See More Myst IV Revelation Various at IGN.com

Why a picture from Myst IV Revelation? We are starting the year with a focus on relationships. As part of that, we are having students decorate their lockers as a way of telling others about themselves. The logical parallel to this is for each of the teachers to decorate their doors with the same intent. So, I have been on a search for images to help inspire my door design.

Mrs. Reed's door is a big sunshine, green grass, blue water and sky. I laughed and told her I would decorate my door (which is directly across the hall) in Goth style and we could see which door attracts which kids. Just kidding. Actually, I am going to go for steampunk on my door, maybe with the addition of a dragon or two.

Building a friendly yet professional relationship has got to be a foundation for our whole year, and the doors and lockers are intended to function as a springboard for getting to know one another a little better. It is also fun. Setting the right emotional tone is important too!

I will update this post with pictures of our doors once we are all done decorating them next week.

Seek and ye shall find

Reaching the iGeneration requires a shift in teacher thinking!

Amazing site!  If you are interested in using project based learning effectively, but have little or no experience with PBL, you need to check out Project Based Learning online. This site has an excellent set of resources to help teachers plan their PBL units.  There are also videos with great examples of schools using PBL effectively.

Maybe I've been around too long, but  when I read statements about things that can go wrong, I get it. Been there, done that! I definitely know about things going wrong!

I also know first-hand how much more time and effort goes into constructing really effective PBL than is needed for a more traditional approach.  Our team is well aware that we will be putting in many, many extra hours this year.  Sites like the Project Based Learning are so valuable in helping us to think about all of the details of planning and carrying off this approach successfully.  Not only do I find myself nodding in agreement as I read their web site, but I also can tell that these people get it - they know what they are talking about.

The planning process the PBL-online site describes echoes instructional design principles I learned in the Education Media Design Technology masters program through Full Sail University.  The site also offers an opportunity for collaboration, as teachers can share their own PBL plans and outcomes with other educators.

Like anything else, PBL can be implemented well or poorly.  The research I've been reading, including articles posted on the BIE site, confirm again the value of learning to effectively use PBL with our high school students.  But there is the caveat - effectively implement - that makes a great deal of difference between having the ideal outcomes PBL is capable of, and creating a big project with no particular positive impact on learning.

I think most people who've been in education for a few years have seen the monster improperly designed attempts at PBL can create.  That is why I keep going back and looking again at resources and research to help guide my practice.  It helps keep me on the right track.  The many videos and reports of success also are very encouraging.  They let me know that, if our team keeps working on using PBL, we will refine and improve our use of this approach with the effect of creating a dynamic, engaging learning environment for our students. 

21st Century Challenge

I was doing some back-up research about 21st Century skills and ran across this wonderful video on the Partnership for 21st Century Skills site.  The video was written by children’s book author/illustrator Peter H. Reynolds and created in collaboration with the Partnership for 21st Century Skills and FableVision.

I had 21st Century skills on the checklist I created for planning my courses.  I have spent so much of the past six years learning about 21st Century skills, that I had to think for a moment when I was asked where I got the idea to include them in my planning.  I went back and made a more detailed listing, including 21st Century literacies, so that I could be more precise in addressing this element of the courses I'm creating.

The planning tools I've created are really for my own benefit, to help me keep track of the many threads I need to weave together to produce a truly well-balanced set of courses for our high school program (no longer "alternative", we are now "accelerated"!  Cool!).  It occurred to me, though, that the tools I created will also help me answer questions when I'm asked how my courses meet state standards, and how I know students are having the kinds of learning experiences they need.  Questions are good - they make me rethink and remember what my reasoning was, how I arrived at a certain conclusion.

Only three weeks until school starts! So much to do...

Putting the Pieces Together

A little A-Team music, please!  Yes, we love it when a plan comes together.  Today Brenda and I are meeting to go over grading and some of the specifics of our planning, now that we actually know when school starts and stops.

The Wordle is a reflection of some of the things we are trying to juggle (hence the drawing).  We have spoken of keeping student work in a cumulative portfolio that will give evidence of their mastery of the skills and concepts expected of high school graduates.  I found a good article on graduate portfolios that I think will be a great starting point for a conversation about a different kind of portfolio than the students have created in the past. 

We plan to have students demonstrate these skills over the course of multiple assignments.  For example, perhaps their first writing will focus on a good, well-written paragraph about a topic.  As students progress, the writing will become more sophisticated.  We intend to introduce MLA style, respect of copyright, documenting sources correctly, and tools for planning a written product (like webbing and outlining).  Assignments throughout different courses and different levels of courses will have students use these skills again and again, so that they will become fluent and proficient in them. 

How often are students introduced to a skill, only to have a great deal of time pass before they are asked to use that skill again?  Of course, they forget.  Asking students to use the same skill across subject areas, and to do it through each level of a course, will help reinforce the skill.  The same is true of our approach to tech and Web 2.0 tools.  There are a million of them.  Rather than continually introducing new Web 2.0 tools to students, we are choosing a number of them as a base and using them over and over again until students are able to use them independently and with a reasonable degree of proficiency.  Of course, we can introduce other tools as individual students master the foundational set we will use in classes. 

For example, each level may require some sort of presentation to allow the student to demonstrate mastery of a set of concepts.  In the beginning they will have learned how to find copyright free music (digccmixter, etc) and bring it into Audacity, if needed. They might use Prezi or PhotoStory3 to combine images, words, and music to present their topic. They will create storyboards to plan their presentations. Their final product will be embedded into their blogs with their reflection about what they learned in a given unit or level.  As students progress through each course, a presentation will be part of their demonstration of understanding the content. 

Students who are more adept at using technology will have a chance to expand the range of tools they use, but everyone will develop fluency and proficiency at using at least two modes of presentation. 

Drawing by Patricia Ort

Why? 

I expect each of our students to go on to some sort of post-secondary education.  Statistics support the reality that, at some point in their future, our students will need to be able to manage their learning for additional training that will be presented to them - whether it be tech school, college, or on-the-job training provided by an employer.  The higher level thinking skills they will hone through the process I described above will stand them in good stead when they are in a different setting, without, perhaps, the kind of support they will be getting in our classrooms.  They will be independent, confident, and equipped to take whatever they have learned and share it with others in a way that is clear and demonstrates good understanding of what they have learned.

This should serve them well, no matter what venue they find themselves in. It should give them the foundation to be life-long learners.

What makes our alternative high school program unique?

I appreciated the comments of another blogger as I gave thought to this question. Rob Barton shared his thoughts on the differences between pedagogy and andragogy (a word I became aware of this year).  I liked best his comment about there not necessarily being a set age line between pedagogy (a teacher-centered approach of teaching commonly used with younger children) and andragogy (a student-directed approach for adult learners).

While I have a responsibility to be the person "behind the curtain," making sure students are involved in learning that reflects state and national standards, many of the things identified as principles of adult learning seem very appropriate for my alternative ed students.

The principles of adult learning (most often credited to Malcom Knowles) are:

• Self-directed, autonomous learning.
• Students bring life experiences and knowledge to the learning situation.
• Learners are goal-oriented.
• The learning needs to be relevant to the learner.
• The learner is practical.  They want to know stuff they can see a use for.
• They need to be shown respect.

Well, yeah.

What about this list wouldn't apply to my high school students?  It is true that there are different levels of maturity among my students that make some more ready to be self-directed than others.  I think that is a matter of experience.  If we create scaffolding for students to give them the opportunity to develop skills which support them as self-directed learners, then those who have not quite gotten to that point can be enabled.  Those who are already able to direct their own learning will simply be able to engage in self-directed learning more quickly, while those who need to have this modeled will be given plenty of help.

I think this is where setting every student up with an iGoogle account, and having them create tabs within that account as part of creating their own Personal Learning Environment (PLE) fits in.  It is also where setting up a blog and using it to journal about their learning experiences comes into play.  Later, when our students move on to post-secondary education, whether it be a college, trade school, certificate program, or some other setting, they will have the tools to manage their own learning.

Our plan to use project-based and problem-based learning situations also fits very well with these principles.  We know our students are not blank slates to be written on.  They have their own experiences and knowledge to bring to the table.  Remembering that they are still teens, we can invite them to use the knowledge they already have while helping them to gain the knowledge and skills they will need as adults.

Each time we approach the standards and topics that are part of a high school education, we will also look for the ways in which they are relevant to our students.  If they can see they are not just doing rote learning, but are discovering things that make a difference in their lives, they will be more engaged and motivated to master new concepts and skills. In this way, also, we intend to help students to see the practical use of the content they will be mastering.

As for showing respect - well, of course.  Kids know if you are talking down to them.  I think this goes beyond just presenting lesson content.  I think it also goes to not gossiping about the kids and not letting them gossip about one another.  The idea of "respecting the absent" is shared in the book Top 20 Teachers by Bernabei, Cody, Sweeney, Cole, and Cole.  They advocate being a problem solver instead of a problem bringer.  What they meant by this had to do with those conversations teachers often have about students...where they complain and criticize the student but bring no solution to the table.

That made sense to me.  It is easy to become frustrated with a particular person or situation and to engage in conversations where you are really just venting about the person.  You might really care about the person - but you feel so frustrated that your conversation isn't about finding a solution, but about complaining. 

So,

• Self-directed, autonomous learning.
• Students bring life experiences and knowledge to the learning situation.
• Learners are goal-oriented.
• The learning needs to be relevant to the learner.
• The learner is practical.  They want to know stuff they can see a use for.
• They need to be shown respect.

These are some of the things that make our program unique.  They are not just principles to be applied to the 20-somethings and older group.  They also have their place in the alternative high school setting.

Finally, I have to share this video!  In my search for more information about adult learning principles, I ran across a project a fellow Full Sail University student produced for the Musical Theory and Educational Applications class.  I just had to laugh - been there, done that!  Not quite ready for prime time, but the content was good and I just had to empathize with a fellow EMDT student!

Progress Happens

Courtesy Creative Commons

Things are starting to fall into place.  We are using a problem solving/project based approach this year, which requires a lot of groundwork!  Today we set themes for the year, which  gives us a framework to build the rest of our learning experiences around.

Most themes run for four weeks.  We are collaborating -  creating whole group learning experiences, which we will team teach. We will also divide the students up into smaller groups to do explicit, direct teach lessons which are aimed at specific learning outcomes drawn from National and State standards.  The schedule is flexible, allowing us to give more time on any given day to a learning experience that requires more time. For example, if Bryan is doing a lab to help students understand plant biology, we can allow him that time, while adjusting time spent on other lessons.  Students who did not need to earn a biology credit would work with Brenda and I in English or social studies.

We previously created a crosswalk from National and State standards and are using those results to create checklists for each of our courses.  We have evaluated the different technology and Web 2.0 tools we would like to use, and today posted an introductory survey we will use at the beginning of the year to start learning about our students.  Our first focus is on relationship building.  The survey will be one piece of that. Feedback from each person will tell us how they see themselves as students and help us in planning lessons.

I am duplicating my courses in Moodle.  This will allow students with attendance problems to keep up.  I have also found my students really like this kind of structure. They like to have a place where they can see what the learning tasks are, what level of performance is required to earn credit, and when things are due. Grades are also posted on the Moodle.  As our program comes together, Moodle will also be a tool for allowing advanced students to finish courses a little faster.  I am drawing from my e-learning and game design courses as I structure these new Moodle versions of the social studies courses I teach.  There will also be one Moodle which will serve as a resource for all students, with tutorials and step-by-step instructions for projects and assignments.  Students who may be working on a project at home could refer to the Moodle if they had forgotten how to use Audacity or Photostory 3, for example.  Or if they wanted to see the rubric for a major assignment, they could pull it up on Moodle from any computer linked to the Internet.

We are also looking at opportunities to integrate reading and writing standards across the curriculum.  The goal is to have students practice and demonstrate mastery of literacy skills essential to future success beyond high school. 

 I am breaking my social studies courses up into levels, with repeated elements in each level.  For example, each level in the history classes will have a vocabulary and a geography piece, as well as core content which students will need to demonstrate mastery of.  There will be increasing levels of sophistication required as students move through a course. 

We created a web as part of our initial planning.  The web was a good starting place for seeing how the English, math, social studies, and science courses overlap.  I am now working on a sort of web/flow chart to describe how we will be integrating all of our courses.  We also need to identify stories we want to use to introduce each new theme.  Storytelling is a great way to draw students in and capture their interest. They are also a great launching point for researching.

I also would like to see our students creating their own stories, as a way of sharing what they've learned.