Title: Its Not About the Blog: with apologies to Lance Armstrong Computers and the Collaborative Classroom
1Its Not About the Blog(with apologies to Lance
Armstrong)Computers and the Collaborative
Classroom
- Justin Reich
- EdTechTeacher.org (coming soon!)
2Framing Questions
- What are the best reasons for integrating
academic technology? - Where does academic technology fit into the
mission of the Chewonki Foundation? - How can we most effectively integrate technology?
- How can technology enhance the best practices in
our classrooms?
3Why Teach with Technology?
- 1- Whoever is doing most of the talking, or
most of the typing, is doing most of the learning
(and the more people listening the better). - 2- The more different ways we put things in our
brain, the more likely we are to learn and
remember. - 3- We can reach out to the world, and we can
bring the world into our classroom- including all
of the sources that helped us fall in love with
our disciplines in the first place. - 4- Sometimes technology makes things easier,
sometimes
4Why Teach with Technology at Chewonki?
- The power of focused, collective effort
5A Framework for Teaching with Technology
- Collect
- Create
- Relate
- Donate
- From Ben Schneidermans Leonardos Laptop
6Taking risks and failing
- Experimenting with computers models the kind of
risk taking we ask students to do - Students need to see us try and fail and try
again - Start small- simple applications of a tool
harness many of the benefits - Plan a back-up
- Practice as teachers and students
- Put a colleague on call
- The more you do it, the more things work
7Collect
- Searching with Advanced Google
- Creating PowerPoint lessons (not presentations!)
- Teaching with BrowserPoint, or tabbed browsing
8Computers and the Collaborative Classroom
- 1- Whoever is doing most of the talking, or
most of the typing, is doing most of the learning
(and the more people listening the better).
3- We can reach out to the world, and we can
bring the world into our classroom
Teachers
Classmates
Other Schools
Students
Other Sections
Outside Experts
9Hypothesized Benefits to teaching with Web 2.0
Improve Student Engagement
New Ways to Develop Fundamental Skills
Rehearse for 21st Century Situations/ Environments
10Motivate Students
Include More Students
Hypothesized Benefits to teaching with Web 2.0
Improve Student Engagement
New Ways to Develop Fundamental Skills
Rehearse for 21st Century Situations/ Environments
Train for Writing under Real World Conditions
Improve Writing Skills
Practice Deeper and Richer Discussion
Engage in New Global Dialogue
Learn New Media Literacies
Enlighten the critique of current education
Engage in New Civic Dialogue
Train for Web 2.0 Applications in Business
Enable Rich Collaboration
11Examples of Web 2.0 Experimentation in the Work
Place (from research literature)
- Banking
- Education
- Marketing
- Federal, State, Local Government
- Intelligence
- Law
- Software Engineering
- Health Care
- Health Education
- Nuclear Engineering
- Human Resources
- Higher Education Administration
- All Fortune 500 companies?
12Tools for the Collaborative Classroom
- Blogs- Persistent conversations amongst students-
where its easy to invite the world - Wikis- Empowering students to publish their
collaborative work - Chatting- Inviting reluctant speakers into the
conversations - Email- Turning assignments into real-world
conversations
13Anatomy of a Blog (r u a blogger?)
POSTS
SIDE BAR
Comments
14Two Basic Blog Types
15Two Basic Blog Safety Rules
- Require students to follow the school Acceptable
Use Policy or other computing guidelines - Enforce that students not reveal personal
information publicly
16Ten Ideas for Blogging
- Post a homework question
- Each student writes a one paragraph response
- Read a few before class to see what your students
think about the reading - You can require students to respond not only to
the reading, but to each others responses as
well. - Start a discussion
- Pose a question and require that students post at
least three contributions to a discussion over
the course of a week, or more contributions over
the course of a unit. - Invite outsiders to comment on student work
- If you know the author of a book you are reading,
have students write feedback and have the author
respond - Have students from another school comment on your
students work - Have students post discussion questions for
tomorrows class - This is great when you know you wont have time
to plan - If you know that youve flubbed a class and
students are confused, have them post questions
about things they dont understand - Post your lecture notes or a summary of the days
class - You can even record a podcast and post an audio
summary of the days class on your blog.
17Ten Ideas for Blogging (cont.)
- Have students post their notes for the day
- Assign one student per day to be the scribe for
the class. This is great for discussion based
classes where you want students to focus on the
discussion and not have to worry about taking
notes. - Post the daily homework assignment
- Post links to supplementary materials from the
internet - Author bios or websites
- Links to book reviews
- Links to relevant news articles
- Post progress reports on team projects
- Students can post their work to the blog so that
others can see what they are doing. They can also
comment on each others work. - If faculty are trying to work as a team or core
group, use a blog to communicate with each other
about lessons, etc. - For an independent study- have students create
their own blog - I have my students post an outline of their
weeks work before our weekly meeting
18Some Exemplar Blogs
- Professor Cooper's Fundamentals of Writing Blog
- Comparative Religions
- The Secret Life of Bees
- Middle East Studies
- Daisy
- Nobles goes to Tanzania
- Chriss American Literature 11
- Stephanie (U.S. History)
- Extreme Biology
- Sargent Park Math Zone
- HHC Collaboration Blog
19Extending the Conversation
Temporally
Geographically
- Once you start collaborating online, be on the
lookout for unexpected benefits
20Assessment
21BLOG REFLECTION RUBRIC
From http//edweb.sdsu.edu/courses/edtec296/assig
nments/blog_rubric.html
22In-Class Chatting
23- The leader from each group should invite the
other members into a chat. From this point
forward NO TALKING, ONLY TYPING. - Each person will then in turn ask one of their
discussion questions. You will be given 15
minutes to discuss. The goal is to discuss
questions as deeply and thoroughly as possible.
I'd rather read an in-depth examination of two
questions than brief discussions of six. GO DEEP! - You will get a 5 point grade for this exercise.
While I will raise the standards later, for now
the grade will be mostly based on the following - 1) Do you stay on topic?
- 2) Do you carefully read and respond to each
other? - 3) Do you ensure that you finish each question
before moving on? - In the future, I will also expect you to actively
challenge one another and to incorporate evidence
from the source material. - When you are finished, the leader should copy and
paste the chat into an email and send it to
turninreich.
24- Pablo Toribio-09101131 AM Why is Arjuna is
reluctant to fight? - Jess Lippincott-09101154 AM because he
doesn't want to kill all of those people - Pablo Toribio-09101155 AM Arjuna is
reluctant to fight because he believes those
people are his family. - Jess Lippincott-09101202 AM and his teachers
- Vinesha Collymore-09101207 AM yeah
- Jess Lippincott-09101209 AM and his great
uncles - Vinesha Collymore-09101222 AM his family, he
didnt want to kill them - Jess Lippincott-09101229 AM right
- Vinesha Collymore-09101239 AM he felt like
he was close to these people - Jess Lippincott-09101312 AM yeah, and he
thought it would be cruel and unnecesary to kill
them - Vinesha Collymore-09101317 AM yeah
- Jess Lippincott-09101328 AM , he says he
doesnt want a kingdom - Jess Lippincott-09101330 AM right
- Vinesha Collymore-09101332 AM he became
overcome with grief - Pablo Toribio-09101404 AM "Then Arjuna saw
in both armies fathers, grandfathers, sons,
grandsons father of wives, uncles,
mastersbrothers companions, and friends. When
Arjuna thus saw his kinsmen face to face i both
lines of the battle, he was overcome by grief and
despair and thus he spoke with a sinking heart. " - Jess Lippincott-09101420 AM right
- Vinesha Collymore-09101444 AM so that's our
conclusion for number 1 - Jess Lippincott-09101449 AM then "I have no
wish for victory Krishna, nor for a kingdom, nor
for its pleasures"
25(No Transcript)
26Wikis
- Wikis, like Wikipedia, are Web sites written by
groups of people - In a true wiki, anyone can edit anything at any
time - Excellent venue for project collaboration within
classes, between classes, amongst schools, and
across the world
27Anatomy of a Wiki
Navigation links to sections of the wiki
Tabs to the article, discussion page, editing
tools, and history of the page.
A form to search the wiki
28Examples
- Flat Classroom Project
- Reich Chemistry Wiki
- Freshman Composition Wiki
- APWorld History Exam Review
- Fishman.wikispaces.com
- Dclc.wikispaces.com
- http//edforunknown.pbwiki.com/
- Curriki
- Bering Strait School District Open Content
29Email
- Many university sites have search directories for
their faculty. MITs is right on the homepage. - New York Times articles now have links to
authors emails right at the top of the article.
David Sanger may not write you back, but that
shouldnt stop you from trying.
30Email
- Send book reviews to authors
- Write letters to the editor
- Respond directly to authors
- Ask questions of experts (and invite them over,
you never know!) - Converse across continents
31Skype and Video-Conferencing
- Guest Speakers from anywhere in the world- free