Bud the Teacher

    Today’s 5:00pm radio news update combined with the filtering conversations of late inspired this podcast.  As always, first draft thinking.  One note: I named a couple of different states.  I was wrong about both of them.  The news blip that pushed me over the edge today happened in Kansas.

Links:

• Will Richardson’s blogbanning wiki
• The Value of Xanga
• Podcast: Choices
• Myspace.  Myspace.  Myspace.

    Bloggers mentioned in this podcast include:

• Miguel Guhlin
• Wesley Fryer
• Andy Carvin
• Christopher Harris
• Doug Noon (On a tangent, Doug has a really fascinating and introspective post on being a witness that you should really, really take the time to read.  Then again, all of the bloggers in this list are usually worth reading.) 

    Spent some time tonight cleaning up the links on the main page to more accurately reflect what I’m trying to read right now.  Also returned to some good old blogging 101 practice by spending some time commenting on the work of others. 
    I find that usually, if I can’t formulate my own thoughts, the best thing I can do as a writer and as a thinker is to respond or react to the ideas of others.  Not only does such an investment in the blogging community help me to get my thinking straight — but I think that it helps to strengthen the loose ties that bind all of us together.
    Thanks to all of you who spend some of your precious time here reading, thinking, and responding.  Know that you’re constantly making me think.

    So just saying MySpace might be a censorable offense in some school districts.  (MySpace.  MySpace.  MySpace.  There.)   Such a ridiculous action is what happens when we let technology do the work that we should be doing in the first place — paying attention to what our students are doing online at school.
    Miguel, I’m somewhere between you and Tom on this one.  How about we name names?
     Andy Carvin has.  (Speaking of Andy’s blog, take a look at the really interesting and somewhat sad first comment to this post to see the rationale behind this anonymously maintained collection of edublogs.)
    Who is that masked librarian?  Will sneaking RSS feeds into a school really accomplish anything?  And has it really come to this?

    (UPDATE:  Will’s started this wiki to collect known instances of blog blocking.  Please contribute if you know of any.    Thanks!)

    I attended my first Discovery Education Ed Tech Connect Webinar this afternoon.  Steve Dembo was presenting on mobile technology — between the topic and the presenter, I knew there’d be good stuff to, ahem, discover.
    I was right.
    Mobile Internet tools and devices are everywhere and I’ve got some learning to do.  I really dislike Internet access via the cell phone — but that’s my problem.  Tools like cell phones and portable gaming systems seem really handy for linking students to information via tools that they already have.  Steve mentioned a ton of handy resources for mobile users and for teachers wanting to create content for a mobile audience. 
    One idea that is making my head spin is the concept of semacodes.  I’ve got some thinking to do about those.  Are any of you using them?  Please tell us about what you’re up to if you are.  (Here’s a link to one project that Steve mentioned that I think could be a great reason for students create informational websites about local sites of interest.)
    Head on over and check out the recorded presentation.  It’ll be posted at Discovery’s Ed Tech Connect site soon. 

    Our community lost a young man this week in a situation that, frankly, frightens me.  Last week, a shooting of the boyfriend of one of our alumni occurred.  The two events are related — both gang-involved events.  Horrible events, at that.
    When I was at the gym last evening, I took occasional glances at the TV screens on the wall in front of my workout equipment.  Almost all of the nine channels were turned to local or national news channels.  All of those were flashing images of the recent developments in the Holloway case.  How many times do we need to hear that particular story?  Certainly, the disappearance of someone’s daughter is news  and awful news at that; but how did that particular young lady’s story capture the attention of so many reporters, while other deaths and disappearances didn’t  or don’t make a mark?
    Why do some stories get so much attention in the media, while others are neglected?
    And how do teachers deal with the real issues of the day in the midst of frightening extracurricular events like these?  Frankly, learning about language arts right now doesn’t seem all that important.

    Terry Freedman has some useful reminders on how not to make an educational technology lesson boring..  Actually, he’s written a pretty good reminder of how to plan good lessons.
    Here’s a piece of the well written and quite handy post:

The teacher spends too much time talking
Most people learn by doing. Even teachers mostly learn by practising
teaching, not reading about it or listening to someone else talk about
it. Yet I have observed lessons in which, out of a 55 minute lesson,
the teacher spoke for 45 minutes. It gets worse. In those sorts of
lessons, the teacher loves his own voice so much that the 10 minutes
the pupils actually get to do something do not come in one chunk, but
in two or three blocks of a few minutes each. Typically, the teacher
says, “OK, now I’d like you to try that yourself. Remember, you select
the text and then click on the B to make it bold.” This leads on to
another characteristic of such lessons, that of boring activities.”

It may sound harsh, but as another consultant said to me recently,
quite often teachers prevent learning, and that they should get out of
the way and allow the pupils to learn!

When I started teaching and giving conference presentations, I used to feel like I was "cheating "when I would introduce an idea or a concept and then give the students or conference participants time to actually get their hands dirty with that idea, either through a simulation or a time for hands on work.  Since I wasn’t filling the session with me, it sometimes felt like I wasn’t performing in the proper role of a teacher.  Of course, I was wrong, even though sometimes I still feel that way.  I find, though,  that I get the most positive feedback when I do the least amount of talking. 
    Weird, huh?  It seems almost counter-intuitive — but it works. 
    I encourage you to check out the full post.

    My spring break is now over, and it’s back to work.  Today’s podcast is some "clearing the cobwebs" first draft thinking about the recent Washington Post article on teachers blogging as well as a conversation about George and educational experimentation.  In the middle, I’m also asking about bandwidth and how it can get in the way of using new tools in the classroom.  (By the way, have you taken a look at Celestia yet?  Well worth your time.)
    Somewhere in there, too, I mentioned Darren’s recent pronunciation post.  I’m so lucky to have such an easy name.  Bud.  Just falls right off the tongue, huh?
    As always, I’m curious to know your thoughts.   

  Welcome to those of you stopping by via the Washington Post.  I’m honored to have been mentioned in one of their stories on educational blogging.  Blogging has transformed my practice as a teacher by demonstrating to me that the best way to learn something is to try to communicate it to someone else in an honest, thoughtful manner.  Our students, as writers, can use blogs to record their thinking, share resources, develop ideas and opinions, and link to, process, and sometimes challenge the ideas of others. 
    I tell my story via this blog as a way to help me understand my experiences.  Usually, those experiences are helpful to others.
     If you’re a teacher, and you’re interested in how blogging can be a tool for both professional reflection as well as a tool for improving student achievement through reading, writing, and thinking, then I think you’ve made the right first step by visiting a blog or two.  I heartily encourage you to begin reading blogs (Will Richardson provides a great resource for you to use to find many of the good ones, and I’ve got many of my favorites to the right of this post on my website.)
    Then start blogging yourself.   I’ve got a collection of resources for helping you to get started with your students over at my wiki.  Feel free to e-mail me if you need help or suggestions as you move online with your students.   You might be interested in this post if you need a rationale for why blogging with students can be transformative. 
    If you’re a parent concerned about the safety of putting student work online, thank you.  I’m glad you’re engaged and interested in the education of your child or children.  There are many great resources available for you to use to help navigate online worlds with your child, but let me suggest to you that the real trick to helping your student be safe in an increasingly online world is to remain involved in their activities.  Read their work, know who they talk to.  Be involved, if possible.
    And remind them that the Internet is a public place, and they should act accordingly.
    There is great potential in helping students to create meaningful work, writing and multimedia that can be read and shared with the entire world.  I am constantly amazed by the quality of work that my students create when they are held to high standards and have the opportunity to share what they do with a real audience of readers.  I know you will be, too.
    If I can be of service to you as you navigate the power and potential of classroom blogging, please let me know by leaving a comment to this post or by sending me an e-mail.  And, if you start a blog yourself, be sure to share and let us know where to find you.

    Today marks the first day of a week of vacation.  See you somewhere around the middle or end, depending on how much I enjoy my respite.