Ideas and Thoughts from an EdTech

I’ve had a great experience teaching undergrads at the University of Regina.  It’s been a great way to try out some ideas and try and build on George Siemens’ idea of connectivism as well as everything else I’ve learned from my network.

I’ve spent a great deal of time over the past number of years studying and leading changes in assessment in our school division. So after leading workshops and discussion with teachers, it was an opportunity to practice the beliefs and strategies I held firmly.

We have set these seven principles to guide assessment practices in our division:

1. Students are the key assessment users.

2. A balance of assessment for and of learning should be used.

3. Assessment should be constructive; it should focus on achievement and progress.

4. Assessment and instruction are interdependent.

5. Good quality assessments must be followed by effective  communication.

6. Assessment expectations and curricular outcomes should be communicated clearly to students from the beginning.

7. Meaningful and appropriate assessments should include evidence about student achievement in the areas of content, process and product.

So how did I do? Well I hoped that my students felt they were part of the assessment. Their blogs served as their personal reflection tool and they did an outstanding job at analyzing their beliefs and sharing their frustrations and challenges.  In this way, they led much of their own learning.  Concepts of “assessment for” and “assessment of” learning were both in action. I tried to guide and provide feedback throughout their endeavors and was also able to send out a mid-term report that included a grade and evaluation of their progress.  I certainly tried to build on achievement and progress. Using assessment to change instruction is one area I’m not sure I was able to achieve. The idea that assessment changes instruction is very powerful. Certainly I will take student feedback and learning to change instruction for next time, but the short time frame of the class made this very difficult. Between emails and blog comments, I tried to provide each of my 14 students will regular input. An online class can be very isolated and requires special attention. As the course progressed, students began doing this for each other;  that was great to see.  The expectations for this class was to experience that:

• Learning is social and connected
• Learning is personal and self-directed
• Learning is shared and transparent
• Learning is rich in content and diversity

These ideas are difficult to assess and grade.  Student’s post demonstrate their understanding of these ideas and I have to trust that they did experience this in varying degrees.  How important is it to break down each of the ideas into measurable data? Perhaps I could have broken these idea down further.  Evidence of their learning was demonstrated in their blog posts, weekly assignments and synchronous sessions.

You’ll notice our principles say nothing about grades. I hate grades, especially using a 100 point scale. They’re fake. I have a hard time telling one student they received a 89 and another a 84. I’m not smart enough to tell the difference. We continue to perpetuate the use of grades to rank students. I hope my students leave this class with having experienced the ideas I’ve outlined and not a grade. Anyways, I digress.

So overall I’d give myself  84 . Let’s just say I got most of it right but will work on a few other things.

[tags]uregina,assessment, prairiesouth,grades[/tags]

Today I had my informal evaluation with my superintendent. She was more than gracious in her appreciation of not only the work I do within our division but truly gets the importance of my connectivity and what this means for teaching and learning. We talked about the growth of many of our classrooms in terms of their move to a more relevant learning experience and more self-directed learning.

I cited one example that to me exemplifies the work and change that I’ve had a hand in.

Sophie has always been a teacher who put the needs of her students up front. This year we met several times to look at the idea of Web 2.0 and what that means for the classroom. She began with a blog. A few months ago we had Darren talk to a group of teachers via Skype to share his work. Sophie made the leap from a classroom blog where she was posting assignments to getting students to not only blog but post their daily labs and learning via video. This semester, they’ve uploaded 38 videos of their work. She’s not the one posting or uploading, it’s the kids. I’ve talked to her about it and she continues to be excited for the work of her students. The growth and improvement of their work over time has been clearly evident. She not only gets this, but is now “evangelizing” in her school and beyond. This is what it’s supposed to look like. So what are you waiting around for, head over to her blog and encourage her and her kids!

[tags]shareski,darrenkuropatwa,sophierosso,skype,youtube[/tags]

It’s interesting how you pull certain ideas, phrases from content that aren’t perhaps the main idea. I guess that’s part of constructivstism and connectivism (still haven’t totally got those concepts firm in my mind).

Will’s recent reflection on Social Computing and subsequent comments, challenged his thinking. While the gist of his latest discussion focuses on considering “big picture” thinking, the phrase

“pushed me to think”

caught my attention.

I spend a great deal of energy and time pushing others to think and considering new ideas and ways to make learning more relevant and authentic. Often I think I’m like most with strong beliefs in that I’m less likely to consider alternative thinking. I do appreciate people who open up my world and thinking and these folks are found online and off. Three big areas in which I’m being challenged are:

1. Social Networking for kids
2. CyberBulling
3. Assessment Practices

1. Social Networking…My basic belief regarding social networking and its implication for students and teachers is that everything has potential. Recent discussions about Twitter and Ning elevate the discussion to question their value.

2. CyberBulling…I still waffle on this one. My post summarizes my view but I still struggle with the amount of emphasis this issue deserves. I’ll continue to read and ponder the ideas and accept the challenges. I know that we’ll have to develop some plan for our division but I hope its focus is not in creating fear and trepidation but rather thoughtful, rationale understanding.

3. Assessment Practices…developing best practice around assessment has been a focus for me and our school division for the past several years. This discussion on final exams, serves to stimulate ideas on just one small aspect of this issue. Again, my ideas are there but I certainly am interested and value those who disagree.

I just these things help me to see I don’t really operate in an echo chamber but am truly beginning to open the walls of my learning and hopefully classrooms.

*took this photo on a drive this winter and have been looking a post to use it with..

Haven’t done a podcast with just me yakkin’ for a while. Tried using GCast on Steve D.’s recommendation. Not sure it’s for me as it wants to build a player for me rather than just give me an mp3 file I can embed with my own built in player. So thumbs down to GCast, unless their helpdesk lets me know how to link directly to the mp3.

Update1: They did email me back but apparently I needed to complete another step using Garageband.com
Update2: Did that, but they link has a weird identifier that won’t work in PodPress
Update3: Final email states the identifier is needed so I can’t use GCast as I had hoped….Steve, you’ll have to do a bit more selling for me to buy in.
Update4:After 6 days, I uploaded it to good old internetarchive and stick with what works.
This is a brief podcast on some of my recent frustrations on ideas of assessment and accountability.
Time:8:56
Size:6.4 MB

 

 Frustrations with Assessment: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Here are my notes from 2 sessions I attended here in Saskatoon. I’ve added my thoughts at the bottom.

Time for a Revolution Assessment Dynamics

Rick Stiggins Assessment Institute

Saskatoon, Sk October 11-13, 2006

We assess to inform us about instruction and to encourage students to try

• How much do we focus on encouraging students?
  
• These reasons do not talk at all about rank and order
  

Two keys to good assessment: accurate and effective use.

Always begin by asking:

• What decisions? What comes next in the learning?
  
• Who’s making them? Students, teachers, parents
  
• What information will be helpful to the students? Continuous, on individual progress towards standards
  

It is more likely students will hit clearly defined still targets that are clearly articulated from the beginning. If these are not clearly stated and communication…success will be random.

Accuracy must have purpose, good design and clear targets

Effective use must have effective communication and student involvement

Reasoning Proficiency Foundation of knowledge is essential

2 ways of knowing

• Know it outright
  
• Know where to find it The distinction in curriculum must be made to determine how much should be known outright and how much should be around knowing where to find it.
  

Students are natural thinkers.

Clear learning targets are essential

They must relate to the real world

Create graphic representations

My thoughts:

I’ve attended a 3 day workshop in Portland with Stiggins and have read much of his work so I’m fairly familar with his approach. I was once again struck at how little we use assessment to encourage students. His initial address focused on creating confident learners. Seems fairly elementary by once again, there are too many instances in our schools where the opposite happens for some. He talked about how in our “data driven” world, the impact the data has on the learner is by far the most critical use. Too many forget this. I know I do. He also talked about winning streaks and losing streaks. Basically that we are compelled to help students get on winning streaks. This doesn’t mean false praise or weakened standards but holding a mirror up to students to recognize progress.

In his second address on reasoning, he did a great job of outlining the importance of knowledge. He also challenged our use of the phrase “higher order thinking” and how critical it is to have knowledge in order to reason. But he was clear in the way he distinguished knowledge into knowing it outright and knowing where to find it. He used the example of his doctor who would listen and observe symptons and based on prior knowledge could assign treatment. If past experience or knowledge didn’t help, the doctor knew where to find additional information. The critical piece is determining how much is needed to be known outright and how much to we teach students to find the information.