Tech Ed-dy

My recent experiences in the Digiteen Ning and a new incident involving my students starting a Digiteen Group that made fun of Canadian Stereotypes has gotten me thinking about Stephen Heppell’s idea that the ‘nearly now‘ of online spaces has interesting educational implications.

In this post I’m hoping to refine some ideas about what are the key ingredients necessary to turn a ‘nearly now’ space into an educational space.  These reflections are all based on the Digiteen Ning platform:

1. It is a public space.  To interact with the students on the space you need to be a member but anybody can see what is going on in this space.  In my interactions with students in the Ning and with my own students this has been a really important catalyst for real conversation because it really holds the students accountable for their own actions.
2. There is network of teachers monitoring what is happening in the Ning and taking the time to have face to face discussions with the students to help them put their online experiences into perspective, and plan their next steps.
3. There are a number of ways to interact and have a conversation.  In particular the ability to have forums or discussion threads on different topics seems to me to have a lot of potential for two reasons: 1) each discussion is focussed by the question quiding the topic; 2) it is a fairly immediate form of communication but there is no need for an immediate response which is less threatening and invites more thoughtful responses.

A couple other thoughts about the ‘nearly now’ that I came across recently in the Jenkins White Paper

Gee (2004) calls the kind of informal learning cultures that emerge from these ‘nearly now’ spaces ‘Affinity spaces’ and wonders why people learn more, participate more actively and engage more deeply with these spaces than with their textbooks.  Is it because it is new?

People can participate in various ways according to their skills and interests, because they depend on peer-to-peer teaching with each participant constantly motivated to acquire new knowledge or refine their existing skills, and because they allow each participant to feel like an expert while tapping the expertise of others.

I am particularly intrigued by the second notion of each participant having some of the knowledge and being motivated to share their knowledge while at the same time gaining knowledge from peers.  It’s like a big online jigsaw activity!

This week I am participating in a Knowschools course on Blogging in the Classroom.  It has been a stretch for me to try and actively participate in this course as well a keep on top of the mountain of other things that usually take up my day, but it has been worth it.

Our latest assignment has been to watch and reflect on an amazing video called Blogging in Their Own Words.

I’m not sure what go into me but I felt compelled to take notes and try to sort out the underlying messages coming from these students.  I used a table in google docs to try and organise my notes and was pleasantly surprised to see some common themes emerge.  In general the students in this video seemed to be saying that they found blogging to be a valuable classroom tool because:

• Blogs allowed everyone in the class to participate in the discussion, not just the vocal few.
• Blogs provided a written record of the class discussion that they could refer back to.
• Blogs were transparent and allowed you to see what other people were thinking.  I included a number of comments about how blogs facilitated the creation of a learning community in this category as I figured their transparent nature might play a role in this.
• Blogs allowed students to feel ownership over their learning because they are able to teach themselves and learn from each other.
• Blogs take the conversation outside the classroom which ‘leaves a bigger imprint’ on their brains.
• Blogs allow for a deeper level of discussion as they have more time to formulate their thoughts.

Wow.  What a powerful argument for blogging in the classroom.

This year I decided my grade 9 class would join the Digi Teen project, an amazing global collaborative project dreamed up by Vicki Davis and Julie Lindsay. As participants in this project my grade 9 technology class is engaged in researching different aspects of digital citizenship and collaborating with peers from other countries to edit Wiki pages. They are also participating in a Ning Educational Network within which they can get to know their teammates and other students from around the world. It is the experiences both I and my students are having on this Ning that I want to share.

Story 1 – “The teacher and the chat room”

I was the most nervous about involving my students in the Ning as I knew that it had potential to ring alarm bells with the parent community at my small private school on Vancouver Island, and I took pains to do my due diligence in informing parents and having conversations with my students around issues of personal and private information, digital etiquette stereotypes. I also made sure to check in on the Ning periodically to make sure everything was ok.

During one of these visits I stumbled upon the Ning chat room and realised that somewhere around the world there was a class of students on the Ning and in the chat room. Most of the chat seemed to be the students saying hello to each other in various ways, but a couple of the comments were quite inappropriate. So, being an administrator on the Ning I did what I thought was best and deleted the chat immediately.

But the comments kept coming and I was pretty sure that some of the were meant to be hurtful to others. So I decided to join the chat. Heart racing I entered a comment something like ‘Hey guys I’m a teacher over here in Canada and I’m concerned that some of what you are typing isn’t very appropriate”. I knew it sounded pretty stuffy but was at a loss to express myself properly in such a limited medium. As was expected l got some quick replies along the lines of ‘we are just having a bit of fun’. So I started typing away trying to express myself when I started getting replies of a much different nature. More apologetic and thoughtful.

What had happened was that their teacher in Australia had gotten wind of the chat and had taken the opportunity to talk to the class about it. What a learning opportunity! To follow up I started a discussion thread on the Ning asking ‘Where do you draw the line between having fun online and being innapropriate’. And I was really pleased to see some of the thoughtful replies posted by some of those Australian students.

So what is the take away lesson from this experience. I think it is that there is a lot of value in allowing students to make mistakes in an environment like the Ning where they can make mistakes and learn from them. I was nervous about the Ning component of this project because of the potential for my students to make mistakes on a public site, but if they are never given a chance to really fully participate in real world experiences then how are they ever going to learn how to navigate these experiences successfully.

Story 2 – “The war in Iraq”

This story is much shorter. One of my students started a discussion thread on the Iraq war. A tricky discussion to have when schools from both the USA and Middle East are involved in the project. The response she received from a girl in Quatar was incredibly mature and balanced. You can find it here if you are interested.

This short story has really reinforced for me the power of these global collaborative projects, and it’s not over yet. I wonder what other teachable moments and wonderful connections will happen next?

FYI this post is being written on the little Asus eeepc that I purchased for the school. So far only three (whoops, four) spelling mistakes because of the little keyboard. This is the most amazing little computer and I’m convinced it is the leading edge of a huge wave of sub-compacts about to hit the market.

It all started with the One Laptop Per Child Program which aims to put affordable, reliable and connected laptops in the hands of children in developing countries. The technology spin offs from this project have led to the development of comparable laptops by IBM, HP and of course Asus.

My original thought was to try and purchase a cart load of these little things (at $400 each they are very affordable for what you get) that could be distributed to students as they work on projects in the classroom. I particularly liked that these little things would be a useful resource/tool but wouldn’t be the focus of the entire lesson.

I am also excited about loading audacity on these things and adding a microphone to turn them into portable recording stations. The potential for exciting multimedia projects is endless.

I’ve since changed my tune a little. The small screen and keyboard on these computers does take some getting used to and I think it might be frustrating for some. Instead I’m thinking that if we can find the money a proper laptop cart would be a better initial investment because it would garner more buy in from students and teachers, which would hopefully lead to more technology integration in the classroom.

However, there will still be 4 or 5 eeepcs floating around the school for students and teachers to experiment with. It should be exciting!