We are committed to a strong and comprehensive educational program and learning environment.

You’d be hard pressed to find a district/school that didn’t include something similar to the above in their mission statement.  Specifically, they all like to mention the “learning environment”.  What is that exactly, the “learning environment”?

In The Courage to be Constructivist, M. G. Brooks and J.G. Brooks (1999) describe a learning environment as,  “… a function of many complex factors, including curriculum, instructional methodology, student motivation, and student developmental readiness.”  Wiggins and McTighe (2008) expand on this in their Put Understanding First article for Educational Leadership, describe that the learning environment, as it relates to the mission of schools, involves, “helping students (1) acquire important information and skills, (2) make meaning of that content, and (3) effectively transfer their learning to new situations both within school and beyond it.”  Unfortunately, as all four authors mention in their respective articles, few schools have acknowledged these truths and continue to be “…constrained by our history” (Brooks & Brooks, 1999).

It seems odd to me that our educational history is mentioned as an obstacle to overcome.  When great leaders like John Dewey suggested in 1938 the framework for a proper “learning environment”, project based learning (Johnson, Laurence F., Smith, Rachel S., Smythe, J. Troy; Varon, and Rachel K. 2009).  Dewey understood that “the search for understanding motivates students to learn” (1999).  Today expert’s like Daniel Pink have echoed this sentiment, diving in and taking a deeper look at what truly motivates us; it’s not necessarily the carrot. The Project Based Learning (PBL) framework is designed to help us stay true to our mission; incorporating the information, skills, value beyond school and relevance components that are instructionally sound.

The research shows that students that are in PBL programs perform better than students in a traditional setting (Edutopia, 2001).  When students are asked about their experience with PBL, an overwhelming majority say they had a positive experience (Johnson, and Laurence F. et al, 2009).  Having 30% of our students dropping out and knowing that student disengagement is one of the top contributing factors, PBL is just the hook we need (Johnson, and Laurence F. et al, 2009).

Hooks can come in many shapes and forms.  Sometimes just their name can entice you in.  Forensics.  Some of you, I’m sure, just had the auditory centers of your brain light up, probably with The Who theme song from  CBS’ C.S.I. Sorry, no cool, I found a dead guy, story, because for me another center of the brain lights up, the one where debate lives.  My sophomore year in college I joined the debate team or as the class was called, Clemson University Forensics and Debate Team.  Our teacher, was in-fact our coach.

She gave very little instruction, simply placed the theme for the semester up on the board, Foreign Policy.  She mapped out the upcoming meets and laid out the timeline for the next three weeks.  Office hours were given, the senior team members introduced and then she asked us to get started.  This was completely different from any class I had ever been in before, but maybe the most useful I’ve ever taken.  I truly learned how to take notes, research, listen, analyze and work as  a team.  Writing had a purpose.  Note taking had a purpose.  The library had a purpose.  These tools all at once made sense, because I knew I was going to have to defend our stance on foreign policy and rip there’s apart.

Through all of this our coach was there to answer basic questions, but more often than not she would direct us to other senior team members, building collaboration and communication.  They had me, hook, line and sinker.

Brooks, M.G., & Brooks, J.G. (1999). The Courage to be constructivist. Educational Leadership, 57(3), Retrieved from http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational_leadership/nov99/vol57/num03/The_Courage_to_Be_Constructivist.aspx

Edutopia, Initials. (2001, November 1). Pbl research summary: studies validate project-based learning . Retrieved from http://www.edutopia.org/project-based-learning-research

Johnson, Laurence F.; Smith, Rachel S.; Smythe, J. Troy; Varon, Rachel K. (2009). Challenge-Based Learning: An Approach for Our Time. Austin, Texas: The New Media Consortium.

Wiggins, G., & McTighe, J.G. (2008). Put Understanding first. Educational Leadership, 65(8), Retrieved from http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational_leadership/may08/vol65/num08/Put_Understanding_First.aspx

Reflecting on last week’s reflections, I can’t help but think of a line from The Cold War Kids , “Something is not right with me. How was I supposed to know?”  If something is not right, say in our school/district, how do we know?  This is a questions many administrators struggle with.  They receive the test data, perhaps from the state.  Like below data from the school highlighted in the Sara Armstrong  Edutopia article.

The data, for the most part shows positive gains, but what good does this do?  The results come after the fact. The students have moved on.  If the data had trended south, you again know too late to do anything about it.  This is  why every school needs proper assessments in-place that support actual learning, not measure an end of year goal.

Full disclosure here, I work for Discovery Education which has an assessment service, Discovery Education Assessment.  That said, even though  I do think that the Discovery Education service is the best because of the easy tie-ins back to content, not all districts will want to purchase it.  Please purchase something.  Something that will give your teachers, administrators and students the data to make decisions.  Decisions on what content is needed, what type of professional development should be delivered and what initiatives are making a difference.  Without this real-time data, you are driving the bus blind.

Where can you find pleasure
Search the world for treasure
Learn science technology
Where can you begin to make your dreams all come true

- The Village People, Go West, “In the Navy”  RCA, 1979.

Growing up listening to “The Village People”, I worked at the YMCA, it’s hard to find a better soundtrack to go with the articles I’m reflecting on today.  So dig out that 45, pop in the 8-track, cue up that cassette, wipe off that CD or simply click play.  These three articles, taking place in three very different schools, on both the east and west coasts, highlight several examples of project based learning at it’s best.  Here, I will discuss what common threads have bond these examples, who did the stitching and what does the end product look like.  To start, just a coincidence here, it takes a village to raise a child.

Newport News to Bowie to Seattle, each project detailed could not have been successful if not for a community approach.  Newsome Park invited in the community to consult on and critic projects.  Mountlake Terrace involved architects, not just as one time guests, but as a true partner; providing critics and expertise to students and gaining fresh insights and design ideas that they incorporated into their designs.  These community connections were not limited to parents and local experts, all three schools utilized technology to go beyond the school walls and tap experts around the globe.  This is the case in the March of the Monarchs: Students Follow the Butterflies’ Migration example (Curtis).  Students continuously connected to scientist tracking the migration paths of the butterflies, recording and sharing their own data with the experts; producing authentic intellectual work.

Authentic work was key to the success of all three stories highlighted here, and is key to any successful project.  Each project provided students with the opportunity to complete tasks that reached beyond the school walls.  Not only connecting students to experts, but also equipping them with skills used by professionals in diverse fields.  Designing a building, presenting a proposal and defending a position are all valuable skills that the teacher incorporated into the project; skills that are not only useful in the current marketplace, but essential.  The project tasks, designed by the teachers, showcased and reflect this authentic approach.

Teachers play a different role in project based learning.  As each article articulates, project based learning is more than likely different from how you were taught.  I myself, on many occasions, am guilty of leaving out the most important group in developing the tasks within a project, the students.  That’s right, the students.  Straight from Diane Curtis’,  More Fun Than a Barrel of … Worms article, “If you find it yourself, it stays in your brain.”  The teachers in these articles worked more as consultants/facilitators rather than the traditional teacher. Many of the teachers here did something we as teachers sometimes forget to do; ask the students what they would like to learn.

When you do ask, as the teachers here did, many times the answer is something being talked about in the community.  Cystic Fibrosis.  Production of the school yearbook.  Maybe even a world wrestling company is on the stock market.  Projects were and can be built around each of these topics and guess what, you’re students are already excited about them.  That’s half the battle.  Bringing your students into the conversation changes their role in the classroom from consumer to creator.   When they complete the project and move to the next grade, their role can change again as it did for the students in Mountlake Terrace; from creator to mentor.  The students that had already completed the Schools for the Year 2050, project returned as mentors; helping freshmen with their projects.  Inviting students to participate in their own learning encourages that basic, intrinsic drive we as humans have to gain knowledge about the world around us.  We then go from simply learning for a test to, “students express gratitude to have a chance to learn these things. (Armstrong)”

What do the tests say?  That’s what the papers, the news and the administration will say, right?  Only one of the articles here point to actual numerical data.  You and I both know that knowledge is more than a number, but lets take a look anyway.   Diane Curtis in More Fun Than a Barrel of … Worms?!, points to data from the Virginia Standards of Learning test.  Huge increases are discussed.  30% gain in math.  27% gain in science.  12% gain in English.  What about today?  If this school had it figured out nearly a decade ago, wouldn’t the numbers look similar today.  See for yourself.   Take a look at the stats below.

If we assume that the administration and teachers have continued with project based learning, the evidence is clear that scores have continued to increase, well after this article was written.

Do you remember the Little Debbie Oatmeal Cream Pies?  Now think about your favorite sugar cookie?  What if you, with no experience in baking, decided to combine these two wonderful things?   Tonight I did just that, mostly because in the process of making sugar cookies I realized I didn’t have enough flour, but I had oatmeal.  Oh man if you combined the two…disaster.  At least in my case.  The culprit, amino acids.  Not just any amino acids:

The protein is a single polypeptide chain, consisting of 201 amino acid residues with M(r) 23,252.8. The N-terminal amino acid residue of the protein is blocked with 5-oxoproline (pyroglutamic acid). All eight cysteine residues in avenin-3 are involved in disulphide bonds. (Egorov, Musolyamov, Andersen, & Roepstorff, 1994)

Baking is a science, literally.  The proteins found in my flour, when mixed with the proteins (amino acid bad boys) in my oatmeal, made for dry, lifeless cookies.  I’m assuming this is why we have recipes, so that no man or woman should have to to suffer what I have suffered, gooeynessless (I know it’s not a word) cookies.  Next time this craving strikes, I’ll simply call Carol.

Egorov, TA., Musolyamov, AK., Andersen, JS., & Roepstorff, P. (1994). The Complete amino acid sequence and disulphide bond arrangement of oat alcohol-soluble avenin-3. European Journal of Biochemistry, 2(224), Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7925380

Intro:

Normal morning, my 4 yr old comes in our room with his animals wanting to play. I get up, make coffee, look over paper (will blog over here about interesting article later) and finally check my email.

In my inbox is a curious message from youtube.

Questions:

So it’s not as dramatic as “1984″, yet. I don’t have a problem giving credit where credit’s due. I gave Discovery credit for this video from the start, in the title and in the description of this video. This email leaves me with several questions:

1. How many others have gotten a similar email?
2. Under “Policy”, what are the others? (Will Not Allow content to remain, Send us your address so we can send the subpoena)
3. Line 8 of message, under the second paragraph, “Viewers may also see advertising on your video’s page.” What kind? (G, PG or R rated

Big Picture:

Now that the game has changed, Viacom win, companies are finding the copyrighted content you’ve uploaded. I turn to YouTube for movie trailers, news, professional development, show compilations/clips and childhood memories. So will Big Brother be Nice, continue to allow the sharing and remixing of their content, or Naughty making you pay and/or sit through ads to see their content? My guess is they’ll be somewhere in-between, regardless like family you have to deal with them.

Transparency:

I know the answers to some of the above questions for this particular video, I happen to work for Discovery Communications, LLC. I’m not worried about the ads from Discovery showing up or a subpeona, pink slip on desk would be more likely. If Discovery, through the YouTube Content Identification Program, found their content and can now place ads on that video’s page can anyone or any company(Viacom) do that? I’d say yes.

First full day of vacation and I still can’t shake thoughts of work.  I hope they all disappear by tomorrow, but something tells me the 1:00 pm conference call will blow that.   Seriously thinking about hopping on the call from the middle of the pool.  Maybe dropping the crackberry in the deep half-way through the call. 

Poor John Michael is sick.  Here in beautiful Flordia with toys, pool and grandparents and he’s sick.  I felt bad for him tonight, he’s so tired yet trying to stay up and play.  He’s so curious about anything to do with nature.  This trip a bird book has him enthralled.   It’s actually a really cool book, names the bird species, shows an illustration and even plays their call.  If into birds check it out here.  

Several years ago I stopped teaching, kind of.  I still teach, just teach teachers now.  I really love my job, but a visit a couple of months ago got me thinking.  I invited a group of 5th graders from King Middle School in Kankakee, IL to present some of their digital projects.  It was awesome getting to see some of the cool projects students are able to do now.  

There are days I wish I could return to the classroom, taking all I’ve learned and put it into use within my own classes.  I miss that feeling when you see the excitement in your students eyes after a cool experiment, a flame-throwing demonstration (gummy bear sacrifice) or that “I get it” moment.   Have to say I don’t miss the pay and right now with 1 kid and 1 on the way, I can’t afford to jump back into teaching.  

You can make descent money teaching, but usually only a decade or so in, no matter how much you have to offer.  That’s something that needs to change.  

Ok, I’m still on vacation.  Happy thoughts! Happy thoughts!.  Kelly, John Michael and I are living it up in Orlando all this week.  A trip to Disney is a sure thing.  A date night is long overdue!!  Kelly and I will be hitting the town sometime this week, taking advantage of having the grandparents around.  

A few picks from the 5th graders’ visit and from our trip to the Shedd Aquarium afterwards. 

The past two weeks have been a blur.  Joliet, Bloomington, Minneapolis, back to Bloomington and now sitting in Orlando finally on vacation.  The last few weekends have been perfect for working in the yard.  I can’t tell you how excited I am to finally have a yard again, even if it is tiny.  Below are shots from over two weekends.   I played around our camera’s settings, some came out awesome, others not so much. 

“Man Day”, a day that John Michael and I spend together. My first blog post, non-work related anyway, in months and I couldn’t think of a better topic. I spent last Saturday in downtown Chicago with John Michael. Our good friend Jen was in town so Kelly, Jen, John Michael and I took the train in. The girls headed off to the Art Institute of Chicago, while John Michael and I embarked on a journey up river.

John Michael and I always have fun in the Loop. He likes to take the water taxi from the train station up to Michigan Ave. You get to go under bridges, it’s faster than taking a bus and costs less than a taxi ($4.00 for both of us). If in Chi-Town, take a water taxi.  I’ve placed the day’s photos below.

So I don’t blog a lot.

Excuse List:

1. dot Mac, host of blog, can only be updated from home computer (I travel a lot and when I’m home I don’t want to type all my thoughts down)

2. see above, just wanted to point out excuse 1 is the main reason.

3. see # 1 above, ok so I didn’t need a list, but sometimes a list comforts people makes them think, that guy has his facts together and makes a good point, I’ll be a sheep on his team.

Just a thought dot Mac, get with the rest of the blogging work soon or everyone will drop you.

Sorry… it had to be said. I did buy iLife 8, which is supposed to allow more flexibility. We shall see.

I spent this weekend reliving the 80’s thanks to Encore’s 80’s Weekend. Man, John Cusack was in everything. I think all kids of the 80’s should watch “Say Anything” again. What a good movie.

If .mac get’s it’s act togther then you’ll see many more blogs from me if not look for a move of the website.