It’s summer vacation, my son is enjoying an hour on his PlayStation, and I’m enjoying the time to just browse the internet, catch up on the starred posts in my google reader, read some books (some fiction, some teacher-ish!) and generally relax.  It’s been a while since I last posted …… I thought I might be having writer’s block again, but the more I think about, the more I’m convinced that I really haven’t had anything worthwhile to say for a while.

I do have a few posts brewing, one on Writer’s Workshop (my own personal area for development and improvement for the 2009/10), a reflection post on the whirlwind year moving from New Zealand to Bangkok, Thailand, and a few other little projects gently simmering in the background!

Image attribution:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/mark78/1463574952/

Course 2:  April 20-26

Essential Questions
Are we preparing students for a world of Mass Collaboration?
How do we prepare students for a world of Mass Collaboration?
Does ISBs AUP take this issue into account?

As we made our way through looking at a wealth of pre-prepared links I began to wonder whether the majority of these sites were truely mass collaboration or just mass dumping.  That’s not to say that mass dumping is bad (because it’s so great when educators share!!) but what I mean is, a whole lot of resources uploaded (shared) but not necessarily altered in anyway and re-shared.  So, no actual collaboration has taken place.

If we truly wish to prepare our students for a world of Mass Collaboration then we do need to be involved in the creation and re-creation of information.  An amazing and worthwhile project that clearly demonstrates the power of mass collaboration, how it can work, and how it should look is none other than Vicki Davis & Julie Lindsay’s work in both the Horizon Project and the Flat Classroom Project as well as the more recently publicised (and replacement for the Horizon Project) NetGeneration Education Project.  These two ladies have been revolutionary in their approach to true mass collaboration, successfully co-coordinating classrooms from around the world to not just work on a project within the confines of their own classroom, but to work on a project where it’s more likely than not that you will never “meet” your team members “face to face.  They have set the bar high on Mass Collaboration.

So how do you prepare students for a world of Mass Collaboration.  Easy.  Get involved in projects like those in the paragraph above.  My Year 7’s back in NZ got involved in the Horizon Project as a sounding board classroom.  They loved it.  Use your PLN to find like-minded educators and put something together OR start smaller than that - do something across your grade level, or with your kinder-buddies.  It can be as easy as our KinderBuddy VoiceThread that we collaborated on - that’s mass collaboration.  We all added a piece to make it one project.

Does ISBs AUP take this issue into account?  Well I’m only commenting on the ES AUP - and it goes some way to setting a standard for the communication part of mass collaboration when it talks about telecommunication (which, I believe, is at the heart of Mass Collaboration)

Telecommunications is like speaking and writing
Telecommunications is another medium of communication.  Like speaking and writing, we can use telecommunications to hurt feelings, invade privacy, spread lies, and plan law-breaking activities.  Or we can use it productively and responsibly to exchange information and communicate with others.  The choice is ours.

Acceptable/appropriate communication needs to be at the heart of any Mass Collaboration project.  As educators, it is our responsibility to teach our students how to collaborate, communicate and cooperate with others who are not necessarily in the classroom with us.  It should be just part of the way we do things ’round here.

April 13-19’s essential question for CoETaIL.Asia

Enduring Understanding:

The communication tools that exist today are powerful mediums to help spread positive change and global awareness.

So what was the first thing I did? Asked my PLN (Personal Learning Network) of course!
First I asked my twitter network:

Then I asked my Facebook network:

And that was just the replies I got in 5 minutes.  Many, many  thanks to my PLN!!

Enough said.

Cyberbullying is no different to offline bullying.  Bullying is bullying is bullying.  Some may argue that it (cyberbullying) is worse as there is an element of anonymity about it and emotional detachment at the time of the bullying that does not bode well for stirring empathy.

Is cyberbullying prevalent at ISB?  Well, we honestly don’t know.  Some colleagues shared stories they knew of but statistically, we do not know.  Finding out may prove equally hard.  Research indicates that most adolescents keep bullying incidents to themselves, believing that to tell, will only make the situation worse.

Elona Hartjes blogged about some eye-openers she’d gleaned from the book Mean Girls by Kaye Randall & Allyson A. Bowen.

Our AUP for elementary school mentions it, but does not expand into any specific detail.  If we stick to the premise that bullying is bullying then this is quite clear:

General school rules for behavior and communications apply.

No profane, abusive or impolite language should be used to communicate nor should materials be accessed which are not in line with the rules of school behavior.  A good rule to follow is never access, view or send materials which you would not want your teachers and parents to see.

Bullying in the school, playground, buses etc is not tolerated, nor should cyberbullying.  But is this clear enough - do our students realise that bullying is bullying regardless of where it takes place - is cyberspace a misconception held by our students.  The more digital we become, the more embedded this knowledge should become with our students.  It should not be taught in isolation, it should be part of what we talk about each time we “go” digital - it’s part of being pro-active.

Cyberbully gets it own heading in the ES AUP but there is nothing in the paragraph about it.

Computer Trespass or Cyberbullying
Illegal or unauthorized access, alteration or deletion of computer programs or applications is known as trespass.  Computer trespass, depending upon the circumstances, is a punishable offense that may receive sanctions for Classroom Disruption, Stealing, or Damaging Personal or School Property.

Seems like this might be the right time for our AUP to be updated.

Many colleagues felt we out to find another name for it too.  Apparently the older students think it’s a terrible name (it makes them snigger, it sounds geekish).  If it’s no different to any other bullying, then we should just call it what it is ….. bullying …… there just happens to be one more place where it can, and does, happen.  And it would be very remiss of us not to be pro-active about the destruction of it wherever it may take place.

Image Attribution: bullying.co.uk poster: http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3604/3406087027_2c39a300ac_o.jpg

Saturday’s Face to Face session dealt mainly with the 5 Principles of Best Practice
From the Code of Best Practice in Fair Use for Media Literacy Education by the Action Coalition for Media Education (AUSOC Centre for Social Media - School of Communication American University)
“Educators need to be leaders, not followers, in establishing best practices in fair use.”

1. Employing Copyrighted materials in media literacy lessons.
Using materials inside your classroom, taking reasonable steps to work within Fair Use i.e:  password protected blog, internal server, attribution to author/owner,  but posting on YouTube - NO

2. Employing copyrighted material in preparing curriculum materials.
Again using copyrighted material in class with fear, working within Fair Use - which enables you to use as much material as you wish as long as it is for the purpose of teaching your students what you need to teach them.

3. Sharing media literacy curriculum materials.

Can you sell it - but not for profit? Yes, and sometimes (in the case of the Video Case Study #1 - you could sell for profit if you were an educational institute. - You are adding value to the works.

4. Students use of copyrighted materials in their own academic and creative work.
If you keep it in your confined space of classroom, internal server - etc then you are pretty much ok.  Once you start posting on the web - then you need to consider the next step - are you keeping within copyright and fair use.

Audience matters - what is your audience?  Work backwards.

Technology allows us to reach a wider audience.  Allows students to have an authentic audience.  What are the things we need to be teaching them in order to operate safely?

Can not use mood and emotion as a justification for breaking copyright/fair use

5. Developing audiences for student work.
Meeting the transformative guidelines you can stay within copyright/fairuse in order to show/share your work to the rest of the world.

NOTE:
This document has been reviewed by specialist copyright lawyers, (listed on the last page) but this has not been tested in court.

Interesting conversations were had, especially discussing the Case Study videos.  There is certainly a lot that is considered when Judges make rulings about Copyright and Fair Use.  It’s fairly obvious that there are clear guidelines that we can follow as educators to ensure that we do not breach Copyright or Fair Use.  But it is also pretty clear that as educators, as long as we don’t abuse Fair Use, we can safely use other’s material to help students learn in a variety of ways.  It would seem the most care needs to be taken when you are posting your creations of work (based on others materials) for the rest of the world to see.

In order to consolidate our learning of these 5 principles, we were giving time in the session to use a multi-media tool to convey the messages of the 5 principles.  You can see some of the other groups work here .

Our group chose Glogster. (Our experiences with it to be a later post - it is still in beta form and it is definitely not the best tool for students - YET).  If the flash doesn’t work, click here for the direct link:

Copyright is for the people, to protect us.

It was interesting to discover that the rules we followed as teachers in New Zealand, 10% of a book, 2 chapters, 30 seconds of music etc were NEVER law.  They were just something that the Ministry of Education gave us guidelines to follow.  In fact we discovered that there are so many guidelines, rules, procedures etc out there, that no wonder this is such a hard topic to get your head around!

Aren’t we also governed by the generousity of others to make their creative works available for us?  Technically we come under Thai law (1994) - but ethically we follow the International Copyright Law.  Big multi-national bodies/companies seemed to have used “scare” tatics to uphold their view of copyright when in actual fact they are in the wrong (in some cases).  It was interesting to discover that copyright law was not intended to protect the original work of an artist - but to enable the artist to share their work.  Somehow along the years this intention has about-turned and has become more negative and the positive reasons it was intended to be used under.

We are all automatically covered by that lovely little “c in a circle” when we create original work - but we as educators would like to be encouraging CreativeCommons and encouraging our students to build on the works of others, add value to it, transform it, and redistribute it to the rest of the world for them to do the same.  There is a wealth of “artists/creators” out there who willingly share their works for us to use, recreate and redistribute to others.  Some people, however, make their livelihood from their original works, and they too deserve the right to protect their work and not “lose” potential earnings from someone taking their idea or intellectual property.  It certainly is a right can of worms with strong arguments for and against.

This little quiz we completed in our groups was very interesting!  Our group did pretty well with a score of 76% (3 incorrect questions).  You really do need to have ALL of the information before you can make a decision on whether or not you are breaking copyright or fair use. And above all, your INTENT has an awful lot to do with whether or not a judge will rule in your favour or not should you ever find yourself in the courtroom.

No one could find a case where a teacher had been prosecuted for breaching copyright or Fair Use.

Do you know of any?

Photo Attribution:
Eks:http://www.flickr.com/photos/eks/388335353/

EARCOS 2009.  Second Workshop Session with Maggie Moon - My thoughts in Italics

Kids like to read, kids like to talk – marry the two together.
Make them think talking about reading is cool
Read-Aloud important time of the day

Framework for Balanced Literacy
Interactive Read Aloud with Accountable Talk
Shared Reading,
Reading workshop
writing workshop
interactive writing/shared writing,
word study (phonics)

Reading Aloud to young children helps them to develop in 4 critical areas: oral language, cognitive skills, concepts of print, phonemic awareness

Different kinds of read alouds
Interactive Read Aloud – stop at places to think aloud, let students talk to a neighbor often have whole-class conversations
Content Area Read Aloud – texts that support learning in science social studies, math
Story Time – get lost in stories
Chose what read-aloud suits your grade level

Read Aloud Book Choices:
High Interest - ask kids!
Can be finished within a reasonable time frame.
Match “Units of Study” or theme work when possible
(get their feet a week or so before you start that unit - expose them to that genre)

Purpose of a Reading Workshop is get students reading independently as much as possible – sustained, focus, stamina building reading – book clubs fits in there – could still be reading own book but reading a bookclub book at the same time.

Partnership reading

Read Aloud is a good intro into bookclubs – you are modeling what a bookclub might sound like, look like.

Grow your own ideas, theme, what is the author trying to say …. Lively interesting conversations rather than a “recording” session

There are student book club basics – see slide notes

Can have individual conference with students who are reading a book above their level to help them cope with the bookclub.
Conversations should be as natural as possible – not retelling, want kids talking throwing ideas around, challenging, questioning
Give students a goal to work towards – that’s what bookclubs are for – use that to drive the reading strategies that we’re teaching throughout the year.

Getting students ready for bookclubs  (do this over the year …… I really like this idea)

Say to students: One of the reasons that we are practicing this is when we get into bookclubs this will be really helpful.    Grow your own ideas, having something to say to your partner, group etc.
Ability to change your mind is important.
Having conversations, how many pages are you going to read, negotiate what we’re going to look for.  When are we going to meet again?

Have your bookclubs staggered so that you as the teacher can manage.

Like the idea of bookclub folders, team brand name ……

Tracking their thinking together – what do you really want them to focus on ….. so that conversation doesn’t go pooooof after 5 minutes

Independent readers could have some ownership in scheduling their bookclub – what would work best for them.

Look out for the coming prepared for talk with Post-its slide. It has some great ideas on it.

Post-its help you prepare for conversations, makes you more ready to talk.

Pause and think – at the end – Maggie doesn’t write a book review at the end of her reading of a book.  Don’t need to always write at the end of the book.  Ask them to capture on paper some of their ideas  in their final conversation.
(book review totally deflates the finish of the book)

There are times that you want to assess the ideas – could see a post-it note wall working here.

What’s a character’s motivation what’s getting their way
Interaction with other characters, what does this say about them?
Character change
Model with students what to pay attention to …… (see above)
Teach them to read off the post-it – model it so they don’t sound robotic

After the conversation, model prompts that record their revision of changing of ideas after listening to others

I used to think … now I think

Little scaffolds that help them do this.

Accountable talk – see slide
Give students a vehicle to get them talking to one another, to have a good conversation.

From EARCOS conference in Kota Kinabalu March 2009.  Maggie Moon is a Literacy Consultant from the Phillipines.  She regularly visits ISB Bangkok as a Literacy Coach.  It was really good to be able to sit down and listen to Maggie speak.  As a newbie to Readers and Writers Workshops, I deliberately chose to attend all of Maggie’s workshops at EARCOS.  I’m so glad I did - although in reflection this would have been a great way to be introduced to Readers and Writers Workshop on arrival at ISB.  I finally feel like I have the missing pieces to the whole umbrella puzzle of my learning about these two types of workshops and student learning within them.  Although my lessons are still no where near how I would like to be, I finally feel like I’m making some progress with the way they are running.

These are my notes from Maggie’s workshop:  Maggie’s handouts here:

Interactive Read Aloud with Accountable Talk Thinking and Talking Deeply About Books

Kids like to read, kids like to talk – marry the two together.
Make them think talking about reading is cool
Read-Aloud important time of the day

Framework for Balanced Literacy
Interactive Read Aloud with Accountable Talk
Shared Reading,
Reading workshop
writing workshop
interactive writing/shared writing,
word study (phonics)

Reading Aloud to young children helps them to develop in 4 critical areas: oral language, cognitive skills, concepts of print, phonemic awareness

Different kinds of read alouds
Interactive Read Aloud – stop at places to think aloud, let students talk to a neightbor often have whole-class conversations
Content Area Read Aloud – texts that support leanring in science social studies, math
Story Time – get lost in stories
Chose what read-aloud suits your grade level

Read Aloud Book Choices:
High Interest - ask kids!
Can be finished within a reasonable time frame.
Match “Units of Study” or theme work when possible
(get their feet a week or so before you start that unit - expose them to that genre)

15-20 minutes everyday
OR
2-3 times a week, 20 mins
2-3 times across a 6 day cycle, 25 minutes
Try to schedule it - the more regular it is the more students come to expect it

Proficient adult reader - good for kids to hear one read.

EARCOS March, 2009 - Session Notes (my thoughts in italics)

• Students learn at different rates - instruction should be differentiated
• Be engaged in authentic work - give them strategies for where writers get their ideas from (key to writers workshop)
• Explicit instruction going on
• Students need a model - do writing in front of them.  You can use mentor text, show them writing (it doesn’t always have to be yours)
• Your goal is to give them strategies to try, and encourage independence and choice
• When you are modeling - don’t give them a perfect model - step by step feel to it, show yourself having a struggle, (students see the action in detail - they see you struggle) try to write things close to what your students are writing. What you are making as a model is as close to what your students are writing.
• Goal of unit-of-study is to have a container that is holding everyone together
• Good writing workshop has a layer of assessment - formal and informal - informs you what you will be doing with your whole class - perhaps the whole class is not getting the concepts that you are introducing. What will you teach more of, less of?
• Possibility of Writers Workshop 3-4 times a week within a balanced literacy programme - in order to fit everything in - not ideal but could still work (perhaps this is how to fit in specific grammar practise - out of 6 day timetable, one day is grammar lesson not writers workshop)
• Workshop Structure:  45 mins: Minilesson (10mins) Worktime (30mins - changes over time, teacher confers while students work, one to one conference, small group work: Mid workshop Teaching point (2-5mins) - take something that you have noticed - manage any little thing back to the whole class. Teaching Share (5-10mins) take time to reflect, work with writing partner, ask questions.  You can stretch the workshop out to an hour if students can stay focused on the writing -the ones that have been writing for a while.
• Mini lessons more than 10mins are maxi-lessons (be clear, concise, planned ahead of time) This is an area that definitely needs to be a focus for me - mini lessons are way tooooo long!!
• Folders and Notebooks - Upper Grades (3-5+) use Writer’s Notebooks and Drafting Folders. Notebooks are for collecting entries.  Writing Folder for the drafting process - write a draft, and revise it.
• Writing Process for Writers Ages 4-7/8:
  • Immersing
  • Rehearsing and Planning
  • Drafting
  • Revising (taking words out, making sentences better)
  • Editing  (fixing mistakes, punctuation, grammar)
  • Publishing (final product - making your final product - want this aspect to go as quickly as possible)
  • Celebrating!! (share the pieces with the class, invite people in, blog? principal, kinderbuddies,writing contest, published authors)
• Writing Process for Writers Ages 8++
  • Immersing
  • Generating (Collecting) Entries (in the writer’s notebook)
  • Choosing a “Seed Entry” (still in the writer’s notebook)
  • Developing and Nurturing
  • Planning and Drafting (see their seed entry differently - don’t copy it - model this) draft on computer - print out Version 1 then make revising changes so that you can track.  Take advantage of spellcheck (that’s what we do).
  • Revising
  • Editing
  • Publishing and Celebrating (ideas: Museum (comment sheet underneath), Group sharing, blogging - authentic audience, Author’s Chair)
• MiniLessons (sense of gathering on the mat area - not at the desks)
  • One, explicit teaching point
  • Student gather at a meeting area
  • Teaching points fit together to create a “Unit of Study”
  • Four parts to the lesson - predictable structure - connection, teaching, active engagement, link - how does this fit in with what we are trying to do, not just another task.
  • Important for kids to see teaching point in action
• Publishing - ok vrs perfect - if it’s taking a long time you need to consider how much of the writing process you are knocking out.  Suggestion from audience - partner/peer editing
  Some units could be teacher-formal editing but not all (Maggie took a post-it and kids had to find the words that she found - don’t write all over their writing - it’s a respect thing.  ELL different ball game for them - they are learning a new language - more time to help them with the editing to help them to learn rather than the focus on the final product - the more you do it for them, the less it becomes their work.  Drawing, then labelling, scaffold works well for ELL students - this is still writer’s workshop (think how can this go for them based on what works for them)
• One to One conferring:  Has a consistent structure (if you have 20 students in your class- across a week you see all of your students at least once - conference times vary but they are not 20 minutes long!!)  Research - talk to student, see what they are doing, watch them; Decide (quick decision - compliment and then Teach) Coach:  Link:
• Writing Centres - tape, pencil sharpener, stapler, scissors, date stamps, paper choice, drafting paper, mentor texts, reference materials - don’t be the gate keeper!
• Writing Partnerships - may or may not be ability based, meeting on a regular basis, to read their work aloud, ask questions/advice of their partners, and to give feedback - this needs to be modelled, taught - watch them, make notes on what they aren’t doing so well in this part and turn it into a minilesson.  The longer you can keep these partnerships together, the better.  At least some span of time - you can change after several unit of studies.
• http://unitsofstudy.com  One way the year of writing could go - it is a RESOURCE - you could follow directly but you don’t have to.  You should make adjustments to fit in for what your students need.
• Units of Study - Grade 4/5  A version of how a year could unfold
  • Launching the Writing Workshop (routines etc)
  • Raising the Quality of Personal Narrative
  • Realistic Fiction
  • Personal Essay
  • Writing Fiction, HF, Fastasy or Mystery Making RW Connections
  • Literary Essays or Fournalism
  • Content Areas Writing, Writing to Convey Ideas and Information
  • Memoir - The Arto f Writing Well
  • Independent Reading Projects / Revision
• Essentials for the success of Writing Workshop:  Don’t wing it - planned ahead of time, waht do you want your students to practise, what do you want your students to create.  Covers the level stands or school benchmarks.  Lasts between 3-6 weeks (typically 4 weeks)  Strikes a blaance between teaching, assessing, teaching assessing
• Maggie did a little small moment mini-lesson - she wrote a story about snorkling with Diane, we then turned and talked about our ideas for our own small moments:
  • Turn and Talk - is the active engagement part (Link - so this is something, where any little story that happened to you and you’re trying to make it sound like it is happening all over again.
  • Dark rain clouds were building up in the sky.  I hope we are not going to be flying through that rain as we walked down the ramp into the waiting airplane.  I put all our luggage in the overhead locker and (I really struggled trying to write like it was happening, I kept wanting to write in the past tense!!)
  • Reverse pyschology - cut off the writing on a high note - don’t fall into the trap of letting writing going if it’s going well.  When something matters to you - when it’s meaningful it’s much more powerful - that’s why you don’t limit the choice.  The big goal is to just let’s all write!  This is not the final product - it’s a collection of entries - one of those will be revised.
  • Have struggling writers “underline” the words they don’t know how to spell.  Writers try their best, sound words out, make sure they are not blocked from writing.
• Maggie will email powerpoint
• Get your own notebook - have to be self-disciplined about it.  Start writing because you will learn what to teach when you go through it.  Make your publication dates public.

Ding Ding …… Round Course Two begins for CoETaIL.Asia

Enduring Understandings:

• Online behaviors and actions impact the access and safety of personal information.

• Responsible use of online tools can help protect the personal information of others.

Essential Question:

When and where should we be teaching students about their digital footprint?

This weeks readings were from Kim Komondo’s Your Online Reputation Can Hurt Your Job Search and Protect Your Digital Footprint from kutv.com

I was fortunate enough to have our afternoon presenter, Silvia Tolisano, stay with me after her presentation at ISB.  We discussed in depth one night the need to own your domain name and those of your children. Thankfully my name and those of my children are unusual enough to still be available domain names.  What I have realised I need to do is take charge of my blog name so that I can continue to control what happens with it.  I’d not really given any thought to what might happen if someone decided to “kick me off” my name.  All my thoughts and ideas would disappear over time as someone began to use my name legally.  Whilst I would like to believe that no-one would do that deliberately, I realise that not everyone  is as idealistic in web ethics as I am.

Google Alerts, RSS feeds of Google Search Terms, Technorati and Edublogs’ incoming links  have always kept me informed of how my digital footprint is impacting on others.  I believe it is necessary to keep an eye on how and when our names are being used on the internet for a variety of reasons.

Clarence Fisher also believes that tracking your digital footprint is an essential part of working online and these are essential basic skills for us and for our students as well. His Digital Footprint blog post is an informative read as he shares how he tracks his digital footprint and the reasons why he does it.

It is great to see what people are writing about you. It gives you a chance to respond to posts people write and also it keeps your finger on the pulse of any ongoing conversations.”

I listened to Ewan McIntosh, at an unconference session at Learning2.0 in Shanghai, about how he has already begun to protect and nurture his young daughter’s digital footprint before she is even old enough to walk let alone blog!  I remember thinking how that was just a little bit over-the-top but as my learning journey continues down the path of 21st Century Digital Literacy, it has become more obvious that looking after your digital footprint is the same as looking after any of your tools in your toolbox and it’s the same as looking after your own reputation.  YOU need to do it - no one else is going to.

Online safety and digital citizenship in the classroom when working with blogs, wikis and any other tools that leave a footprint of ourselves online is a message that we, as educators, have a responsibility/need to continually push at ANY level.  It’s no different to teaching encouraging students to respect themselves, or respect one another in any space they are in.

Only this time the space is the internet and this space keeps a record of all behaviour - the good, the bad and the ugly.

And anybody can look at it.  Anytime.  Anywhere.

Image Attribution:  TeachingSagittarian