Blackberry to our wi-fi network the other day. She had a Smartphone but she didn't have a data plan with it, so she was unable to use all of its' capabilities.  Until now.

It is an exciting time in education, particularly when it comes to technology.  Right now, there is an abundance of discussion and debate about the use of cellphones in schools.  Detractors have many arguments that range from a fear of inappropriate use, to students being distracted, to a decrease in writing skills, to impersonal communication, and even to excessive radiation.  Numerous schools and districts have chosen to ban these devices, with consequences that vary from confiscation of the phone to be picked up later at the office all the way to suspension and removal from school.  Even my own district, there is very little consistency from school to school:  there are some that permit their use and encourage students to learn with them, and there are others that do not allow cellphones to be visible at any time.

This scatter gun approach is reflected in this recent clip from CNN:



Patrick Larkin (great guy to follow on Twitter @bhsprincipal ), Principal of Burlington High School in Massachusetts has also chosen to meet this issue head on in a recent article in the Boston Globe. Patrick has been a trailblazer with the BHS 1:1 Laptop project for students, and is inspiring all of us to move into the 21st Century with our attitudes towards embracing technology and learning with students to become critical consumers of the staggering amount of information that is only a few key strokes away.  I think Patrick said it all in his final quote in the Globe article about when students graduate from his school: “if they only know people in Burlington, we didn’t do our job.’.  What a tremendous quote.

Whether it is laptops or smartphones or iPads or whatever device comes through the door in the future, schools need to be at the leading edge about how these technologies can help learning. There will always be the potential for them to be used 'for evil', but too often this 'evil' that we use to demonize these devices or the students that use them is created from a place of fear or ignorance.  We have a duty to learn about technology.  We talk about the need to prepare students for "the real world" (I loathe this term), and yet the technology and rich, interesting information that is availed to students in that "real world" is lost when they walk into many of the classrooms of today.  And while we may blame budgets and access issues for this inability to keep up with students, I believe that these can often be used as convenient scapegoats for the real reason that we have fallen behind.  Simply put, we have not made learning about technology a priority.

I am not going to point fingers; it really doesn't help anything and we can't really control what other people do.  But we can do a few simple things to help role model learning about technology in our schools, regardless of our position in the school.

1. Make time.  I can't tell you how, but you can.  I have two children under the age of three, a wife who actually enjoys spending time with me, and a busy job like the rest of us, and I manage.  You just do.
2. Get connected.  Get a Twitter account, get on Facebook, do something so that you (to steal from Patrick again) don't "only know people in Burlington".  The people that are out there to help and support you are endless and really cool.
3. Try one new technology per week.  Just try it.  Spend 10 minutes trying Diigo.  LiveBinders.  Google Docs. Screenr.  Yoono.  Whatever.  You might use it, you might not, but at least if someone mentions it, you will have some idea what they are talking about.
4. Don't make excuses why you aren't connected.  Sorry to say, no one really cares what the excuse is.  All they know is that you aren't, and that they now have to tolerate it.
5. Share.  With your colleagues.  With your students.  With your PLN. They will think you are cool, and trying your best to stay current.
6. Learn. From your colleagues.  From your students.  From your PLN.  They will think you are cool, and trying your best to stay current.

I will be the first to admit that our school does not have the financial capability to do what Patrick has done at Burlington High.  We simply do not have the cash.  However, what we do have is a student population (over 90%) who have cellphones, and a growing majority of them are Smartphones (particularly Blackberry--the little scamps love that BBM capability).  But some of them can't afford data plans, and the best thing that we could do is provide free wi-fi at our school, create policies in our district that embrace technology, and to begin to find ways to leverage the technology that kids have in their hands to help us in the classroom.

We need to stop playing catch up.  And while keeping up to the technology that our students use on a daily basis outside of school would be a welcome substitute to catching up, where we really need to be is on the leading edge so that students look forward to learning from us and with us rather than learning through a rear-view mirror.

Get Admin Connected - Help them find "The Switch"!

I’m fatter than I was when I was in university.  Yup, not much doubt about that.  I was in pretty good shape back in those days.  I could run 10 kilometers in right around 40 minutes.  I could bench press 275 pounds.  I could dunk a basketball (at least if someone alley-ooped it for me).  I had the makings of a flat stomach.  I could drive a golf ball 280-290 yards.  I probably was better looking (but 2 times 0 is still zero, so whatever).  Can you hear Bruce Springsteen’s “Glory Days” in the background?

Now, I run a couple of times per week, and my knees hurt.  40 minute 10km run—ha, not quite, maybe break 48 minutes and throw up after.  My shoulder would pop right out of it’s socket en route to my decapitation if I tried to bench 275.  290 of the tee needs a big tail wind and a severe elevation change for me now.  As for the stomach part, well, I guess I could wear pants with a 30 inch waist, but a 36 is much more comfortable and doesn’t disgust family and friends nearly as much.  Why am I telling you this?  It will provide illustration for “the switch” that is inside each and everyone of us.  I will get back to that.

On Sunday, I got the opportunity to spy on one of the Educon sessions in Philadelphia that was put on by George Couros and Patrick Larkin.  The talk centered on the question of “How to get more administrators connected”—in this case, to social media and Web 2.0 tools.  Of course, not being at the conference, I had to rely on the online AV feed, the chat, and the back chat that was taking place on the #educon thread on Twitter.  The session was fascinating and invigorating:  there were multiple perspectives—teachers, administrators, parents, even representatives from tertiary education.  There was plenty of emotion, numerous bits of gentle finger-pointing, examples of accepting blame, and a general bearing of souls.

As a result of this session, I wanted to support George and Patrick.  They are two of the many crusaders that are out there trying to push people into uncharted waters.  And they need help.

So I thought that I would jot down my Top 5 ways PLUS ONE to get administrators connected.  I am only one person, (I fully recognize and accept that) but I represent the voice of a busy high school principal with (two children under the age of three) who did not utilize anything more than email and Powerpoint just a short four months ago.  For some reason, I now am considered by some (probably more wrongly than rightly) to being a technological leader in my school and school district.  So, here goes—this is how I think we can encourage administrators like me to get connected.

But there is one qualifier: I believe the first five thoughts here really do make a difference, and I mean that sincerely. And if they don’t work at first, perseverance says try, try again, and DON'T give up.  But as compelling as these strategies might be, as convincing as you may think you are, and as often as you are going to try (and please do keep trying), the sixth one is the kicker.

1.     Create a sense of urgency:  As someone new to social media and getting connected and, I needed to feel this urgency.  If you like fatty food, going to the doctor going and finding out your cholesterol is too high, that your gall bladder is malfunctioning, or some other critical issue allows you to play the movie forward and see what things might look like if you don’t make some changes.  Maybe this analogy is too rudimentary and crude, but there needed to be some sort of initial, armpit sweat-generating moment for me to want to embark on the social media journey.  For me, it came from two speakers, Will Richardson (@willrich45) who gave a keynote in Chicago in October, and Tony Wagner's Keynote made me think completely differently with respect to the skills that children will need in the future

2.     Show them the potential for improving the capacity of their organization:  Every school-based and district-based administrator wants to have an organization that is brimming with capacity.  Distributed leadership is incredibly important, and (hopefully) all administrators recognize that having an school or district filled with people who will lead the charge in curriculum, instruction, assessment, and technology is a rich district indeed.  Show them this video—it makes so much sense in terms of developing capacity.  Check out this TED Talk, a talk that we all need to watch.

3.     Show them something cool:  I posted this on my blog a while ago when I stole it directly from George Couros (@gcouros—a must follow).  It demonstrates the power of a PLN through Twitter, Screenr and Google Docs.  It is very cool, and in your own context, I know you can come up with something even cooler.

4.     Pester them with your support:  Nothing glamorous or Web 2.0 here. Administrators need to be worn down a bit.  Invite them to your school or classroom.  Show them what you are doing with social media, with blogs, wikis.  Even better, have your students pester them, have your students demonstrate what social media does.  If a Grade 6 student can use social media, for the love of mercy, I think an administrator with a few letters behind his name can do it to, can't they?

5.     Show them examples of other Admin that are doing it:  There are SO many to list, but it’s pretty tough to get a better example than senior administrator Chris Kennedy, Superintendent of West Vancouver.  There are hundreds of principals out there as well, but Chris is pushing this aspect of the Superintendency to a new level.  As well, here is a list of administrators in British Columbia, and a list of Canadian Educators on Twitter just as an example, and here are a few more from cybraryman1 (thanks to @TheHomeworkDog and @sram_socrates)

But there is one more point to consider after looking at this list (PS. I am positive that others will come up with much better lists than this), and it is absolutely key.  Isaac Newton said:

"If I have seen further than others, it has been because I am standing on the shoulders of giants" 


Yes, we need to get to know giants. We need to seek them out. We need to stand on their shoulders.  But we also have to have the intrinsic motivation to climb up on their shoulders.  Alfie Kohn would agree. Something needs to flick that internal switch—it is a switch exists in every one of us.  The hard part is, your switch truly lies out of the reach of every last person on this planet, save for one.  YOU.

What made me want to get a Twitter account?  ME.  What made me want to start a blog? ME.  What made me want to work with our school improvement leader to create a dynamic School Improvement Plan template?  ME. What makes me want to get up early on a Sunday morning to watch a conference on getting administrators connected to social media and Web 2.0 tools?  ME.  What is going to make me try to run 10 km in 40 minutes? ME.  Bench 275?  Well, let’s not get crazy here.

The point is, we cannot make the excuse that “someone isn’t giving me the tools”, “if only I had a Principal who showed me the way”, or “my Superintendent isn’t connected, how can they expect me to be?”, or “I wish my staff would get online”.  Bollocks.  Garbage.  I won’t accept any of these.  Because at the end of it all, the reason I do something is when I can find that switch inside of myself and turn it on.

But the thing that we all have to remember about #1 through #5 is that they make that switch inside reachable.  Urgency, developing capacity, coolness, and supportive pestering make the switch inside of reluctant administrators like me and others believe that the switch can be turned on, and there will be people around to encourage us if we should ever think about turning it off.  They make us see value in the work that is going to go into turning that switch on, keeping it on, and encouraging others to find their internal switch.

And once they’ve found it, be there to encourage and support them, and keep showing them cool things that remind them of the urgency there is to adopt getting connected so their schools or districts BURST with capacity.

So my #6 is simply this:

5. Use #1-5 to help people find their switch.

And speaking of which, it’s time for me to go for a run.

Guts

"American stunt men are smart.  They think about safety.  When they do a jump in a car, they calculate everything:  the speed, the distance...Everything we do is a guess.  If you've got the guts you do it.  All of my stunt men have gotten hurt."   - Jackie Chan

There are certain times in our life when we come to a fork in the road and have to make a decision.  Do we head down the traditional, beaten path that is clearly marked and know where we are going to end up?  Do we hike down the less conventional trail which has twists and turns, but that we still believe will take us where we would like to go?  There are pros and cons to following each of these.  The traditional path is easier, it's comfortable, and the results are tried and true.  Most people are going to go that way anyway, aren't they? The trail less traveled is going to guarantee that we are going to get a good workout, that we would have really flexed our muscles along the way, and it likely would have break us out of the rut we might have been in. Yet even by choosing this more challenging pathway, we often know that we are going to end up pretty close to where we thought we would get, but with some slight modifications.  Definitely more adventuresome is the latter, and those who have this willingness to take on the additional challenges are to be commended.

However, the people who are really changing my thinking today seem to ignore both of these paths and create their own.  These individuals are not the type who follow a pathway anyway, they blaze a trail which is often in a completely different direction than most people are going.  And these people have one thing in common that propels them through these uncharted waters:  each of them has GUTS.

"Gold medals aren't really made of gold.  They're made of sweat, determination, and a hard-to-find alloy called guts." - Dan Gable, US Olympic Wrestling Gold Medallist

I like people with guts.  Being around people with guts makes me feel 10 feet tall, and able to leap over tall buildings in a single bound.  And in the last few weeks, there have been a few people that have done exactly what they always do, they inspire me (and many others) with their guts.  While there are so many people like this out there, and I hate to exclude any of the people who shape my thoughts, these are a few examples GUTS for me in the past few weeks:

1)  Chris Wejr - Principal of Kent Elementary Bucking the trend with his post called The Death of an Awards Ceremony subsequent radio interview about Awards = GUTS

2)  Chris Kennedy - Superintendent of West Van changing the way that Superintendents do business by making himself completely accessible to the public at all times, as outlined in this article in the Vancouver Sun = GUTS

3) Brad Epp and Blake Buemann - Teachers at my school who are using this survey to have their students evaluate their teaching so that they can get formative feedback and improve their methods of instruction = GUTS.

4) Joe Bower - Teacher in Red Deer, Alberta, who continuously challenges our thinking of assessing student learning first rather than assigning students grades in his blog "For the Love of Learning" = GUTS.

5) Jonathan Martin and Patrick Larkin, (via Karl Fisch and Daniel Pink) - Through their introduction to their staffs and implementation of the "Fisch Flip" of instruction, where students get the content at home and get the benefit of teacher instruction during class time = GUTS

6) Suanne Wallin - Teacher at Westsyde Secondary in Kamloops, BC who is completely committed to making connections to students in her classes, and believes that EVERY LAST STUDENT in her 'Strive' Program can be successful.  My visit to her classroom last week has truly inspired me to think of students and the services that we provide in a completely different way = GUTS

These people all inspire me in very different ways.  Through their actions, they have challenged conventional thinking, and have bared their values for all to see and critique.  These individuals know that the worst thing that we can do is stay put, and have made some pathways that might have been thought of as 'risky' in the past not only safe but possible.  And as much as each of them is incredibly talented, I would argue that the characteristic that sets them apart from others is the very reason why they are to be admired: each of them has GUTS. 

If you have examples of people in education that have GUTS, please feel free to add to this list above with your comments, and to share what it is they are doing with your Personal Learning Network.  The more that we hear about people with guts, the more it inspires each of us to be courageous in our own situation.

We all know people that are good at what they do.  We sometimes look with envy at those with raw talent.  And we all admire those with guts.  But if I had the choice to take someone with more talent than guts, or someone with more guts than talent, I'll take the one with more guts every time.