Pete Hubbard

When I try to syndicate the tag "comment added" I get an "Feed subscription failed: feed appears to be invalid. Please check your link or try later." error msg..

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http://www.weblogg-ed.com/2006/03/08#a4800

When I saw this cartoon from Hugh MacLeod I had to laugh. This pretty sums up the feeling of the teachers in our Tablet PC pilot group, who are now in the process of refining the summer curriculum for the 175 or so additional staff who will be using them in their classrooms next fall. There are a couple of reasons why leaving this job is difficult, and the Tablet program is certainly one of them. I can't imagine what might happen here next fall when every classroom is outfitted with wireless Internet access, wireless access to a ceiling mounted projector, a full lineup of multimedia peripherals (DVD/CD player, speakers, microphones, etc.) and a well-prepared teacher with a Tablet PC. Could be very cool, and I'm sure I'll be stopping back for a look periodically.

I alluded yesterday to the fact that we'd had a group of visitors from a school in south Jersey, and they were pretty much in awe of what they saw. It's hard not to be. I even learned a trick or two yesterday in terms of using the projector effectively, which is not something we did a lot of training on. At one point, the Spanish teacher we were observing handed the Tablet to one of his students and asked her to fill in the names of objects he had highlighted on a PowerPoint slide. As he did so, he froze the screen so no one could see what she was writing until he was ready to show it. Not a big deal, I know, but still pretty interesting.

I've really become a proponent of the Tablet, and little birdies are telling me that all sorts of goodness is coming down the pike both in the software and hardware arenas. I can't imagine ever being without one at this point.

http://www.weblogg-ed.com/2006/03/07#a4796

For some reason, the mashup metaphor is popping up all over the place. First, Clarence Fisher, who references a CNN Money article about the Next Net 25, which describes the net as a place where

The new era is also creating a realm of endless mix and match: Anyone with a browser can access vast stores of information, mash it up, and serve it in new ways, to a few people or a few hundred million.

And I think Clarence gets it right when he writes

They have hit a few key ideas head on: "collective wisdom," "deeply collaborative," "rapidly tweaked." The article looks straight through the hype and the hyperbole to the centre of web 2.0; it's finally about us. It is about the information that we produce, want to use, and can play with. It is about remix culture and bringing us to new places.

As I prep my talk on vidcasting for MACUL this week, I've been struck by how many cool examples of mashup I've been finding, (here's one example) and how much I wish I had the time to create more of my own. The Web has become such a fertile ground for this, much more flexible and dynamic than the paper environments we've been constrained. It's a whole different type of content, which is where George Seimens is heading with his mashup reference.

We can now acquire our information in any manner that we desire. Learning, seen as content consumption, doesn't fit this model anymore. Learners piece together (connect) various content and conversation elements to create an integrated (though at time contradictory) network of issues and concerns. Our learning and information acquisition is a mashup. We take pieces, add pieces, dialogue, reframe, rethink, connect, and ultimately, we end up with some type of pattern (meme?) that symbolizes what's happening "out there" and what it means to us. And it changes daily. Instead of a CD with the songs of only one artist, we have iPods with a full range of music, video, audio files/books, images, etc. Our classrooms, instead of the pre-packaged views of an instructor or designers should include similar diverse elements.

I love that idea of just breaking out of the textbook mold and presenting teachers and students with all sorts of choices from which to cobble together a more relevant and interesting learning experience. (Remember "Teacher as DJ"?) And then having students perform their own mashups to add to the menu. But that is such a different way of approaching the classroom. (Ironically, I did get a taste of this today when observing one of the Tablet PC teachers who had taken old Civil War photos of dead soldiers and laid the "Gravedigger" track by Dave Matthews over it into a simple PowerPoint. It was a pretty powerful combination, and I could just tell from watching the kids that it made for a much more relevant experience. They actually applauded at the end! Now if only they were creating their own...)

Which leads to David Warlick's post about mashups today.

My son sits in his bedroom with a TV, VCR, DVD player, video game systems, a small video camera, a digital camera, a computer, and a Video iPod. Each product was initially designed to perform a specific task, allowing us to be entertained or to record images and sound. My son, however, spends his time mixing them together, drawing audio and video from his video games and from movies, and mixing them together with video and still images that he makes of himself and his friends to produce a different and entertaining new information product. Information, to him, is never finished. ItÂ’s just a raw material with which he can make something new. It is important, I believe, that we look at curriculum the same way, that it is a raw material, something that we can mix in different ways, and produce learning experiences that help our students to teach themselves.

It's fun for these kids, no doubt, who are connected and self-motivated and have the equipment. They're learning, and they don't even know it. They're writing, producing, organizing, planning, editing, listening, dreaming, presenting and more. It's good stuff.

But I wonder how much further down the road they'll be able to run than the kids who aren't getting the chance to create and connect their own content either because they can't afford it or their schools can't see it. When I think about this, I see amazing potential. But I also see a lot of kids getting left further and further behind. For too many, learning is still pre-packaged, and it will remain so for quite some time unless some major changes occur. The same holds true for educators who are unwilling to imagine what could be, much like the Oscar voters who couldn't bring themselves to see Brokeback Mountain because of the "unsettling" content (at least for them.)

I agree with George.

As educators, we are not grasping (or prepared for) the depth of the change that is occurring under our feet. If it's happened (breaking apart the center) in every other industry - movies, music, software, business - what makes us think that our educational structures are immune? And what does it mean to us? What should we be doing now to prepare our institutions? Ourselves? Our learners?

We should all be thinking about that.

http://www.weblogg-ed.com/2006/03/07#a4791

It's great to see another edublog award out there, and my heartfelt congratulations to the winners of the eSchool News entry: Tim Stahmer, Wes Freyer, Andrew Rotherham and Frank LaBanca. Should I be chagrined that I only have two of the four in my aggregator?

Here's the problem. As a sometime contributor to the eSchool News blog, I probably shouldn't dis the sponsors, but, as usual, I can't help myself. Look at the way the article defines and describes blog uses in education:

Basically a web journal, a blog allows any user to post his or her thoughts, links to favorite sites, and—in many cases—audio and visual media. At its heart, a blog is a personal diary for the internet age.

The advent of blogging represents an unparalleled opportunity for educators. The typical educator has minimal contact with his or her peers once the bell rings. In what often can be an isolated profession, blogs can break down barriers of time and space, encourage collaboration, and enhance professional growth and development. They also can be used in the classroom to help students develop writing
skills or allow them to post video, audio, or other multimedia.

Oy.

Talk about missing the ed blogging boat. "A personal diary for the Internet Age"? Nothing about learning. Nothing about connections. Nothing about c-o-n-v-e-r-s-a-t-i-o-n.

If we're going to give ed blog awards, which I don't think is a bad idea, we ought to do a better job of articulating the qualities for best practices.

http://www.weblogg-ed.com/2006/03/06#a4790

I was seriously shocked this evening when I read that Stephen Downes had decided to dim the lights on his blog for an indefinite time. It was pretty clear that he has been struggling with his own reinvention for some time now. Needless to say, he has been one of my most respected teachers over the last few years, and I will definitely miss his daily contribution to the conversation.

If you aren't familiar with Stephen's work, one of his last posts today will give you a sense of what we'll all be missing:

So here we have another case of 'simply not getting it'. In a nutshell, it's this: "In effect, John Clare has set our members a challenge which, expressed crudely, is: put up or shut up! Show us evidence of transformed teaching and learning -- not anecdotal stuff, but measurable gains and, I would add, examples which are both scaleable and replicable, and which stand the test of time (ie short-term gains are sustained in the long-term)." Sheesh. Why should we respond to a challenge on these terms? Why should we let someone like John Clare set the agenda, set the terms of success? If he wants "measurable gain" he should go out there and produce them himself, not sit there and carp at us for not doing it. While he's at it, why doesn't he calculate the "measurable gain" from friendship, loyalty and trust? What blogging brings for us - and for our readers and students - is all of this, and more, and measuring it is as ridiculous as counting the number of friends you have. Having a personal, self-defined identity and being able to express one's thoughts and feelings might not alter a math test score one iota, but honestly, who cares? Education isn't about improving test results, education is about helping people enjoy richer and happier lives (not 'more productive' lives - that's a measure of value we should discard as empty and worthless). Here's my answer to John Clare (and, incidentally, what I would and do say to students and teachers): if blogging works for you, then do it. If it doesn't, then don't do it, and leave the rest of us alone.

Stephen's frustration is palpable, as is his passion. I hope he finds the answers he's needing in his time offline.