Future Schools

DSCN0210.JPGThis post was originally rough notes live blogged during the second session of the edubloggercon. I’ve cleaned them up only minimally, and I’ve added a picture… one of many from my flickr necc2007 photoset, which includes the edubloggercon. Again, if you were at the session, please leave a comment to correct any inaccuracies or add anything to this post.

Warlick: What have you seen that you want to see in the school of the future?
I mentioned Dave Conlay’s Aristotle Experiment and classroom management.
Diane Hammond: university has an arm into k12 – we have to share resources… positive experiences overcome resistance to change…
Jakes: The power of wikis… web 2.0… these new tools give us a new way to approach skills we’ve always wanted students to use… we’re building momentum (nothing specific?)
Rushton: A charter school… online math setup – the kids could zip ahead until they needed help. We’re creating opportunities for students to show us they are done with a class. (Good point… performance based.)
Brian Crosby: Digital cameras… flickr… the gateway drug.
?: In some cases the equipment is becoming cheap enough that it’s happening on its own.

Dembo: Are we talking about what the classroom of the future looks like – or what the classroom of today should look like?
Vicky focused on the importance of making connections with other classes, especially in other countries.

Group: What has stopped these things from happening in the classroom? Bandwidth… but that’s changing.

Group: What are ways we can get this to spread? Bring the universities in… but we can’t even do that in a teacher’s college.
Sheryl: We need to get practitioners who are integrating these things into teacher prep programs.
Scott: But I find new tools developed yesterday when prepping for workshops.

Warlick: Lets have a bit to say about each of these things – the school, the classroom, the learner.

THE SCHOOL

?: Connected to the outside world…
?: But what happens in school, stays in school.

THE CLASSROOM

Jakes: Don’t forget the current teachers. We have access to all these tools (none of them are blocked), but I struggle to get teachers useing these tools, because they are comfortable.
Warlick: What ignited you, Julie?
Julie: Well, you, David.
? (to my right): Was it because you were interested in being a life long learner – that you cared about your own learning.

knowclue (an SL name) challenged this idea… she notds that kids don’t know more than teachers… and when we show them how to be more dynamic teachers they do it… shift the focus from “you’re a dinosaur and not on board” to “you’re a teacher, and you’re valuable… want to see some new tools?”

Sarah Rolle: use examples of successes.

THE LEARNER

Julie: I expect my students to use wikis, to use bloglines (or to choose what reader to use), and to bring something into the classroom.

Doug: Lets look at the long tail… there’s something out there for each kid (with dif. strengths and weaknesses, and learning styles) IEP for every kid
Chris: IEP for every teacher.
Vicky: I give kids options… blog post, wiki, video, podcast… then you can pull in the different learning styles into one place (like a wiki). Just because the students are doing the same project, doesn’t mean they have the same output.

Sheryl: The school of the future isn’t based on tools or skills, it’s based on passion and learning.

?: How do we do this without impacting teachers time – taking more time?

David: What do leaders need.
Brian: They need to “get it” they need to “see it” they need to go “wow”

Jakes: we still need to show the effect on the bottom line of student achievement (paraphrased)

Sarah Rolle: No matter what we do, students will use these tools.. we need to teach them to do it well. (Of course.)

Steve: pass :)

Scott Merrick: expose the kids to the tools that exist, enable their awareness, and they need to learn how to choose which tool.

Warlick: These are all things that are empowering the learner… and putitng the responsibility on them. What we want to see is life long learning.
Rushton: “life long learning” is a vague and overused term.

Now back to the SMARTclassroom: interactive whiteboard, surround sound, laptop carts…
Warlick: Somebody else… what is it?
Vicky: You don’t need a lot of money to have an interactive classroom (wikis since 1995?)
Jeff: it’s about more than the hardware… some smartboards sit there.
Warlick: what is different… what is the teacher believe in?
Joyce: are all “smart classrooms” constructivist.
Doug: a smart teacher knows their students strengths and weaknesses… and subjects matter expertise. (a bit of an explosion of chatter here)

The teacher’s the lead learner (from a few people).

Chris Craft: The smart classroom is a philosophy

?: It’s not new…

Joyce: there’s a playfulness inherent in the classroom we want… lets explore… this doesn’t look so different now than 20 years ago… and we’re at the very beginning… also there are about 20 different divides…

Sheryl: There will be new divides

Steve: What about this conversation couldn’t have taken place 5, 10, 15 years ago?
Me: Yes we can have done the constructivist stuff for a hundred years, but what IS dif?
social networking
connections
it’s a catalyst
the long tail

Warlick: what we want to see happening is conversations – new kinds of conversations – between many more people… multifacted and multidimensional and multidirectional… facilitated with new technologies.

Another change of question: What does assessment 2.0 look like?

Jakes: rick stiggins’ assessment for and of learning (assessment literacy for teachers) – formative assessment.
?: Authentic learning is different for college bound kids and non-college bound kids.
Julie: It takes a lot of work.
?: Start with a rubric… kids can write rubrics too.

Eliabeth Davis: when we talk about assessment – why are we assessing the technology. we don’t assess how well the pencil helps kids learn. School 2.0 shouldn’t have a computer teacher.

Janice: professional learning communities – how can we use these tools to move forward those conversations.

next to David?: what about peer assessment?
Doug: Self assessment is critical…
Sheryl: Assessment is going to measure adaptability and ability to manage ambiguity… and another great list.
Jeff: We had 5th graders create their own rubric for blogging… based on educational blogs and tech blogs as models. (having models is definitely key)

Joyce: Technology makes learning very transparent… it allows assors or peers to come in later… literature circle blogs…

Warlick: Will social networking be an integral part of schools and assessment of schools?
Vicky from a kid: lets not call it “social networking” lets call it “student networking” – linked in did it.

Doug: ISTE has added new NETS about creativity… how the hell do we assess creativity?

Warlick: 1 minute… describe the learner (I hope he got this list of descriptive words.)

?: Attitude is critical.
Vicky wants it to become intuitive for her kids.
Sheryl: We train some of this out of them.

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