Nexus

Skimming my Twitter messages yesterday, I came across a request from Dr. Alec Couros from the University of Regina to help him respond to a writer who took issue with his use of the phrase “authentic learning” in an article, Safety and Social Networking, that he had written for TechLEARNING. The writer in question characterized the term “authentic” as meaningless edspeak.

While I couldn’t take the time yesterday to respond, many others did and are quoted in Alec’s post, Authentic Learning Environments. The comment by Rob Wall hit home with me.

First - “authentic” means genuine as opposed to artificial, contrived or imitative. In traditional schooling, many experiences are contrived. We tell students to write for their audience, yet the audience for whom they are writing is just the teacher or perhaps their class. An authentic audience is an audience beyond the teacher, class or even the school. It is a heterogeneous audience as one would write for if one wrote in a newspaper or magazine article. It is an audience that chooses to read what is being written instead of a group that is chosen by the writer or a teacher.

There’s little to argue with in Rob’s comment and most language teachers can see snapshots of their classrooms when reading it. But gosh, it’s hard! How do you move beyond the artificial when a contrived system dictates that:

• you will have 27 twelve year olds with no choice but to sit in front of you;
• during a time frame that an artificial schedule has determined to be “language” time;
• ready to learn about “planning for writing” because a prescribed curriculum mandates it?

What’s a teacher to do? Carefully craft a lesson centered around a topic that will hook the interest of as many of those twelve year olds as possible, ripe with examples from literature and shared writing, logically broken into meaningful steps, rich with opportunities for students to practice and apply what they have learned, all coherently and masterfully logged in day and unit plans. Does learning take place in this scenario? Certainly some. After all we have test scores that verify this fact, don’t we?

What can a teacher do to break out of this artificial mould, to move towards more authentic learning opportunities? I think the first step is to realize that authentic learning is often not scripted nor planned for. The teacher needs to open up the classroom and see who and what will enter “naturally”. A good first step is blogging. Here’s an example in one of my project sites, Ontario Blogs, where blogging has opened a classroom to authentic learning.

The teacher has asked students to share responses to the books they are reading on the Ontario Blogs site. There are many classes from across the province using the site, so there is the potential for a wide audience for these young writers. Student “Bam” shared her response to “OK to Be Me”, a short story written by Monica Marie Jones and published in “Chicken Soup for the Girl’s Soul”. The author of the story came upon Bam’s post and contacted me to ask for a login to the project site so she could respond to the student. A meaningful dialogue is shaping up here and a learning network has been started involving students and author. Please read the exchanges yourself, but if time is lacking, I’ve picked out some highpoints:

Jones

My name is Monica Marie Jones and I am the author of the short story, “Okay to be Me” from Chicken Soup for the Girls Soul. That story is an excerpt from my novel, “The Ups and Downs of Being Round.” I was so glad to see that you wrote a blog about my story. Reading it really made my day.

Bam

I am the writer of this blog and I was so exicited to have you respond to my blog!

… I was wondering if my class could blog back and forth to you?

Jones

I would love to blog back and forth with your class.

Bam

Wow, wait until Tuesday when my class finds out about this!

…When you begin a book or are brainstorming for a book do you go right to typing or do you draft up a mind map first? Do you have a little “inspriation book” for when you think of story ideas when you are on the go?

Bam’s teacher

WOW!!! I am very excited the you are interested in blogging back and forth with my class Ms. Jones! When I first showed your response to BAM they were thrilled and applauded her. It has definitely been motivating for all of the students to hear comments from an author.

Bam’s classmate

That is very cool that mjones responed on our blog site
that means any author can get an account and repond on anything on here that is really cool

Jones

When I write a book, it begins as an idea in my head. From there I start by writing short stories or situations that I see happening within the book. I guess this is kind of like my way of doing an outline. I write everything that I want in the book, then I go back in and fill in all of the gaps and the details.

Hmmm… now let’s compare this experience with the lesson I mentioned earlier, the well-crafted one about “planning for writing”. Which experience is more authentic? Which has more impact? Authentic learning - meaningless edspeak?

Technorati tags: authentic learning, blogging, Alec Couros, Rob Wall, Monica M. Jones

It’s been more than a month since I’ve posted to this blog. Although it has sat here, looking for all intents and purposes abandoned, unwanted, and forgotten, that couldn’t be further from the truth. All this time it has been beckoning to me, calling me “home” to take time for reflection. This fall has been such a whirlwind of activity, it seems like there’s barely been time for breathing, let alone reflecting! So…what’s been keeping me gasping for breath?

Our International Space Station Project seems to have taken on a life of its own, consuming every waking moment I have. Although I’ve had no time to record my reflections, I have learned lots.

• We have visited dozens of classes in Ontario and Alberta, and even one in New Hampshire. These classes have been in such diverse settings - urban, very rural, inner city, upper middle class and everything in between. Although we notice differences in the background knowledge of the various classes, there is virtually no difference in the fascination the students have with space exploration. When we tell students that they are the generation that will be going to the Moon and then on to Mars, you can see magic in their eyes - dreams being born and goals set!
• We have 930 students to date who have been active online. You could call them the web 2.0 group. They are consumers of information but also creators, leaving a lasting legacy of their thinking and learning.
• We have that many more students who are following the blogs and completing investigations in their classrooms, but are not yet active online. This is the web 1.0 group. We have visited quite a few of these classrooms. There’s exciting learning taking place in the classroom, but the teachers haven’t yet taken the leap to have their students collaborate with others beyond their physical walls. They seem content to nurture information consumers. We’ll keep nudging these teachers, bit by bit, beyond the edges of their comfort zones.
• We still have work to do in helping students develop the skills to become reflective writers. Students are using their blogs to ask questions of our astronauts and scientists, and we have had many thoughtful questions. However, we need to keep pushing students to read what others are writing, add their own comments and share their insights.
• Our video conferencing using FlashMeeting is working out very well. Here’s the archive of our recorded sessions. We had of course expected that the webcasts with an astronaut would be very popular. We have been pleasantly surprised at how effective it has been to bring other scientists into classrooms to work with students. We will be doing much more of that as the project continues.
• Last but not least, we can’t underestimate the impact of meeting face to face with our online participants! Schools often feel unsupported in the work they are doing and are extremely appreciative of any outside support they can get. That probably explains the reception we got. We were so warmly and enthusiastically received in all of the schools, it was almost overwhelming. Administration and other staff seemed to appreciate our visits as much as the project participants! For one teacher’s reaction, see Rick Biche’s post, The Power of Connections. It was a good chance for us to see our teachers and classes “where they live”, getting a first-hand look at school organization, priorities, teaching approaches, and access to technology. This has helped us plan meaningful next steps. (Note: for anyone reading this who might be unfamiliar with the organization I work with, YES I Can! Science, there is no cost to schools for participation in our projects. That includes school visits.)

The school visits are over for the moment and we’re glad to be spending less time on the road. Now…on to next steps, and yes, maybe even some time to sort through my thoughts here! For more information about the International Space Station project or to involve your own students visit the project site: iss07.yesican-science.ca.

Technorati Tags: education, YES I Can! Science, International Space Station Project, online collaborative projects, video-conferencing, FlashMeeting, blogging

Whew! Didn’t think I’d ever “see the light of day” again, but after a marathon work session, my latest project, Ontario Blogs is now ready to receive bloggers!

www.ontarioblogs.com

Supported through legacy funding from the former Education Network of Ontario, Ontario Blogs provides teachers and students in Ontario, Canada with a vehicle for reading, writing, discussing, debating, sharing, exploring, collaborating, connecting, creating, reflecting, learning…province-wide.

The project consists of a series of connected blog sites:

• Elementary @ Ontario Blogs
• Secondary @ Ontario Blogs
• ESL/FSL @ Ontario Blogs
• Professional Development @ Ontario Blogs
• Ontario Blogs @ UOIT

The first three sites in the list above are self-explanatory; they are intended for elementary, secondary and English/French as a Second Language classes.

The Professional Development blog site is for consultants, coordinators, workshop leaders and interested groups of teachers to use in support of professional development activities. Registered participants are invited to:

• post their “workshop” agendas on the blog and get feedback from teachers in advance of the face-to-face PD sessions
• poll PD session participants to gather information in advance of the sessions
• post session notes
• continue the discussion long after the face-to-face sessions have ended.

The University of Ontario Institute of Technology (UOIT) blog site is intended for the use of pre-service teachers to share reflections of their learning experiences.

All teachers who register for any of the Ontario Blogs projects will also be given a login for the Ontario Blogs “Home” blog. There are no student logins on this site. It is intended for teacher conversations: lesson ideas, writing prompts, inter-class collaborations, literacy, communication across the curriculum, web 2.0 applications etc. etc. Teachers are encouraged to consider this blog as their provincial staffroom - grab a coffee, pull up a chair and dive into the conversation!

There are some key features of the project that are worth sharing.

• Ontario Blogs is both a protected and public space. It is protected in that only registered users may post or comment, and all posts and comments must be approved by a teacher. It is public in that it is read-only by anyone on the web, and all posts are profiled on the main page of the blog.
• The blogs are single owner, multi-author Wordpress installations that have been modified for our use. The major programming change has been to tie user logins to categories. When a teacher registers for the project, he/she is assigned two default categories, one for teacher posts and one for student posts. Teachers are free to create as many more categories as they wish, but their students’ posts will always default to their class category first and then to the additional category that is chosen. As this version of Wordpress was not intended to be multi-user, the categories provide the tool teachers need to manage their students’ posts and comments. When teachers login, they manage just their own categories, approving drafts and moderating comments.
• So why not just use WordPress MU, the multi-user version? While this version is great for creating separate and distinct class blogs, it doesn’t promote inter-class collaboration. To me it feels more like keeping the classroom door closed. Each Ontario Blogs site is a single blog with many classes posting to the main page as well as to their own class categories. This feature gives students an audience beyond their own classroom and gives teachers a chance to see what other teachers and classes are doing. In past years we have had many students commenting all throughout the different class categories. For example we had a class of very weak grade eight writers connect with a class of very strong grade six readers. It was amazing to see the conversations emerge between the two classes as interests, likes, dislikes, and books were shared and discussed! These were discussions that emerged naturally and were not orchestrated or assigned by teachers. I don’t think either class was aware of the grade level of the other; it didn’t matter. What mattered were the shared interests and the thrill of learning about each other.

So…the blogs are ready…the teachers are registering…let the conversation begin! If you have a spare moment, drop by and watch the progress.

Technorati tags: Ontario Blogs, classroom blogging, edublogs, student bloggers, student projects, Wordpress