T+L Conference Nashville, Tennessee October 17-19, 2007

 

Departure date for T+L October 16th 9 a.m. Central!!!

 

October 17, 2007

 

Last night we had an enjoyable time at the conference reception.  Great country music and time to relax from a long day's travel.  I am set to register this morning and get to work!

 

I had to switch my breakfast speaker this morning as I wanted to see, hear, and learn form Will Richardson.  Fortunately there were a few open seats and I secured one!   I have no access to wireless as of yet, and it appears we are in a state of finding out right now.  Unfortunately we may not have wireless access without pay here at this "technology" conference!  I am typing this in TextEdit to be added later to my wiki and to slap into Twitter from time to time during the course of the day.   

 

I did get a password to get on the wireless and shared it with Will but it is very unreliable.  I thought I could pop something into Twitter, and  you may see this eventually.  It  may be our location in the convention hall, and I may have better luck elsewhere.  Notes will be here for now!

 

Will Richardson (Breakfast Speaker):

 

http://willrichardson.wikispaces.com

 

Will Richardson

 

Newsday The Technobabble battle...

 

61% preferred computer therapist

 

Will's kids in Australia:  Learning is totally engaged.  That's what I hope there education is like!

 

Not pleased with public education.  Paper based, don't get out much, not using the web that allows for going places.

 

20 + years experience using tech tools with students, especially with the new tools in recent years.

 

Weblogged (Will's blog)

 

Own kid's experience using Skype (Steve Hargadon connected with them)

 

Blogging allows for a better learning environment than a physical space.

 

Create a network of people that are passionate about learning and want to share.

 

Clustr Map:  Shows what an engaging process blogging is!  We can connect around our passions in a way we have never been able to before.

 

Social tools can connect people around their passions. 

 

Obama is using social networking on his site as a successful tool.  He leads the number of people that donate $, attributed to the social networking features of his site.

 

Figuring out a different model for doing things.

 

It's not about competition, it's about cooperation and collaboration.

 

As we share it makes us all smarter!

 

Education does not move quickly!  Students have their own tools and we have to begin to understand how to use them and help students learn with them.

 

Students will probably not be using keyboards and mice. 

 

How to kids compete and connect?

 

Most schools choose to pull the plug!  Students cannot use the tools at school that they use everyday!!!

 

We need to make some changes in our own practices.  If we get that for ourselves then we can make the changes for students.

 

Twitter (If you can get an internet connection <-Neil Hokanson!!!)

 

We are not teaching networks  very well.

 

http://www.fanfiction.net/book/

 

Huge numbers of kids  involved in this fan fiction site!!!

 

Convergence Culture (Jenkins)

 

Making it Global (site?)

 

xoxo-hillary-xoxo.learnerblogs.org

 

natavillage.typepad.com 

 

We are not teaching students and helping them use the tools they use each day.

 

46645=Google

 

Nowhere in Will's daughter's education are they teaching how to use a cell phone.

 

We need to teach this!!!

 

Wikipedia (many schools block it "because it can't be trusted")

 

We need to teach how to use Wikipedia.  Example of how a student "fixed" his paper in Wikipedia :-)

 

Content is rich and changing.

 

Teaching has to change.  With an internet connection you are no longer the smartest "person" in the room.

 

The Secret Life of Bees (Will's classroom example of using social networking with his students and author)

 

Radio Willow Web  "This is what I want my kids to be doing!"

 

This is what are kids future looks like.  these are the  types of  classrooms they need to be learning in.  We have educators need to figure this out, the kids are not waiting for us.  It is a difficult  challenge,  but it starts with us!!!

 

1122334455 (NSBA Wifi)

 

Lyn Heward (Keynote Speaker):

 

Comes from a line of teachers in her family.

 

Taking us on a creative journey: (topic creativity)

 

Note - Ray Bradbury quote behind Lyn:  "My own belief is that the universe exists as a miracle ...

 

A Brief History of the Cirque de Soleil 1984-2007  invoke imagination, provoke senses, and evoke emotions

 

Door 1:  Great Expectations  "Creative"

 

Door 2:  Surrender to your senses! "Develop intuitive instincts."  "Capture the experiences when they happen!"  Even if they don't seem significant at the time.

 

Door 3:  Treasure Hunting and Creative Transformation  Shared experience of "seeing" China - using all her senses to experience the place!  We learn first and foremost through our senses.  We create the same way!!!  "We need to scoop up all those sensorial experiences."  "Go fishing for talent!"  "We are looking for a little bit of craziness..."  "Closed auditions rather than cattle calls..." 

 

(Translate all this to education!!!  I get it!  Do you!?!)  Lyn is sharing the process the Cirque de Soliel goes through to find cast members, the same goes for reaching our students!!!  16 weeks of training without the guarantee for a job.  Hire for what they might become!

 

So who are you?

 

Creative  transformation.

 

Example:  Creating a statue

 

Who are you?

 

Peel back the layers to get to the intense  sweet core.

 

4 Keys:

 

Work outside comfort zone.

 

Try something different.

 

Never repeat yourself.

 

Apply creativity to everyday tasks as well as to those big new projects.

 

Door 4:  The Nurturing Environment  "Playfulness"  "Requires stimulation and cooperation - teamwork"  "Collective Creativity"

 

All team members should "feel" responsible and share ownership.

 

Given protection and support to take risks = greater results.

 

Creation studios organized like a ship.  We are on a journey.

 

Everyone is invited  to send the performers off to perform.

 

Door 5:  How Constraints, Challenges, Difference and Consumer  Expectations become Creative Catalysts 

 

As we overcome things we  grow.

 

2 ways to get to an end result!  60 million required, you have 25 million

 

"Evocation is more powerful than sensation!"

 

Forces people to think and work a little bit harder.

 

We must be in touch with our world.

 

The world can work together to solve  problems.

 

You must stay connected to your world.

 

Pay attention to cultural differences, and they will become great assests.  Cultural  assets.

 

Take  into  consideration the needs and expectations of our consumers!!!

 

(Triangular Diagram top to bottom)

Creative Drivers

Human-Centric

Polymorphic, Open Architecture

Introspective,  Evokes Emotions

Nomadic Spirit

Handcrafted

Sensory Abundance

 

Door 6:  Risk-Taking:  Do you ever get burned?

 

Mike= "You have to leverage your credibility over several years to get to a new level of credibility."  We have to practice risk taking and learn from our mistakes = research and development.

 

Door 7:  Keeping  it fresh!  Committed to the show.  Leader sets the example.  Expose employees to the product.  Share success.  Product  launches.  

 

The seven doors revisted...

 

October 18, 2007

 

 

Jim Brazell Breakfast Speaker

 

The Future is Here!

 

Ray Kerzwell:  We will see the equivalent of tech of tech in the past 100 years in the next 25, in the next 50 the equivalent of all tech in human history.

 

What shifts will we have to make?

H.S. dropouts to graduates.

 

Why?

 

Video games:  Average user 25-32 years old, 56% male 44% female

 

Mixed Reality

 

Shift  from games as toys to games as ed. tech

 

America's Army game

 

http://www.whyville.com

 

Resources:  http://www.ventureramp.com (download free reports .pdf)

 

Shift from IT to Mechatronics (nano mechatronics)

 

What?

 

Shift from  specialized to systems

 

Shift  from 1950s workforce model to Millenial model

 

Today, 65% of jobs require at least 2 years of training or coursework.

 

Shift that vocational education is less to that it is more!

 

How?

 

Robotics, trades, engineering

 

Shift from why to how!

 

How do we fix the crisis?

 

Peter Diamandis (Keynote Speaker)

 

Inspired by the  NASA program.

 

We're only 100  years old as a technology species.

 

X-Prize

1927 Orteig Prize Charles Lindberg

People changed their minds to allow something to happen.

If people believe they can, they will change.

 

The idea is to challenge people to think differently and change things.

 

Anasari X Prize

 

26 teams from 7 countries spent 100 million dollars to win 10 million dollars

 

Private space travel has boomed since this 2004 event.

 

X Prize Mission:  "To bring about radical breakthroughs for the benefit of humanity."

 

New Grand Challenges:  Sequence 100 Human Genomes in 10 days; Automotive cars that exceed 100 mpg; Lunar Moon 2.0 260 requests for registration packets.

 

http://www.googlelunarxprize.org

 

Lunar Legacy Program:  allows people to upload family pictures and messages for $10 that will betaken to the moon.

 

First e-mailandvideo message from the moon.  "One small click for man, one giant message for mankind."

 

Zero Gravity Corporation

 

Took 11 1/2 years to get operational.

 

Anyone can fly and reach zero gravity.

 

"The day before a breakthrough it is a crazy idea!"

 

Stephen Hawking zero gravity experience.

 

Zero G education Initiative 2007 20 flights 400 teachers  Goal next  year is 1000 teachers and 1000 students.

 

This project makes math and science cool!

 

Helps them believe they can do the impossible!

 

Florida "Hawking Center"

 

CNN Video  "Weightless Classroom in the Sky"

 

http://www.GoZeroG.com/education

 

Gwendolyn@GoZeroG.com

 

Stirring the Pot Mixing Blogging, Podcasting, and Literacy (Essex Town School District Essex, VT (Workshop)

 

Moodle site:  http://essextown.vtlearn.org/

 

Blogging

 

Class Blogmeister (Safe and Secure)

 

Everything is sent to the teacher first via e-mail!

 

Students use psudonym and school password

 

Have to have a title or it won't be sent to teacher!

 

First year success (Dec.) students enthusiastic, student moved to Utah in Mar. and continued  to blog and keep in contact.

 

Class Blogmeister http://classblogmeister.com/

 

Be careful about giving blogging assignments as they will fill your inbox!

 

Engages student's desire to write and get their pieces published  on the front page of the classroom blog.

 

AUP has to be tweaked to meet the requirements of digital citizenship and posting online appropriately.

 

Podcasting

 

Use audacity:  http://audacity.sourceforge.net/

 

Absolute Sound Effects Archives:  http://www.grsites.com/sounds/ (Also download LAME to save as an mp3)

 

A good site for royalty free music that Neil Hokanson recommends is http://freeplaymusic.com/

 

Credit you sources at the end:  where you got music, etc.

 

Don't over edit!  Remember the goal, publishing a product.

 

You can use music vocabulary, physics, etc. as you look at and edit the tracks.

 

GlobalPodder free space to store your podcasts

 

Technology Unleashed to Meet all of your Customer's Needs Craven County Schools North Carolina (Workshop)

 

http://www.craven.k12.nc.us/

 

Open Source Tools

 

Survey Tool:  http://www.butterfat.net/wiki/Projects/phpESP

 

Web/DatabaseServer:  http://www.devside.net/

 

Strategic Planning

 

Webmail

 

TeacherWeb

 

iNet

 

iWeb

 

iWeb;  Can be locked down (username & password) or open to the public.  This particular district  keeps sensitive info within their system thus locked.

 

Forms

 

Desktop Applications

 

Web Applications

 

Use FileMaker Pro to create database reporting systems.

 

October 19, 2007

 

Ian Jukes (Keynote Speaker)

 

Understanding the Digital Generation

 

Online handout link:  http://web.mac.com/iajukes/thecommittedsardine/Handouts_files/ndl.pdf

 

Wants to stretch our thinking about change!

 

Lou Salza quote:  "Easier to change the course of history than a history course."

 

Took stepson Nils to Slayer concert.

 

The Mosh Pit Not for the Faint at Heart!

 

Kids today are different.  Digital bombardment.  "Screenagers"

 

Images on a screen are interactive environments to project their identity.

 

Digital Natives.

 

Digital has become their language of choice, it is digital as a first language (DFL).

 

We (educators) are digital immigrants.  DSL Digital as a Second Language.

 

Children's brains are changing and developing differently:  Hypertext Minds.

 

We once believed the brain was set by age 3.  Neural pathways and brain studies find this is not true.  The brain is constantly restructuring.  Growth is based on stimulation and intensive, sustained stimulation increase growth and change.

 

Neuroplasticity  (the brain is plastic and constantly changing).

 

A Whole New  Mind, Daniel Pink (Right Brained Thinking - Conceptual Thinking)

Left Brained Thinking has been automated here in the 21st century.

 

Neuroplastic brains have to be stimulated several hours a day seven days a week.

 

Video games in 1974 (Pong) began influencing the brains of children.

 

MMORPG

 

What is digital bombardment doing to kids brains?

 

The brain is a tree.  "Neural pruning."

 

Myelin boosts neural transmission speed by 13 times.

 

Digital bombardment is rewiring kids brains.  Our children and students are now processing information differently.

 

Human Brain Project:  Neuroinformatics.  Analyzing brain processes.

 

fMRIs

 

Technology is helping us to learn how the brain operates and how the mind  works.

 

The Teen Brain (Scientific American Mind)

 

Visual Cortex

 

The eye processes info 60,000 times faster than text.

 

Todays students read in an F pattern rather than a Z pattern of young people in the past.

 

Readers of the past "prefer" black text on a white  background.  Today's learners prefer pink, green, orange text.

 

All of this impacts how children learn.  They spend much of their time unengaged in schools today!!!

 

We continue to do the same things in classrooms over and over.  Definition of insanity!?!

 

Who really has the learning  problem because it certainly is not the kids!

 

Your kid is normal after all!!!

 

There is a growing disconnect between how kids learn and the current focus on assessment.

 

It is a recipe for disaster!!!

 

6 Major Changes

 

1.  It is time for educators and education to catch up. 

 

Educators need to start using and doing 21st Century Skills.  Read "Zits."  Play video games with them.  Explore their online worlds.  MTV'S "The M."  Etc., etc., etc...  Digital divide is a generation divide!!!

 

2.  Educators must teach to the whole mind.

 

Critical thinking skills must be taught all along.  MC, TF tests test low level learning.  We use non-technological tools (20th century tools).  This learning is boring an irrelevant.  Shift from rote memorization to higher level thinking.  "Prosumers" = produce and consume content.

 

*Move from 20th century literacy to 21st century fluencies.

 

*Technological Fluency

 

Focus on headware not hardware.

 

*Media Fluency

 

Being able to look critically at content and understand intuitively how it is being used to influence people.  Teach empowering skills that enable this.  Instead of handing in an essay, create a digital product.  These products are essential.

 

*Information Fluency

 

Being able to use data, ask good question, analyze and authenticate info, and turn data into usable knowledge (apply), and assess what was learned.  This needs to be taught in every grade and subject area!!!

 

3.  Educators need to shift their instructional approach.

 

Becoming an expert is virtually impossible in today's digital world.

 

Dale's Learning Cone

 

 

We are trying to fit square pegs in round holes.  they do not have ADD or short attention spans, they don't learn with old ways of teaching.

 

4.   Move from a focus on LOTS to HOTS (lower/higher order thinking skills)

 

Teachers become problem solving experts.

 

Velcro learning:  brain makes a series of relevant connections between past experiences and new knowledge.

 

5.  Let  kids access information natively.

 

Social networking

 

NSBA social networking study: http://www.nsba.org/site/view.asp?CID=63&DID=41340

 

Inappropriate use of networks has been vastly over reported by the media.  Students need to have the opportunity to use these tools.

 

6.  Let kids collaborate.

 

How do we bridge this digital divide?

 

Alfred North Whitehead quote:  "It’s the business of the future to be dangerous.  Major advances in civilization are processes that all but wreck societies in which they occur."

 

Let go of old ideas and stop hanging  on to old assumptions.

 

Eric Hoffer quote:  "In times of radical change, the learners inherit the earth, while the learned find themselves perfectly equipped for a world that no longer exists."

 

I added this quote from Jukes' writings:  "The only thing worse than not being able to see, is being able to see and having no vision," Helen Keller.

 

Rubber Band  Mindset:  comfort zone, stretch it and keep it stretched.

 

http://www.ianjukes.com (see handouts:  especially Understanding Digital Kids)

 

The committed sardine blog ijukes@mindspring.com  I need  to be committed.