Stay Out of the Way and Let the Music Play

My blogging has dropped off the map, but I had a profound occurrence at school this week and just had to write about it.

We have a makerspace in the LMC of the intermediate (grades 5-6) building that I work in. At six different times during the day in slots known as "workshops", students can come down and interact with the different items we have in the space. This includes well-known items like littleBits and Sphero, as well as hot wheels race track design, Kerbal Space Program, and kano kits. One of my favorite technologies in our space is the MakeyMakey. If you don't know about it, this video is required viewing:

Every day, our library media specialist sets out a Chromebook and puts on the MakeyMakey.com/Piano site, then hooks up the MakeyMakey. During the workshop times, students can then use aluminum foil, copper tape, or any other products that conduct electricity (such as humans) to create inputs for the piano.

However, on Monday, the piano was switched to a website with a much fuller piano. I didn't look at it closely so I don't know how well it integrated with the MakeyMakey, but I wasn't too concerned about it as most students ignore the MakeyMakey and do other things in the space. Being one of my favorite things, it bums me out and I want more students to be creative with it (like create a realistic input for Minecraft where they literally swing a pickaxe and connect with a block to destroy a block in the game).

So on Monday, the 9:10am group came in to participate in the space. The groups are kept to around six students since many times we don't have the ability to work with them and they have to be able to operate on their own. The students come in, sign in to the LMC and choose something to do. 

And that is when this wonderful music started to play.

It sounded like the lobby of a fancy hotel took up residence in our library. Beautiful elegant melodies rang out among the quiet busyness of the space. As I looked out the glass windows of my office, I noticed that they weren't coming from the MakeyMakey interaction, but rather a girl simply using the keys of the Chromebook to play the piano.

At that point, I had a choice. As much as I believe in student agency, I often feel compelled to direct the learning, even in the makerspace. Especially since the entire reason the Chromebook is there is to facilitate the use of the MakeyMakey, I try and get students to create with it. This is the route I could have gone. Perhaps even months ago it is the route I would have gone.

But as I listened to the soothing tones, I had to tell myself to stay out of the way. After all, what is the point of the makerspace? To use specific technologies or to provide a place and the tools for kids to be creative? The makerspace isn't about using the MakeyMakey. The best decision I could have made in this moment was the decision I made - and that was to just stay out of the way and let the music play.

As workshop came to a close (they have thirty minutes), I approached the girl. After all, she had been playing for the entire half hour! I asked her how often she played piano. Her response? Only a couple of times in her general music class. 

I was floored.

Maybe this positive experience will motivate her to give an instrument a try. Maybe it will lead her to look forward to coming to the makerspace more often. Or maybe it was just a pleasant thirty minute experience that will be slowly forgotten by her.

As for me, I'll never forget it. It taught me such an important lesson. If I could have gone up to her and said "Hey, that music sounds cool, but you should really be using the MakeyMakey, let me show you" I believe that would have killed it right there. There isn't anything inherently wrong with trying to get students to try new things. But in this moment, I believe it would have been the worst thing I could have done.

We can't always stay out of the way as educators. I understand that. But if we set up conditions for something to happen, even if it isn't the thing we exactly wanted, we should let the "music play" and see where the students take it. In my experience, they will almost always go beyond our expectations.

Hattie vs. Papert - Part 1

Author's Note:  What started as a concerning week is looking like a year long (or longer) journey of discovery,research, and inner conflict. This will be at least the first post in a series where I argue with myself about John Hattie's Visible Learning Research as it contrasts with my beliefs and the work of Seymour Papert. 

Monday was one of the most stressful days to prepare for since I started in De Pere. That's right - more stressful than TEDx, preparing for board presentations, or teaching lessons in classrooms. Why?

Education is an incredibly complex machine. Research can be used to support or decry just about any strategy or methodology. Currently, as a district, we put a lot of stock in Fisher and Frey (The Gradual Release of Responsibility model) and John Hattie (Visible Learning). This research puts the focus on particular structures that classrooms must have in place, as well as an emphasis on collaborative learning and common assessments. To be clear, NONE of those things are inherently bad, or even bad at all.

Now, as a disclaimer, let me just say that I love my district. We have committed professionals trying to make education as awesome as possible for our students. That isn't the point of this blog post.

In past few years I have been enlightened by Maker Education, and more recently, the writings of Seymour Papert. I know that taking stock in simply one person's thinking is often dangerous. We want our students to back up their thinking with a variety of supports, and I think the same. After all, Papert, although highly regarded at MIT, Harvard, and any serious academic circle, doesn't receive ANY time of day at all in undergrad or schools. Hattie, on the other hand, has over 800 different studies that he has analyzed about what works in education. He also believes that the education system as a whole is doing well.

Here is where I'm concerned about overthinking it. Based on my interpretations of Hattie's work, a lot of the areas I believe strongly in and champion do NOT make an impact on student learning. Problem/project based learning, personalized learning, creativity, inquiry, team teaching, and worst of all, student control of learning. In fact, according to his research, student control of learning barely results in any achievement at all.

So here is where I am stuck, and concerned. Are the methodologies and beliefs that I consider to be paramount to education actually not going to help them become successful adults? Is the dream of self-directed learning a recipe for disaster? I want so badly to believe in Papert's work and that if we can just get his vision "right", then we can unleash incredible learning opportunities for our students. The biggest reason I still support Papert over Hattie is because what do Hattie's numbers boil down to? Achievement on standardized tests. That means so little to mean. But it means a lot more to public schools.

And yes, I said Papert over Hattie because I don't believe the two can coincide. It is almost like two paths diverging in the woods. In one route, you head down the Hattie way, and work on good things that make education as it exists better. The other route is far riskier. If we truly embrace the work of Papert and those that aim to foster constructionism, school is completely different. Students will not learn the things they've always learned. They will take wildly different paths. It is quite unlikely that any school that goes this way would perform as well as tests as they would the other path.

Ultimately, I believe that the Papert path can lead to great motivation and engagement in learning for the student. I believe it can improve the school experience for the student in an authentic way. I believe that it can result in incredibly well-adjusted adults because they grew up as children with opportunities to practice with decisions and control.

Some would say that I'm just the "tech guy" and that I shouldn't be overthinking these things. I should just do my job and work to support our teachers. However, as a "tech guy", I believe in Papert's work and that we should be using technology to let our students be creative and discover learning in their own personal way. That is the most effective use of technology there is.

Unless, of course, I'm wrong. And that is what I'm afraid of.

So Yeah, We Just Hosted a TEDx Event With Middle School Speakers...

The feeling in the room was tense. Months of planning and work coming down to this moment. As she takes the stage, Jolie is unaware of how awesome this day is about to be. The first sentence from a speaker could not have set the tone more perfectly: "Ladies - have you ever been told you couldn't do something because you are a girl?" With that, we were off and running.

TEDxDePereMiddleSchool was a TEDxYouth event planned by a large group of staff at De Pere Middle School. I happened to come up with the crazy idea, so people looked to me as the "leader". In any case, the challenge could not have been any greater:  starting in mid March, we had two months to procure 20 excellent student presenters, 5 community speakers, a venue, sponsors, and combine that all together to generate day long celebration of individuality, based upon the theme of "My Unique Contribution to the World". I wrote at length about our planning process in a previous post.

We had a few challenges to overcome to make this happen. First, we needed the venue. Thanks to our lovely sign, and the donation of two big screen TVs by local company Camera Corner, our venue was pretty much set. We had three iPad tripods and utilized the RecoLive Multicam app ($5 on the app store per device) to create some groovy multiple camera angles. For our live stream, we simply had a laptop near the front of the stage that ran on Youtube through Open Broadcast Software. From there, the fanned our chairs in rows. We had 96 seats in total. Our awesome secretaries and head custodian helped block out our 27 windows so the room could be dark like a theater.

Next, we needed volunteers. We had some student greeters, a student social media person, some student camera people, and student MCs. I have to say that if you are going to do this, get students as involved as possible! We didn't have an opportunity to really work with these students on how exactly the process was going to go until the very last week. Guess what happened? They so totally rocked! Check out our Facebook page from that day. Every single post was done by the Amazing Alyssa. She doesn't even have her own Facebook account!

Our Super Incredible Volunteers

My Library Media Specialist compadre Donna Young was sensational in helping plan the event and running it. She was in charge of presenter flow. We had to organize 36 humans, 28 of which were students, through the process. We did have a dress rehearsal on the Tuesday prior, so that helped. However, Donna was simply steady as a rock on the day of our event. I could not have done this without her. Another honorable mention was to Melissa Flucke, who helped build our schedule, procure some community presenters, reach our for sponsorship, and got use media coverage with a local TV station!

We utilized our Food Service to feed us during our three breaks and lunch. I felt that the breaks ended up being a little long by about 15 minutes. The day as a whole could have been condensed by about one or two hours, even with the amount of talks we had.  However, it was nice to have downtime between each group of speakers.

Being well planned has it's benefits. Because most things were taken care of, I was free to solve tech issues. We had one right off the bat. The microphone for our live feed was not working. While our first speaker was firing away, I was just a few feet in front of her frantically trying to solve the problem, which we did. Jolie's talk was very good, and unfortunately because of this, only the people there got to bear witness to it. Thankfully, the iPads recorded everything so it will be up on Youtube soon! In addition to that little snafu, we also had to quickly generate a new live stream after lunch. Ours must have timed out, so just minutes before our first after lunch speaker, I had to fight with the keyboard to make it happen. Then, while he was rolling, I was updating the links in a million different places. Ahh. I got quite the workout.

I can't say enough about our speakers. They made this event possible. They made this event awesome. Having the opportunity to work with so many students made my entire year. As a tech integrator, I have very few students I get to work with and know. This was such a cool opportunity to work with students over weeks to build towards something and improve skills. It was a proud moment to see them stand a deliver on their passions. Our community speakers also brought some great perspective, cool ideas, inspiring stories, and of course, the feels. There was a lot of heart and a lot of emotion. Everyone was giving their all. Everyone was sharing their unique contribution to the world with the world.

All in all, this was the most incredible experience I have ever been a part of. The amount of camaraderie that was developed between me and my colleagues could not be created out of thin air. All of us working towards the same cause, a clear cause, did wonders for our relationships. I feel like I got to know everyone so much better. 

Of course, the event doesn't end when the event ends. Each individual talk needs to be edited out and uploaded to the TEDx Youtube Page. This is where the videos will be housed forever. I am currently in that process now. Using the MultiCam app made my life a lot easier. However, because we didn't really have the infrastructure to support a sound system, the volume isn't ideal. Hopefully we can improve this if we do it again in the future.

If you are looking to do this yourself, understand that the sooner you can start the process, the better. Have a large team, and especially make sure you have enough adults and volunteers to cover everything. Who is welcoming people? Are students introducing the speakers? Who is taking pictures? Who is recording the official video? Who solves the technical problems? Who organizers the presenters? Is there a green room for presenters? How will your breaks go? Will you run all day? The evening? A weekend?

If you are reading this and want to try this yourself, feel free to reach out. I would love to help you in the process as much as I was helped when we were getting started. We didn't do everything right, but we had a unique venue and a totally authentic experience. It also underscored something very important - when students can have a choice in what they talk about and have it rooted in something they are passionate about, they can exceed expectations. These students most certainly did.

Will there be a TEDxDePereMiddleSchool in 2017? Time will tell... :)

The Journey of TEDxDePereMiddleSchool...So Far!

At the end of last school year a colleague of mine, the great and wonderful Adrianne Burns, began doing Genius Hour with one of her math classes. She had mentioned how she thought it would significantly upgrade their effort on presenting if we were to do a TEDx conference for them to showcase their projects. Thus, the idea was planted. After some conversations with my unofficial TEDx mentor, Jimmy Juliano about his involvement in the very successful TEDxLFHS, the idea was born. We would be doing a TEDx at my middle school if I had my way!

I began the year with seven distinct goals in mind. One of these was creating a TEDx event. As the year progressed, however, it seemed to drift further and further away. Other initiatives (otherwise known as my day job) pushed the idea of a TEDx aside. It seemed too big to accomplish myself, yet I was wary of bringing in other teachers and putting more on their plate. As February drew to a close, TEDx was about to go out the window.

But at that point, I decided to call a meeting of the dedicated (or crazy) educators who wanted to follow this vision with me. We discussed everything - our shortened timeline, expectations for the event, and how we would procure student speakers. Out of that lunch meeting the TEDx process starting rolling, and hasn't stopped yet. 

We introduced the idea of TEDx to our students just before our Spring break at the end of March, and they had three weeks to put together a short application that included a general topic idea and a short video to display their speaking ability and why they wanted to give a TEDx Talk. Our theme is "My Unique Contribution to the World". If anything, it is a celebration of individuality for the 20 students who have been selected. During this time, we also began reaching out to members of the local community to fill five potential slots we had in mind for them. As of writing, we are at four and still searching for one more inspiring member to share their idea worth spreading!

The interest from students surpassed our expectations! Even with the short time frame, we had 27 different submissions. Because some students proposed in pairs, that means nearly 40 students were involved in the process. As mentioned above. we were limited to accepting 20 students due to time and schedule constraints, and we had to make some tough cuts. 

So here we are. We have students. We have community members. We have one month. May 27th is fast approaching and we have a lot of work left to do. After all, we want this event to be an amazing experience. Very few middle schools have run a TEDx event, but the hope is it will not feel like a middle school event at all.

What's next for our team? Most important, we have to coach and mentor the students to make their talks professional quality and TED worthy. The day of schedule has to be determined, and we need to figure out just how many volunteers we'll need. In addition, we want to feed the people who attend, so that is a task and a half to accomplish. Speaking of attendees, we can only have 100. Promoting this event to get to that number will be important, but designing an event that keeps them there for an entire Friday will be another task entirely!

Our social media pages and website continue to need work. I am fairly comfortable with my tech skills, but trying to build those out hasn't been easy and I am still not happy with their look.

We have a sign in the works. Our tech ed teacher built a small stage. To show how big this is getting, we even have our secretaries getting involved to make curtains to cover the 27 windows in our library media center so we can get as close to a theater setting as possible.

We have nearly 20 staff members involved in planning this event, with a potential addition of 5-10 student volunteers. 

And best of all, any purchases right now are currently being funded by the Bank of Josh. My principal is working hard on funding and partnerships, but we're limited on just how much we can do if we don't find another source besides my wallet. However, I am committed to making this event as awesome as possible and I will continue to do what it takes to make it happen.

In the end, it really comes down to giving our students an opportunity to share their voices, their passions, and themselves with the world. We might only have 100 people in the room, but the event will be live streamed and recorded forever. This is something they can look back on and be proud of. They can use this as they apply for competitive organizations, colleges, and careers. This event is a way to showing students that we want to provide them opportunities that transcend academics but incorporate all of those skills they are learning in their classes.

TEDxDePereMiddleSchool is going to be amazing. With amazing student involvement and amazing staff involvement, it can't help but be that. Hopefully you'll get a chance to join in, whether physically or virtually. And maybe, just maybe, you'll be crazy enough to try and make this happen where you are.

Adventures in Personalizing Professional Development, Act 1

Whew...what a month!

In fact, to give you an idea of how crazy February was, I haven't gotten around to writing this blog post for nearly two weeks!

Back in December, I attended the TIES conference in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It was incredible. This was where I finally put the pieces together for something I wanted to try, as it related to Professional Development at my school. The catalyst? A great session on gamifying PD by Dr. Anthony VonBank. He spoke on how he tried a "March Madness" tech challenge with his teachers. You can see his wonderful slides here.

This, combined with hearing about the Gurnee district wide Tech Trek, I was equipped to go to the principals in my 5-6 and 7-8 buildings and propose a plan for February. That month was chosen due to a lack of days off, a well-placed late start at the end of the month, and the overall drag February is on everyone's psyche.

As February began, we put together a website, with challenges, teams, points, and prizes. Everyone was in the game, including aides and office staff. You can see our Fired Up for February Challenge here. I had a little fun with graphics and I also built a mail merge using formMule into our submission form so that the staff would get fun messages as a confirmation for their submissions:

Philosoraptor is always good for a laugh

The last piece, which was the biggest part for me, was that if teachers were going to invest their time in this, we needed to provide some rewards. In the future, ideally, we would great a progression or threshold in which all teachers could earn a reward if they surpassed the threshold. We settled on a compromise of top three rewards for individuals and teams at both buildings. Even better - both of our admin included prizes for individuals of "subbing" for that teacher's class. Awesomesauce.

When February launched, I was incredibly nervous. Would people give it a try? Would it make sense? Would this even have an impact? Needless to say, I was floored.  Over 70% of the staff involved (nearly 130) contributed something for the challenge. Keep in mind about 5% or less had attended one of our 14 after school sessions offered in the Fall. 

Our challenges asked teachers to reflect on their tech usage and look at it through the lens of SAMR (if you aren't familiar with it, you can learn more here). Here was the break down on what people submitted for:

The best part of this entire graph (the point breakouts aren't too surprising) is the large amount (one in every five submission) of leadership points. I wanted to weigh this heavily because I really wanted people to start branching out. Attend edcamps. Participate in Twitter chats. Share with staff. It is safe to say I am more than happy with the amount of teacher leadership I was able to witness. In the end, that can only benefit kids.

In total, there were almost 1000 submissions during the month of February of different things teachers were doing with technology. Since my initial focus was on the tasks being "new" things the teachers were trying, several more that are already integrating a lot didn't submit things they were doing (something to work on the future to make it more equitable). In any case, it was an incredible step forward for our staff.

You can see how I feel about it. But the big question is, how did the staff feel?  To find out, I surveyed the staff. 55 responded, giving me a fairly solid statistical significance. Here are some takeaways.

1.  This beats regular professional development. People crave choice. Edcamps are awesome and very successful. Twitter could be the best PD out there. Letting people choose what and when they learn is powerful. (For more ideas, I highly recommend purchasing "PersonalizedPD" by the Bretzmann Group):

2.  Teachers want to do this again. I believe the collaborative and competitive aspects, combined with the rewards for the efforts of teachers and the way this made our culture fun around technology, made this something that teachers, for the most part, enjoyed:

3.  Our late start format might be onto something. In late January, I had the privilege of being involved in the first ever Tundra Ed Tech Tool Slam.  The premise was simple - 10 presenters would demo a tech tool for 5 minutes. Then, there would be an hour for collaboration and deeper conversations. It was AWESOME. So, I modeled our February 24th late start after this. We were able to combine both of our buildings, and we had 11 teachers/teacher groups willing to share. Then, after that, we did five rounds of "Speed Dating" where teachers could rotate tables and have deeper discussions about the tools and strategies. To sum it up, I hear the same message from many teachers: "I've been in this district a long time. This was the best PD day we've ever had"

4.  We don't do enough.  We don't provide enough opportunities to learn in a variety of ways. We don't provide enough technology devices. Clearly, this was a positive experience, but several teachers commented that they don't want to commit much to tech integration when they know they can't have devices every day. While I still believe it is important, I can't fault people for feeling that way.

5.  Flipped learning is just one piece of the pie.  Like with anything personalized, everyone has different likes and interests. Professional development is no different. My favorite part of this graphic, however, is the number of teachers who said they prefer after school sessions. The amount if 11. Only 8 teachers/staff from my two buildings attended one of the 14 after school sessions offered in the fall. I guess I'm not sure what to take from that. Bad timing I suppose.

A lot more feedback is contained on the form. I am reserving the right to craft another post to include a few more graphs and a lot more specific comments from my colleagues.

What we achieved in February could be the start of something incredible. Hopefully, we can expand this so that the other 4 schools in our district can also take part. Perhaps more important, I hope we can make it part of what we do. Instead of being contained to a single month, I'd like to see a longer term "challenge" in which teachers can earn valuable rewards, like a period or two covered. I would also like to build in a progression, so teachers can do down different strands and build skills in a specific category.

If you have any say at all in the professional development in your schools or districts, I truly believe you should try something like that. You can certainly contact me and I'd be willing to help however I can to assist you in implementing this type of PD for your schools.

Thanks Zaption for Sponsoring #edcampGB 2015!

If you've ever had an opportunity to experience the great professional development that is edcamp, then you need you also thank the multitude of companies that offer their resources and support to make these events happen.

EdcampGB (Green Bay) 2015 was blessed with many sponsorships. One of the great edtech companies supporting us this year is Zaption!

If you aren't familiar with Zaption, they are an online tool that can take videos to the next level by allowing you to add videos, pictures, drawings, and questions that need a response. The videos can be trimmed, and you can import them from a ton of different websites:

If you want to add any of the additional features I mentioned above somewhere in the video, you can do so by simply clicking and dragging the icons, and pulling them over the video when it is stopped at the point you want it to be.  It will appear on the timeline below the video where it will appear. Certain features, like the response, require an answer before the video will continue:

After you've added all of your wonderful goodies and trimmed your video, you can publish this "tour" for use with the world! One of the publishing options is to share it directly to Google Classroom. Talk about saving time and being efficient!

 You can even embed it on websites. My example is below: (NOTE - the embedding feature was causing my blog to jump, so I took it off)

www.zaption.com/tours/5632371384ce4c4479d40600

Zaption is simple to use and provides some great options to take videos to the next level.  If you are interesting in flipping your class, or you just want to get better formative assessment out of videos you have students watch, Zaption is a must use tool!

Hold Me To It

It has been a crazy start to the year.  In the midst of all of this, I've developed seven goals I would like to accomplish this year.  All I ask is you help hold me to it.

Here are the goals I've developed. They are a mix of personal and professional goals which aim to improve my school, upgrade the abilities of my colleagues, students, and myself, and improve my well-being:

It is a long year, and it is easy to get dragged down by minutiae That is why, in my mind, it is crucial that I have clear, stated goals. Anything worth accomplishing was never accomplished alone.  I'll need all the help I can get, all the support I can get, and all the accountability I can get. By publicly stating my goals, everyone is aware of what I am working towards.  This puts the kind of pressure on me that I need!

Reaching all of these goals isn't impossible.  They all require slightly different approaches, different timelines, and different levels of support. But, they won't get done if I don't work hard to accomplish them, for my students, my colleague, my school, and myself.

All I ask is that you help hold me to it.

Oreos, Late Night Runs, and The Importance of Being Driven

Tonight, in a moment of weakness. I ate an Oreo.  Then another.  In total, I ate 6 Oreos.  Now it may not seem like many, but calorie wise, that is a 420 calorie hit at a time when I should be asleep.  Now, to many people, that may not be a big deal, but let me provide a short backstory.

Nightmare Fuel

Back in January of 2011, while I was student teaching, I suddenly realized, while eating a gigantic bag of Reese's Pieces, that I really needed to stop. I took that moment to weigh myself, and was horrified to see I weighed 242.  Only a few years prior to this, I was in the 180s and 190s and totally happy. So, I made a point to restrict my eating.  I didn't add a whole lot of exercise, but as I was student teaching, I was up and moving most of the day anyways.

By the following Spring, I had managed to get down to 195. I was excited, happy, and ultimately, in a place that I was okay with. However, if you will notice above, there wasn't really any exercise routine in place, and honestly, getting down to that weight was a "victory" and, after accomplishing that, quit focusing on the things that made the diet successful.

Fast forward a few years to late December, 2014.  After eating a big breakfast buffet, my wife and I decided to have Mexican for lunch.  Afterwards, I can remember feeling the same explosive feeling in my stomach like I couldn't possibly hold anymore, and that sensation that I had lost all control over my weight.

So I made a commitment to start anew. However, this time it was different. Later that week, I had dinner with my parents, aunt and uncle, sister, brother and sister in law.  That night, we hatched a plan to do a family "Biggest Loser" competition.  My wife joined in, and soon, we were off to the races.  After a week of no pop, cutbacks to eating, I weighed in for the first time at 223.  

The competitive side to things always kept me focused, and, in the ultimate geeky move, I actually kept a spreadsheet to track where I could end up if I kept on the same calorie in/calorie out schedule.  But, the real turning point came in the form of the weekly challenges we had in our competition.  No pop week (I went two months without any).  Drink half your body weight in ounces of water per day week.  Exercise at least 30 minutes 3 days a week. No fast food.  These were key things, because, while I didn't meet every challenge, they forced me to make LIFESTYLE changes, not just eating changes. 

Somewhere along the way, I started using a pedometer to track my workouts.  As I tinkered with the math on my spreadsheets, I settled on a number of calories burned that would allow me to eat a certain amount but still burn at least a couple pounds a week.  This was really the turning point, because now, the obsessive compulsive person in me could not only track what I was eating through looking at plenty of nutrition labels, but now I could track what I was burning.

And thus, for a bulk of the competition, I was looking to get my pedometer to read "1000 calories burned" every day.  Thankfully, my job allowed me to keep moving and I did a lot of standing, walking, and walking in place around the house, as well as the Wii Fit.  Recently, I even added running to my repertoire and have competed in a couple of races.

So that brings us to now.  This morning, after a pretty up and down summer with A LOT of eating, I weighed in at 184. Tonight, I went outside and ran for about 15 minutes. I couldn't come to grips with the fact that I would just eat those Oreos and go to sleep. I empowered myself to take action.  It might be too obsessive, but that works for me. Deep inside, my biggest fear is waking up one day, and seeing myself back at those heavy weights again.  It drives me to keep thinking about the calories and keep focusing on exercising.

This can be applied to so many things in life. Having a chip on my shoulder about events that have happened in the past is part of what makes me the person and educator I am.  Whether it is helping to educate the next generation, helping teachers, being a good husband, or being healthy, it is crucial to always be thinking about what is driving me. What is the point?  Because if there isn't a point, then we're all working pretty hard for nothing.

As for me, I know what I am working for, and it is that drive that keeps me going.

Having Faith Vs. Being a Skeptic

Cholesterol is bad for you, and then it isn't.

Research says vaccines might cause autism, and then it turns out the doctor was a fraud.

There are countless situations in life like this, where things are generally accepted, and then the next day, someone else comes along and disproves that notion.  While I was out running last night, I really got to thinking about the baskets some of us are putting all of our eggs in.

In teaching, many of us are so convicted in what is best for kids.  Less or no homework. Student centered environments. Technology rich activities. Project based learning.  In some cases, freedom to explore, like Genius Hour. There might not be any research that supports some of these things but we feel it is right and take it on that feeling and faith that doing these things will be better for our kids in the long run. In fact, I tend to agree more with the Sudbury and Montessori models of schooling than the traditional models of our public schools.

But what if Genius Hour becomes the next Pluto? What if someone somewhere researches it and determines that actually, it hurts kids and they are worse off for the future? Would we still be as convicted towards that as before, or would we drop it altogether?

For instance - a lot of articles have come out recently saying that kids' retain more when they handwrite, as oppose to type. Even some teachers back this up, saying their students have done poorly on assessments when they type things like sight words, as opposed to writing them out.  I still believe in doing things electronically, even in the face of that. Is that blind faith of mine hurting students? Should that really be something I continue to support?

It's not like there aren't positives to more classical teaching methods. But, because I don't prescribe to them and don't like them myself, I don't support them.  Yet, in the end, research may end up supporting those as being better for kids than the horses I am backing, like flipped learning or the Maker movement.

I don't have a great answer here, even though I wish I did. I'll continue to be passionate about revolutionizing our schools and classrooms, and being innovative with tools and strategies to make school a place that kids enjoy being for more than lunch, recess, and friends. Even in the face of little to no research that supports these practices, I feel as convicted about doing this as anything in my life.  The question is:  am I putting my faith in the right things?  I may never know...

In the end, what are the things that matter?  Is it about the way we teach, or the fact that we are working hard to provide great learning experiences and opportunities for students? Should it really be of concern which method is "better"? Maybe it should be.  We talk a lot in education about preparing students for the future with little clue as to how to most effectively do that.

So, when it comes to why I put my hopes and energy into the teaching movements and strategies I do, the biggest reason is that I believe they do prepare students better for the future we have no understanding of. My only wish is that someday, somehow, I can see some sort of proof that I'm on the right side.

Truth be told, that will probably never happen. And that's okay. I'd rather put my faith in things that give me reason to believe that life can be great for everyone.

Building an Amazing Race Activity!

A lot of people have been asking me about an activity I have used called "The Amazing Race".  I've used the strategy at two professional learning sessions and an Edcamp, and it has been very successful all three times. Therefore, I'd like to continue spreading the love of what I feel is a worth while activity design for a multitude of uses.

First though - full disclosure - the Amazing Race style of content acquisition/discovery was NOT my idea. I learned about it at the Google Teacher Academy in Mountain View in 2014.  However, after creating my own, I have a better handle on the design that could potentially go into creating one of these.

The idea of the Amazing Race activity is to get participants owning the learning and exploring in a collaborative and competitive environment.  You might think it is similar to a webquest - I find it to be a vast improvement.  In my set up, the challenges are all points on a map. Students are giving a link to the first challenge, and upon finishing, fill out a form to receive the link to their next challenge.  The following goes into more detail on the planning and thought process side of things.

Step One:  Use Google MyMaps.
I don't know what it is about Maps, but something about them is just incredibly engaging. You could technically do an activity like this without it, but I'm not sure it would hold the same appeal.  My Maps gives you a lot of flexibility in putting clues in different places on a map.  This would be very natural for social studies and geography classes to utilize this tool, but I could see any class use this as a way to revamp the way content is acquired.

Step Two:  Start a planning document.
This is a necessity.  If you are going to have students or participants going to multiple places and filling out multiple forms (as I have), then you are going to have to keep yourself organized. I highly suggest creating a Google Doc with the links for each step.  Click here for an example.

Step Three:  Determine what you want to have students/participants do
An Amazing Race style activity fits perfectly in the flipped classroom. While it isn't the most time friendly of flipped classroom methods, it certainly can be one of the most engaging.  In the above example planning doc, the goal was to have teams of people who haven't really worked together collaborate, and eventually gain some comfort with MyMaps.  I have also done it where participants learn a bunch of different skills. The competitive nature of the "race" helps all participants take it seriously and give it their all. Here is the planning document for an Amazing Race session I ran where participants gained experience with Google Classroom, Kaizena, Flubaroo, and Plickers.

Step Four:  Think about time
In both cases I ran this, I had an hour, in which I also wanted to have some time for reflection.  Both times, it was about the right amount of time. I wish I could offer some guideline in figuring out how long these could take, but ultimately, it depends on the audience and what you'll have them do.  The best piece of advice I can give is to make sure your challenges are chunked in small pieces so participants, at least at the beginning, can feel success and, depending on how quickly they move through the race, get key information and learning regardless of how far they make it.

Step Five:  Consider tutorials
In order to better help the variety of participants I had in a technology training session, I incorporated visual directions on each challenge that essentially walked the participant through exactly what they should do. While there are some cases where you might not want to do that level of detail (for instance, if this is some kind of assessment review), I found it to help sell participants on the face that I wasn't direct instructing them on how to do some of the tech skills.

Step Six: Test it out
Have a friend or colleague go through your Amazing Race and ensure that all the links work correctly and that the directions make sense.

Step Seven:  Unleash and Have Fun!
I guarantee that the day(s) that you run this activity in your class will be intense and enjoyable for everyone.  Designed correctly, and you'll be giving students an opportunity to really experience the "4 C's" in a more authentic way as well as providing a memorable experience that will not only allow them to take more ownership over the learning, but can be differentiated because of the flexibility within the directions.

If you are interested in doing an activity like this but want a little more help, you can reach out to me at mrgfactoftheday@gmail.com, +Josh Gauthier on Google Plus, or @mrgfactoftheday on Twitter. Truly, I believe this could be an "amazing" experience for your class. Looking forward to hearing about how you'll use it!

A Whole New Classroom - #techeducator Episode 81 Podcast Recap

The #techeducator podcast returned after a week away enjoying the Super Bowl, and was it ever an action packed show!  Google Classroom was the topic, and not only did we have some great demos, but we also had incredible guests, including Google Guru Alice Keeler and Classroom Product Manager Jen Holland.  Featuring some insight into the design of Classroom, as well as solid advice on ways to utilize Classroom, this show is sure to get you fired up to give Classroom a try. Click here to see the show!

Next week, #techeducator dives into the world of iBooks.  Join us at 7pmEST/6pmCST for another great episode of the podcast!

The Educational Impact of Twitter - #Techeducator Podcast Episode 80 Recap

This past Sunday, the #techeducator podcast had on special guest Susan Bearden (@s_bearden) to talk all about how educators can leverage Twitter. With a balanced panel of seasoned Twitter users, a lot of tips and advice were shared to help teachers who may be new, a veteran to Twitter, or somewhere in the middle. For those interested in learning more about how to use Twitter, please check out the podcast here as well as Susan's "Tweech Me App" here: http://crescerance.com/tweechme/

Next Sunday, the #techeducator podcast rests while we all enjoy the Super Bowl.  We will resume on Sunday, February 8th at 7pm/6CST with a conversation all about Google Classroom. Rumor has it, superstar educator Alice Keeler will join us, as well as Classroom project manager Jen Holland! Hope to "see" you there!

Safely Searching with Google - #Techeducator Podcast Episode 79 Recap

This past Sunday, the TechEducator podcast was all about ways that you can use Google for better research.  Throughout the show, we talked about simple things like using search operators to find better results, or searching with an image.  Other topics demoed included Google Scholar and the Google a Day game.  Essentially, the idea behind the show is that students are using Google, so why fight it? Let's educate them to get the most out of it!

Next week, the podcast returns to its regularly scheduled time of 7EST/6CST. We'll have a special guest, Susan Bearden, as well delve into the big world of building a PLN with Twitter!

Getting Back to the Classroom

I've asked myself this question a thousand times this year - if you love the classroom so much, than why did you move to a tech integrator role?

The answer is never as simple as the question as makes it, as a variety of factors led to that. But, most important, I felt that given my strengths and passions, that role was the best for me to help the most kids. After half a year of doing this, I can honestly say that was the correct decision.

Even though many days are filled with a lot of behind the scenes stuff, such as configuring Infinite Campus settings, solving weird issues like Tech Support-lite, or creating tutorials, I cherish the moments when I get to be in a classroom with kids.  A lot of what I do will impact kids eventually, as teachers learn to be more innovative with technology, they can offer students a better learning experience.  That is a win for everybody. But interacting with the students and running a classroom is what it's all about!

So today, as I wrapped up my 4th class teaching about computer science and genetics to 7th graders, I left with such a great feeling. I don't think it was the best lesson I've ever taught. I certainly presented more than I like to, and didn't give the students nearly enough time to be hands on or reflect on what it is they learned. Ultimately, however, I had an opportunity to utilize some new learning (crafting learning targets) while getting the students excited about a topic they rarely receive exposure to.

And that is really why I left today feeling great. This was a short lesson, 40 minutes.  We didn't have much time to get in-depth on anything. But the win wasn't whether or not they learned a lot then, the win is the excitement and interest the students had in the topic. I gave them an example of how scientists worked with programmers to create a game called Fold-It which allowed users from anywhere to fold proteins in an effort to solve the mystery of their true shape.  I couldn't explain how it worked, but in one particular instance, gamers playing this game solved a problem in 3 weeks that scientists were perplexed by for decades. To see students' eyes light up to think of how gaming can actually make a difference in the world was just so cool.  I know that not every student is going to go home and totally embrace this, but the feeling was that some will. Some will take my tiny lesson and run with it.

I have a few more in-class lessons lined up in the near future, and am really looking to step up my lobbying efforts. Being in contact with students directly is what helps keep me sharp, and understanding what the students need and what they are interested in.  In addition, the freedom of being a tech integrator provides me the opportunity to get into a wide variety of classes in a wide variety of subjects, far expanding my skills and abilities beyond what I gained as a Business Education teacher. My goal remains to provide students the best, most enjoyable education possible, and my hope is that every time I enter a classroom, both the teacher and the students are excited for what is about to happen.

Sure, some of my colleagues are still shocked when I tell them I'm not really tech support, or that I'd help them plan a lesson and teach with them.  Slowly but surely, the integration part of my job that I am so passionate about is beginning to have a bigger role. I'll never get away from the doldrums of administrative tasks, or the teacher to teacher training that is so crucial. After all, if I really am successful at my job, I'd make myself obsolete because the teachers wouldn't need me!  Ultimately, though, I'm in it for the kids and will do whatever I can to make our school a great place for them. For me, getting back to the classroom is one of the best ways I can serve both the students and the teachers.

Here's hoping for a lot more of that in the second semester!

Authentic Student Writing with KidBlog! - #TechEducator Podcast Episode #78 Recap

The TechEducator Podcast was back in action with their first episode of 2015 this past Sunday! The focus:  Kidblog.Org - how to get started and make the best use of it.  As luck would have it, Kidblog (@KidblogOrg on Twitter) is currently on the tail end of a major revamp, and their website is looking beautiful.  The podcast went through everything from setting up your first class to writing a post to sidebar widgets.  It truly was a great show highlighting an awesome tool for authentic student writing.

Check out Episode 78, and don't forget to catch the TechEducator Podcast every Sunday night at 7EST/6CST! Next week we discuss safe searching and researching skills with Google.

Review: C-jump Computer Programming Board Game

Review:  C-jump Computer Programming Board Game

A while back, someone who’s name escapes me mentioned there was a board game that could be used to teach some basic programming concepts. I scoffed at it initially, with my own knowledge of programming limited, it certainly couldn’t be done with a board game.

As my experience has increased and knowing what I know about teaching kids to code, exposure is everything. The expectation shouldn’t be that students jump into coding with both feet and begin writing loops and variables in C++.  The goal is to lay the bread crumbs in the hopes that they’ll find it enjoyable or seek more out on their own in the future.  This is where c-jump succeeds.

The goal of the game is to use terminology and syntax similar to languages such as C++ and Java to drive the gameplay and reach the end. It works like a normal turn-based, die-rolling board game, with the added element of commands to obey on most squares.  For instance, if a spot says “x+1” you would add one to the roll and move that many spaces.

The directions that came with the board game were decent.  They covered the spots you would land on.  However, upon replaying the game, we did run into an issue that we were actually playing the game incorrectly. For the ifs and loops, we were only supposed to react to those if we landed on the spot, instead of during a move. Thankfully, the c-jump website cleared this up for us.

I played the game for the first time with two eighth-grade students, both female. They seemed to get into and have fun.  Probably the most encouraging thing to me is that after a few turns, we didn’t need to consult the directions on some of the landing spaces because they got it and it made sense to them.  They also picked up the variable “x” pretty quickly and were able to calculate the additional spaces to move on the roll without struggle.

When talking to the students after the game, they indicated they enjoyed it, and also learned the words “increment” and “decrement”.  However, at least after one play through, the programming logic didn’t seem to be something they understood.  Part of this was due to the fact that the game isn’t actually a program that you could run.  In that regard, you aren’t so much dissecting code of a working program, but rather repeating the same types of programming syntax over and over again.  It would be cool, and possibly more useful, if the code on the board game was a working program (NOTE: The website does refer to this game as being based off the code of a working program). However, that would likely include too many advanced features that would detract from the enjoyable experience of the board game.

Some interesting things that came out: I always took the == as a given for just being equal. However, the students didn’t quite understand why it had to be two equal signs as opposed to one. With my basic background, I know that using = usually declares a variable, but did not explain it to them, and if a teacher is utilizing this board game with no prior experience, they will likely miss out on that detail as well.  The students also saw the while loops as an enemy to avoid.  I thought this was funny, because loops are an integral part of making a program work.  Perhaps somewhere in the directions, or on the board, it could be explained how loops are actually beneficial. I’m not sure students are left with that impression when playing.

The second time I played through this, I was with my brother in law who knows a bit of programming. He helped explain to me some of the syntax and also helped do some double checking of the game play with the c-jump website.  We played a few times, really enjoying it in both cases.  That game is fun as it is easy enough to understand but complex enough that there is a bit of a challenge. A good combination of both.

In my two gameplay cases, the game was well received and enjoyed. The goal of the creator, Igor Kholodov, was to make a game that took the intimidation out of beginning to learn code.  He certainly succeeded. The students were pretty fearless once they got in, and actually were excited to give it a try.  The concept was interesting to them and got them exposure to programming that they may not have otherwise received in any other format.  As someone who is passionate about getting more students to try coding at a minimal level, I would highly recommend this game. It is affordable, has great replay value, and lays those breadcrumbs that can lead to connections later on for kids to continue down a path of computer science.

To check out C-jump and purchase it, head here: www.c-jump.com/pagebuy03.html

(NOTE:  Special thanks to Igor and C-jump for allowing me to review their product.  It was a joy to play and experience!).

A Clean SLATE - Lessons in Starting Over from #SLATE2014

The room is blank. I needed something to match the title

I just returned home today from a few days at a large technology in education conference in Wisconsin, known as SLATE, or School Leaders Advancing Technology in Education.  This was my third year attending, and it is interesting to see how things have changed for me over that time period.

To start with - the biggest reason I attended this year was due to having a presentation proposal accepted. Not only was it accepted, but it was a pre-con, which is a 2-hour session prior to the main event. My topic was on coding and you can check out my slides here. The session itself went well, and as usual, I feel like I learn more than the attendees when I present.  It is pretty apparent the things that work and the things that don't work, so I just need to bring a lot more energy and get people doing and moving more.  But, this post isn't about that, so I digress...

The opening keynote, Scott Mcleod, inspired me.  I was set on fire and ready to go, even though his presentation wasn't as well received by everyone.  I was hoping to keep that energy going.

However, my struggle this year with SLATE was that I had a challenging time finding sessions that really met my needs.  Sure, there were lots of topics that were interesting to me, but ultimately I wasn't learning anything new, or more importantly, wasn't being inspired.

See, the thing for me that I am over are the tech tool dumps. I have nothing personal against them, and they are certainly valuable for many people, but for me, that doesn't help me grow where I'm at right now. The other struggle is when I find a session that sounds interesting, but then ends up being a lot of theoretical stuff without practical examples of how to utilize what is being presented on. What helps me grow are sessions like the one Dale van Keuren had, where he was energetic, giving examples and reasons for why he did what he did with personalized PD at his school. He really helped connect the dots on some struggles that I'm having and suggested solutions for those.

Pictured above:  one awesome dude

After his session we had lunch, expo center time, then session 2. Because I was busy networking, I was late getting to the room of the one I wanted to get to, so it was overflowed into the hallway. It was about a 1:1 path and I was really interested, since I want to move my school that direction. However, I couldn't really hear them, and didn't have any links to follow along, so I stayed as long as I could and then left. I gathered a few notes for my reference, but ultimately didn't leave feeling ready to roll, nor did I have the opportunity to talk to them afterwards like I always do when I'm really curious.

The real reason I was late - my fixation with the hashtag lamp!

The other two sessions were decent. One was on Digital Book Clubs with Matt Renwick - very humble guy with big ideas and an even bigger heart for kids. The other was the way one school does their weekly announcements. Ultimately, I learned a few new things I could potentially use down the road, but nothing that really impacts what I do now, although I did enjoy both presentations.

The best session of the entire conference happened that night. No, it wasn't a concurrent session, it was a brew pub hangout session until past midnight with Jason Bretzmann, Kenny Bosch, and Mr. #Wischat himself, John Gunnell. These two brilliant educators had so much insight and ideas to share that I wanted to run back to my school and try them immediately.  I loved Kenny's approach of asking what part of a teacher's day they hate most and how I can help them get rid of it (I've heard the approach before but appreciated how he phrased it).  We also talked about idea sharing and successful personalized PD and flipped classrooms and toast. It was truly a great time.

Jason and Kenny - the pride of Muskego

Wednesday brought a couple more sessions, my favorite being Joe Sanfellipo and Melissa Emler jacking up the crowd to #gocrickets and really hammering home not just why we need to share our story, but how we can do it efficiently and work for us (such as meeting Danielson domains).  Honestly, this was the most fired up I've ever seen presenters in my life. The passion was flowing and it is contagious. I can only hope to be that passionate when I present and is always something to strive for. Thanks Joe and Melissa!

So, after gathering my thoughts and trying to get them down before I left, I really am left with a lot of things to ruminate.  The combination of a couple key sessions and the late night conversations helped me get what I needed from this.  Then again, for the sessions I did not get a lot out of, maybe I should have taken this advice from David Theriault.  Next time man! Thanks should also be given for my former colleagues from Denmark School District, who ate dinner with me both nights. It was a ton of fun getting to catch up and keep the friendships alive.

Probably the biggest takeaway from SLATE, synthesizing my thoughts from all the sessions, is how I could be doing things so much more effectively. What I really need to do is clean the SLATE and start over. Start over with my approach as a tech integrator. Start over when I think about how to move my school 1:1.  Start over when discussing technology professional development and including more key stakeholders (thanks for the push, Corey Hansen!). Start over when planning how to run a workshop or conference session. I can't stay stuck in the old paradigms of how things have typically been done.  Sometimes, to move forward, you have to kill a few sacred cows along the way. Not everyone will like it, and it will be hard work, but anything worthwhile is. Time to get back that sense of urgency. Our kids need us to be better yesterday, so we have no time to waste. Let's clean the SLATE, start over, and move forward to where we know we need to go.

Sorry Bessie, your days are numbered