Frustration, Disappointment and Failure

At the ADE Summer Institute we were urged to embrace failure and a natural part of the quest to innovate. I understand the notion, but it does not make the consequences any less painful if you have invested time and effort into a project. Perhaps by sharing my frustration, disappointment, and failure; someone will have some helpful feedback or at least be spared a similar experience.

Frustration
I urge my cbl project groups to map their progress using Google Docs. They are required to include me as a collaborator so that I can add notes and provide guidance. I get the strong impression that usually one group member tends to dominate the authoring. Worse, the comments I make don't elicit any back and forth. A couple of students waited until class to see me about the comments (What happened to email?), in both cases worrying that they were being "marked down". One erased my comments before the rest of her group even saw them, and then asked me if she had fixed the problems, sort of missing the point of collaboration.

I'm hoping this situation will improve after the students become more acquainted with Google Docs and the benefits of collaboration.

Disappointment
Build it and they will come....That certainly is my experience with the Blog Squad Ning. The purpose of this virtual club is to afford students the chance to help other students with commonly used technical tools. I gathered names last spring and issued invitations. Students immediately signed up this Fall. I began a couple of discussion threads and groups. Then . . . . nothing. I am reluctantly conclude that to ignite the group we a physical meeting or email bombardment may be necessary. The members are not used to being attentive to the Ning. This is ironic, because the reason I jettisoned sponsorship of a more conventional club was that students seemed to assume I would be its major force. Now I find myself in the same position with the Ning.

Failure
A) I was very excited about offering my AP students an ebook option for their text, this year (At our private school the students purchase books). It has nice features and is half the cost its traditional text. Strangely, only about 15% opted for it. This I simply do not get.

B) Last spring I offered film students the research option of writing a digital research "paper" with hyperlinks rather than using the conventional MLA model. The result? I got dreadful citation and reference with both options. And I mean, really bad.

Have you noticed than in all of these I've mistakenly assumed that students will adjust readily to digital media?

P.S. While I haven't yet sewn any silk purses from these sow ears, at least they have given me blog content!
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"Angst" Flickr Creative Commons photo by tizzle

Planning a High School Web 2.0 Project

This post was inspired by a comment to my Real Projects with Real Problems post. aml asked,

What if a hypothetical teacher were considering . . . embarking on some kind of project adventure in a course next fall? . . . .What would be the first steps? And how much do you think this not-entirely-tech-savvy but willing-to-do-some-heavy-lifting teacher could accomplish without having to run to the in-house tech gurus every day?

Here's my current thinking on this great question:

Dear aml,

I think without any doubt that anyone willing to roll up her sleeves, as you are, can accomplish a great deal by going down this road. Will it be frustrating at times? Absolutely. Can it be exciting? Without a doubt!

Ideally, you could find a partner (or partners) for this venture The advantage of partners would be shared skills and ideas. and/or just bite off a corner piece of a project you have in place.

Is it possible to bite off a corner piece of a project you have in place? If you think of your project as modular, then you are less likely to feel overwhelmed (As you may recall, I am a big fan of the Tinker Toy Curriculum).

Choose a curriculum area that you are itchy to overhaul, anyway, so that you don't feel that inevitable first-time tech issues aren't messing up something that used to be cool.

Don't put yourself in the position of teaching much of the tech. You'll be hip deep even if you take something very familiar. Speaking of familiar-- prefer it. At our school a critical mass of kids have now experienced Google Sites and Blogger, so they can help each other.

Freeware is all the rage, but as you know first hand with Gabcast, you can have the rug pulled out from under you, so if we're keeping it free, this would be another reason to start with Google. They change the rules too, but they don't instantly drop support for an app, and they will not vanish overnight.

I you know of another teacher who has used the app, talk to him or her about its pitfalls before going blindly ahead (You'll bump your head as I have done).

*As part of your heavy lifting set up a prototype for the students which will be useful for teaching the kids and learning the stuff yourself.

*Consider having the students create something that can be shared with or taught to an audience beyond the class. (highly motivational).

*I urged groups to set a time lime for when different phases should be done. This really helped with accountability. But be forewarned (the project based learning gurus never tell you this), students are as likely to let down their peers as their teacher.

*Share your progress with others. Blog about it, tweet about it, Ning about it. Lots of us want you to succeed and will commiserate with your frustrations.

*License your project with Creative Commons. Web 2.0 is all about mixing, mashing, collaborating, sharing.

Best of luck. I'm hoping that you will tell us about your experience with a guest blog at the Drive-thru.

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"Dream Big" Flickr Creative Commons photo by bebop717

Project Based Learning (ADE Institute Reflection #2)

When I posted Larry's Queries a couple of weeks ago, I got some helpful feedback. But one area went unaddressed:

Trickle Down Wikinomics
I teach. . .Advanced Placement U.S. Government. . . . I usually require some kind of project . . . .This time, I was thinking of assigning some wiki projects around different portions of the Constitution. . . . But I am not sure how to utilize this kind of resource with the younger students. Any ideas?

The solution came to me at the ADE Institute where we immersed ourselves in Challenge Based Learning. This concept "applies what is known about the emerging learning styles of high school students and leverages the powerful new technologies that provide new opportunities to learn to provide an authentic learning process that challenges students to make a difference." The challenge begins with a "big idea and "cascades" through a process of
*forming an essential question
*devising a challenge
*asking guiding questions
*exploring activities / resources
*determining and articulating the solution
*taking action by implementing the solution
*reflecting, assessing, and publishing.

Pardon the above jargon, but suffice it to say that this will be a huge change for me because I will be placing open ended projects in my students hands. Instead of predetermining the type of outcome I desire from them (a wiki), I will let them arrive at the solution. I'm excited, because I think they could come up with some great things, but it makes me anxious because I know they and I will be venturing far out of our comfort zones.

At the ADE Summer Institute we formed groups and engaged in a compressed version of cbl. We did not have time to produce the greatest results, but the process itself was intellectually stimulating and gave me an idea of how engaging this type of collaboration can be.

You can expect to hear back from me in a couple of months at launch.

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Photo of Summer Institute cbl Group, by ADE '09, Kenneth Shelton

Larry's Queries

Just in case, I seem to have grown to cocky while away from my students, I want to lay out some issues that are simmering away over the summer, unresolved. I’m hoping that my readership may have some ideas about my assorted challenges. Feel free to comment publicly or correspond privately.

Trickle Down Wikinomics

I teach an elective Advanced Placement U.S. Government to seniors and a required America Government class to sophomores. The former is a college political science class and the latter is more comparable to basic civics.

I usually require some kind of project from the AP class during the first semester. This time, I was thinking of assigning some wiki projects around different portions of the Constitution. I would like to give the seniors the aim of building a helpful resource for the sophomores. I’m comfortable assigning the wiki project. I’ve done that before with other classes. But I am not sure how to utilize this kind of resource with the younger students. Any ideas?

Blog Squad

I am very excited about the impending launch of the Blog Squad. The general aim would be to provide a way for students to help students when teachers launched tech projects. This will be a pilot involving a small circle The participating adults (six or seven) have helped me identify thirty prospective student participants. I have decided to try a Ning for facilitating this project. I am relatively inexperienced with Nings. Any suggestions?

Group Work

As I move forward into challenge based learning I still remain puzzled about achieving accountability with the groups. I can reflect on a number of great things that came out of the wiki projects I tried last year, but complaints about group members not following through dogged these enterprises. Any input will be welcomed.

Weekend Take-out from the Drive-thru

Recommended Toys and Tools:

* "The Flat Classroom Project is a global collaborative project that joins together middle and senior high school students. . . . .The Project uses Web 2.0 tools to make communication and interaction between students and teachers from all participating classrooms easier. The topics studied and discussed are real-world scenarios based on 'The World is Flat' by Thomas Friedman."

*"Ning offers an innovative and easy-to-use technology platform for people to join and create new social networks for their interests and passions and meet new people around the things they care about most about in their life."

*"Advanced Image Search allows users to filter search results by Creative Commons (CC) license. For now, this search only includes CC-licensed images from Flickr, Yahoo's own photo sharing service. The Yahoo Image Search interface actually turns out to be a very nice gateway to the CC-licensed image collection on Flickr, especially because the previews update immediately after you change a filter setting." (Written by Frederic Lardinois).

"bit.ly allows users to shorten, share, and track links (URLs). Reducing the URL length makes sharing easier. bit.ly can be accessed through our website, bookmarklets and a robust and open API. bit.ly is also integrated into several popular third-party tools such as Tweetdeck."

Scott McLeod offers 20 TED Talks podcasts for busy principals . . . . "These are the TED presentations that I think are most likely to interest, educate, and entertain administrators as well as make them think!"

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"Take Out" with generous permission of americanvirus

Year in Review from the Trenches -- Making Headway

Part 1 of 3

I am pleased to reflect upon on a number of techy milestones this school year:

*I have integrated several new applications, sites, and tools into my personal and professional life. (Some listed at my new Presentations Site).

*Being named an Apple Distinguished Educator was the thrill of my career.

*I have been professionally enriched like never before from my Twitter and ADE networks (See Why Twitter).

*Facebook and this blog have generated , stimulating tech conversation with personal friends like @bridgers, Rick, aml, Katy. And Facebook has allowed me to begin lining up classroom visits from accomplished alumnae like Nadia and Monica.

*I launched three very stimulating collaborative projects: The Civil Rights/Liberties Wiki, the Congressional Simulation, and my favorite -- Blogs on Vlogs.

*I enjoyed delivering a number of in-service presentations (fully listed on my new presentations resumé). There is no better way to learn than through teaching others.

*In Resolved.... I announced the New Year's resolution to avoid checking a single "paper" at home for the entire school year. Resolution kept.

*Also Resolved.... was my determination to keep blogging. Forty-six posts since the resolution, I am still going strong.

*Rick Strobl and I have begun collaborating on Web Warriors, and the results have been gratifying.

But not all has been triumph in the trenches. Come back Wednesday for "Shell Shock".

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"Success" Flickr Creative Commons photo by aloshbennett

Web 2.0 Simuation Post-Mortem

Part 2 of 3

In part one (Taking a Deep Plunge into Google Sites) I outlined my new, tech-improved Congressional Simulation:

All of the game documents were distributed through Google Sites. In addition, each of the students created her own Google Site and was responsible for building the site with a character profile, daily journals, a summary podcast, and a "score sheet". The podcasts were created using the free audio recorder, Audacity. What is more, separate simulations were launched in three sections of American Government, involving 87 students, total.... (Click for the the full project assignment).

Here is an evaluation of the highs and lows:

* Technical Issues Trying to bring 87 students on board is, well, trying. Eventually everyone got going, but I was amazed at how many students did not check their own uploads. I would go online to check the work and encounter a problem, creating a series of email back and forths that tested my patience. My next post will propose one remedy to this problem.

* Accountability I have to figure out how to hold students accountable without repeatedly returning to the sites at various steps along the way. This was exhausting. But fifteen year olds still need progressive due dates to create a complicated final product. In our school procrastination is embedded in the culture, and to allow students to complete all the work in one gush would turn the whole enterprise into a fiasco. The time stamping provided by Sites' "File Cabinet" page may be a solution. Knowing their work will have a time signature may sufficient incentive for the majority to meet the due dates.

* Uniformity I was anxious to encourage creativity so it never occurred to me to have the students create uniformly named web pages for their files. This cost me considerable time searching for the work, particularly since Google Sites has a weak default navigation system.

* Podcasts The podcasts for the simulation were outstanding. It took forever to listen to all of them, but I could not have been more pleased. Students had trouble exporting files from Audacity and then uploading them. I think more time in class will be needed to work on this. My plan B was to have the students use flash drives, which became a clerical nightmare.

* Video The Presidents in the three classes were required to post video State of the Union messages. These were wonderfully creative. I might make video extra credit for the other players, next ttime.

* Creativity Many of the students "got into it" and developed creative sites as I had hoped. If you would like to sample one of the best all-around sites, click the Harvey Sartori screen capture in the upper right hand corner and you will be transported into our '09 simulation.

* Fun Though I was worn out by the process several students confided in the podcasts that they had learned a great deal while having fun. This was gratifying. I will conclude Part Two by offering this excerpt from Alison's podcast.

P.S. Part 3 proposes a "Blog Squad" to troubleshoot the little day to day problems that arise during a complicated Web 2.0 project like this one.