Talkin' 'bout my cerebration.

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• elearnspace › Age of External Knowledge

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

I am once again in a cycle where reading time is dramatically reduced.  I’ve not opened my current book at all this week.  Thanks to my lovely wife allowing me a lazy Saturday morning (by allowing I mean she has looked after everything), I’ve had some time to catch up on my blog reading and important tweeters.  Two posts in particular caught my attention for various reasons.

1. Chris Betcher – Five Simple Skills
   In this succinct post, Chris identifies five core skills he believes teachers should possess in order to enable their engagement with 21st century learning.  Now while I don’t necessarily agree with his list, its a great starting point for any teacher wanting to enhance their own skills and knowledge, or a leader designing training to enhance the skills and knowledge of their staff.  So I applaud him for drilling down to identify a definite number of simple skills that can lead to further skill development and increased ability.

   In my opinion, effective searching is the most important skill.  Chris has this at the top of his list but he does not necessarily state they are in order of priority.  Once teachers and students can search effectively (and beyond Google) their access to relevant and valid knowledge is increased significantly.  Knowing how to use web services such as all the options within Google search, certainly makes life easier and a person more effective.  I also like to teach my students (and teachers) to search through dedicated repositories as a launchpad to locating reliable and valid information – particularly for research.  The first three places I send them are my delicious account, wikipedia and slideshare.  Important to note I set these up as launchpads to research – the sites themselves are not citable evidence.

   Editing of photos, pictures and video is also essential.  Understanding the need to manipulate quality and sizes of files for various uses should go hand in hand with this.

   Personally I would add 2 more skills to the list; using RSS and backing up.  I’ve lost count of the times a student or colleague has lost files due to a damaged USB drive or some other occurrence.  A backup solution certainly reduces the stress and pain involved with this.  The backup options these days are many and varied.  RSS is such an effective way to gather information in a time efficient manner, especially when you know a source will continue to produce quality information.

   Thanks to Chris for this post, it has provided me new direction to help develop my teachers for the Transformative Learning Project I am managing this year.

2. Dean Groom – Class vs. Metaverse pedagogy
   Dean has certainly a strong opinion about the (un)balance between educational policy and 21st century learning.  This post will hold items that many teachers can relate to yet still provide us food for thought and motivation.  I particularly like his identification of “motivation-centred” learning instead of “student-centred” learning.  An interesting concept that could do with some exploration and reflection on my part.

This year I have committed to being transparent and open in my management of my department.  One significant change has been the inclusion of staff opinion and feedback in budget planning.  Now this is not ground breaking leadership practice, but it is not something I have practiced in my 12 years of budget management so is a considerable change for me.

At the beginning of the year I distributed a memo to all staff outlining an intended budget distribution (after consultation with staff on what they wanted.)  A copy of the distribution graph is linked below.  For your viewing I have changed the absolute values to percentages as I am unsure whether sharing of my allocated budget is in line with policy or not, so its best to be safe.

https://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0B7GAksV-G0MBZjRiZThlMmQtNTJlYy00NDM1LWEyZDktZWZiMTZjMTY0NDU1&hl=en

Some considerations I had when designing this distribution were;

1. Transformational Learning Project (4%) – despite my focus on this project for 2010, I needed to be equitable across all staff.  I am responsible for 19 staff this year, only 2 are working in the project.  Therefore it was important that the allocation to the project was appropriately sized.
2. Teacher Innovation Grants (24%) – this was a planned way to offset any dissatisfaction with funding to the transformational learning project.  However it has evolved into something much more powerful and at this stage will be an initiative I continue.  Each staff member is allocated a set, common amount of funding with which they can buy whatever they desire.  The only requirement is the purchase is used to enhance learning.  I committed to not questioning their purchase, instead allowing an open book.  This in itself was important as they no doubt think differently to me.  There have been a range of purchases so far including iPod nanos, mini projectors, pedomoters and swimming goggles.  What has really excited me about this is the serious consideration staff are giving to their expenditure.  They are not rushing me with their first idea, but engaging in conversation with each other regarding the suitability of their ideas.  For me, the investment of 24% of our budget is money well spent.  The returns will be so much more.
3. Staff Comfort (6%) – this allows certain spending to ensure staff are comfortable and can enjoy their time at work.  It includes materials to help them get their work done (eg. markers, pens) and hopefully discourage the spending of their own money on supplies for their job.

A regular report on spending will be produced and shared allowing staff to see / track expenditure across the department.  If a certain allocation is overspent, then I have committed to asking for staff opinion on the manipulation of allocations to cover for this.

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As is to be expected, my return to work this week has resulted in a slow down of reading.  I need to get into the habit again of reading in parts, grabbing some precious minutes here and there where I can.

So what was significant in my reading this week?

1. I’m still working my way through “First Things First” by Covey, Merrill and Merrill.  This week I found that one half page caused me to pause and reflect quite heavily.  The relevant section appears in the chapter “First Things First Together” and outlines five elements any group of people working together to achieve an objective must address.  This relates directly to my work as a Head of Department, and particularly holds relevance for the Transformational Learning project staff.  The five elements are; shared knowledge of desired results, guidelines, resources, accountability and consequences.  A quite simple framework to pose as questions when reviewing progress or even in a planning meeting.
2. A great post by Deb Jones – Instructional Design in a Virtual World.  In this post Deb posed thoughts on a framework for transitioning physical learning environments to virtual learning environments.  She references some design planning considerations from Karl Kapp, which upon reflection should be forefront considerations in any planning of learning.  I will be reflecting upon these in the design of the virtual components of my learning environments this year.
3. A succint yet inspiring slideshow from Wesley Fryer – Things I want to model as your teacher.  Quite simply outstanding.  I will do something similar for my classes, which I meet Thursday so I’d better get working.

• Adobe – Video Production Resource Center

• CoSketch.com – Online Whiteboard Collaboration

• Placefy – fun geography game, twitter game, travel game.

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• TodaysMeet

• Chatzy – Create Virtual Room

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• Tran|script, by Mike Caulfield » Blog Archive » Learning Styles and Manuals

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

As I sit down to my Google Reader over breakfast this morning, I am exposed to a number of posts and links by others to videos aiming to be inspirational to educational change.  As I sift through them, a thought hits me.  We as a professional group are constantly fighting the public image that we are ineffective or non-responsive to change.  And yet, when educators produce videos, or have their students produce videos, that is exactly the message we are sending.  As I realise this I also realise how deep this goes.  There are an inordinate amount of videos that promote the teaching profession as lazy, uncaring, stuck in the dark ages and all that.  Now I am not suggesting all teachers are great, but surely we are not this bad.  For example, consider how teachers are represented in the following;

Online Student Experience

When I become a teacher.

Do you believe?

Mr Winkle Wakes

A vision of students today.

And there are many more, I bet you are thinking of some now.

Some of these I have used before, thinking I am motivating people to change.  Have I instead contributed to the belief that we as a profession are so ineffective?  Perhaps I have.  So instead of using videos that show us how bad we are, we should be finding alternatives to inspire and inform our colleagues.

Tomorrow heralds the official return to school for me (we traded our Monday for tomorrow – result is 4 day weekend). Conversations with my PLN following my last post have me clearly focussed to achieve two goals tomorrow, and only two. First is the need to inform my staff of the reflection I have undergone and that the result is my two objectives for leadership and management in 2010. Presence and accountability. Presence is something I can begin to show them straight away by outlining the roles I have withdrawn from (yes, I actually said no – a number of times). I intend to also offer my presence as a contribution to their classes. If they plan a lesson that would use a second teacher, then I can ensure a second teacher is there.

Accountability is something I cannot demonstrate to them today. It can only be demonstrated over time. I’ll acknowledge this to them and state my intentions of dedicating a year to department leadership and management as my primary role. I need some sort of system to allow a check on this, but have not thought of a suitable method as yet.

My second goal for the day, and in my mind most important goal, is to set my workspace up to enable efficiency. We have had the advantage of our staffroom being painted over the holidays which means they are empty. A clean slate to work with you might say. I will spend time playing with different office configurations to enable my peace of mind and efficiency. (Side thought- I think I need an office plant). I like an open space on my desk. I like the two computers accessible. I like to have my iPod docked. I want to reduce my paper use, with a goal of getting to two filing drawers by the end of term 1 (from 7 at the end of 2009).

Following this I will need to visualize my workflow, and evaluate that for efficiency. With the support of you all, I am ready to start my journey.

Well, I’ve completed my working year for 2009 and I have to admit the final stages have left me in a not necessarily happy place.  During the last term I have not felt completely comfortable in my roles or completely satisfied with my work life.  A few of my more perceptive colleagues have picked up on this and attempted to engage me in conversation to discuss the reasons for my “uncertainty.”  Since the school year completed for me (about 5 weeks ago) I have been sparodically reflecting and thinking about why I feel this way.  My reflections lead me to believe there are a number of reasons, and I need to sort it out before the start of the 2010 working year or I fear I may lose my ability to provide a quality service.

First and foremost I think I have developed a confusion of roles, and ultimately this has resulted in me not being sure of where I want to be professionally.  I am employed as a Head of Department (called Head of Faculty or Subject Master in other organisations) which has a half teaching load.  I think that I need to constantly remind myself that this is my primary role, its what I was employed for.  Anything else that I want to do is an extra.  And this is where I believe I have confused myself this year as I have pursued other options and opportunities, at times neglecting my staff and primary role.  This pursuit of other opportunities is (I believe) a result of an extreme desire to contribute to the progression of my profession.  I see and think through a range of possibilities and processes for refinement of practice and greater collaboration and efficiency of work.  This ranges from basic skills training on technology (eg. How tos and tutorials) through to 5 year visioning of staff development programs for my place of work.  I’m not sure why these are bouncing around in my head, but it quite often results in me feeling like my head is going to split due to so many unshared ideas and thoughts.  I have an intense desire to learn more, and to share that knowledge with whoever will attend to it.  Self confidence in my ability to contribute is a direct result of my colleagues and PLN displaying faith in my contributions.  This has reinforced my desire to share and contribute where possible, and I am eternally grateful for their faith and support.  It is the PLN that kept me powering on through 2009.

A result of this desire to learn and share I have been offered opportunities to contribute to a range of initiatives.  Some of these are within my school whilst others are external.  I have agreed to contribute to the vast majority of these with the blessing of my administration.  What this has resulted in is the following list of responsibilities other than leadership and management of my subject area within my school;

1. District Review Panel Chair (Health Education)
2. Member syllabus sub-committee (Health Education)
3. Regional Facilitator for ICTs in Learning
4. eLearning support teacher
5. Member school IT committee
6. Presenter at various conferences for DETA, QSA, ACHPER
7. Lead teacher on project with Qld Health
8. Lead teacher on project with Griffith University
9. Mentoring of pre-service teachers
10. Digital Pedagogy Leadership project

When I look at this list I begin to think its no wonder that I often felt like I was not achieving all that I needed to achieve.  It also reinforces to me I am a classic example of someone who struggles to say no to opportunities that are offered to me.  But as I also reflect on the uncertainty within my own head and decreasing collegiality I feel with my team then I begin to think that the continual drive for my own development and contribution to greater causes is not fair on others who depend on the presence and accountability of a person as their Head of Department.  This is particularly relevant to the teachers I have recruited for the Transformational Learning Project.  I have a commitment to them, they deserve the fulfillment of that committment.

Something which has contributed heavily to me questioning my continuation as a teacher and Head of Department is the reduced joy I have felt from actually teaching high school students.  That is not to say I have not enjoyed the engagement and learning, but I used to love teaching.  I used to love every minute of each interaction with my students.  But this year it seemed more like a job than a passion.  This feeling in itself drove me to deeper feelings of uncertainty and unhappiness as I began to question why this was occurring, and whether I really wanted to be a teacher anymore.  After much thought I truly believe this is the result of the long list of other roles I strived to include in my working life.  These roles were new, exciting, high profile and continually reinforced as a range of people offered various forms of support and encouragement.  My school even added another 2 lines of time to allow me to productively contribute to the school based roles.

What this resulted in was me teaching only one class.  So in reality, actual teaching was a minor part of my employment throughout 2009.  And continually adding to my list of roles was further diluting its relevance within my working life.  For someone who proclaims (and believes he does) love teaching, confusion and uncertainty resulted.  I understand my administration were attempting to support my pursuit of these roles, and there was benefit to them and the school from my involvement.  However their unwavering support has been confused by inconsistent knowledge of my responsibilities.  This was partially a result of a transient administration within my school for 2009 and insufficient communication from me to my upline manager regarding my total work experience.

So here I am, not knowing whether I want to continue as a teacher, Head of Department, eLearning advocate or even some other role.  At least that is how I ended 2009, and to some extent will being 2010.

I’ve taken the time to re-read one of my favourite books. A book that never fails to get me thinking about who I am and why I do what I do.  A book that encourages me to reflect on my actions, and the results of these.  This time around it has taken on so much more significance as I attempt to straighten out my thoughts.  The book is “First Things First” by Stephen Covey, Roger Merrill and Rebecca Merrill.  Each time I read this book I end up with pages and pages of notes, and a determined plan of action to sort out my life.  This time around I really need it.

So what has my reflection and reading lead me to realise;

1. I want to teach.
2. I want to continually pursue new knowledge.
3. I want to challenge my own practice.
4. I enjoy sharing and contributing.
5. I need a process through which I can realise the need to share that minimises absence from school.
6. I need to regularly reflect and plan.
7. My staff are great.
8. I need to be present and accountable for my staff.
9. I need to ensure my family remains my first priority.
10. I need to figure out where I want to be in life.

This final point is perhaps the most salient.  I need to know that if Head of Department for HPE is not where I want to be, then my staff deserve someone who does want to be that.  In other words, if it is not where I want to be then I should be actively seeking other employment opportunities which will provide another capable staff member the chance to support and guide these wonderful teachers through their professional life.  How do I figure this out – the answer is actually quite simple.  Dedicate one year to it and through that experience reflect on my desire to continue.  This means I need to restrict my external involvement in other opportunities.  There are two external roles I am committed to, and I need to draw the line at that.  I am also allocating myself a full (half) load of classes, giving me a chance to experience teaching as a major component of my employment.

Two words are continually propping up in my mind and thoughts – accountability and presence.  My 2010 working year will focus on these as guiding principles for my decisions and actions.  I intend to be present for my staff and my students.  I intend to be accountable for what occurs in my department, significantly focusing on learning and relationships.  I will be present, and I will accept personal accountability.

So I enter 2010, unsure but determined.  I cannot see the future at this point, but see the methods to plan and act in accordance with the guiding principles of accountability and presence to test my intent to continue within these roles.  Wish me luck.

Stumbled across an interesting read today on Corporate eLearning Strategies and Development on what the author (Brent Schlenker) termed the Golden Triangle of Tech.  Essentially Brent suggests that if 3 specific aspects of technology are present, then eLearning is likely to be more viable and successful.  The three “sides to the golden triangle” reported by Schlenker are;

1. mobile
2. social
3. real time

Whilst I don’t necessarily agree with how Schlenker has defined each of these, I believe his thinking process has direct application for my planning of learning experiences.  At its base the post considers the importance of convergence when planning learning.  Discussing mobility he focuses on mobile devices and applications installed on those devices.  This represents on part of how mobility can be implemented in a learning environment. An extended concept of mobility is simple – move the learning into different environments.  However I challenge the shift can even be so much greater than that.  I’d like to think of mobility more conceptually.   Think of mobility in learning as developing in students the ability to transfer learning skills across learning contexts.  Students taking processes and tools and applying them to a range of learning tasks.  Enabling students to learn independently.  (As an aside I am not a fan of the term independent learning.  When I say independent I don’t mean alone, but self guided and motivated).  In my thinking, mobility also refers to flexibility in learning mechanisms and spaces.  The ability to change the learning environment in response to spontaneous occurrences.

The concept of social is essential in learning, however not necessarily as Schlenker has presented it.  Schlenker refers to social networking and the services that enable this.  However social learning at its base is collaboration.  This is a key skill that I focus on in my learning environments, and features prominently whenever educators discuss 21st Century learning.  I agree completely with one phrase Schlenker writes … “In these spaces we build groups, or networks, of friends/followers who share their knowledge with us.”  It is my responsibility as the “teacher” to create the space that encourages and enables the building of groups and networks that collaborate towards a learning goal.  The sharing of knowledge and contribution to knowledge creation is the social aspect of learning.  This can occur within the flexible learning space through spontaneous adaptation and refinement of spaces and processes.

Schlenker’s final concept of real-time is akin to Jonathan Nalders discussion of ubiquitous learning.  They talk about anytime anywhere access to information and services.  In a learning environment where ubiquitous access to web services is not possible, the concept of real time learning is still achievable.  As long as there is engagement in a conversation or exploration that reinforces the concepts which constitute the learning objectives of the lesson then real time learning is achieved.

As Schlenker finishes his post, he makes a statement that is in my opinion quite profound. “I feel like many people are already learning in a personal environment that reflects the golden triangle with the existing tools.  And that’s what seems to be frustrating to many.  There is no control of it just yet, and so many need that sense of control”.  How true is this of many educators today.  They themselves may engage in a personal learning environment that reflects the golden triangle, personal learning driven by personal desires and motivations. Yet they fear implementing the same environment for learners in their care as it requires a release of control.  For many educators this is a shift they are not willing to take, in fact one they will fight.  I for one am glad all the innovators out there keep pushing the envelope and demonstrating that the release of what I term perceived control (the perception of educator control of the learning) can result in greater learning.