Final Project

Just a quick note to say I've put a little something up on Google Plus...

Future Vision Project Post #4

So I like food blogs. So what? No big deal.

My friend Aimee calls me domestic... Actually she calls me a domestic goddess with a heavy eye roll. I certainly protest. A quick finger swipe along the top of my book shelves will reveal otherwise. While I can live with a little filth (not squalor, mind you), I do take notice of what I pop into my mouth. My last blog post revealed a happy little love affair with food blogs.

Thinking about food blogs first got me eating and then thinking about how more than anything I like the idea of food blogs and cookbooks. I love the spirit of a recipe, the glossy photograph (though, more and more often we're seeing a matte finish in the cookbooks), the clean list of ingredients running down a page, the comfortable cushion of text that follows...

For me, recipes are poetry. Teaspoons and tablespoons are metaphors and similes. A cup conjures the weight of symbol and underlying meaning. The theme is what really brings me to tears -- exotic, homespun, nostalgic, fusion, twist on a classic -- the list runs on.

Recently, I experienced  an epiphany delivered in a pan of brownies.
 
Alice Medrich is a sort of chocolate genius. She has countless recipes for brownies, all containing flour, salt, sugar, eggs, vanilla, butter, and cocoa OR chocolate. Nonetheless, much like snowflakes, each recipe is different and unique. Within each lies a different path each baker must travel to reach chocolate euphoria.

The full impact of this realization struck last week when I attempted Alice's New Classic Brownies (or, specifically, here) and I didn't follow the recipe at all! Ok. Back up the truck. Let's focus on the ingredients.

I had the ingredients right.

But part way through chuckling at CBC's the debaters, and spotting my cousin and her kids rooting through my daffodil patch, I rather ignored the directions and took my own path. Like, for instance, ice water bath? Not likely. Or my flour certainly met the sugar before it joined the chocolate and who bakes brownies at 400 degrees? Not me!

Anyhow, despite ignoring the advice of a renowned chocolate and recipe guru, I baked perfect brownies.

Ha!    Ha, ha, ha, ha!! (Maniacal)

Point (s):

I don't follow directions.

Things usually come out ok.


I hope you Bears have all had a look at Aaron's assignment details. I'm sure you would have before attempting to plan a Final Vision Project. That's what most people, most teachers, would do.

Yup.

Just checked them out. And so I'm rejigging. I'm considering what Aaron actually wants us to do. I've noticed, by actually reading the assignment guidelines, that the focus is on what we are taking away from the course. My vision should "encapsulate [my] potential path after [I]’ve completed this course" (Aaron Mueller, Library and Web 2.0 Guru).

What I'm creating is a reflective piece that outlines a plan for the future.

 I must share this vision using a platform of my choice.

Beyond this, Aaron has provided a rubric. This is just the sort of thing I love about Aaron.

Primarily, we are to articulate an idea. We are to express the articulation of said idea in a public and shareable manner. Originally, my thinking revolved around creating a lesson sequence that could be used in my teaching and that this piece specifically would be the item and the platform. I am realigning my thinking to consider the specifics of the project. I must gather some larger ideas, I must articulate details, I must lay the plans for my journey and I must  tie these concepts into one place.

I recently checked out Storybird. So cool! And would love to ramble out a story on that platform but I am held back by the inaccessibility of the site. Basically, after completing the story, one must wait about a month before it is approved and placed on the site for sharing. Bummer.

And so I moved onto the webpage. Perhaps not the most original choice, but I felt this would allow me to include a number of pages, each with a different focus. I began a Weebly site. I started recording ideas and links...but for some reason I just couldn't get the flow I was looking for. The truth is I like to prattle on a bit and the website format felt so succinct, too polished, somehow.

Then I read Leah's final vision project. She's using her blog. Wow. Why not?

I mean, really, it doesn't matter what I choose, like the brownies, I  just need to stir those essential ingredients together, scoop them into some type of vessel and deliver sinful decadence, or insightful education, depending on whether we're talking brownies or library. Because if we're talking brownies...

Future Vision Project Post #3: Getting Wonky

Fact: Some weekends you just eat a lot of chocolate.

Coming to terms....

Moving on.

Gosh, this world is full of distractions. I can't even write a blog post because I'm too "busy" checking out all the new exciting blogs I now follow via Feedly. Reading posts by the Bears (Go Bears!) is productive. Random food blogs, not so much. Although, I'm pretty sure this is a great idea.

Food blogs. We love them! (Ok I  do, and I can't comprehend that you might not share my enthusiasm.) Because every body eats, right? Everybody is always hungry, right? Oh wait, that's likely just me and my hubby who also has an absurdly speedy metabolism. Thank goodness for peanut butter! Regardless, food is about sharing. We dine with our friends. We bring treats to our nephews. We gather for random potluck lunches with our staff... Then we pass out the recipe cards. Or, more and more often, we cite a food blog. Once you hop onto the foodblog train, you just keep riding. The stops are endless. Ideas zig zag back and forth. Photos, videos, tidbits of wisdom and foolishness keep us informed and entertained as we try on new sites and authors.

Essentially, what we're looking at is a community driven my similar interests as opposed to geographical location.

As educators, we see the need for community in our classrooms. Educator Annie Shaw cites community as the starting place for learning. As learners, we require a place of safety and sharing. Often, we speak of developing a community of readers.

We want our students to be lifelong readers. We want them to have choice, to engage with various texts and to make connections to those texts. While reading is in some ways a solitary activity, it's surely more fun and exciting when we share the experience with others. This spring, many of us will be participating in community runs, such as the TC 10km or the Goddess Run. Many of our training challenges occur in isolation but the excitement of running with a community powers our initiative. And also allows for increased chocolate consumption.

So I'm interested in community. It is, afterall, what made this course of far greater interest to me than any of the TL courses I have pecked away at so far. Students need to engage in a classroom community, but they also need to learn the skills associated with engaging in an online community.

As my contact with students is limited to library times, an online community is of particular interest to me as it is not hampered by the confines of geographical limits.

 Thus, I plan to examine the question:

How can teaching students to use social media create a community of readers in my school?

Likely, I will use a blog to record my ideas. I'm not set on this platform but I am trying to consider how I can best present my ideas in a simple and straightforward manner. I am also considering the use of a Facebook page but I need to decide why I would use that site and if the reasons warrant the result.

Oh, and I plan to focus on the Destiny Quest Website and the way in which it's functions can be used to see students making lists, and sharing recommendations. I would like to jump from this site, where students will learn about responsible use and build community, to a second platform in which students share about a particular book in a larger, more in depth way. I had considered booktrailers but I don't have the iPad access to support this and I'm not super keen on the windows program. If anyone has suggestions, please chime in.

And if all this comes to nought, I'll probably just throw together a video like the one below. I'll tweak the topic for teacher librarians. They're usually up for a good rant.

Citation:
Willy Wonka Photography: Flickr

Future Vision Project Post #2: A Change in Destiny

I can't escape Destiny

Every time I contemplate ideas around research and Web 2.0 skills, my thoughts flicker back to ways in which the Destiny Quest program could be better used to teach and practice skills of information retrieving, list making, and sharing.

In scooting about the web for other educators ideas and sharing around this topic, I encountered only two resources that discussed Destiny Quest as a teaching tool. The first was a pay-only resource (not likely!) and the second, generated by the New York City School Library System, provided a list of simple lesson plans related to the site.

You can check it out here.

How I Might Use Destiny in My Library

How to write a review. Students can write reviews that are then saved in Destiny Quest and remain attached to each book.

How to find a Just Right Book in Destiny Quest. Students can make recommendations. They can look up a book that they have already read and view a list of read-alike links. Students can check out the top 10 books. They can also look at the list of new arrivals.

Accessing Resources. Students can search for books or websites on a topic. Titles can be saved to a resource list. Titles can be reviewed. Lists can be generated into a Bibliography.

Website Review. Students can access websites via One Search. One Search allows is an Internet search on a topic. Students can practice information retrieval and also review resources found.

Considering the Topic

As I consider this topic, a number of classroom applications come to mind and yet I find myself wondering if this is a topic that is interesting enough to share out.

Also, who would be interested in this topic? Teacher Librarians and students are the primary users of Destiny Quest. Students are interacting with the site. An additional site about the topic might just translate to another layer of information that inhibits rather than promotes use of the site.  Hmmm. How-to Videos could be helpful... And yet when I find those videos online, I often find them boring. I certainly glaze-out during the explanations and find that exploring the site to figure something out is often how I learn what the video is trying to teach me.

Teacher Librarians would likely be interested in ideas around using the site. Creating an entire website devoted to the topic seems a little much. Perhaps videos might be more engaging to this audience. Or perhaps still shots with something like Voice Thread.

I suppose I need to go back to my planning with the end in mind:

What do I want others to take away? Some ideas for how to use Destiny Quest to support digital literacy.

How can this information be best conveyed? Still thinking...

Perhaps I need to expand my thinking from computer-based concepts to consider the iPad possibilities. Leah shared out that awesome list of apps. Perhaps an app is the place to start. I haven't actually spent a lot of time exploring iPad teaching possibilities. I know Leah has. I think that I could learn through this process and also share in an effective way.

I just stopped for a brain break to read Danielle's blog. Danielle always has these awesome ideas, deep thoughts, and succinct communication which is both inspiring and mildly depressing (because I'm not Danielle and am juveniley jealous). Anyhow, her latest post is chocked full of great links. Not only does she reference classmates' ideas, she also tips us toward some excellent resources. Toward the end of her page she mentions Edmoto. I haven't spend much time there but I think this could be a good time to sign up and see if this might be a place to share out my final project.

Anyhow, it's Spring Break and the sun is shining and it was all I could do to sit down at a computer this afternoon. My bike and a coffee date are calling. I think I'll just have to do some constructive thinking out in the sunshine.

Future Vision Project Post #2: One Long Hmmmmmm

When the flag dropped and we bounded out of the gates into our first blog posts, I ran right into the topic of research. How can we research better? I wanted to know. As I dropped into my pace through the course, I found that a new topic kept poking out from the sidelines. The practice of online sharing just refused to be ignored; so I figured I might as well have a look at it.

I begin with a glance at the good old Points of Inquiry. As I peruse it's gleaming points, I find myself wondering: is this model outdated?

We are asked to begin at the top of the star and work our way around (clockwise, naturally) to reflect.

Likely, the model is still relevant but I'm going out on a splinter of a limb here to suggest that perhaps we will not be working our way around the star for much longer. Investigating is perhaps beginning to intertwine with expressing and constructing. Reflection is ongoing. I can't seem to usurp Connect and Wonder from it's throne but as evident in the process we've engaged in through this course, our initial connect and wonders must be reviewed and often revised.

Our vocabulary has also begun to shift. Take the word, share, for example. "Share" is not given a point on the star. One might argue that it is implicit in the "Express" point, but sharing has become a crucial part of our language and are way of viewing the trade and transfer of ideas and information. "Share" needs to become part of our classroom process. Sharing out to a classroom, a school, a district, a classroom across the globe or the web public in general, must become a regular occurrence if we are in fact teaching and learning with a Web 2.0 lens.

In the past, teachers focused on an academic model of research. The internet has blown that model into a whirlwind. No longer are we limited to academic sources. Even within this course, most of us are finding the richest most relevant articles on blogs and websites like Edutopia. Truly this is a pretty amazing time to live through and teach through as so many of our "cannons" become uncannonized. The rules are changing very quickly. The skill of research was once primarily needed for those entering college or university. Now, research is a necessity, a day-to-day skill.

How is education addressing this shift?!?!?

Okay.

Breathe.

I don't feel equipped to tackle some of these issues. Aside from the lack of resources provided by our Ministry of Education, I don't feel I have enough time with my students or collaborative time with my colleagues to do justice to the task at hand. Nonetheless, I don't believe I'm allowed not to try.

While I have often found myself worried about and limited by privacy issues, I'm finding some ways to address skills of collecting and sharing while sidestepping these road blocks. For instance, I found a nice little article that discusses the importance of list making.

Read it here. 

Done?

Good.

In the article Twitter is used as the platform. I'm not going to put a class of grade 4 and  students on Twitter. That is not an option in the reality of my school. BUT, we can make lists in other places and other ways. Destiny Quest give us list making options for books we want to read, books we are reading, and books we've read. Beyond that, students can compile lists of resources around a given topic. This is certainly a good place to start.

Similarly, at the elementary level, I am not prepared to share student work on a blog for a larger audience, but I am excited about trying the Book Creator app on my iPad to create a class book with a grade 2 class. We can share our book with other classes in the school. (A number of other book creation apps can be found here.)

So yes, I've established that there are ways to share in the elementary world, but I find myself wondering, how does this link back to research and how can sharing make us better researchers?

As I continue to write and think, I'm popping on and off my blog to review ideas on other sites, to check my email, and to look for new resources.Yes, my investigating, connecting, expressing, and constructing is all happening in one messy ball of right now. Suffice to say, I just came across a new new image.

 

It's pretty. Sure. But it's also pretty powerful and pretty crazy.

It suggests messy.

It suggests a system in which creation, sharing, and research are given equal importance.

I suggests projects structured to allow for personal exploration that allows for conversation, in which copying is not an issue as ideas are shared and then further developed.

What, I find myself wondering, does this look like in a grade 4 classroom?

Is this, I find myself wondering (again, with the wondering), possible in a grade 2 classroom?

Pintrest says yes!

Frighteningly (for me, Queen of the Scatterbrained), organisation becomes central to success in these learning paradigms. A quick glance at the above image shows us that the potential for excitement is equal to the potential for chaos. Particularly, as the 'rules' as we know them seem to be shifting. For example, blogger Shawn McCusker suggests that "It's Time to Change How Student's Cite Their Work." McCusker reasons that if we are using a Web 2.0 platform for presenting (ie sharing), students should be embedding links throughout their project. In this way, the (McCusker says) the links reflect the process of construction and also allows for better sharing of orignal sources with the audience, which is hopefully made up of a students' peers.

Reshaping these rules to meet the needs of our student is going to take time, thought, plenty of trial, and a fair amount of error.

Suffice to say, these are some of the ideas rattling around in this old noggin. It will be interesting to see how they rearrange. Then rearrange again, before shaping into some kind of a cohesive whole that might be considered a final project.









An Idea Shared from http://www.edudemic.com/share-your-ideas/Points of Inquiry from
Connected Learning http://connectedlearning.tv/infographic

Inquiry Blog Post #4: The Techy Have's and Haven'ts

For a number of years, mobile devices have been lurking in the background of many of our decisions, debates, and questions around education. More recently, they have shimmied out of the shadows and onto the stage -- not quite centre, more like downstage right -- of our educational focus. As Mobile devices have become a key feature of our society, we must reflect this shift in our learning and teaching practices. Nonetheless, a number of hurdles still seem to pop up in our path. For me, these problems seem to centralize around the issue of access. I find myself wondering...

Who are the educational have and have-nots?
Can we safely lend tablets to our students?
Are we creating a two-tiered system?
What about band-width? Will our school districts support it's tech aims with infrastructure?
In Destiny Catalogue, my eBook platform never seems to work...How can we create a workable eBook lending system?
What are issues around consent and privacy when working with younger children?

.... That's all I've got right now. But I'm sure tomorrow a new issue will find its way across my desk.

Now I risk posturing myself as iPad fearful, whereas I infact jump at the opportunity to integrate technology into my lessons and library. I am excited by the new ways of showing what we know, as well as the opportunities for sharing on a classroom level, a school level, a district level, and a public level.

We are seeing so many incredible things happening in education as technology becomes more widely available.

New voices are being heard. I love this First Nation's People's Project in which bands are sharing movies made of their traditions. Super Cool.

Another incredible story featured on Edutopia, is one of a school in the Austrian Alps. Technology allowed this small school to continue its work. Students are able to connect to a wider world via the Internet. As this article was published in 2008, it is unclear as to whether mobile devices have become a significant feature in the Austrian School. Nonetheless, the concept of a connection to more information and ideas is central and vital.
Organisations such as Room to Read and  Library for All are using technology to deliver literacy in developing nations. Incredible opportunities are being created for students in these schools. Respire School in Haiti was a recipient of the Library for All project. Read their story here. Respire was ready for this technology and seemingly able to integrate it into their program. Very exciting.

At the same time, we truly need to consider the questions I've aired above. As we travel this yet unforgged road into the future, we will find ourselves having to answer questions we can not yet conceive of.

This summer I had the opportunity to volunteer at a school in Honduras. Nueva Esperanza provides childcare and education to children in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, one of the neediest cities in the world. Children who attend Nueva Esperanza, are incredibly poor. Theirs are single-parent families. Without the support of the school, these single mom's (and occasionally fathers) would likely place their children in orphanages.  Nueva Esperanza might benefit from tablets in their school, but the school lacks the resources to pursue such an aim. While staff have cell phones, none can afford Internet connected devices. A primary focus of the school is feeding children and keeping children safe in a neigbourhood with one of the highest crime rates in the world. Where does the finance to setup and support mobile devices factor into this equation? I'm not sure.

Below is a picture taken from a the school in Honduras. I have not included pictures from the school as all my pictures included children and I would like to respect their privacy.

While organisations like Room to Read and Library for All are doing what they can to support international literacy, we would be naive to imagine that most of the world's population is enjoying the level of technological literacy and support that we experience in the first world.

I find myself wondering how Room to Read continues to support its pilot schools after initial start up. I'm curious as to how teacher's in Haiti and Honduras are using these devices when they are available. It is rather exciting that I can explore these ideas in an online community.

I like that we paused to consider this issue. There is so much rich discussion to be had and so many ideas to continue to pursue as our library walls begin their slow collapse...


Video:
http://www.edutopia.org/first-peoples-project-indigenous-technology-video 

Inquiry Blog Post #3: The Lit and Pit of Pro-D

I thought about the topic of Professional Resources on my run this morning. Sloshing through the snow around Elk Lake, I was feeling a little Canadian and a little inspired. The sky was full of clouds and rain and snow. I had on my toque plus three shirts. Life looked pretty closeup and as in focus as a wet West Coast snowflake -- clear and fast and headed somewhere.

When my foot broke through slush to find its way into yet another puddle, books started to seem irrelevant. We need to 'do,' I felt. Development requires immersion.
 
Home and in a giant housecoat, I still feel similarly, today's teachers -- likely any day's teachers -- require authentic experience as part of growth and change. At the same time, with my feet in warm slippers, my hands itch for a book and I must acknowledge that literature remains an important part of Professional Development. It is important that teachers have a number of tools provided for their growth and personal exploration. Furthermore, teachers need to be able to access these tools.

Ultimately, my approach to professional development support, is two fold. The first focus area is literature and the second is participation.

Literature

While crucial to developing new ideas and accessing points of view, Pro-D literature is often difficult to access for the following resources:

1. Clutter- Often, the Teacher Resource of a school library is a neglected shelf. Like a dirty house, it has gathered a generation of dusty articles.  Teachers are hesitant to approach the shelf as they know they're going to have to pick through a bunch of junk to find an item of value.

2. Timeliness- We've all seen it, the 1970's physical education manual with short-shorts basketball players wearing knee-high striped socks. It's 2014... Need I say more?

3. Location- My current Teacher Resource is tucked in a backroom on a shelf so high I need to stand on a chair to reach it. This is not convenient or inviting.

4. Cost- Usually, what we're looking for isn't there. The book, text, video, whatever that we want costs fifty dollars. We forget about it.

I don't think these issues exist in every school. BUT in the last three years I have worked in four different libraries. Each suffered from at least three of these maladies.

As Web 2.0 aficionados, we know that many of these problems can be surmounted. Last year I had the distasteful pleasure of weeding and reorganising a Teacher Resource section.  First I rolled up my sleeves and tossed all the 1970's Phys Ed literature along with other outdated texts. Next, I restructured the shelf. A couple teachers had complained to me, 'you can never find what you're looking for. Why are the same-subject resources never together?' Indeed, why not? I wondered. So with Dewey as my guide, I reassigned numbers to match books to subject areas. I then applied labels so that teachers could quickly see where to find math or science or counselling  resources.

Simple.

Super Effective.

People started checking stuff out.

Wow.

Of course, Pro-D literature is not limited to print resources. As we are learning in this course, a whole world of resources lives on the web. In fact, in my last post, I list some of the resources I found helpful in regards to my own professional development. Different teachers will be interested in different sites. As a teacher librarian, my role is to provide access and opportunity for staff to find these resources. Options might include a staff resources page on the school library website, a list of resources in a staff access folder, or a Wiki for staff use and sharing. In my school, likely an online list housed on our website would be the simplest way for teachers to access information. In my experience, teachers are far more likely to use resources that are easily accessible.

Participation

In addition to literature, hands-on experience is crucial to teachers' development. Our district seems to enjoy a number of school-based Pro-D days. Here presents an opportunity to provide workshops hosted by members of our staff who are engaged in interesting learning initiatives, other members of our district who have stories and resources  to share, or educators and specialists from other districts.

Similarly, teachers have much to share in terms of providing tools and dialogue to their colleagues. A place to share discussions and conversation is coveted in schools. We often complain that we haven't the time or space to collaborate. The teacher librarian might provide a virtual version of this space through a Ning or Wiki. For example, this Ning focuses on the Project Based Learning.

Finally, allowing my library door to literately and figuratively always be open has allowed for some of the richest sharing and staff discussion opportunities. While I settle in at my new school, I look forward to forming the strong bonds that I have shared with teachers wherever I find myself.