Random Thoughts

Clarence has a great post called The Things I Carry. He talks about things he has given up in his classroom and things he is going to give up. He has what, to me at least, is a great idea:

This year I’m starting off the year with having the kids look at the required outcomes for the ELA (english language arts) curriculum. There are a whole lot of them and I’ve decided to start with this one document since it is the one I am most comfortable with. I have placed all of the outcomes onto a spreadsheet, and in the fall I plan on having small groups of kids take one or two outcomes, write it up in kid friendly language, make up a rubric for assessing this outcome and then make a work sample that would meet it. Once all of this documentation has been produced, it will all be assembled into a binder which kids can access. But this is all background work. The purpose of it is to give kids choice about what they are learning.

This part of the idea is important, I think. It takes the outcomes and makes them accessible to the students. After this step, you can be sure that the students know what it is they are expected to do during the year. And they have have more than a vague idea of how they could demonstrate that they have met an outcome. I think this gives students very valuable tools to use throughout the year.

He then gives an idea of what students would these tools and what it might look like in the classroom:

For example, if we are doing a unit on present day societal issues, at the beginning of this unit, I plan on having the kids choose possibly four or five of these outcomes that they want to pursue over the unit. They will then have to collect evidence and conference with me, showing me they have met the outcome. By years end, they should have spreadsheet that shows they have completed all of the outcomes. Done on a Google spreadsheet, we will be able to see its revision history, make comments on it, etc.

This is such an incredibly simple and yet profound idea. It lets students in on the process: Why do we make them do the things we make them do? How do we decide what they do when? It is transparency in the classroom on a daily basis. It gives the students choice. It trusts them to understand that there are certain things that have to be done. It gives them ownership — or at least can help foster ownership — of what goes on in the class.

As I am not currently employed, I can only dream about this. But I would really like to try it. I hope Clarence will blog about this process throughout the year.

Richard MacManus‘ post reporting on the faberNovell Consulting research paper on social networks was quite interesting. I am not into Facebook or MySpace, but I know people on both networks. I had never thought of them in the terms that faberNovell did. What struck me was MacManus‘ statement that:

Facebook is viewed as “real identity”, whereas MySpace is “fanntasized identity”!

As I said, I am not overly familiar with either network, but these characterizations don’t seem too far off.

What I found interesting was my reaction to the idea of a fantasized identity. Granted, I am quite old (57 at last count!) and stodgy, but I can’t imagine going on MySpace and creating a fantasized identity. I don’t know how I would even go about it. And if I wanted a fantasized identity, why not do it on one of the many online games that are out there, where you are expected to take on an identity within the game?

I think about my desire for transparency in my blogging and in my life in general. I guess am not a good candidate for MySpace. But then, I am not sure I am a good candidate for Facebook, either.

There is a slideshow of the faberNovell paper in MacManus’ post. Check it out.

Miguel says it all: Share More!

He says:

Our gurus should be those who are unafraid to share their most vulnerable moments, those moments when they are learning that show they do not know what they are doing but are trying to learn.

While Miguel is primarily speaking to educators, his advice is good for everyone. When we have to pretend to be perfect, when we are afraid to show that we don’t have all the answers, we do a disservice to ourselves and to everyone around us.

It’s hard, though.

I find it easier, for instance, to talk about my uncertainties here on my blog than I do with my coworkers. But when we do it, the results are usually amazing. I had a situation just last week where I was looking for a way to approach a topic in class. What I had done hadn’t worked, and I needed help. I was looking in the resource room for something to use when a fellow teacher asked me what I was looking for. I told her. She didn’t have any great ideas, but another teacher in the room told me to look in a particular book, that it addressed the topic very effectively. I took his advice, and the lesson was very successful.

Why are we so afraid? Why do we feel this need to be perfect?

I constantly tell my students that if they wait until they can do it perfectly, they will never learn to speak English. And yet I find myself not wanting to share my vulnerabilities with my colleagues.

I think I am getting better about this. Blogging has helped me a lot. Reading blogs has helped me a lot. I hope I can make more progress as I go along.

Thanks to Derek, I found the Making Teaching Public website. The site offers a look at some great teaching and great teachers from around the country.

What impresses me most about the site is just how public these teachers have made their teaching. I wonder at times just how much of my teaching I am really ready to make public. There are days when I am ready for the world to see what I do, but there are other days when I find I would rather keep it quiet.

As I have made my teaching more public by putting it on Moodle, by including wikis and webquests and blogs, I have fewer moments that I wouldn’t want others to see. Not that everything goes perfectly, but I feel more like I am following a coherent plan. The secret, I think, is that I reflect much more on my uses of technology than I used to in my strictly textbook-based days. While my reasons for doing what I am doing may not be any more valid than they were before, the fact that I have thought more about them and expressed them more coherently seem to give my classes a more solid base. And it gives me more confidence in them, too.