The first month of school we focused on the theme of “Responsibility” in regards to students being on time and being prepared. Relating this theme to technology, I see a wonderful opportunity to highlight the topic of “digital citizenship.” Digital citizenship “describes the norms of appropriate, responsible behavior with regard to technology use.” (ISTE 2008) As citizens of the digital world, middle school students are faced with issues of digital literacy, cyber safety, cyber bullying, social networking, digital footprints, hacking, and much more!

Middle school students love to use technology from listening to music on their ipods, text messaging, taking photos and videos, connecting with friends through Facebook and chat, searching youtube videos, playing video games, and surfing the net. As students have access to a wide variety of digital/online tools it is important for teachers and parents to support them in learning to be a positive digital citizen.

• Ways to support positive student digital citizenship:
• 1) Talk to your student about their use of digital tools: What are they using? When? How?
• 2) Educate yourself on the tools for both positive and negative uses
• 3) Set time limits and purpose of use guidelines for your child/student
• 4) Monitor use of digital/online tools
• 5) Model appropriate and safe use of digital/online tools

When we learn of potential negatives in student use of these tools, there can be a reaction of fear or banning their use altogether. It is important to recognize that digital tools within today’s media/digital culture are here to stay and will only continue to develop in more ways than we can imagine. It is equally important to recognize the countless positive things we gain from technology. Through teaching students positive benefits of digital tools and appropriate use of them they are empowered to build a positive digital footprint for themselves.

*Click on the link below to read an article from The International Society for Technology (ISTE) “Passport to Digital Citizenship.” This article explains nine elements of digital citizenship.

ISTE: “Passport to Digital Citizenship

As an educator, I love using Moodle for many reasons. Moodle allows me create customized online learning units and lessons that include embed links to online content, question forums, collaborative discussion boards, grade books, assignment logs, assignment feedback, and many more tools that I am still learning about! One of it’s best features is that it makes learning available to my students wherever there is internet access. If a student is absent, needs more time learning a lesson from class, needs extra practice, wants to turn in an assignment, or check grades outside of class time, they can easily do this from home…or anywhere!

Twitter and how the mathematical title of this post breaks down:

140 characters X who I am FollowinG + my FollowerS= an incalculable amout of shared resources, ideas, feedback, and collaboration…also known as “Professional Development”

I joined twitter last spring after after attending the 2008 ETC conference where I presented with fellow MSU MAET graduate cohort, Sergio Martinez. Many of the other presentations I attended referred to twitter, but I didn’t know much about it. I was curious, so I signed up and wrote one tweet on April 25th, 2008. However, I followed nobody and really had no idea what it was all about or why I would keep the account. So my account sat there waiting patiently for someone to follow me, or something to compell me to follow someone else…then it happened!

Five months after my first post I attended the Learning 2.008 Conference in Shanghai, China.  At the opening keynote, a twitter feed of the conference was being projected on a huge screen on stage. Everyone in the whole conference it seemed was on Twitter, connecting to each other through 140 character messages. Every few seconds a new message would pop up, information about sessions, notes from the keynote speakers, excellent information being shared freely. It was like a collective side conversation of the entire conference.  I wanted in!

I started by following colleagues who were also attending the conference, wrote a couple updates here and there, but mostly read what others were writing.  All of a sudden conference attendees I didn’t know started showing up as followers.  I felt a pressure to post something, but not just anything…something they’d want to hear. So, I waited. I read my feed full of tweets with links to great blog posts, free online resources, updates on other conference opportunities, invites for collaborations…Wow…what I had been missing all those months my account had sat there dormant within the twitterverse.

Slowly but surely I started to post things that I thought others might benefit from. From time to time it led to one on one connection with a follower halfway across the world interested in the same topic, idea, or issue in education. How cool is that!

Now, over a year later I follow hundreds of educators from around the world and have a sense of belonging to what one of my favorite authors and presenters, Seth Godin, would call a “Tribe.” Most of the people I follow I have never met in person. However, I had the priviledge to attend the Apple Leadership Summit in Hong Kong in April where I met mutual followers face to face who I have collaborated with through twitter. While “tweeting up” with each other for the first time, it felt as if we already had a mutual understanding and kinship through common interest and passion for sharing, collaborating, and seeking a global community of educators daring to challenge and shift the definition of teaching and learning in the 21st century.

Currently in my MAET courses we use Twitter to share in a similar manner tweeting resources, posting our work, and collaborating within a Twibe, a smaller community within the Twitterverse.  It keeps us connected outside of classtime and allows for a backchannel of ideas and excerpts during classtime.  Do a search on Twitter of #maety3_2009 and #maet to get a glimpse of what I am describing.

I have had a lot of conversations about Twitter throughout the months since September. Answering to eyebrow raised questions about why I use twitter and what it’s all about. To answer those questions publicly…no, it’s not just like Facebook…and no, I don’t tweet about what I am eating for breakfast. Some do, but I don’t follow them. My best description is that for me it is like a radio feed of professional development just waiting for one to tune into.  But, the only way to find out for youself is to jump in and try it!

Follow me on twitter: @saraebest

Credits: Thanks to my friend Linda Ledesma for her help in creating the mathematical formula for my title! I love how much she loves math!

I have been thinking a lot lately about the ideas of creativity and innovation.  Being an artist as well as a teacher of art, design, and photography the concept of creativity is central to my profession and daily interaction with my students. The later concept of innovation was central to the Apple Education Leadership Summit I attendened in Hong Kong in April. Since then I have been doing a lot of reading about innovative people and what it truly means to innovate. Through reading and having discussions about these two topics, an underlying theme of passion as a driving force emerged.  It seems without passion neither creativity nor innovation can occur.  A passionate emotion, thought, value, or experience kindle and provoke the fires of creativity and innovation. Without passion there lies a void of initiative that is central to both the abstraction of ideas in creative process and the courage to forge newness through innovation.

In further connecting the idea of passion to both creativity and innovation, I created a concept map using mindmeister. The map is still under construction and will evolve as my ideas about passion unfold.

Sometimes when I am teaching with my Smart Board I feel as if I am the lone personnel member in mission control at NASA.  There are so many tools and features at my fingertips I get afraid to hit the wrong button and launch something from my desktop unexpectedly, sending my students on an unplanned shuttle from learning to confusion.  Ever feel this way?

In an effort to keep things grounded and only launch those planned missions, I have been searching some sites on Smart Board tips and have found a few things I am going to try out:

Screen Shade, Spotlight, Magnifier:

Smart Gallery:

Screen Capture:

In collaborating with colleagues on starting to integrate technology, I have heard myself saying the same line several times “It’s not about the tool!”  Meaning, connecting technology-rich, engaging lessons into one’s classroom isn’t about providing a “Wow” factor experience for students.  Technology integration should start with focusing on what it is that you want to accomplish with your students.

I have had several conversations with colleagues lately about this sort an approach and they all seem to struggle with the same issue…they are teachers who truly want to provide meaningful use of technology, but don’t know where to begin.  They attend workshops on wikis, blogs, smartboards, etc…but, walk away with a sort empty Wow factor.  It’s a cool tool, but how would I actually use it in my classroom?

As an educator striving to integrate 21st century learning practices with technology into my teaching in meaningful and seamless ways, I am continually reflecting on what works with my students and what does not.  One of the biggest hurdles I faced was, where does one begin?

In reflecting on what works for me, I decided to put together a 5-step approach that helped me get started, stay focused of my goal with my students, and stick with my goal of connecting technology to meaningful learning for my students.  Below is a Voicethread outlining this 5-step approach:

5 Steps to Using Technology to Engage Learners and Enhance Teaching

If you haven’t yet watched the much talked about TED talk “Are Schools Killing Creativity” it is a must see. I first watched it over a year ago and recently watched it again. It raised some new questions and thoughts about the hierarchy of education today and how can we begin to shift 20th century thinking in schools to support 21st century skills such as creativity?

The video brought to mind a few questions…

Are schools educating through an outdated value system?
Sir Ken Robinson talks about the current hierarchy in education based on a value system put into place during the industrial revolution. Disciplines that were necessary to learn skills to be successful in the work force were given the most importance such as science, math, and humanities. It seems today, we are still educating through a system that upholds the same hierarchy, even when the workforce of today requires a completely new set of skills that aren’t fully learned through these disciplines: problem solving, collaboration, innovation, synthesis of information,…and the list goes on.  Why haven’t schools kept up?

What role does “assessment” and standardized tests play?
If what we are teaching neither keeps up with skills necessary for our students to be successful in the workforce nor does it meet their variety of learning styles, how can we be assessing the right things? We need to reassess what we place importance on and will make students successful in an ever-changing world/work place.

How do we foster creative thinking?
Before discussing how schools can foster creativity, I think it is important to point out the difference between creative thinking and critical thinking. Being an art teacher for 11 years and being a practicing artist, I have often thought about whether “creativity” can be taught or whether it is an innate quality that some individuals simply possess more than others. “Creativity” is often defined with a skill set that which describes “critical” thinking: analyzing, synthesizing, problem-solving. I find creative thinking to be more of a self directed free thinking that includes innovation, discovery, experimentation, and new application that are uniquely their own but include the processes of critical thinking. As educators we can foster creative thinking by structuring learning environments that encourage it, but I believe it comes from within the individual learner vs. an input of skills learned from the educator.

A thought-provoking video indeed, one that each time I watch brings to light the need for a major shift in the way we approach education.

I have recently read several articles on differentiation through use of technology. The various articles led me to reflection on use of technology with my students and whether or not it is a direct means to differentiation.  

We use technology in my classroom daily. However, a student’s access to technology does not automatically equal learning with technology. Learning with technology, like any educational tool, is the result of consideration for student’s various learning levels, learning styles, and the enduring understandings you wish for them to gain through a lesson. In reflecting on use of technology with my students, I have found 3 ways that I achieve differentiation…

1) Using technology to reach various learning styles:

In some cases, reaching various learning styles is a direct benefit of technology tools specifically designed to make learning easier and better for everyone.

Interactive white boards: engage visual learners, auditory learners, and bodily-kinesthetic learners when used with embedded media that is interactive and allows students to engage in manipulative activities on the board.  *Don’t have an interactive white board?  Read here to find out how you can make one for under $50…Ted Talks-Johnny Lee Wii Remote Hacks

Digital document cameras: benefit and engage all students by enlarging a live demonstration 20-30 times larger than real life. Instead of students crowding around a table trying to see a teacher demonstration, students can benefit from guided instruction from a large screen live projection while following along from their desks or work stations.  

2) Using Technology to reach varied learning levels:

In the same way that using technology does not equal learning with technology, using technology does not equal differentiation through technology. Equipping oneself as an educator with a variety of tools and literacy’s that will help students learn better and knowing which ones might be appropriate for a specific student is what makes differentiation work. The same goes for differentiation with technology.

-Pacing: Web based tools such as Moodle & Google Docs can allow students to access instruction both in and out of class to learn through them at their own pace. 

-Guided Choice: Social bookmarking tools such as Delicious are great for creating groups of resources based on tags. You can set up an account and tag specific websites based on topics you are studying in class. This can also be done through a host application such as Moodle, Google Docs, or a class website through which you provide a variety of links. Another way I provide choice is by allowing students to a choice of media when creating a reflections.  I allow them to choose from a variety of computer based applications such as Microsoft suite, iMovie, and Garage Band (Audacity is a free equivalent to Garage Band). I love the variety and creativity that comes out of these choices. 

3) Filling the teacher “tech”box:

There is much discussion about “digital natives” (Prensky, 2001) and how we as educators must teach them in their own language.  21st century learning initiatives encourage a new set of skills necessary for students to succeed which are vastly different from that of just a few decades ago when some of us might remember the first time we ever used a computer or heard of the internet. Students today are growing up having never known life without them.

To meet these needs and teach our students using tools that are part of their everyday digital world, we as educators must be filling our own toolbox of technology. There is no one size fits all to student learning. Having knowledge and familiarity with a variety of technologies and pairing them to individual students to help them learn better just might be the best form of differentiation using technology. *Please visit the website “Teach with Technology” for ideas on integrating technology into your classroom.

I am about to embark on a new and exciting implementation of using a social network for educational purposes in my photography classes. I have been thinking about ways to encourage more collaborative dialogue among my students. With so much of class time spent on learning technical aspects of camera functions and digital photo management, critical analysis of student work often takes a back seat.

In an effort to give “critique” a place in the front seat where it belongs, I plan to implement the use of a new open source application called “Elgg.” It is an application that can be uploaded to a LAN server for private social networking. Considering my students are beginning level photographers and Middle School age, using a private social network will allow them collaboration amongst peers in a private setting.

I myself am a member of 3 Ning educational networks which has connected me to educators across the globe. I had some initial reservations about the “networking” possibilities with a social network housed and accessible only to members of the school. However, I though further about my learning goals for my students, which is collaboration among their peers within the class and have decided to try Elgg out.

My implementation plan:
-Setting up the network and testing all tools students will use
-Create a timeline for Phase 1: introduction, teaching appropriate/responsible use
-Create a timeline for Phase 2: log in, basic tools, groups, pages
-Create a timeline for Phase 3: discussion, critique, reflection assignments
-Implement Phase 1 then record and reflect, adjust timeline if needed
-Implement Phase 2 then record and reflect, adjust tool “glitches,” moniter student use in and out of class, adjust timeline if needed.
-Implement Phase 3 then record and reflect, moniter student discussions, critique, reflections for content understanding and appropriate/responsible use
-Ongoing monitoring and reflection
-At the end of course: Continue use following plan, continue use with adjusted plan, or discontinue use

We’ll see how is goes! Check back for a later post on this topic in a few weeks!

I began digital portfolios with my Middle School art students this year. As is the case with any new goal of integrating technology, it has evolved a great deal from the original plan. (see blog post from 7/7/08)

I started the year with a plan to house student work on a  website I created using Google Page Creator. No sooner did I fall in love with this application then to find out that it was being replaced by Google Sites. “No big deal” I thought at first, until I investigated Google Sites and realized the layout templates are quite boxy, all look the same, and have the feel of a wiki template. Page creator allowed for a good amount of creative control, for an art teacher an attractive and dynamic feature. But, fearing starting the endeavor then having my site in Page Creator later be dropped by Google I went ahead with Google Sites and created a new class website.

Once the school year was underway and students began creating sketchbook drawings and art projects, I had them write short reflections on their work using MS Word and Powerpoint. I was very impressed with their insightful, personal, creative reflections and could not wait to post them to the class website and share with parents. Then a big reality hit me…TIME! Saving their work in formats that could not be easily uploaded to the site became time-consuming and tedious. I also realized that through creating reflections in computer based applications such as MS Word andPowerpoint I was not only adding to my workload, but I was denying my students an opportunity to connect and collaborate with an online community. My original intent was to use the site to share with parents and showcase student work. Essentially, I was seeking an “audience” for my young artists when what my students truly need to be learning is how to be artists as part of a broader “community” of artists .