To whom and how best do we communicate this message?
Model after Salon.com and Slate.com as an outlet for creative writing publication
Publishing Tools
YouTube
Flickr
Facebook
WordPress
Twitter
Conversation with students about WAMash
How do you get students engaged — turn some of the control of creating and sharing content over to the students
What have you learned as a part of taking the class?
More technology
Enjoy writing more
What does it mean to be a writer?
Before, I considered writing as an essay style, but now it has really expanded my horizons about writing and there are more ways than just essays and school work
What has changed for me is that I am a lot more willing to put myself out there for people to examine and I was questioning my own ability, but there are so many ways to express yourself in writing. I am more able to accept criticism now and having a good support group from peers and teacher.
For the past few years, just writing essays, now I have learned that I can express myself more; writing from different perspectives
Before the class, I thought that it was limited and you had to just write, but now I realize that writing is more about expressing and getting the word out there about something that you care about because people will listen. Writing is important, and I respect it. It is more of an art than I thought it was.
Thinking about change
Change needs to be organic — comprehensive school change does not work
It will cause chaos — people will not be doing substantive and good work with students
Establish a culture for creativity, innovation, and the appetite to try new things are the norm
Support the inventors, creative thinkers, risk takers, and innovators with resources, PD, and public accolades
Purpose of copyright: to promote creativity, innovation, and the spread of knowledge — Article 1, Section 8 of the Contitution
Copyright was not designed to have forceful restrictions
How teachers coped
“I am going to do what I want”
“Close the door”
“Hyper-comply”
Problem — the educational use guidelines are still confusing
These are negotiations between media companies and educational groups
But, these “guidelines” are not the law — these documents give them the appearance of law, but they are not and the guidelines have a negative effect on education
Transformative use
Repurposes materials for a use that is different than original intent — modifies exisitng media and places it in a new context
Panel Discussion @ The Franklin Institute — “What is the Purpose of School?” Come to the Franklin Institute to see a group of societal visionaries speak about their vision of the purpose of school in a panel discussion.
Joel Arquillos — Executive Director, 826LA
8 years in San Francisco schools, dealing with all that happens in the classroom — the purpose of school is to build community and to respect and honor the students that come into our classrooms
The best that you can do some days is to help students talk with one another and get through all the big issues in their lives
How to help them build the world that they will inherit
Then, I began to see that there were other ways of opening the school to the world — working with 826 Valencia
Wanted to create a space for students to have an opportunity to work on their writing
Connecting the classroom and the community; changing the perception of what schools can be
Dr. Molefi Asante — Professor, African American Studies, Temple University
First, this is a complex question, the purpose of school, because the purposes given for schools have always changed
17th century — train young white men how to be leaders in the world
What should be the purpose of school is perhaps what we should ask
One purpose that perhaps should be non-changing is that the purpose of school is inquiry
If there is a value to be transmitted by schools, it would be inquiry because inquiry is about openness
The notion of knowledge needs to be developed such that we have an understanding that all cultures contribute to knowledge; there is not one perspective on knowledge
We might need to redress this whole question about this idea of a monocultural system that has evolved from the Greeks to now; we forget the Chinese, Africans, Indians, and others
The purpose is inquiry — just when we think we are set, that is the moment we should inquire even more
Kendall Crolius — Founding Partner, The Sulevia Group
Creativity — what business leaders say is that the biggest challenge is to keep innovation going
Collaboration — more important now than it has ever been, must be able to work in teams by appreciating cultural diversity and other perspectives
Courage — confidence; embrace change and challenge the status quo
Jeff Han — Founder, Perceptive Pixel and inventor of the multi-touch screen
Did really love school, and I had some really excellent teachers
We were really well equipped and got to use technology in the classroom
Communication
Learn how to communicate socially, and also in the sense of sharing concepts and constructing an argument
Be didactic, be able to communicate with one’s peers
Calibration
Look at how teachers can callibrate what knowledge is difficult to understand, what problems are difficult to solve
Is this something that is novel? That is a real contribution?
Prakash Nair — Co-Founder, Fielding Nair International — Architects and Change Agents for Education
There is a huge disconnect between what you see as the rhetoric in school offices and what happens on the ground
Six ideas
Schools should be a social anchor, a hub that offers value to students and community
A place for kids to hang out with all the cool toys: computers, video links, gamers, artists, musicians
Generate ideas and not just regurgitate ideas: from architecture to courses
Ideas harvesting, bring them to fruition
Key player in community’s economic network
Flexible, accessible to build social capital: physical and cultural resources for schools
Many of these things are happening around the world today
How do you enhance the bottom line — accountability for all, and everyone should be pulling in the same direction
Dr. Stephen Squyres — Principal Investigator, Mars Exploration Rover Mission
Two particular purposes for science education
Open student’s eyes to what is possible — this is important for those who are going to go into STEM
Went to a public high school and realized that teachers were hamstrung in many ways because they couldn’t do everything that they wanted to do with students
Space exploration was something that I saw on TV, and not until college realized that there were options for being exposed to those doing space exploration; this is much too late
Need to reach students in high school and middle school — expose kids to what is possible
To allow people how to understand how things really work
Teaching an introductory astronomy course — it is very easy for students to see science as a static body of knowledge to be learned and tested
Instead, try to show them what science really is and what scientists can do
Start with “what happened on Mars” today in the course
Science is a process of uncovering new knowledge, of discovery
Opening their eyes to how things really work
Collaboration with the Mars Rover — the machines are so complex that no one of us understands everything about it
Bringing together the right size group of people for the task at hand that are united by a common passion
Everyone has to believe it is going to be great and has to agree to the core, crisp statement of the mission and what we are trying to accomplish
Diane Castelbound, Pennsylvania Department of Education
Meeting with people everyday from businesses, to politicians, to people in schools from rural to urban and talk to kids and find that they feel schools are failing them all
Schools are supposed to create community and civic identity, and failing on that front, too
By whatever metric, our schools are not keeping pace
How the system is failing our kids and teachers — public education funding system
If education is supposed to be the great equalizer, then it is no wonder that we are not keeping up
Moderated by Frederic Bertley — Vice President of the Center for Innovation in Science Learning, The Franklin Institute
Franklin Institute founded in 1824, teaching in mechanical arts 2006 – SLA opens in a partnership with Franklin Institute and Philadelphia Schools
Apologies in advance for what will be a long post here, as my “reflection in action” during the conference consisted more of trying to find free wifi and navigating the Riverwalk than it did of actually having time to sit down and think. I tried to break my thinking up by day, for what that’s worth, and hope that these thoughts are useful for all my readers, especially all my colleagues who were unable to attend.
That said, NWP/NCTE2008 was a wonderful week of connecting and collaborating with colleagues, and there is so much to think about it is hard to know where to begin. So, I will organize it by day.
One thing that I will note here and throughout the rest of this post is that I sensed a definite shift, a change in the tone about how people are talking about newer literacies and technologies. In a sense, it is as if we no longer had to begin every conversation, every presentation with a disclaimer: “let me tell you why I use technology in my teaching of writing.” Instead, the conversations simply began with the premise that we simply are using technology to teach writing.
And that is darn cool.
Now for a summary of the week.
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Wednesday brought me in early to work on a book project with NWP, and we had some great discussions about the state of digital writing as well as the Letters to the President Project. Having been in the process of interviewing a number of educators this fall, getting this day to work with Danielle and then meet with Elyse
and Christina from NWP brought some clarity to my thinking (something that has been sorely lacking as I have been digging through loads and loads of data). I feel very confident in the work that we did and that the book will be useful for educators in a variety of contexts.
I was able to interview someone from Google about the use of Google Docs in education, and that conversation (among the many I have had with NWP colleagues) reminds me that things are definitely changing. Yes, there are still issues of access and the digital divide. Yet, I think that students and teachers are finding more and more opportunities for thinking about how to teach digital writing because the tools are (almost) all online and (almost) all free. Not to go overboard on the idea of the conference theme, but I could finally see the revolution in action over the course of this weekend. Teachers are beginning, across the board, to make the shift.
Thursday, November 20, 2008
On Thursday, the NWP Annual Meeting kicked off and, for me at least, the best part of the day was the new site meeting. I enjoyed the Writing in a Digital Age session, but then got caught up in other things all afternoon, in particular some great news… Last week, on my birthday, I was pleased to learn from NWP’s Executive Director that Central Michigan University had been awarded an NWP site! Thus, this was my first official meeting as a new site director. When asked how I was feeling, all weekend long I repeated the “excited, but terrified” mantra. Attending the NWP Annual Meeting as a site director was a new experience, and again I was amazed at the ways in which technology and writing were simply a part of the same conversation now. As I begin to think about how to frame the work of our new site, I am encouraged by
the fact that being digital will be a major part of who we are. A talk with Bud Hunt later in the weekend reaffirmed this belief that our site should intertwine our web presence with our core work, and I look forward to tackling that when I get home.
Also, another cool aspect of Thursday was that I was interviewed by Paul and a crew from the Pearson Foundation about how writing is changing in a digital age. They were getting interview with a large number of TCs throughout the annual meeting, and I can’t wait to see how the videos they will be producing turn out.
Here are some of my thoughts from my preparations for that interview:
Why is writing important now?
As it has always been, writing remains a key mode of communication. It is important today because writers in a variety of personal and professional roles are being asked to produce a greater variety of texts, for a greater variety of audiences.While many teachers — especially those involved with NWP initiatives — continue to build on the principles of good writing instruction, we need to continue our efforts and supporting the teaching and learning of writing in all of our classrooms, K-12, and across content areas. As writers adapt to new situations for composing texts, they need to be adept in a variety of writing skills and genres.We, as educators, are the ones who introduce them to these skills and genres when we keep our attention on teaching writing with intention.
Writing in a technological world means what?
In an increasingly networked world, writers need to adapt to different purposes, audiences, and contexts for writing that have been enabled by newer technologies. This also involves a shift in how we think about who writers are, how texts are produced, and where texts are distributed.
Regardless of how “digital” we think our students are — and, no doubt, most of them are more adept at particular digital skills like using Facebook, Twitter, or text messaging, they do not necessarily come to those tasks with the capacities that make them critical and creative digital writers. Not only do they need to understand the technical aspects of creating hyperlinks, posting to a blog, or collaborating with a wiki, but they need to have the intentional focus as a writer to understand the audience and purpose for which they are writing. Who reads your Facebook updates and why? Can you write to that audience in the same manner as a you can when you produce an academic paper, even if it is posted on a blog?
Moreover, they need to consider the ways in which we can compose with multiple modes and media. For instance, one can argue a position through a traditional essay, a 30 second public service announcement (either an audio or video), or in the form of a single-page advertisement with an image and few words, or no words at all. Understanding when, why, and how to use different forms of media to convey a particular message requires a working knowledge of the mode — that is, what does an audience expect in order to be persuaded — and how to effectively manipulate the media.
So, writing has always been a complex act, and newer technologies offer writers numerous opportunities to get their message across. Writing in a technological world means that we, as writers and teachers of writing, need to be aware of these choices and how we can best utilize them to have the intended effect on our various audiences.
One disappointment… no more Tech Matters. That institute, more than anything else I have done, has shaped my thinking on teaching digital writing. I will miss it dearly, but understand the choice that was made to go to a more site-focused technology retreat. So, while I am sad to know that Tech Matters is no more, I am encouraged by the work that is happening across the NWP network related to digital writing. There are some promising things on the horizon, one of which I hope becomes this book project.
Thursday night ended with our traditional RCWP dinner. Janet thanked all of us and praised our new site, but I want to say thank you, Janet, both for dinner and for all that you have done to enable teacher leaders to fill entire tables at an annual meeting, reflecting on a year of shared work.
Friday, November 21, 2008
Friday brought breakfast with a friend I hadn’t seen in some time as well as the invitation to be interviewed for NCTE’s Centennial film being produced by John Golden and his colleagues. Wow, what an incredible honor to be invited into that work. He asked me to reflect on how the teaching of writing has changed over the past few years with the advent of Web 2.0. What an honor and a wonderful opportunity. In preparation for that interview, I wrote the following:
The read/write web has finally delivered the promise of having a real audience and varied purposes that writing teachers have so long looked to bring to their classrooms. From the beginning of the process writing movement, when Emig first looked at the composing process and Sommers identified revision strategies of experienced and novice writers, teacher researchers such as Murray, Graves, Calkins, Atwell, Ray, Fletcher, Portalupi, and others have been trying to invite student writers to see audiences and purposes beyond the classroom and traditional school genres. While this began to occur in the 80s, 90s, and early 2000’s, there was still something “fake” about this writing. Yes, it was shared with peers in class. Yes, it was read at author’s chair or published in a school anthology. Yes, it went home and made it on the fridge. And, if it was lucky, that student writing made it to a local newspaper or other venue for publication. When the internet really hit big at the turn of the 21st century, writing teachers felt as if they could have a purpose and audience beyond the classroom and school. Some were able to publish their writing online, but things got in the way: FTP, limited or no access to the server, passwords, firewalls, as well as the onerous HTML editors. The promise of the web was to democratize information, and it did — if you could figure out how to create web pages and uploaded them. Even discussion forums — with all their ability to post and respond to writing — hit the scene, there was still something impersonal and difficult about “publishing” one’s writing.
Then, when read/write web tools such as blogs and wikis emerged, and “push button publishing” become possible for anyone, anywhere. Along with the increased bandwidth and access to internet-enabled computers in schools, the ability to post and share writing on a blog was revolutionary. Finally, the goal of “publishing” work for an authentic audience and purpose emerged as a goal for writers, both in and out of school. No longer did a writer need to know HTML (although it helped),
or have a specified program on his or her computer. We could write (and publish our writing) any time, any where.
This has resulted in a shift in thinking that Knobel and Lankshear discuss in their work on New Literacies. In a nutshell, the traditional vision that we have of a single writer, working alone on a piece of writing that has been culled together from a series of authoritative sources has been replaced with one of a collaborator who is able to build on the ideas of others, and participate in what boyd calls
“networked publics.” We can access our documents any time and any where that has a network connection, including on handheld devices and mobile phones.
What this means is that — in addition to being able to write in multiple modalities and media — students must be made aware of the ways in which their writing is distributed and perceived across the many networks in which they participate. What this means for teachers — and NCTE — is that we need to consider the many ways in which students see themselves as writers (and, according to the Pew report sometimes do not see themselves as writers) and invite them to be intentional about how they read and write in a digital age.
We have learned a great deal about revision and how audience and purpose can lead to intentional writing. NCTE should continue to support scholarship and professional development that builds on the principles and research findings that we have, noting the ways in which we as teachers can guide “digital natives” who may know how to send a “tweet,” but may not always be thinking about the ways such a message can be interpreted. In short, we need to continue the professional conversations that we have been having about writing and revision over the past three decades, taking what we know about these processes and moving them into the era of the read/write web.
NCTE continues to move in the right direction. In just the past year, they have adopted the statement on teaching multimodal literacies, and released two research and policy briefs (one specifically on 21st century literacies and the “Writing Now” brief that encompasses a broader view of the composing process). By offering the summer institute on 21st century literacies, webinars, and the “Tech to Go” sessions at the conference this year, NCTE keeps moving ahead with this work in practical manners. The website redesign and Inbox blog offer good examples of how NCTE is trying to stay in touch with members.
Doing that interview really helped me articulate my thinking, and I appreciate the opportunity to have done it.
Friday morning brought me to my first presentation with some NWP colleagues, “Revising the Writing Process: New Literacies in the English Classroom.” Paul Allison, Chris Sloan, Aram Kabodian, and Dawn Reed were able to present their work related to blogging, podcasting, digital storytelling, and social networking to a crowd of over 100 (don’t believe me — check out the pictures below!). I won’t go into detail on the session, as we have all our materials on our wiki, but suffice it to say that the work these four shared is both amazing and timely. Participants left with only a tiny handout — a bookmark with our URL on it — but loads and loads of ideas. I think that my friend and Project WRITE colleague Liz Webb recorded the session as a podcast, and I will try to get a link to it.
Friday dinner brought together friends and alums from MSU, packing a restaurant. A few of us ended up in the Italian place next door when the tables overflowed. Despite missing the conversation with the large group, it was great to spend time with so many people who have ties to the green and white, even if just for a short while.
Saturday, November 22, 2008
Saturday brought a meeting with my editor on another book project, on that I will be very excited to return to as the semester comes to a close and hopefully involve some Project WRITE teachers (as well as their students). Then I was off to present at my Tech To Go kiosk for “RSS Feeds and Teaching English.” Again, more of the work of that session can be found on my wiki, so I want to reflect for a moment on the process of presenting that session (thanks to Bud Hunt for the photo).
My thoughts on the Tech To Go session are mixed, but all in a good way. On the one hand, I wanted to have it be a little more formal with a larger screen and some chairs, so people would feel free to linger. On the other hand, that was precisely the point. People were able to move around, or just stop by is something caught their eye. Having to
reexplain RSS got a little repetitive over the course of the hour and fifteen minutes, but I think that people walked away from the session — no matter how long they stayed — having just enough info to go back and try things out. I hope my wiki page helps them do PD in their own school. As for the Tech To Go Sessions, ideally, I would like to see
them working there with computers in front of them, so they could try it out at the moment. Yet, perhaps there is some value in getting these micro bursts of information about newer literacies and technologies. I
will be interested to see how the conference evaluations reflect people’s experiences with these Tech To Go sessions and to think about how we can shape them for next year.
After browsing books, I was fortunate enough to see Barry Lane heading towards his room with all his gear in tow. After offering a hand to help, and having a quick discussion about when we met in October at the MCTE conference, we were able to walk and talk on the way to his session room. He remembered our conversation in October, reminded me that I needed to send him the podcast (which I finally was able to do
today!), and offered me one of his CDs for helping. When we got to the room with time to spare, he asked if he could interview me for his YouTube channel. I encourage you to watch the video with Corbett Harrison instead!
Video Added 12/5/08
Then, was time for me to sit. Whew…. A session presented by Bill Bass, Melissa Lynn Pomerantz, and Debra Solomon Baker from St. Louis on “Extensions: Using Technology to Extend the English Classroom.” The three of them talked about how they used participatory tools in their classroom, including the use of audio recordings embedded in word docs to give students feedback, a variety of formats for discussion forums, and how to organize your personalized professional development with RSS feeds. It was good to hear Melissa and Debra in particular talk about how very simple uses of technology were having such a profound effect on their teaching.
Later in the afternoon, as PSU was crushing MSU, I was able to ignore the pain of the game by thinking about my third session, “Why Should We Write with a Wiki? Professional Development and the Read/Write Web.” Working with Mary Sawyer and Tim Dewar to frame a session on how pre-service and in-service teachers perceive literacies, I was able to share some of the work of Project WRITE and how teachers engaged in professional learning and collaboration with a wiki. In talking with the two of them, as well as other participants in the session, we were all able to enjoy a thoughtful and engaging close to Saturday. While
Anne Whitney’s Nittany Lions whipped on my Spartans, at least we were able to have a good conversation about how teachers learn digital literacies and we talked about how to continue supporting graduate students in the NWP network.
Saturday night brought a trip down to the San Antonio Market District, and fun night of conversation with RCWP colleagues.
Nacho libre anyone?
Sunday, November 23, 2008
Wow… A “down” day in that I had no presentations to do. Instead, I was able to meet with some colleagues throughout the day to discuss some projects as well as catch a few sessions. One of the more interesting
ones was a panel of British scholars — Julie Blake, Tom Rank, and Tim Shortis — who talked about their work with digitizing texts in the British Library, teaching 21st century literacies to teachers, and understanding the role of txting in our language. All were thought provoking and helped me consider the many ways in which as the nature of literacy continues to change, the ways that we frame the discussions about the change matter as much — if not more — than the changes themselves. The idea that sticks with me most is that we, as educators, can help provide context, in a variety of ways, to the vast bits of knowledge that are out there. The project that the British Library is undertaking to organize and contextualize the texts in their collection is simply mind-blowing.
Also, Kathy Yancey delivered another outstanding address that suggested we reframe the teaching of writing. I can’t even try to capture everything she said, but it was great stuff.
Monday, November 24, 2008
Final day. ACE Workshop. As it has been the past two years, lots of fun to talk with teachers about the use of read/write web tools in the classroom. As always, the sessions were fast-paced and I again talked
about Writing with Wikis. We had fun overwriting each other in Wikispaces, yet it seemed like most participants walked away with some ideas about why and how to use wikis in their classroom. Before we had
to go to lunch, Allen Webb shared his new website, Lit Archives, and talked about a number of ways to engage students in classic literature by harnessing digital versions of those texts and inviting them into virtual worlds.
After eating with my friend Carl Young, I had to catch a cab back to the airport. Finally able to get on wifi for free, I tried to write this blog post but (as you can imagine) ran out of time after checking email and talking with my Michigan colleagues who were about to hop on the plane with me.
So, NWP/NCTE 2008 comes to a close with me writing the bulk of this post (novella?) on the plane heading home towards Detroit. Of all the things that I didn’t do, I feel bad that I didn’t keep up with Twitter via SMS all weekend, as Andrea worked very hard to get that as our networking tool for the weekend. And I missed a lot. A lot. I look forward to reading everyone else’s reflections.
Yet, it was still a good conference. And the talk about technology and newer literacies filled most of the conference presentations and hallway conversations, implicitly or explicitly. I was able to help highlight the work of my colleagues and friends, some who were able to be at the conference and others who were not.
For as much as I did, as many new people as I met and those who I became reacquainted with, I have to say that I am tired. Not looking forward to shoveling snow, although I am looking forward to seeing my kids, my friends, and my family over the holiday weekend.
Happy Thanksgiving to all my students, friends, and colleagues reading this. Thanks for sticking through this post and sharing these reflections, as well as the entire conference, with me.
See you next year in Philly, hopefully with a crew of teachers from our new writing project site.
Saint Exupery – “… your task is not to foresee the
future, but rather to enable it.”
Inverse correlation between leadership responsibilities
and the capacity to plan and lead strategically
William Gibson – “The future is here; it’s just not
widely distributed.”
Our capacity to look at short and long range trends is
better than it has ever been
What will the world look like in the year 2025?
What are the challenges facing humanity?
To what extent will we be able to deal with the
organizational situations in front of us?
What are the precursors of a better world?
To what extent are we vulnerable more even now?
Seven Revolutions
Population
Strategic Resource Management
Technological Innovation and Diffusions
Information and knowledge creation/distribution
Economics
Conflict
Governance
Overarching Comments
Darwin – “It is not the strongest species that survive,
nor the most intelligent… but the ones most responsive to change.”
Einstein – “No problem can be solved from the same
consciousness that created it.”
Need to think about a new paradigm
1. Population
Where we have been: from 150 million to 6 billion people
in 1999
We are growing at a rate of millions every year: 2.4
people per second
Now at about 6.7 billion people
8.0 billion in 2025, 9.2 by 2050
Global population growth in an absolute sense has been
going up, but the rate of growth as slowed significantly
We can anticipate a stabilization of 9-10 billion
people at the end of the century
But… the highest growth will be in the poorest
countries
Soviet Union, for instance, has de-population; China,
in 2005, has a contracting population
Population expansion and contraction
Most populous countries in 1950 had six well developed
economies; by 2050, only the US will be in the top ten
15% of population is migrants in 50+ countries
Developed world could contract
Tensions in population with immigration, for instance
in France
Global aging
More older people on our planet than younger ones in
the near future
Life expectancy has gone from 50 years in 1950 to
nearly 80 by 2050
Urbanization
60% of humanity in urban areas by 2020
Could be good for education, health, and other social
services
But… it is bad, too. More slum dwellers in Mumbai and
in all of Norway
Change in distribution of world population — move from a
pyramid to a rectangle
Tremendous capacity problem for those who are younger
to work with those who are older
“Age quake” in industrialized country — more older
people in industrial world than youth; more youth in undeveloped world
2. Strategic Resource Management
Food
Need to be looking at issues that have change
agricultural horizon
We currently have 800 million chronically
undernourished people — can we feed 8 billion?
Doubling global food production
No limits to growth in agricultural productivity and
water… yet
But, how much more usable land it there?
How much more water?
Effects of global warming?
Water
Imagine that all the world’s water was in one gallon…
only two drops would be accessible fresh water.
2025 – 3 billion face severe water shortages
One flush of a western toilet – one day of use of water
in a developing country
Need twice the amount of water by 2050, and then 50%
more for each generation after that
Mobilizing new and old technologies
Climate change will negatively affect our ability to
deal with all of these factors
Energy
Transitioning away from oil will be the most difficult
thing we can face
Reliance on hydrocarbons continues to increase more and
more
By 2025, US will still rely on 65-75% of oil
Developing world is using more and more oil, up to US
levels by 2030
Can we continue with this same infrastructure,
environmental impact, and geopolitical forces
3. Technology Innovation and Diffusion
Computation
Deep computing
467 trillion calculations per second
Pervasive computing
No longer a discrete experience
Information security
Personal privacy
Biotechnology
Human genome project allows us to think about what used
to be impossible — personalized medicine
120 year life span?
How do we regulate human cloning and the broader
manipulation of the body?
Who will get to see these technologies and who will not
Nanotechnology
Nanotech is moving down to the molecular and atomic
level
Could have need for 2 million nanotech workers in near
future
4. Information and Knowledge Creation and Dissemination
Global information and knowledge flow — the death of
distance?
Eroding prerogatives, redefining community, shattering
established practices
Children today will go through a number of career
changes; need to retool
Differentiating between learning and working — are they
becoming the same thing?
Shorter life span of information — need to reeducate in
order not to become stale
Thomas Friedman — The World is Flat — “innovate without
having to emigrate”
What is right, what is wrong, what is true, what is false?
We choose our truth based on where we get our
information
Reduced decision times
More complex issues
Polarized positions
We need to be knowledge proficient
5. Economic Integration
National Intelligence Council, “Mapping the Global Future”
80% output growth to 2020
50% growth in average per capita
“It is now possible to produce a product anywhere to be
sold anywhere…”
Global economic output of industrialized countries has
gone down while non-industrialized countries are going up
China increases to 129% of US output by 2050
Brazil, Russia, India, and China are beginning to
overtake the G6
That said, 2.8 billion people live on less than $2 a day
225 richest people in the world = combined annual
earnings of 2.7 billion other people
6. Conflict
How will terrorist groups use the information capacity?
Bioterrorism — anthrax and ricin attacks
Even in the context of this revolution, we need to find
ways of retrofitting a cold war mentality in the new kinds of theaters
that are occurring today.
7. Governance
We are now beyond nation states, but one in which
corporations and NGOs are taking a bigger role
9 of the largest corporations would be in the top 50 GDPs
of the world
How are new standards for corporations, moving beyond
profitability
Exponential growth in NGOs around the world
What does this mean?
Atomization
Dispersion
Fragmentation
Henry Kissinger — challenges now are different in that
they are global and information is readily available to all
Each week, have a student be the official
photgrapher, recorder, reporter, and producer and these students create
a curricular review through a podcast
The important piece is not about the podcast, but
about the context for teaching in learning
Teachers should bring two kids with them, one of
them being the “mess up” kid, when they come to technology training
Solution seeking problems — we put technology in school,
but the problems were not there or evident
Trusting the wrong agent — Whose machine is it? The
teachers? The students? What purpose does it serve?
Student attention and time — teacher, computer, books,
other technologies, other students
Technology environment — we talk about
student-to-computer ratio, but we should be talking about the entire
school ecosystem
Lack of systems thinking — The jet engine on the horse
wagon: Seymour Papert wondered if we would even turn on the engine or
if it would destroy the wagon?
Didn’t anticipate major transformation — bringing one
car to the road, then hundreds, thousands, and millions
Virtual marriage — the effects of socializing
virtually (iapartment)
Second Life — buying real estate, products, engaging
in educational practices
Gold farming — kids playing virtual games in China in
“gaming factories”
What can we do?
In schools, we have not thought about how to realign the
human/machine relationship
Personal response systems
New Era Interactive English, Tsinghua University Press
Online Chinese Language Courses
We always need to anticipate the long term changes, not
just the short term effects
Evidence-Based Practice in Writing – Drawing on Experimental, Qualitative, and Single Subject Design Research for Answers
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
11:30am – 1:00pm
Room 133F Erickson Hall, Michigan State University
This presentation will examine what we know about effective writing instruction, drawing on three recent reviews of the literature. One of the reviews (Writing Next) was a meta-analysis of experimental and quasi-experimental writing intervention research. Another review was a meta-analysis of single-subject design writing intervention research. The third review was a meta-synthesis of qualitative research conducted with outstanding literacy teachers, designed to identify common practices across studies. Advantages and disadvantages to the use of evidence-based practices in writing will also be explored.
About the Speaker:
Steve Graham is the Currey Ingram Professor of Special Education and Literacy, a chair he shares with Karen R. Harris. His research interests include learning disabilities, writing instruction and writing development, and the development of self-regulation. Graham is the editor of Exceptional Children and the former editor of Contemporary Educational Psychology. He is the co-author of the Handbook of Writing Research, Handbook of Learning Disabilities, Writing Better, and Making the Writing Process Work. In 2001, Graham was elected a fellow of the International Academy for Research in Learning Disabilities. He is the recipient of career research awards from the Council for Exceptional Children and Special Education Research Interest Group in the American Educational Research Association.
And, here are some notes from the session:
Opening quote: “Kids know the most interesting things” – Mark Twain
“It hurt, the way your tongue hurts when you accidentally staple it to the wall.”
Writing is nowhere in terms of the educational reform movement in this country
The things that drive the educational reform movement are reading and math
This is not always bad, as it sometimes results in school practices that are not good
But, we need to make the case that writing is important
1. One of the reasons that people are not paying attention to writing is that there is a general perception that we do not know how to teach writing. Policy makers want evidence, and they want particular kinds of evidence.
We do know that there are some things that work for all students 4-12 and younger
People don’t think that writing is important. So, we have to look at the effects of writing on content area learning. We make the case that writing can be helpful in terms of the STEM skills
Reading gets more play in the literacy discussion. We need to look at the effects of writing on reading. How does writing affect reading?
2. What are the practices going on in elementary and secondary schools
Limitations: survey data that could be rosy, but the data is still not good
ELA teachers are doing less than one extended writing assignment a month
You don’t wan to go into policy making without good research to make recommendations
3. Theoretical framework — from Patricia Alexander from moving from knowledge about discourse and enhancing motivation
What are three primary resources we can draw from?
Professional writers
Unfortunately, the advice can be simplistic and only moves confident writers to expert writers; it doesn’t help other writers
Effective practices from experienced teachers
Talk to effective teachers or observe good teachers in practice and study them
Problem: if I go in looking for one thing, I will likely see it (difficult to separate the wheat from the shaft”
Problem: Donald Graves and the example that works. Yet, there are times when this doesn’t work.
Problem: generalizability. Evidence is often selective.
With scientific studies, we collect evidence, presents findings for all participants, replicability, strength of impact — all this leads to something that should be more trustworthy than insight and experience.
This presentation, thus, will draw on three sources: experimental, single subject, and teacher practice
Other criteria:
Four replications
Converging evidence (the sun, the moon and the stars align)
Recommendations based on higher quality studies are superior
Process writing has very poor research, so you need to be cautious about this
The more studies, the merrier
Effect size:
.8 is large
.5 is moderate
.25 is small, but significant
Writing Next looks at overall quality of writing
Strategy instruction (planning, revising, editing, and regulating the writing process; 20 studies, .82 effect size (particularly helpful for kids who find writing difficult)
Don’t just PEE (post, explain, and expect) students need repeated modeling
For instance, the STOP strategy (Suspend judgment, Take a side, Organize ideas, Plan more as you go)
Teaching Summarization (systematic and explicit teaching of how to summarize texts); 4 studies, ? (missed it) effect size
Teach the six rules of summarization
Peer assistance (working together to plan draft and revise); 7 studies, .75 effect size
Needs to be a structured in a positive way — having students add questions marks and carats in their peers’ papers
Setting product goals (specific goals for the written product to be completed); 5 studies, .70 effect size
Need to tell students what you expect without limiting them
Product goals and revising
Word Processing (using word processing); 18 studies, .55 effect size
Some are short studies, but some are up to a year
Using the technology which is widely available is important, but it is used infrequently in schools or, when it is used, it is only used for final draft/publication
Sentence combining (constructing more complex sentences by combining shorter kernel sentences); 5 studies, .5 effect
Work on this together with students, then invite them to apply it back in their own writing
Process Approach (extended opportunities for writing, student ownership); 21 studies, . 32 effect size
Inviting students to engage in planning and revising is good
Bad news: the effect size is scattered all over the place
Receiving training from NWP is about a .46 effect, and is insignificant if you did not get that training
You can do this in a very poor way, and not get a good effect; this is compatible with a strategy approach that makes the writing more visible
Pre-Writing (have students engage in activities such as brainstorming; 5 studies, .32 effect
STOP strategy, for instance
Inquiry (old research); 5 studies, .32 effect
No pre-test done, so these studies may underestimate the effect size
Example: set a goal, analyze the data, look at specific strategies, and apply what you learned
A student in elementary school looking at conflict on the playground
Study of Models
Examines examples of specific writers and types of text; 6 studies, .25 effect
Model from good readings
Writing as a Tool for Learning (writing in the content areas); small but positive effect
26 studies, but I think that it is more effective in science and math than ELA and social studies based on the effect sizes that we see
Grammar (explicit teaching of grammar); 11 studies, -.32 effect size
Quality of writing is not affected by grammar instruction
What this traditionally looks like is that you give a definition, example, and then is used in decontextualized works
If we expect it, but do not help students use grammar then it will likely not work
Take the kernel sentence: Dog bit mailman
Recommendations for Struggling Writers (teaching handwriting, spelling, and typing to struggling writers — teaching transcription skills towards automaticity), small positive effect
Single Subject Design Recommendations
Explicitly teach students strategies to construct paragraph; strong positive impact
Showing parts of a paragraph to the point that students understand the goals of writing a paragraph
Explicitly teaching students how to capitalize, punctuate, etc. helped
Reinforce positive aspects of students writing — social praise, tangible reinforcement or both as a means to increasing specific writing behaviors (small positive effect)
Traditional means of grading papers doesn’t work — “we get more with honey than we do with vinegar”
Couldn’t draw the summary effect from this, however
Need to move the feedback beyond the specific paper and help the student move forward in his/her writing
Self-monitoring (students asked to count how many errors they made); might be effective for some struggling writers
Individual Teachers
Study exceptional teachers and schools
Practice had to be applied by the majority of schools or teachers
10 Practices that might make a differences (had to occur in four or more studies)
Dedicate time to writing and writing instruction, with writing occuring across the curriculum
Get kids in the game of writing
Increasing writing by itself is not enough, it also needs to be motivating and give kids tools to be effective
Involve students in various forms of writing over time
Treat writing as a process
Keep students engaged by involving them in thoughtful acticvities such as planning compositions
Vary individual, small, and large group instruction
Mode, explain, and provide guided assistance when teaching
Teachers need to relinquish control
Provide just enough supprt so that students can make progress or carry out writing tasks and processes, but encourage students to act in a self-regulated manner as much as possible
Be enthusiastic about writing and create a positive environment where students are constantly encouraged to try hard, believe that the skills and strategies that they are learning will help them write well
Set high expectations
Adapt writing assignments to meet the needs of students
Caveats
We should not order these practices hierarchically in terms of one being more effective thananother
Instead we should order them in a way that we see them working well for us
The database is thin
Just because a practice has been studied, it does not mean that it will be effective for all teachers in all classrooms.
Pay attention and see if it works in your classroom, with your students
Little data on those students who are most at-risk: ELL, learning disabilities, struggling writers
Lack of data on maintenance and generalization
Don’t really know best how best to put all of these things together
Think about trying to integrate some of these ideas as part of an overall approach rather than try to fit it into an existing approach
Teachers’ views on acceptability of these practices will clearly influence their use — this will include the issue of domain specificity
If you don’t accept it as a reasonable practice for you in your classroom it will not work
Just because a practices is effective in a study or was used by an exceptional teacher does not mean that it will always work
Questions
6 traits
Most studies were pre- and post-tests with no control
Look at journal article on Writing Next
6 plus 1 looked pretty good for what was there
In-Service
When we asked ELA, science, and social studies teachers about how well their program taught them to teach writing, 70% said it was inadequate
We also asked about in-service preparation — you personally, school, conferences — ELA said that 70% were adequate, but 30% were inadequate
Most science and other content teachers didn’t feel prepared to do so
Not doing it at pre-service level because most states do not require a course in teaching writing
We have been doing this work for nearly 25 years and we have not delivered our work in terms of learning strategies approach and outreach
We have a distribution problem — we are not providing what we know in pre-service and in-service ed
A lot of this is very complicated, so we did the best practice book to give something for teachers to look at
We need to have support materials showing teachers how to do this — if you can see it, you can do it
My Reflections
In thinking about Dr. Graham’s talk, there are a number of salient points that I want to consider. First, he went over the 11 strategies from Writing Next and, even though there is evidence to show that all these strategies are effective, it is the individual teacher that makes the difference in writing instruction.
Second, he talked about how students can use word processing to write and revise, and that is very effective for their growth as writers; however, most of the opportunities that students have to write with the computer only involve typing in a “final draft” of something else that has been written out beforehand.
Next, he talked about peer editing and how students must be scaffolded into the process of giving feedback; just having them give comments to one another is not enough as they must use the language of writing in that talk.
Finally, he talked about the writing process approach and having an authentic purpose and audience for students should happen more often than what it is. Typically, the audience is only within the classroom walls, and students don’t share beyond their friends. Yet, he described a project in his children’s school in which students shared their work more widely and that it could be a goal for many, although not all of our assignments.
Notes from Margaret Hedstrom’s “The Future of Networked Knowledge”
Overview Announcement:
Dr. Hedstrom is an archivist who is on the faculty of the School of Information at U of M. Her research interest is digital information. She has done some interesting cross cultural empirical research on user response to various methods of archiving digital files. (e.g. “The Old Version Flickers More:” Digital Preservation from the User Perspective. American Archivist http://www.ils.unc.edu/callee/dig-pres_users-perspective.pdf) Not just ease of use but also reliability of stored electronic files.
She is also a member of the American Council of Learned Societies Commission on Cyberinfrastructure for the Humanities and Social Sciences. (Their report available at http://er.lib.msu.edu/item.cfm?item=050123)
Notes from the session:
Intro
Recent feature story from NYT on archiving digital materials
We are trying to build networks, facilities, and human capital that takes advantage of the burgeoning world of digital information
There are archival questions in every discipline, problems that we encounter in humanities and social sciences, as well as other sciences
Today’s talk will be to reflect back on the ACLS Commission’s thoughts on infrastructure for education and the humanities
What is the vision and potential of this, as well as the challenges that we experience on a daily basis and others that we can anticipate; then discuss some paths that we can use to move towards this vision
The Vision
The potential for cyber infrastructure allows for transformative research that were not possible for people to address in the past as well as open scholarship
This is the big goal for research cyber infrastrucure
Looking from the humanities and social science perspective at a report from science and engineering report on cyber infrastructure
What could we do if we had massive amounts of digital data, easy-to-use analytical tools, and networks of repositories, and well-trained people to use it?
There must be money out there for the scientists, and the humanists could ride on their coat tails, right? Well… it turns out that when you talk to scientists there are problems with funding for research, and competition is intense, too.
Many of us from outside of these science communities think that they are networked and forward-thinking, but there are many questions about what makes legitimate science, peer review, qualifications of researchers, etc.
More thoughts on the vision
What do we mean by infrastructure?
It is about the protocols for moving data, for sure
But, it is also about the people who know how to approach these new resources
Archivists who are getting data into shape so others can use it
There is a lot of technical work in adding metadata that goes unnoticed and, consequently, is different from what has been done in the physical world
To take advantage of this potential, we need to learn how to teach and research in different ways, and these are the bigger stumbling blocks that we need to get over
There are new ways of addressing research that are happening in a parallel with a move towards interdisciplinarity
How do you take ideas that have been historically separated by institutional boundaries that are now coming back together again in a digital convergence?
How does an interest in cyber-enabled learning happen in conjunction with this? Is there a dissastisfaction with the compartmentalized visions of scholarship?
A goal for cyber infrastructure shifts your way of thinking about research and looking at problems that allows for a new way to think about problems.
What would “big” humanities (transformative research) mean?
Because of the way that humanities research has been done in the past (single investigator, deep problem, specific set of data resources) — the problems have been scaled down to fit within the scope of work for one human being.
Now, we can scale the work across a team of people and apply knowledge to much bigger questions
Changing the culture is partly a generational change and partly thinking about not trying to convince those who do not want to change their ideas.
Some of the big issues with the humanities is that the early attempts to do quantitative research didn’t fit in with the paradigm of what people were trying to look at.
What has happened since then is that the kind of resources available to, say, historians, are richer and more vast.
You can get census data, yes, but you can also get images, primary texts, and other items more easily
UM and Google’s library project — how does a historian go about mining that data?
Resistance
You can enable other kinds of cyber science, but don’t take away from my current budget.
Is the work empirical? Does it have rigorous tests of validity? What happens when you triangulate it with other kinds of research?
Openness in Scholarship
Open in both the sense that it is making contributions to research as well as have access to the results
The raw materials for the research (documents, data, and even people) are networked and widely accessible
In this area, she gives librarians lots of credit for moving forward in this area
There are formidable monetary and intellectual property issues to overcome here, though
Research becomes much more collaborative
It doesn’t mean that the idea of the lone investigator goes out the window
Expertise is shared, however, and scholarship is open to new audiences and perspectives
Universities have done a disservice by trying to have “quality” through exclusivity
What is the line between a free-for-all and a very rich dialogue about the research questions we are trying to pursue?
Also, could we engage younger people with a degree of fun? Have we dismissed something that people might find engaging by dismissing it as frivolous?
Challenges
Where do you start with all of this?
There is a complex set of interdependent variables here.
How do we do research without a critical mass of resources and tools?
There have been some areas in the humanities where things have changed.
For instance, in the classics, you find many early adopters because the primary resources are finite (there are only so many original Greek texts) and you can get it online; it is the base of data that everyone draws there conclusions from the ancient world
On the other hand, what happens when you look at 20th century history and the endless amounts of content that are out there?
What happens when all the volumes in the world are digitized? Of all the primary sources out there, we only have so much money to digitize though…
What do we bring out that is trapped?
Within the disciplines, there is lots of room for advice from scholars on this
Someday, can we help make decisions about what is important in the field and what needs to be digitized?
Can we help develop the analytical tools to look at the data?
Can we do massive text mining?
Visualizations?
What about stimulating the demand for this new kind of scholarship?
Who wants to take a risk as a young scholar when it could fall flat on deaf ears or it could be the greatest thing since sliced bread?
Is there an in-between space that we can translate the goals of that vision on a reasonable scale?
Where does the money come from?
Most of the physical infrastructure in this country came in the early part of this century. The point is that we do no, as a country, invest in maintaining infrastructure. Universities do a little better at this, but there is more to do to mobilize these resources.
How do we build an ethos of openness and the public good, when the culture and legal structure locks data up and attaches ownership to them?
Social and cultural challenges
Institutional Roles
Incentives and rewards for scholars who take the risk to do research in these new ways
There are challenges to the ways of doing this work
Conservative, traditional modes of funding
Finding others to collaborate with
Tenure and what counts as legitimate contributions to scholarship
These are all ways of thinking in institutions that are deeply held and may not be antithetical to these newer notions, but certainly don’t jive with them either
Everyone’s work will change as a consequence of this shift
The role of the brick and mortar university will still attract students from a variety of backgrounds and these interactions will not go away
But, what is it that distinguishes one place from another, especially with this notion of openness?
What are universities doing to attract faculty?
What physical resources does the university have (librar, facilities)?
What happens when anyone can get access to these materials? What is the value added by the institution?
One of the questions also becomes whether or not we are willing to do something different as well as what we were doing before?
Can we teach as much and do elaborate research projects?
In libraries, for instance, if we are out there cataloging every web page like we do every book, then there are certain things we can and can not do with every resource.
Conceptual Challenges
If we want to draw a variety of perspectives into looking at the problems, then how do we maintain scientific rigor and have inclusion at the same time?
The wisdom of crowds argument
What if everyone in the crowd is wrong?
How far can we push this from opinion to educated judgment
Universities that have resources as compared to those who do not
Digital ivory tower
How do we convince skeptics of the potential without solid evidence?
Avoiding the “trust me” syndrome and making a case for how to spend money
Where to start?
Starting in the schools, doing things in a connected way is good, but they are doing things on a superficial level and we have not done a good job of packaging this information
Getting info from 19th century and putting it out there for people to gobble up
Getting the next generation of scholars being more insistent on this kind of work
Encourage the convinced to talk to those who “don’t get it”
Don’t want to be dismissive, but there are some who need to at least not stand in the way for others to bring this work forward
There are those who place lots of value in traditional kinds of work and we need to convince them that there are ways to do otherwise
Look at pockets of innovation and support that work rather than spread things too thin
There are things that people are doing, but don’t contribute to the infrastructure
We can stop doing some things if they don’t seem important
The world won’t come to an end if the pre-prints don’t come to the mailbox
Some kinds of work that might seem frivolous might come to be valuable in the end
The gaming metaphor and how there is something profound there
If you can learn by doing something with a game, we need to embrace that kind of shift in thinking
My Reflections
As I prepare materials for CMU’s online repository, CONDOR, I have been considering many of these same issues. What “counts” for me in terms of creating blog posts, wikis for my class, opening up content that has been published in “locked” journals? I want to be a young scholar who pushes these issues in my department, college, and university, yet I want tenure, too. I think that I am striking a good balance in doing the types of scholarship that is considered as legitimate by my colleagues and publishing in these types of open forums, yet there are still the nagging concerns that my work will not be understood. So, I continue with the both/and philosophy (publish in books and peer reviewed journals as well as in digital formats such as blogs, podcasts, and other forums).
Certainly, these will be issues that I wrestle with for years to come, if not my entire career, so hearing her talk today helped me see my concerns in a larger educational context.
Apologies in advance for what will be a long post here, as my “reflection in action” during the conference consisted more of trying to find free wifi and navigating the Riverwalk than it did of actually having time to sit down and think. I tried to break my thinking up by day, for what that’s worth, and hope that these thoughts are useful for all my readers, especially all my colleagues who were unable to attend.
My thoughts on the Tech To Go session are mixed, but all in a good way. On the one hand, I wanted to have it be a little more formal with a larger screen and some chairs, so people would feel free to linger. On the other hand, that was precisely the point. People were able to move around, or just stop by is something caught their eye. Having to