Comments on: Advocating for more Transparency

By: Dean Shareski

Dean Shareski — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 02:23:40 +0000

@John I think so. If you mean the one on #2 just north of Assiniboia, then yes it is. Dean Shareskis last blog post..EdTech Posse 5.4 Grumpy Old Digital Residents

By: Saskboy

Saskboy — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 00:15:42 +0000

Is that the building that used to be by the meats place at Vantage? Saskboys last blog post..TLt Conference - Leaders Forum - LIVEBLOG

By: Transparency and Professional Learning « Plugged-In Teacher

Transparency and Professional Learning « Plugged-In Teacher — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 20:46:10 +0000

[...] nudge I needed to get this place going came in the form of a very interesting post on Dean Shareski’s blog “Ideas and Thoughts from an EdTech” on professional [...]

By: Alan Stange

Alan Stange — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 00:14:05 +0000

*Offers a strangled cheer and slinks back into the corner.

By: Lisa Huff

Lisa Huff — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 13:46:49 +0000

For me, the question is HOW do we DEMAND our leaders to actively involve themselves in this online world of learning. I am attempting to establish small teams of learning communities at my own school, each team including an administrator. My vision is that members will stay with the team for a three-year cycle. Year one we will focus on teacher (and administrator) as learner, requiring teachers to keep a blog where they regularly showcase their reading and reflection and where they house a professional portfolio. Year two will focus on teacher as designer, having teachers design inquiry- or project-based units to use with their students. They will then showcase these units in a "21st Century Learning Showcase" open to the public. Year three will focus on teacher as collaborator, having them link their students, and in essence themselves, with people beyond our school walls. I know this is a worthwhile goal, and I believe, a workable plan. But, in the end, HOW will I DEMAND that the administrators actually blog regularly and produce a portfolio? Fear, I think, is our biggest enemy. We're asking people to make their learning, their thinking, their writing transparent. That's scary for many, for others downright threatening. How do we get them past their fear so that they're willing to engage in the global conversation, so that they're willing to risk others evaluating their work? Lisa Huffs last blog post..Head2Head: Teaching Students to Argue the Right Way

By: Ira Socol

Ira Socol — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 18:33:18 +0000

In the credentialist society embraced by “the west” since The Reformation leaders expect people to follow them simply because they have been declared “leaders” by persons previously declared “leaders” who have, in turn… This has created an immovable elite – an “elect” as Calvin would have put it – which stabilized society (the goal) by creating a massive, and permanent, underclass.

The new technologies which have arisen in the past 15 years offer an opportunity for us to return to humane principles. People will be judged by their work and their contributions to society, rather than by their inbred status conferred by their birthrights to Oxbridge or the Ivy League, or by their ability to conform the norms of institutions granting degrees.

Will is right. This must become a demand. Following leaders who will not demonstrate their leadership is probably, in Dylan’s phrasing, less logical than “worship[ping] parking meters.” We not only need the demonstration, we need the proof of ongoing education, of lifetime learning, of commitment to the future of knowledge.

Ira Socols last blog post..A Toxic Mix and Children at Risk