#CUSTOMIZEDU

Mass Customized Learning is functional and available in schools today. If the tools are there why wouldn’t we allow our students to learn in the best way possible for them? Customizedu.net is an excellent source for those considering mass customized learning. Aside from the site being user-friendly, it is providing you with great information. Regardless of where you are with mass customized learning, they will be able to help you. I like that they include the steps needed to implement customized learning in your school. I think that the Customized Learning Classes page was the most useful. This page gives you the tools for creating a flipped classroom. This is an easy way to begin customization even if the other teachers are not on board. I do wonder about the costs of implementing customized learning into a small school. I am curious about the outward perception of what students and teachers are “doing all day” that may be taken by some community members. I am also concerned about what would happen to a student’s schedule. In the MCL scenario, students are signed up for classes/seminars at random times. Theoretically, they could be working anywhere. Unfortunately one of the most important aspects of school is that they are a place where students physically are during the day. We cannot get away from this in any situation. Students always need to be accounted for. I also read a lot about the idea that the 9-month school year is not necessary and is outdated. While that is true for much of the country, it is not true in my school. I work in a rural community. My students live on farms and they are expected to help out. Summers for my many of my students are spent farming. Mass customized learning should only be implemented if there is a need and desire for it. But I also believe that once it is tried you must be willing to give it a fair shot. Once implemented you must commit to a minimum time frame, we should not quit after one year. Sometimes you have to wait to see the benefits and success of a new program.

One-to-One: When they need proof...

The importance of technology in school is rising. It is most vital in the upper grades. These websites allow us to discover how to implement one-to-one initiatives in our schools by offering proof of effectiveness. They provide us with specific examples of success in schools, teacher support for technology in the classroom, and show us specific high-need subjects that are supported by technology in the classroom. I like that the research is available. I feel that some school patrons and community members are more likely to take the opinion of an outsider as an “expert” opinion rather than those working in their own district. In any case, it’s best to have someone corroborating your own findings—that one-to-one initiative can be successful, that technology is a necessary tool in the classroom. Some websites provide many examples of one-to-one ititatives across the country. I do think this is beneficial to selling the idea in your district. THe more that people see that this is common and helpful the more they will be willing to buy into the idea itself. I especially enjoyed this quote from the CASTLE site: "A report on one-to-one computing in the state of Indiana revealed that 100% of educators interviewed shared either observational or anecdotal evidence about the success of one-to-one (Lemke & Martin, 2004b)." I thought the connections to science and math on the National Science Foundation website were excellent. These are considered very important subjects—and very hard to find teachers for. I think that when people see how necessary technology is to math and science they will count this as another point for technology in their schools. Finally, the Department of Education is wise to publish information on the last twenty years of technology in schools. I think that this will force people to reflect on their own school experiences. Hopefully this will encourage them to see where technology has been and where it’s going. They will acknowledge the years of growth and remind them that this is not a “new” thing.

Move with the Stream

Mass-customized learning is great for motivated students. They're able to plan their own course of action. They can study the topics of their choosing. Hopefully this will lead to more student interest. The idea that a person sets their own path is a great idea. But I don’t think that students are able to do this. They still need guidance. Now I realize that using personal learning plans would still have required subject areas. But I think that students need more than that. How do they know which classes they want to take without some background information? I do not think that student will carry this over with them from middle school. Today a student asked if I would assign the third book in a series so that he could read it. (We’ve read the first two in class.) I told him he could find the book at the library. He told me that if he didn’t have a reading assignment he wouldn’t get it done. Sure, he’s motivated. But by the wrong things. He wants to read the book. Not motivated to do it. He’s motivated by my requirements/grade. He would not do well with mass customized learning because he does not have the proper motivation. Personalized learning plans also assume that students will have interests in all subject areas. Most students are only motivated to work hard in one or two classes—because they genuinely like them. I think it’s a mistake to discount the benefits of moving with the stream. I feel like most students in public school are “moving with the stream.” They are only swimming when they’re interested. Teachers are needed to keep the current moving. This is harder to accomplish in a mass customized school environment. I think the superintendent must look to the students and their level of achievement. What are the goals of families and their students in the district? There must be a strong desire for personalized learning plans in the community for them to work. This cannot solely be driven by the superintendent or school.

Technology Resources

As a school leader you must push for innovation and change. I think administrators have so many responsibilities that they need a reminder to innovate in their schools. The technology resources provided by The School Superintendent’s Association will offer school leaders perspective. And hopefully guide them towards innovation in their schools. The Office of Educational Technology, part of the Department of Education, seems to offer the most for school leaders. I like that the website helps school administrators formulate a technology plan. The website is very user friendly. This website would be the most useful for me as a school leader because it provides information on funding, services, and goal setting for districts.

Cyber-Bullying

Dealing with cyberbullying in the school can be tough. A lot of cyberbullying can take place after school hours. But the effects can show during the school day. Anytime a student does not feel safe in the school environment action needs to be taken. When looking at online resources about cyberbullying, I found Internet Safety 101 the most helpful. It had really great definitions for adults and teachers. I thought the FBI Safe Online Surfing website had great tools for the classroom. There were games that may appeal to younger students. IN our school cyberbullying is treated as bullying. Whither it happens online or in school there is a zero-tolerance policy for bullying. I think the most important concern is that students are made to feel like they can and should come forward if they are being bullied or if they see someone else being bullied. I think that this is just as, and maybe more, important that trying to prevent it. This does not mean that we should not try to prevent cyberbullying, but we will not be able to prevent it all so we need to try to create safe place for those students to tell that they or someone they know is being bullied. I think that staff and students should be taught about cyberbullying in different ways. Staff should be shown real life examples of things that have gone terribly wrong as a result of cyberbullying. Some teachers may think that it’s not a big deal. If those staff members are confronted with the real ramifications of cyberbullying maybe they will be more likely to watch for and report it. Students on the other hand need to be told about cyberbullying in the same way they are taught about other forms of bullying. They need to know the school rules and policy on this and there should be no exceptions to the rule.

1-to-1

When a school implements 1-to-1 devices the benefits to students far outweigh any barriers that a district may face. Benefits to students include: *being allowed to explore their own interests during free time. *completing or participating in class no matter where they are--I've had students FaceTime to participate in a class discussion while they were away at a 4H activity. *checking their grades at any time. *taking the responsibility of having a device ready to go for class. *having access to information in the classroom—you don’t have to reserve computer labs or library time. The biggest barriers you face (other than money): *working through the first few years when students (and their parents) will think of the device as a toy. *the illusive “same page.” Staff, community members, and administration will all have different ideas about how to best utilize the technology. And there will be meeting after meeting about how “we all need to get on the ‘same page.’” This could be about what websites should be blocked, can we use social media in the classroom, or how everyone should be going paperless—anything really. GET ON THE SAME PAGE! The “same page” does not exist. Teaching will change when everyone has a device. The most important change I have seen is about the information itself. For example, I do not worry about students memorizing dates in a history class. They can look that up on their phone--it's always with them. Instead, I am teaching them to think critically about the information they find online. Does this seem accurate? What makes it credible? Can I find this fact anywhere else? Is this a primary source? I think that the benefits of a 1-to-1 initiative outweigh the barriers. They help students—not having devices for each student can hold them back. School boards should support the endeavors of schools looking to make these changes. And it would be nice if we could all get on the “same page” with that…

Copyrights! (I stole this title.)

My school does not have an official copyright policy. Just because we do not have a policy does not mean that we do not follow copyright guidelines. (Copyright violations are a legal issue and not every legal issue is addressed in specific school rules. I think that copyright guidelines are implied in two ways in my school: 1. Student acceptable use policy, and 2. Teacher’s code of ethics. Students are held to an acceptable use policy which includes the prohibition of unethical behavior. Copyright violations would be an unethical behavior. Teachers are held to a teacher’s code of ethics which requires teachers perform duties in accordance with local, state, and federal rules and laws. Both of these seem to remove blame from the district and place it back on the offending individuals. In a blog like this I am hesitant to make concrete remarks about the use of copyrighted materials in my school. I do not wish to make sweeping statements about this subject in a public forum. Does my district follow copyright laws? My district works within the confines of the law at all times. I cannot, and will not, speak for individual teachers. I like to have vague rules and guidelines for students regarding behavior. All situations involving students are different and should be treated as such. Copyright, however, is a specific law and should be dealt with in district policies. I also think that having a policy on copyright/digital copyright is not enough. This is something that needs to be taught too. I think that copyright laws are an essential tool in American government. They are there to protect artists, visionaries, and entrepreneurs. Because of this, I think there is a way to connect its importance to all students. Music students can relate to the struggle of Prince, who for years fought for the protection of his music. And those students with goals to make money—owning their own business or creating and innovating industries will be interested to learn about the struggles between Apple and Samsung. Copyright violation can be a teachable moment for students.

Please Bring Your Own Device...Sometimes

I think many schools struggle with mobile devices in school. They could be used inappropriately, they could crowd the school’s network, or maybe they could be broken/used by another student and possibly become the school’s responsibility. There are so many variables that many schools just say no to personal devices. While these concerns are valid, I believe that the devices should be permitted in school. There should be rules and regulations as needed, but we should allow students the opportunity to use their own devices in the classroom because these are what they are using outside of the classroom. Occasionally in class I will have students use Twitter as part of an assignment. Students find it easier to use the app on their phone. They are not permitted on the school wi-fi with their phones so if they choose to use their own data while working on a school project I think they should be allowed. Students also need to submit to time and place regulations with their phones. For example, walking and using phones is not a good idea. I think this would be a good place to bring students into the conversation. If they are helping to set the guidelines for personal device use they may be more inclined to follow the rules. While I do support students using their personal devices in school I do not support BYOD (Bring Your Own Device). I think there are more negatives than positives. What one student can afford compared to another is a huge factor. Also, if some purchases their own device they can do whatever they want on it. This means that students will have access to things on their device that they may not on a school issued device. At my school, all students have an iPad with no access to the App Store—they cannot put any apps on the device. A personal device could become overloaded with whatever the student (or their family) want to put on it. This could limit space for school projects. Apps and their availability can vary between types of devices. This could interfere with a teacher’s plans. In my opinion BYOD is the same as if a teacher said bring your own book. All the books may be about World War II but there is no guarantee about what will be covered, how accurate the book will be, and if the book will be at grade level. This is not an effective way to teach a class.

Technology Policies in School

Looking at the Bellingham Public Schools website I was able to view their technology policies. Clearly, the best part of their policy was found under “unacceptable use”—participating in chain letters. Joking aside, the technology policy at Bellingham Public Schools covers EVERYTHING. I especially liked that they included staff in the rules. Most people are held to special standards when issued a device for work. But each school can be different. Teachers in my (small) school seem to enjoy a little more freedom with their devices. But the next time I get a chain letter in my school email I will suggest some more strict changes to our policy. ☺ Rutland does have an acceptable use policy in place. It does a good job being descriptive about what may fall in the spectrum of inappropriate or unethical. It does not (smartly) list the effects of a violation past restriction or removal from the network or school issued device. I do think that there could and would be additional repercussions for those violating the usage agreement. But you certainly would not want to speculate about what the punishments could be for every possible scenario. Every situation is different. Rutland also has a Distance Education policy. But it only states that this is available as an option for students. It seems no different that the policy of other districts. Rutland does not have an Internet Publishing Policy. I have noticed that other schools require parental permission before a student’s work can be published. Certainly this is important. And this is the one that, since lacking, Rutland should be the most concerned with updating. Updating technology policies is a project that needs to be an ongoing part of a school’s technology team. Technology is constantly upgrading and the change in it should lead to a change in rules and guidelines for a school. Acceptable Use Policies (AUP) is a good teaching tool to instruct students about how to best use the technology in a safe manner. To update our policies at Rutland, we should incorporate staff into acceptable use policies and develop a policy for publishing student work to the Internet. It seems like there are some classes that we should be able to assume a student’s work will be published. Students working on a newspaper should expect their work to be published. But parental permission is a good idea across the board for all students in all classes. I also think that Internet Publishing Policies should include some notion of schools having the final say in what may or may not be published. It seems like Rutland likes the idea of “less is more” in their technology policies.

Consortium for School Networking

When I first viewed the CoSN (Consortium for School Networking) website I was not certain I would be able to find any use for the information they had. It all seemed very technical. But I was able to find information very easily. The most helpful things I found were the Superintendent Self-Assessment and District Leadership Assessment forms. They both seemed like excellent tools for a school to have access too. If I was forming a technology committee in my district, I have no doubt that I would use this website to offer guidelines about what they should be working toward. The website offers clear goals of leaders and technology in a district. I think that the leadership team would be able to set out a long-term technology plan using the site. I like that they push innovation and risk-taking. I think districts should be doing this—but you need to create the environment that this is what were going to try and it might be the best thing ever or we might give it a try and have it fail. But at the very least we’re going to try it out. Here is where you need buy-in from community members and staff. They need to be supportive of this idea. The CoSN website reminds you to include other community members and teachers. Again the self-assessments are the best. If a superintendent and leadership team are going to be honest in their actions, they looked like wonderful tools to identify areas of improvement.

School Websites

Schools may use websites for a variety of reasons. They could be a good way to introduce the public to teachers. Websites could list popular (and approved) links for students. It could be used as a way to communicate with any school patron about up coming events they may be interested in attending. A website can prove very useful to its school. A website, however, puts a lot of the initiative on the seekers—the information is there, if they’re willing to go look for it. If they are willing to go looking, what should they be able to find. It seems like, after looking over various school websites, what one may find depends on the school’s respective goals. It seems as though larger districts have a more sterile atmosphere. They are “all-business,” lacking classroom pictures and athletic event scores on their home pages. Large districts, like Sioux Falls, jump right to their bus schedules and other important information. In contrast, a smaller school like Chester shows us the scores from the most recent high school games. Flandreau, some where in the middle in size, lists the Homecoming dress-up days along side a student spotlight section on the home page. Does this mean that the smaller schools are more “student driven?” The smaller schools’ websites seem to establish a more relaxed feel to them. Maybe in these small communities most patrons know the students. Parents and grandparents come to the website to see the recording of the spring concert. Or to find pictures of their student working on a science project. I think that the number of people a district like Sioux Falls is trying to help may be the reason for their more “informative” focus on their district website. Also, it seems like it’s better to avoid student photographs altogether than worry about permission for every student—especially when you are dealing with THOUSANDS. I realized that when I was looking at this collection of school websites that I thought of Sioux Falls as a different animal altogether. The workings of a district that size are going to require something different on their website than the smaller school districts in the rest of the state. The schools next in size (Brandon and Flandreau) tried to create a community atmosphere. They wanted a connection to the community—as shown in their personalized notes for administration and staff. Several of these websites had correspondence from the superintendent. I think this is a great way for them to connect with patrons. Often this is an elusive position. And I think it may help people to recognize the superintendent’s connection to the school community. Some of the schools had links to teacher webpages. (Several did not.) I like the idea that a teacher’s lesson plans are available online. It could when students miss school. Or if a parent wants to know what their student is learning about. On the other hand, I think that lesson plans on a website can be restricting to a teacher. As a teacher, you don’t know what lessons your students may need extra time on. Or maybe your students are really interested in a topic so you decide to spend a few more days on that topic to go more in-depth. When you have months worth of lesson plans it can really stop a teacher from allowing the students to control the pace based on interest or just gaining a good grasp on some material. Finally, I think that a district website can and should serve as a place to showcase student work. The College and Career Readiness Anchor Standards for Writing requires students to: “Use technology, including the Internet, to produce and publish writing and to interact and collaborate with others.” A page on a school districts website can serve as an excellent place for students to publish their work. A school website can be an asset to the district. It can be fashioned to the specific purpose of meeting each school’s goals, no matter how different the goals may be.

Technology in the classroom

Students need frequent and varied exposure to technology. They also need time to figure it out on their own. I think that students learn the most when playing around with a new or unfamiliar device. I am not of the belief that students need to have the same device and I allow students to use their phones in the classroom if that’s their preference. I also believe that students should have unlimited access to information—via the Internet. They have phones with them at all times that allow them to access the information. As educators, it is important that we teach students how to filter information to find credible sources and accurate information.