final reflection; a shift in thinking

This course has been interesting, even a journey, albeit an unexpected one. I expected to review much of what I already know: blogs and wikis, and to get some tips and pointers and little tricks. I didn’t expect to be thinking about schools in libraries rather than libraries in schools, or libraries as being more than the physical space they occupy as in our chat on Tuesday.

I didn’t expect to be thinking about how we can use Web 2.0 tools, not just to enhance our regular ways of teaching, like what my group did for assignment 3, but as a new way to approach teaching & learning, a way that synthesizes all this information, access to information, ways of managing and amalgamating that information and creating new ideas, products and content. My group incorporated blogging and vlogging into lit circles, and by doing this, we became more aware of multi-literacies and how technology can meet different learning styles.

But I hadn’t made the leap of understanding that I did when I watched the Stephen Heppell video the other day. Listening to him discuss metacognition and how we can work with the twenty first century learner or we can choose to ignore that Google exists and continue to teach as we have for years.

Putting Heppell’s ideas together with Lana saying how she teaches a few kids in each class to be organizers of the wiki (leaders and teachers), and Lisa saying how she wants to do cross curricular collab in secondary, and Lisa also wondering what would happen if she collaboratively planned a unit with her students using a wiki, created a big shift for me. I have know since my career began at a little alternative school in Vancouver, that teachers are not all knowing beings who share their knowledge with students, but that teachers are facilitators of student learning. But for teachers to collaborate with students to create new learnings had not occurred to me until yesterday.

Digital natives do not just access information like we digital refugees or immigrants do, they take information and ways of using and accessing information, and recreate it into something new. They create content and share it. They create, share, and connect.

Digital refugees and immigrants are so concerned with privacy and may make statements like, ” I don’t want my photos on the web.” But digital natives don’t have this concern. Sure, this can be problematic, but could it be today’s equivalent of your fourteen year old leaving the house in a mini skirt and crop top? You can’t control who sees them out of the house, who whistles when they walk by, who may behave inappropriately. You can only teach them how to be more aware, what to do in different scenarios. The internet is the same. 

How can we be effective teachers if we don’t work with or even understand the students’ culture? If you can’t figure out how to use email, how can you effectively teach students to be information literate? How can essentially illiterate teachers help prepare their students for the future? That doesn’t mean that teachers need to photograph themselves every other nanosecond and post on Facebook, but it does mean we need to gain better awareness of our students and how their learning is different.

Last Thursday, one classmate asked, “How can some students in my morning class look at Facebook and their email while the instructor is talking? Can they multitask that easily or are they just rude?” Both, maybe. if the instructor isn’t engaging you, why wouldn’t you do something that is? Especially in university where we are paying hundred of dollars per course, aren’t students entitled to the education they want? And doesn’t this also apply to our elementary and secondary school students?

The past two years I have regularly complained about students who question me, who demand to be entertained, who tell me what they like and what they don’t. But what I am realizing as I write this, is that they aren’t asking to be entertained, they are asking to be engaged in learning about things they care about and in ways that make sense to them. That’s what I ask for as a student, so why wouldn’t my students? And as digital natives, aren’t they wanting, demanding even, to learn as digital natives and not like the obedient, cooperative, and submissive students of yesteryear? I have done some students a disservice in not understanding about their culture and the way they learn. This is probably the biggest thing I will take away from this course, so I am glad it is my last one for the certificate.

Create. Process. Collaborate. Question. Recreate. Reflect. Share.

I am most engaged when examining, creating, and reflecting with peers. I am most engaged when choosing what to learn about and how I will share that learning (I chose this blog for example). I automatically tune out in lectures. I am not an auditory learner and neither are most of my students. 

Create. Process. Collaborate. Question. Recreate. Reflect. Share.

That’s what I need as a learner. That’s what my students need. That’s what my fellow teachers need too.

If web 2.0 is user created/adapted content, sharing and connecting, then schools and libraries in the twenty-first century should also be user created/adapted content, sharing and connecting.

In our text, Ward’s article, “Learning from games and gamers,” it states that Harvard even offers classes in Second Life, a virtual world. Virtual libraries also exist in Second Life, and even the Vancouver Police Department recruits new officers there. These few examples point out that we need to start shifting the way we understand and approach teaching and libraries, in order to serve our clientele effectively.

where to now?

In his Learning About Learning series, Stephen Heppel discusses how students learn better if they reflect on their learning and how they learn the whole time they are learning (developing their metacognition). Teachers learn how their students learn and how to teach better. Students need assignments that meet their needs as twenty-first century learners. For example, you could assign a child an essay and risk them cut and pasting or copying off the internet OR you could assign them the task of finding an essay on the internet and improving it or critiquing it.

I have done this many times, the former not the latter. I am guilty of giving my students assignments that do not reflect the digital culture they live in. Teachers I know, myself included, worry about plagarism because of all the easy and free access to information, and try to have all these checks and balances so kids don’t cheat. I need to shift the way I understand my digital native students and the way they learn.

I am currently an enrolling teacher on Vancouver’s affluent westside. I have applied and interviewed for a 0.78 libary/resource position at an inner city school where they have needle clean up before school and at recess. The job has some prep and some resource and very little collab time, so my goal is to educate and change this. I have debated this long and hard, and I could wait for a cushy job to come my way, or I could take this position (if offered, just waiting to hear) and try to positively change the TL and library role in this one school. Anyway.

Plan for next year as a TL in a new school:

• meet with admin, discuss goals, get her on board
• start connecting with colleagues who are interested in collaborating and build those relationships
• build a good relationship (hopefully) with the tech teacher
• develop presence around the school: attend/present at PAC meetings, assemblies, staff meetings
• join/chair relevant committees: Pro D, Library, Budget, Literacy, Computer, Learning Resources…
• meet with individual staff and poll them on what the like, don’t like, want, etc. for the school library and the role of the librarian
• advocate for better computers (they were rated the worst in Van elementary schools), smartboard 
• meet with parents (although parent involvement is low) and get their input
• meet with students and ask them what they like, don’t like, want to change about the library
• meet with admin and library committee, to begin looking at library policy based on information collected, work towards a collaborative policy over time (plan for pro d next year), try to do this using a wiki
• build library website and blog
• build wikis to use with classes I do prep with (so it won’t be just a book exchange), and build on units teachers are already doing
• collaboratively plan a unit using a wiki, start with one group, teach small groups at a time since there are only 4 computers in the library
• include the use of video and podcasts with students (media release forms)
• present successful ways to collaborate with the TL at staff and PAC meetings, as a way to gain support and some more teacher converts
• join TL groups for professional development, attend workshops, build connections and relationships in the greater TL community
• help fellow teachers create their own blogs, wikis

Plan for next year as an enrolling teacher (current position grades 2/3):

• continue to use class blog for information to students & parents
• develop wiki with students, teach a few to be organizers (Lana’s idea), work with small groups at a time in collab with TL, focus on one unit such as Canada or Communities
• teach them how to edit, post photos, create links, create and post video, etc.
• present class work to parents, PAC, staff
• offer to help other staff build their own blogs & wikis
• continue to use and learn about web 2.0 tools as professional development as a digital refugee

Open Source

Open Source means free access and use of various media, including software, video, photos, clip art, etc. Net purists I know believe very strongly in open source and free access to information and software. Many of these people refuse to use MS products whenever possible, including WIndows platforms, instead using open source platforms like Ubuntu (Linux), which are highly user friendly. 

In class last week I had a very satisfying experience with open source software. Unable to open Sandra’s power point presentation on my Macbook, my classmate Keith said, “Why don’t you try Open Office?” OpenOffice is free to download and enables the use of MS products without the hefty price tag. Without any price tag, in fact, though donations are welcome. 

After downloading OpenOffice, I was easily able to access the Power Point presentation. Yay for open source. I like the whole idea of open source. I find it mildly subversive and evens the playing field a little more. Regular people with a library card can put content online, meet people, find information, join a group interested in pretty much anything you can dream up, and share. Open source chips away at monopolies.

Personally, I find myself very, very reluctant to use web based applications that cost money. I would be willing if I were making money through them, but otherwise, I like the option of free, upgrade and by donation.

This blog is a another great example of open source software. People create widgets and plug ins that they allow others to download and use for free. Many provide support, otherwise support can be found through helpful other users. To me, this is the true spirit of the net, the free sharing of information, and information management systems, networking and building connections. It is the true global community.

Policy and TL role

TLs must be leaders in their schools, TL communities and districts, in order to continue to exist, influence and enact change for the betterment of our students. I agree with the statement that TLs influence teachers and teachers influence students, though I had not really thought that before I read yesterday’s power point. In fact, I had not really thought about it at all. This makes sense to me, because at my elementary school where I am an enrolling teacher, I control my students access to the library, the librarian, and all learning resources. Because of teacher autonomy (which I believe in), rarely are my students exposed to material or content or speakers unless I approve and schedule it. In other words, my students are exposed to what I feel is important, to what I understand and feel comfortable with.

TLs in little TL groups can think and plan whatever they want, but unless the enrolling teachers are on board, their access to students is heavily restricted. In fact, it can be restricted to the short half hour before and after school (and in some cases, lunch time). Not exactly ideal for promoting literacy and teaching info lit skills.

Therefore, it is crucial that

• TLs have excellent working and personal relationships with the enrolling teachers
• the library and the TL is seen as an integral part of the school (protect our jobs, budgets, FTEs)
• TLs have an excellent working relationship with the administration
• TLs have a strong leadership role in the school
• TLs are heavily involved in all school policy making, including Pro D, budgets, information policy, etc.

TLs and libraries are about more than books, they are about information, and teaching new literacies.

What do I love about this video? I love that you can easily embed it into your blog with a little URL paste instead of uploading it to the site. It works seamlessly. It would be easy to do this for students and for students to do themselves.

I also love how it examines the discrepancy between what teachers know and teach and how students (digital natives) learn. Too often I hear teachers slag students for their efforts, rather than trying to understand and work with student culture. Teachers often have this elitist view, their way (often not far from what they experienced as teachers) is the best way, and students show follow blindly. What we are missing when we do this, expect compliance and top-down approach to teaching and learning, is the opportunity to create something new with our children. There are so many possibilities for collaboration, among teachers, students, parents, board members. 

In class last week, Lisa said she wondered what would happen if she built a unit with her students using a wiki, where they collaboratively planned what they would learn about and how they would approach it. This is an amazing idea, in my opinion, as I am also guilty of limiting my students learning by falling back into a teacher-centred rather than a child-centred approach to education. That’s where the learning happens! Right in the collaboration, the discussions and negotiations, right in the planning of unit. The students must gain knowledge in order to plan the unit, engaging in meaningful resource based learning.

wiki thoughts

Class Ideas:

• use to create a group or class novel/story, could have alternative endings or chapters
• staff committees for planning that event or Pro D Day
• staff discussion of topics/themes
• group projects instead of another poster project – Ban Those Bird Units  
• collaborative unit planning with colleagues
• feedback from students on unit planning or your own writing
• tutorials, students post questions and other students or teachers reply
• summer communication with students (summer reading wiki)
• movie critique page
• post handouts on wiki for easy downloading at home
• designate a few students to be organizers – other kids can go to them for help
• eportfolios 
• take a break sites – student posted so they can have a break
• wikispaces will create ids and passwords for many people if you email them, additional students can ask to become members by accessing the wiki

Considerations:

• can you tell who wrote what for assessment purposes?
• How do you get staff to participate on a wiki?
• assess specific things like collaboration, participation, content rather than correct use of language, etc
• How could wikis be used with parents? Could be used to share among parents from a particular class.
• ESL or lack of access to computers/internet – could somehow translate on the web?

Benefits:

• paperless, sustainable learning & sharing
• able to continuously polish
• focus on process rather than product
• encourages collaboration
• student input into their learning (i.e. planning units with teacher) gives them ownership over their learning and greatly increases their engagement

Lana is an IT teacher at Tupper and she showed us her wikis, all through Wikispaces for teachers. She uses them with her students and her colleagues. She had some fabulous ideas. My favourite was to appoint a couple students as organizers to help you maintain the wiki and assist other kids. The organizers get a wonderful leadership opportunity, and you don’t lose your mind because you have time to work with students without a huge line up. This is one idea I will definitely adopt to make my wiki more successful next year.

Lana also had the students respond to questions in the discussion area, including rules for the class. Each of her students had a page where they shared their learning (usually a link) and a reflection about it. Great ideas!

This is also relevant if I do get the TL position I am hoping for next year. I will try to use a wiki with interested staff, or help them set one up for their classes. Also, I will promote wikis in collaborative teaching units. If i do prep for classes, then I will use wikis for sure.