Category: Education (Page 1 of 3)

Ben Werdmuller, who is brilliant, has a great write up, Running your own site painful. Hosting Nazis is worse. Seriously, this is a GREAT article. Please go read it (and then come back here).

He makes important points about social media, where your stuff is hosted, options for discoverability and more. He focuses on writers, but so much is equivalent to educators.

I’d say his wonderful article is relevant in two ways for educators:

1. Parent/Community Communication
2. Educational Resources.

Parent/Community Communication

Parent/Community communication is a challenge in education. All schools have a website and post to the website. However, people don’t generally know when or if to check the website. As social media took off, schools transitioned to posting on social media, mostly Twitter (now called X) and Facebook. Schools also posted to Instagram. Lots of schools also send out emails and texts.

As Ben Werdmuller points out, schools don’t have control over Twitter (X), or Instagram. So, while schools benefit from the audience of those social media sites, schools are also at the mercy of their decisions and plans. So, if a platform were to allow Nazis to post (and promote those posts) the school may be appearing to support those kinds of activities. However, this gets complicated as lots of parents/community members may use the site and maybe they do not see the Nazi posts. or maybe the site gets sold and goes out of business. Now schools have to redirect parent/community members to a new site(s).

A website based upon a domain that you own means that you have control over that. By owning a domain, schools have control over who gets to post and what things look like. However, that means that schools have to develop and promote the site.

Parents/Community members usually find other social sites “easier to use”. They really don’t have to do much. This is a big strength, and a big weakness. They may or may not see specific things. Facebook has gone through many periods where they were/are tightly controlling what people see, what gets promoted (thus seen).

Ideally, parents/community members would set up their own RSS feeds to follow. However, realistically, they aren’t going to do this. (Even though RSS is actually very easy to use. I personally use NetNewsWire). It is a mindset that needs to be developed.

So, schools post to websites, X, Facebook, and Instagram. They may be re-evaluating that as sites change, though given the amount of issues that have come up with Facebook and haven’t resulted in people moving away says that it would take a lot for people to actually move to another platform.

Educational Resources

I see similar issues with Educational Resources. Quizlet is a pretty popular flashcard creator. Recently, I’ve heard that they refuse to sign a DPA (Data Privacy Agreement). Thus, some schools are moving away from allowing access to the site. Some teachers are upset. They have spent years creating resources.

This is really part of a common issue though. Most educational resources need to collect money in order to continue to provide services. Thus, educational resources are constantly adjusting things to make sure that they can stay in business.

Long ago, I was talking to someone and used the phrase “you are always investing in someone – either yourself or someone else”. (I know this because that person repeated it back to me in a future meeting.) Lots of educators have bought into (via their time, and work) an educational resource or ten.

Schools also purchased a variety of resources through the ESSR funds (COVID relief). That money has come to an end. School budgets will be getting tight again. There is the possibility that schools won’t be able to fund all of the educational resources that they have over the last few years.

The alternative though is open-source. Open-source has the advantage of being controlled by the district. It is not free, there are some costs involved in hosting, configuring, and updating. However, it is much, much more affordable. Open-source software tends to not be as pretty as commercial resources. Plus, open-source software tends to be more powerful, but less focused. So, there is some learning involved by the teacher (you are always investing in someone – either yourself or someone else“). If educators would come together and create and share things, the effect could be extremely powerful.

So, what are some examples?

• H5P
• Moodle

Both of these are open-source and powerful. H5P allows users to create Flashcards and much more. Both have platforms available to share work. Even more powerful for me is that both can allow students to create resources.

So, what’s going to happen is that some educators will switch from one commercial product to another. Teachers may be upset and frustrated that they have lost a bunch of work. They will then switch to another commercial product. That will work for a while until a business model changes, free accounts become too limited to be useful, or something else. They will get frustrated. They will move to the next product.

What a powerful world it would be if the students were doing the creating. What a powerful world it would be if educators took control of educational resources. What a powerful world it would be if educators were sharing, and adapting resources.

The New York Times recently posted an article (apparently a subscription is now required) about online grades and “Snow Plow Parents”.

What is a “Snow Plow” parent? According to Parent:

…a snowplow parent removes any obstacles in their child’s way. This type of parent does not want their child to experience any discomfort or problems, so the parent intervenes and fixes it for their child.

I remember “Helicopter Parents”, those parents who hover over their children. I remember that when my own kids went off to college, there were a few parents who actually moved to the college town that their kid was attending.

Snow Plow and Helicopter parents are related. Both take on way too much of their child’s life.

I found the article interesting and insightful. There is a definite bias early on in the article about the “dangers” of online grades being available for parents, which is balanced out later in the article. (Thus, it is important to read the whole article.)

Really, the article ends up focusing on the importance of students developing agency and responsibility. Oh, and how some parents are taking that away from kids.

Part of the advice is about making sure that parent’s connection with kids goes beyond grades:

…parents shouldn’t want conversations about grades “bleeding into every conversation you have with your kids. That does a disservice to your relationship, and it does a disservice to your child.”

A big focus of the article is about kids developing executive functioning.

“Part of executive functioning and personal management is understanding what’s the right time and place to have a conversation versus not. And so students do need to develop that,” she said.

The article even addresses a couple of interesting issues:

At its heart, the issue is that too many parents see their children’s grades as the ultimate reflection on themselves and their parenting.

and

There were kids, he said, who were “incredibly skilled at gaming the system” — grade grubbing rather than achieving anything intellectually.

In the end, the author admits that it’s not all negative.

… not every teacher I spoke to had a negative experience with online grade books. Some said that the technology made their lives easier and improved communication with some parents. Even the teachers who pointed out the unseemly behavior of some parents and students stressed that it wasn’t a majority who abused the system.

I find this an interesting time to be a parent (just like all the other ones in history). Parents today deal with social media, connectedness, information overload, pressure to be successful, and on and on.

I don’t think any of this is really new, but it is new for each parent. Also, the number of parents who are truly “Snow Plow” is pretty minimal (still makes it rough for those particular kids).

So, what about online gradebooks? These can be beneficial. However, it is also important to establish how grades work in the classroom early on in the year (or now). Set out expectations of when work will be graded. Communicate how grades are calculated. Take advantage of the power of the gradebook. I have found online gradebooks to have much more good than negative. The article even points this out. Remember, no matter what system that you use, you could have a lot of these same issues. Many of these are “people” issues, not technology issues.

If you are a parent of a child under 18, do your best. Help them grow. They’ll make mistakes. They’re human. Don’t be a Snow Plow.

Background

I’ve long been using Technology in education. I was an early adopter. I clearly remember having one of the first WiFi access points in our district (an Apple “UFO”). I integrated Technology into my classes early on. The students were highly motivated, novelty of technology was high. At the time, I was teaching in a lock-up facility for teenagers. The students had lots of challenges. It was a great place to learn to teach.

I learned how to create worksheets that were easy to change, modify, and adapt. I learned to create quizzes that were different for different students. I had a wide range of student abilities in my classes.

I learned how to differentiate not only the quizzes but the instruction as well. I became a Constructivist. I learned to adjust the pathways so that the students could reach the same standards, but using different materials.

I worked with a variety of teachers who did similar work. Sometimes it looked very different, but many (most?), started including technology into their skill set. It was early on, but there was hope that most teachers would add some technology tools to their skill set.

Administration

I moved into school administration. I took some of my tech skills with me. I leveraged some of those skills to work with others.

For example, I can’t tell you how frustrated I was with calendars for example. We would get updates on calendars about weekly. Let me be clear here, we would get an updated paper calendar through interschool mail weekly. At the time, I kept my calendar on a PalmPilot. (side note, that was a great device, only really replaced by the iPhone – eventually, not the first edition). So every week I had to sit down and do a full review of my calendar. Did this event change? Nope. How about this one? Oh, look, one has been added. I begged the Administrative Assistant responsible for the district calendar to Please use a shared calendar.

I worked with several teachers to implement some laptop programs. We started a laptop program for our sixth graders. We brought in lots of computers for students and staff to use.

I started an after-school program to teach computer skills, with a technology integration focus. These were pretty well attended.

We shared differentiation strategies, actual classroom use, and more at Staff Meetings.

I moved from school administration into district administration as a Technology Director.

Technology Director

I spent about a decade as a Technology Director. I worked to bring in technology use throughout the district. I created a Technology Coach position (with two Technology Coaches) for the district. Together (with more Tech Team members), we focused on how to use technology for student success.

We had bits of success here and there but failed to institutionalize the growth. There were always lots of roadblocks. Lots of misunderstandings.

We did get a program where every teacher was at least expected to create a blog. No, this is not the greatest instructional use of technology, but it did help some teachers move to develop some tech skills. Even more importantly, it increased communication with our parents and community.

iPad Story

I clearly remember having lots of discussions about iPads. When the iPad was first introduced, it was, at least partially, targeted at schools. Several people were pushing how iPads were going to revolutionize education. There was a school in Ireland that went all iPads. Fraser Speirs was widely lauded for his work. Lots of media pushed the possibilities of the iPad. Los Angeles famously signed a billion-dollar iPad program (which promptly crashed and burned).

I was always of the belief that the iPad would never be a really successful product in education UNLESS there was a massive amount of professional development. I’m talking about the kind of professional development that we’ve never done.

Fraser Speirs ran the iPad program for almost a decade. In 2019, Fraser Speirs switched his one-to-one program to Chromebooks.

And, finally, the ultimate switch: moving the world’s first 1:1 iPad school away from iOS to Chromebook. Writing here in 2020 under Coronavirus lockdown, I can honestly say this was the most prescient thing I have ever done.

There was a time where Fraser Speirs argued that the iPad was a content creation device.

This is not meant to be critical of Fraser Speirs. There were several things that just didn’t catch on (like iTunes U), or never really were supported very well.

COVID

COVID hit and everyone went full-on technology. Zoom was purchased by tons of school districts. Learning Management Systems (LMS), or those that pretended to be an LMS – Google Classroom, were brought into schools. Teachers were NOT prepared for this. I posted about this early on, Learning Is Messy. Teachers did an incredible job of adjusting. Naturally, learning looked very different based on the teacher. Generally, though, COVID did not bring great technology implementation. COVID brought some use of technology.

Now that COVID is “over” (it’s not over, but we are acting like it), there is a huge backlash to technology. One of the most popular things I’m hearing is all about how we need to “limit screen time”. (This is actually nothing new. There was pushback about screen time prior to COVID shutting schools down.)

The optimistic side is pushing that teachers will “use the new skills that they developed during COVID”. I’m afraid that I’m not really seeing that. First of all, COVID was a different structure for education. Secondly, I’m not sure that educators were supported much in really using technology.

Technology Understanding

Michigan had a Teachers Technology Initiative (the TTI program) right about 2000. (It’s tough to find information about the program, so I’m going to mostly rely on my memory.) Here is a bit of a write-up from MacWorld:

The Teacher Technology Initiative (TTI) is a voluntary program designed to support teaching and learning in Michigan’s public schools and public school academies through a one-time investment in Michigan’s K-12 teachers. You can learn more at the TTI Web site. The initiative is managed by the Michigan Virtual University, a private, not-for-profit Michigan corporation established in 1998 “to meet the specific workforce development education and training needs of Michigan businesses and industries and their current and prospective employees through the innovative use of electronic learning technologies.”

The idea was to prime every teacher to develop technology skills by providing them with a computer (either a Mac or a Dell). So, lots of computers were purchased and handed out.

Maine has had the Maine Learning Technology Initiative (MLTI) since right about the same time. Maine has a different focus and has continued.

Teachers now use technology every day. Email is the prevalent communication platform. Many (most?) teachers use a computer every day. Grades are probably entered electronically. Maybe they post assignments on a blog (or Facebook or Instagram).

Yet, for many teachers, there hasn’t been a fundamental change. Sure, the worksheet is now typed up on a computer and printed on the copier. Or maybe the worksheet is shared electronically. But, it’s still a worksheet. (*Note: there is nothing wrong with worksheets. However, if that is the only form of assessment, or the educator isn’t clear about why a worksheet is used, well….).

Writing Across the Curriculum

Recently, I was reading Curmudgucation about Writing Across the Curriculum . Part of the point of the article was that not all teachers were prepared and trained to be writing teachers. And that got me thinking.

I think that technology is much like writing. Teachers still don’t have the requisite training, background, and knowledge to fully implement technology in their classrooms. We don’t really have universally implemented models of education with technology. (Yes, I’m aware of the work with Blended Learning Models. I believe in lots of them and am critical/hesitant/thoughtful about some of them. Blended Learning has been around for quite a while.)

EdTech

EdTech has long been a popular(???) topic in some circles. Different technology tools were going to completely revolutionize education. These tools were going to make teachers obsolete in some cases. Frequently, these were based on Adaptive Learning methods. This is where the software would adjust which lessons/material would be presented next based on what the student was doing or answered on a quiz.

Heck, even Khan Academy was going to take over at one point.

Now comes news that may EdTech is seeing a bit of withdrawal: EdTech is No Longer a Funding Fave.

Future

So, what is the future? Will we start to really investigate how we can make school reflective of student choice? Will we create opportunities for students to differentiate how they learn or prove that they have learned something? Will we help develop teachers to be the best that they can be?