Open Source

Some comments on "How the Open Source Movement Has Changed Education: 10 Success Stories" March 2007:
The article reviews and commends various open source initiatives and applications that are changing the rules of how we learn and share our learning.

I liked the section below which commends the efforts of teachers of all levels who are "jumping on the train" and learning how to use and apply these online resources effectively in their institutions. I think that real change in education comes from the ground up. It's the educators who take the initiative to research and reflect that lead us to discover better ways to teach and reach our students. And, of course, the teachers can only do so much. While teachers still have some autonomy in their classroom, their efforts go only as far as allowed and assisted by their administration and support from colleagues. Do I go too far here? What other factors contribute to effective change in schools?

Instructors: Instructors, along with their educational institutions, have made the decision that open source venues supply the economic solution to problems defined by school budgets. Although the learning curve is not easy at times, instructors from preschool to Ph.D. levels have found resources that help them to decide what to use, when to use it, and how it's all done. These resources are often delineated by subjects, countries, and languages, but all can find resources on the Internet — like through the EduResources Portal — that can lead to solutions for open source questions.

I also liked the commendation for students. While we don't know what their futures will be like, they certainly don't either. The students who take the risks to experiment with new opportunities certainly must have an advantage in these changing times. I have a student this year who used his Senior Exhibit to start an initiative at our 1:1 laptop school to test the functionality of Linux in our classes. He and several other students took the risk to experiment with this open OS without the support of our tech coordinator, who doesn't have the time in her busy schedule of assisting students when needed to learn how to support them. While he has faced some frustrations throughout the year from unexpected challenges, taking this risk has allowed him to explore an area of interest and learn real world problem solving strategies.

Students: Although some students feel that programs like the OCW deprive a student of the bond that often comes from a student/instructor relationship, most students have embraced open sources and open access with a budget-minded joy and with a skeptical eye toward college programs. An MIT survey of users showed that about a third of freshmen who were aware of MIT's OCW site before attending the university said it made a significant impact on their decision to enroll.

Other student benefits to using open source and open access include:

• An increase in educational opportunities for those who can't access a classroom. [or outside of the regularly scheduled school day]
  
• The ability to see the value and quality of courses offered before making an application to a college.
• Access to supplemental learning materials. [and supplemental learning applications]

I find that the most exciting applications of Internet resources are those discovered by the students themselves which they use to assist in their own learning, not the ones directed by me. A class of students maintaining blogs to record their reactions to readings is not nearly as exciting as a student who uses a blog to discover new ideas about literature through her own questions and the comments of others.

a call for more tech in the classroom

I was interested in a recent Read Write Web article which stated:

...there is clearly a pressing need for bringing more technology to the classroom to train students for a job market where these skills are now mandatory. It should be noted, though, that technology is often the least pressing of all the problems faced by some of these disadvantaged schools.

I agree that this is a "clearly" pressing need, but not even everyone at my 1:1 laptop school agrees on how pressing. In developing this conversation about the role of technology in the 21st century classroom, I believe that it is important to include as many voices as possible-the critics and the enthusiasts as well as the rich and the disadvantaged. But is it reasonable for this conversation to take precedence over other problems which plague disadvantaged schools? Or, can access to these new technologies help in alleviating some of those historic problems? Any thoughts?

technology in the classroom

Here is an example of why we need technology in the classroom: because we are not always the experts, but someone in the world is.

My students are participating in the national Poetry Out Loud competition by reciting poems in front of their English class next week. One reminder that I give my students is that they should pronounce the words in their poem correctly, especially the poet's name. One student stayed after class today to get help on the pronunciation of her poet's name. Since this was a poet that I had never read before, Carol Muske-Dukes, I googled her name and found her webpage then went there to look for help with pronunciation. On her webpage I saw a link to an interview that she did on NPR. We listened to the interviewer welcome her and learned how to pronounce her name correctly: [mus-key]

Why wonder when you can find the answer in under two minutes?

"I...was born to be my own destroyer"

My senior level elective class on the development of the novel will be blogging throughout this semester about the various "classic" novels that we read together. They have blogged in my class and for other teachers before, but we are trying to make the experience more meaningful by giving less specific direction for each blog post and more choice in what they choose to write about. The first criticism that they had about blogging was that blog posts were tied to specific reading selections and weren't worth commenting on later when we had gotten further in our understanding of the novel. We were really using blogs just as a record of the readings completed and a place for reading response. This did not create any kind of conversation and certainly didn't invite any readers outside of our school.

The goal for each blog post now is simply to write about some aspect of the novel, especially including personal reactions and connections. Well, week one is over and the first blog post was due on Friday. Only three out of eight students completed the assignment. Quite disappointing. This was the best one this week. Here's my response to the opening chapters of Robinson Crusoe:

While the adventure novel is not favorite genre, I was pleasantly surprised by many of the events in the first 58 pages of the novel. After 50 pages, he only just got stranded on the mysterious island somewhere in the Caribbean. Movies, which continue to popularize this 17th century novel, don't even touch on what really happens before the island. For anyone who enjoys action, this is the novel for you. Despite the 17th century language, readers will not be disappointed in the drama that unfolds. And, as I read I began to question Robinson in so many different ways: why do you disregard advice from your parents and mentors so readily? why leave the secure yet exotic life that you set up in Brazil? why do you seem to only look out for yourself?

My favorite quote of the novel so far is "I...was born to be my own destroyer." This really hit me when I was reading because I can certainly relate, and I think that everyone can relate to this at some point in their lives. Why do we do the things we do when we just KNOW it's going to turn out badly for us? Why do I always procrastinate grading papers? Why didn't my students just write that first blog post on time-after we had such a long discussion about it in class this week? Maybe one of the timeless qualities about this novel is that we are all Robinson Crusoe a little bit sometime in our lives: our own worst enemy.

How can we "do better next time" and how can we help each other? Because we are not so bad off as Crusoe and can rely on each other to help us with this very human flaw.

pondering the future

I just left this comment on doyle's edublog "Science Teacher" in response to his musings about what kinds of skills teachers should be preparing their students for. Am I too idealistic?

I wholeheartedly agree with Spencer, preparing for the unknown possibilities of the future is simply recognizing that it is unknown. We cannot continue to prepare our students for factory jobs or middle management anymore. Now it's time to focus our efforts on creating creative critical thinkers who are flexible and independent in their learning when they leave us. Of course, this has been done for centuries in school settings, like your earthworm example in your previous post. Using current technologies is another weapon in the teacher's arsenal to accomplish the goal of facilitating learning, whatever the age or level of learner-there seems to be something out there for everyone. The evolution in education that is happening now should be a refinement of what we are doing well and an adventure in discovering how we can serve our students and create an even better future for us all.

My head is also floating around a conversation that I had with Scmorgan yesterday about progressives and conservatives. Seems that teachers fall toward one end or the other-embracing and running toward new change or staunchly trying to hold on to the tried and true, nobly. Where do you fall on the continuum? I wonder 1) if most teachers are more progressive which explains penduluum shifts in teaching methods, and 2) if most teachers today who embrace new technologies are more progressive, eager to give it try and less fearful of the brave new world before us.
I guess it's pretty clear that I am more progressive and actually enjoy the new challenges that Will Richardson and his web 2.0 revolution have presented me with. However, I attribute my sanity mostly to my husband who is a more conservative person and reminds me to preserve the successes of the past while building toward the future. The scary unknown future is not so scary when we remember that there WILL always be new things to learn and master and human by nature will look to teachers and masters to help them in their learning. So what does Socrates look like in the 21st century?

talking about wikis and collaboration

Tomorrow I will attempt to Skype into a presentation in New Jersey lead by Patrick Higgins. He sent me some questions to think about and so I thought I'd post them with my answers here.

• What pushed you to begin using collaboration with digital tools in your classroom? Fear. Will Richardson gave the key note at a VAIS technology conference in 2007. I had never seen blogs and wikis in action before. Will used a wiki to present from and shared so many examples and made such a compelling argument about the future of education that I really felt that I was doing my students a disservice for not knowing what these online tools were and how to incorporate them in my lesson planning.

• Tell us about the first time you used a collaborative tool with students. I tried to hold back and learn things for myself, like how to use a blog by creating my own, but I was so excited to share the possibilities with my students that I created a wiki for a literature circle unit on Black Ice with my juniors that first year. The collaboration was already happening in the concept of literature circles, but I just added the element of recording and posting group work online so that they could see it and I could double check and participate in their work as well.
  

• Student responses to using these methods within your classroom? I teach in a 1:1 laptop school so my students are used to learning and using new tools whether it's a new way to use Word or a new online tool. And they were accustomed to using their computers in different ways for different classes. When I remember to go slowly and make the curricular goals for using a particular tool clear, then my students are very receptive and even apply the tool independently in their own projects and learning outside of my classroom. When I let my enthusiasm for a particular tool supercede the learning goals of the lesson, my students begin to grumble and complain that the extra work of learning to use the tool is not worth their effort.

• When you are designing your curriculum, what factors go into deciding whether or not to include a collaborative element? Now, more than ever I start with the biggest questions and course goals and work backwards. When thinking of my new novel course I ask myself: how does this help my students understand the development of the novel or help them to begin composing their own novel? Can this tool help acheive our course goals efficiently or will too much class time (and student energy) be spent on learning the new tool. Of course, I have the luxury of teaching my students for two or three years in a row and the luxury of an English department that works collaboratively to build on skills from one course to the next. ( Thanks Susan Carter Morgan and Susanne Nobles!).
  

It would be much harder for me to do what I have done so far with my students, in less than two years, if I did not have the help of my collaborations with other teachers at my school and online with social sites like Twitter (jclarkevans) and various NINGs. But, most importantly, I have students who work hard, take risks, and really try to get the most of their learning experiences at school. In return, I try to work hard, keep learning, and do all of this for them.

New Year, New Resolve

I'm reviewing my most commonly used sites and prioritizing so that I can be more active. Of course, doing anything online I stumble across five new things that I want to join!
Here are my priorities:

• International PLP NING with Will Richardson & Sheryl Nussbaum
• my blog
• twitter

I'm also thinking of

• returning to www.librarything.com
• joining http://englishcompanion.ning.com/
• submitting lesson plans to awaytoteach.com
  
• developing a webpage for my school's literary magazine
  

I'm interested in thinking and learning more about using assessments to inspire creativity. Some recent conversations with non-teachers have been very enlightening. It's so important not only to remember that my students learn differently than I do/did. When talking with other adults about their school experience, I get so much insight about how I might help my own students now.
In "Measuring Skills for the 21st Century" by Elena Silva on , she states

the skills that really matter for the 21st century—the ability to think creatively and to evaluate and analyze information—

I want to keep this in the forefront as I continue to develop my plans for this new semester.

Happy New Year and leave me a comment!