EricHoefler.com

As the end of the first semester closes in, it’s time to review what I’ve been doing in my classroom. I’ve been aware of the changes in my teaching and teaching philosophy over the last year or so, but only nebulously. I think I’ve needed to allow that vague drifting in order to stay free enough to allow the changes to happen. However, I’m now feeling like it’s time to review what’s happened and think about what I should keep, change, or cut–and a few things will still be “on probation” because they’re new (meaning, they’ll have to wait for a summer reflection).

Part of these reflections are driven by the “Choose Your Own Resolution” post by Lucy Gray on the infinite thinking machine blog.

Transparency – A Window into the Classroom

Keep:

• SchoolFusion pages for each class provides information about assignments, calendar of deadlines and events, documents, links, and explanations of standing assignments or larger projects.
• Flickr group collects pics of and by students in my classes.
• My blog allows parents and students to see my thinking about education.

Change/Add:

• I want to use the WSHSBeyond blog as a way to offer updates on what’s happening in class, and re-post those entries as items on a mailing list for parents.
• I want to remember to use some of the Flickr pictures in the blog/newsletter

Digital Literacy – Expanding the Curriculum

I think educators should now be just as concerned with digital literacy as with its more standard forms. Here are some goals:

Keep:

• Students have blog readers (and learn about RSS) in which they read some blogs that I suggest, some blogs of other students, and some blogs of their choice that relate to their interests
• Students share items of interest through “Google Shared Items” and through a social bookmarking service (like del.icio.us or diigo).
• Students reflect on what they’re reading by posting in their personal blogs (using ELGGSpaces).
• Students continue the conversation of the classroom out into their lives by discussing related issues on the course forums.

Change/Add:

• I would like to get students working more with image and audio, first by including images and audio in their blog posts, and eventually by working with video and podcasting.
• We haven’t worked much with the course wiki yet, but in the spring, I plan to have students using the wiki to build pages and resources for their end-of-course projects
• I also plan to have students develop ePortfolios of their work for the end of the course.
• I want to make clear to students the idea that they are learners, and that they can and should use the tools available to them to make their learning more efficient, more subtle, and more in-depth. This relates to concepts like eLearning, Learner Generated Contexts, eLearning 2.0, School 2.0, etc. (about which I need to learn more).
• I want to better prepare students to use the internet and related tools to conduct research, including: understanding copyright and related legal issues, finding helpful tools (like diigo and Zotero) to assist their research, evaluating resources, and finding items through search techniques, databases, and the “deep web.”
• I want to work more with the social networking capabilities of the class website to demonstrate to students how these can be used for more than just making random comments and posting the latest pics.

Despite all these goals, I don’t want to become a “technology teacher,” whatever that might mean. First of all, it seems that most of the “how to” of these tech tools can be picked up through play and require little direct instruction. Instead, I want to introduce helpful tools to students, suggest ways that they can be used to increase their ability to learn, and then bring it all back around to what’s important (see below). Secondly, what I do understand of School 2.0 seems to be “about the pedagogy,” not about the tools themselves. In the words of Jeff Utecht:

School 2.0 needs to be about creating knowledge, analyzing information, and evaluating both. It’s about understanding a world in which connections and communicating with others is at the foundation of how we learn, that through creating our own knowledge not from what a teacher tells us, but rather from what we read, listen to, and watch ourselves is far more powerful. A teacher is a guide … answer questions when we have them, and stay out of the way when we want to experience something ourselves.

Pedagogy defines School 2.0 at The Thinking Stick

Flat Classroom – Connecting to Students Elsewhere

This is a “too new to know” topic, but I have been talking with teachers outside of my local area. Though we haven’t started any real collaboration between these classrooms yet, the plans are growing.

Staying in Focus – Remembering What’s Important

Despite all these goals, I don’t want to lose sight of what’s ultimately important. In the words of Roger Schank:

Preparedness for any class I ever taught would mean knowing how to express oneself in an articulate manner, being able to write clearly, being capable of an original thought, being able to reason logically, and the willingness to work hard to accomplish something.

Roger Schank : Preparing for a Fictitious College

In all of the “things” we do, I want to keep the focus on those skills, and I want to be sure to provide my students enough leisure time to process what we’re doing and reflect on it. I think the technology makes this easier, breaks down barriers and widens the audience, and allows each student to better understand their role as learner.

Hearing the Still, Quiet Voice – Preserving Privacy in a Public World

While I love the possibilities technology affords, agree with the direction “school 2.0″ and “flat classrooms” seem to be taking us, and want my students working in a more public place with an authentic, world-wide audience, I also believe in the importance of learning to hear the “still, quiet voice” at the center. Community and collaboration is key, but a community is made of individuals, and collaboration is a “laboring together” of individuals. “Hive mind” can be dangerous, and without voices of dissent or the ability to view things from different perspectives, those dangers can grow into consuming beasts.

I want to open the world to my students, but I don’t want to strip them of their own identities. We all need a safe place to retreat and listen to that voice.

So, they will choose whether their posts on ELGGSpaces are public or private and will be able to make smaller communities that aren’t open to others. We will still do some of our writing in a journal, with pen and paper. We will still read from books. We will take time to be quiet and reflect. We will discuss the important (and ageless) concern about the border between public and private.

And sometimes, when the weather is nice and the light is just so, we’ll go outside for no discernible pedagogical reason at all.