#SDUHSDchat February 9-15: Slooooooow Chat

Instead of our traditional Tuesday night 8:00 - 8:30 "blink and you'll miss it" #SDUHSDchat, let's try something different this week. For the week of the 9th through the 15th, we're going to do a "slow chat". One question will be posted each morning at 7:00 am. You can participate in the chat at any time you like, however frequently or infrequently you choose. Just be sure to include the hashtag #SDUHSDchat in your responses and discussion.

If you are using the standard Twitter website, you can always click on the hashtag to get a timeline that only includes #SDUHSDchat. If you are using Tweetdeck, you can create a separate column for our chat. Or you can use the Participate Learning interface, which is getting better and better for managing Twitter chats.

I will update this post with the questions for each day, so you can always refer back to this post if you miss the day's question in the morning. Questions will be coming from the @SDUHSDchat account as well as from my account, @kfairchild6.

Q1 - Tuesday the 9th
What are some things in your life that happen too quickly? What do you do to make them slow down? Why?

Q2 - Wednesday the 10th

What are some things in your class that happen too fast? What makes you think so? How could they slow down?

Q3 - Thursday the 11th
Team Hare or Team Tortoise? Slow and steady or quick as a jackrabbit? Which is the way you typically work? Why?

Q4 - Friday the 12th
Think about a student’s typical school day. In what ways are they too rushed? How can Ts help them slow down?

Q5 - Saturday the 13th
Often, being “busy” is seen as being successful. Do you agree? Are your weekends busier than your work week?

Q6 - Sunday the 14th
Is the old adage of “Sunday is a day of rest” outdated? How do you rest and recharge over the weekend?

Q7 - Monday the 15th
4th day of a long weekend! Did your Ss relax at all, or are our Ss' lives overscheduled? How can Ts help?

UPDATE: I should have mentioned in the first place that my own introduction to "slow chats" was from the inestimable David Theriault (@davidtedu) in this blog post from January 2014. He tells me he had never heard of a slow chat before that, so lacking evidence to the contrary, we're going to give David the credit for this idea!

How SDUHSD Learned to Twitter Chat

I've said it before and I'll say it again: If you're not reading Bjorn Paige's blog (bjornpaige.wordpress.com), you are missing some fantastic writing and reflection on education in general and middle school in particular. In January, he announced the second installment of the Diegueño book club for parents and staff, focused on Daniel Wolff's How Lincoln Learned to Read: Twelve Great Americans and the Educations that Made Them. (Amazon link)

Since the book club meeting is scheduled for a Tuesday evening, Bjorn and I decided to also use this book as the topic for our weekly district Twitter chat, On March 10, #SDUHSDchat will be at a special time and will focus on several issues raised in different chapters of the book.

Wolff's book is a collection of 12 more-or-less independent chapters, each describing the education of a famous American and how that education both reflects the ideas of the times and shapes the lives of the people who experience it. Bjorn is planning his own questions for the in-person book club; for our Twitter chat, aimed at people who may or may not have already read the book, each of our discussion questions will be based on a short excerpt from a chapter. If you have the time to read the book beforehand, that would be great; if you don't, you'll still be perfectly able to participate in the chat.

I will be moderating the chat from the book club in-person meeting, at the Diegueño Media Center, from 5:00 to 6:00 on Tuesday the 10th. We will be displaying the chat on a screen in the Media Center, for in-person participants who might be interested. I'm also hoping to be able to bring some of the book club discussion to the Twitter chat as well.

This is an experiment on our part. I've never live-tweeted a book club discussion before, nor have we done a hybrid Twitter/in-person conversation like this. I'm hoping that the combination of the two discussions will produce something greater than the sum of the parts.

On Chatting, Proximity, and the Advantages of Pizza

Over the last several months, many districts in San Diego County have started regular Twitter chats. Inspired by them, and frustrated with my inability to keep up with huge fast-paced chats like California EdChat (#CAedchat), I gathered four other SDUHSD tweeters in May and we started #SDUHSDchat, on Tuesday nights from 8:00 to 8:30 Pacific Time.

Over the course of the year, we've had some well-attended chats and some not-so-well-attended. No matter who is there, the chat is entertaining and interesting (at least to me), but it seemed that we had a drop-off in participation in November and December. This is perhaps to be expected, as teachers were busy with holiday activities, and our chat schedule was irregular to say the least during that time. So I wanted to do something to increase interest and participation.

I had already had the idea of doing an in-person chat, with teachers who were unfamiliar with Twitter or with chats sitting in the room with Twitter veterans who could look over their shoulders and help them out in person. Then I saw that the Santee school district had done just that, but at a restaurant, as a social activity! The light bulb went on! #PizzaChat was born, at least in my head. (Thanks to Kristen Eveland, @keveland2, for the inspiration!)

Administrators as well as teachers came out to learn!

We would do our first #SDUHSDchat of 2015 as a #PizzaChat, using the promise of free food and free help to attract teachers! The next steps were to choose a time and a location. If we used an off-campus restaurant, the event would be more social and teachers could indulge in adult beverages. If we used a location at one of our school sites, we would have better computer and wi-fi access, and we wouldn't need any reservations or agreements with a restaurant. Holding the chat in mid-afternoon, right after school would be more convenient and would probably get better attendance; having it later (like 5:00 or 6:00) would be closer to dinner time and take better advantage of pizza. (Who wants a pizza dinner at 3:30?) In the end, we decided on earlier and on-site, and that turned out to be exactly the right decision.

SDUHSD teachers learn (or re-learn) using Twitter for professional connections.

As it happened, we ended up with about 15 teachers either brand-new to Twitter or who had signed up but never used their account. The conference room we chose was crowded, which was exactly what I was hoping for. (Others had suggested moving to the media center, but I thought that I'd much rather have a crowded small room than a relatively empty larger room.)
We had a chat with questions that were relatively silly, because the questions were not the point of this particular chat. The point was getting teachers familiar with the idea and the mechanics of building their PLNs.

OK, so we proved that we could draw people to our Twitter chat if we fed them pizza. The real test, however, would be the next week. How many of these teachers would return to our Tuesday night chat if it was, as I put it, "BYOP (Bring Your Own Pizza)"? The answer was gratifying. Our chat on the following Tuesday was better attended than almost any of our previous chats.

What were my take-away lessons from this?

Who knew chatting was such serious business?

1. Twitter chats don't have to be serious, high-minded, or deeply philosophical. My questions were silly, but slightly thought-provoking. I was inspired by #WeirdEd chat, started and moderated, appropriately enough, by @TheWeirdTeacher.
2. Proximity means a lot. Being physically present in the room, and able to answer teachers' questions by looking over their shoulder and pointing at the screen, is for many teachers a thousand times more effective than any explanation by email or phone or social media.
3. Teachers will come out for pizza. Doesn't matter what else is happening.
4. Once we get teachers started on Twitter, they recognize what a valuable resource it is, chats or no. I commented to my officemates that I thought it was cool that part of my job was to eat pizza and tweet, but it's not as trivial as it sounds. One of my goals this year is to help teachers build their PLNs, and using Twitter is the single best way I have found to do that.

Special thanks to Bjorn Paige (@bjornpaige) for the use of the Diegueno conference room and the photos in this post. Also thanks to Lori Meyer (@meyerteacher), Mark Van Over (@APMarkVanOver), and Michelle Anderson (@mathmama) for helping moderate #SDUHSDchat. Look for us on Tuesday nights at 8:00 PT!

Alternatives to Microsoft Office

Our license with Microsoft no longer allows for teachers to install Office on their personal computers, only on district computers. Teachers have asked me what their options are if they don't want to pay for their own version of Microsoft Office to use at home. Here are the best choices that I know of:

1. Google Docs

Google Apps can convert Office documents to native Google format, but now it can also edit Office documents directly, as well. There may be some formatting changes if you convert back and forth, but the content should convert pretty well overall. This should probably be your first option for working with Office documents.

I find that I do most of my work directly in Google Apps these days. The only time I need to use Word specifically is if I need to do a complex table layout, with merged cells and odd borders. Everything else I can do with Google Docs.

2. Free Alternatives

There are two sets of programs that are free and open-source, and compatible with all Office documents. You can download and install either of these on Windows or Mac computers.

• Apache Open Office - www.openoffice.org
• LibreOffice - www.libreoffice.org

3. Educational Pricing for Microsoft Office

If you absolutely need to have Microsoft, not an alternative, you can probably get educational pricing with a teacher ID, paystub, or letter from your principal. There are lots of places that will sell software at educational pricing; probably the largest is Academic Superstore (www.academicsuperstore.com). As of today, they are listing a copy of Microsoft Office 2013 for $140 or a subscription to Office 365 for $70 per year. (What's the difference? Read this to learn.)

SDUHSD Instructional Technology Vision Draft

Over the last six months, SDUHSD has been engaged in a process to develop a vision for how instructional technology should be implemented in our district. A team of 30 faculty, staff, and administrators developed the following draft, which is now being shared with parents, students, and community groups. The team tried to write a vision that was general enough to be broadly applicable and lasting, yet specific enough to be useful.

The statements below are not yet final and have not been adopted officially by our school board, but we hope that they will be soon. We welcome your comments, either on this blog post or by email to kevin.fairchild@sduhsd.net.

---

SDUHSD Vision for Educational Technology

The San Dieguito Union High School District uses instructional technology to provide a world-class education that engages students, inspires achievement and service to others, and prepares them to be lifelong learners and responsible members of society.

Strategic Themes

Student Outcomes

Through the use of technology, our students develop the ability to think creatively and critically, evaluate tools and information sources, communicate effectively, and collaborate productively in order to connect with the world and prepare for college and careers.

Instruction

We provide dynamic, engaging, and rigorous learning experiences for all students through the purposeful use of instructional technology as part of our innovative, standards-based curriculum. Teachers continually evaluate the effectiveness of instructional technology through student outcomes.

Citizenship and Safety

We teach and model the importance of online safety and civility, personal responsibility for one’s own digital presence, and shared responsibility of digital citizenship in a global community.

Equity

We ensure relevant, appropriate, and equitable access to technology for all in order to support student success.

Support

We provide ongoing professional development, technical support, and dedicated resources that foster dynamic learning experiences through innovative applications of instructional technology.

---

Speak Up Survey 2012 - Districtwide Summary of Results

I've spent some time analyzing and summarizing the districtwide results from the Speak Up Survey that our students (and parents and staff) took in the fall.  Here is a prezi that highlights some of the significant findings and implications as I see them.

Prezi recently added audio options, so be sure to turn on your speakers or headphones, so you can hear my mellifluous voice commenting on each slide.

21st-Century Skills and Common Core

I spent yesterday with about 40 teachers and much of our district leadership team as we began the planning for our transition to Common Core State Standards (CCSS). I have been talking about the Common Core with teachers since the beginning of this year, as I explained what my job is all about.  At CUE 2013 last week in Palm Springs, there were numerous sessions on Common Core standards, including one that I attended that emphasized the overlap between CCSS and 21st-century skills.  All this was re-emphasized for me during our session yesterday, and gives me an opportunity to republish one of my favorite diagrams:

So much of the emphasis in the CCSS fits in exactly with the student outcomes in this chart.  The 4 C's (critical thinking, communication, collaboration, and creativity) are what will be expected and assessed if we implement CCSS correctly.  Information and technical skills are interwoven throughout the CCSS, and the entire purpose of CCSS is for students to develop authentic life and career skills.

Teachers and administrators have chafed under the constraints of the standards and assessment system that is currently in place in California.  The adoption of CCSS gives us a chance to start fresh, in a sense, not just with curriculum but with instructional methods as well.

What is My Job?

Last night I presented to the SDUHSD Board of Trustees. Our superintendent had asked me to give a short presentation describing my new position and what I have been working on so far this school year. I appreciated the opportunity to get to speak, and enjoyed the experience. The process of trying to write a concise summary of what I do (as well as the reasoning behind it) really helped me to gather my thoughts. Here are my notes that I wrote out ahead of time; I stuck to them pretty closely, with only a couple of ad-libs.

Many of you know me; I've been a science teacher at La Costa Canyon for the last 16 years, teaching Physics and Earth Science. This year, I'm serving as a Teacher on Special Assignment for Technology and Learning. As you know, this is a new position for our district, so it's an honor and a challenge for me to define exactly what this role is.

One way to think about this role is in the name itself. Many districts have a similar position, working with "Instructional Technology". Ours is "Technology and Learning". It's more than a semantic difference, it signals that our focus is on student learning and what students do, rather than focusing on what teachers do. Obviously, teachers influence what students do, so as Rick and Mike and I have defined my role, it has fallen into two categories: core technical skills, and 21st-century learning.

Most of the work I've done so far this year has been around providing support and professional development for teachers to improve their core technical skills. We've put together a short list of "what a technically competent teacher can do", including skills with Aeries.net, Gmail, Google Drive, websites, and instructional technology. We had all teachers respond to this survey, and I'm now working with the site administrators to plan and deliver professional development for teachers who need to get up to speed.

I've worked a lot with teachers at all sites to help them use their websites to communicate effectively with students and parents, and to use Blackboard, our online learning management system, as a complement to their in-class activities. I've supported teachers who are using Plato for the 9th grade health component of PE or for support and intervention classes for students performing below grade level in mathematics or who need extra help to pass the High School Exit Exam. I've also been working with teachers who are using electronic textbooks, as we begin to move in that direction, to make sure that the teachers and students can easily access their class materials.

The other side of my job at this point is to help our district to define what 21st-century learning looks like. Our current education system remains largely a 19th- and 20th-century creation; (and here I am speaking not just about our district but about our country as a whole). This system was designed for an age of information scarcity; in which knowledge was difficult to get, and largely held and disseminated by teachers to students.*  We don't live in that era anymore; we are in an age of information glut; most students have access to more information than they know what to do with, and they can look it up on a powerful computer that they carry around in their pocket, unless we make them turn it off when they enter the classroom.

So if schools are no longer the holders and disseminators of information, then what is the role of schools and teachers? There are a number of groups who have been working on developing sets of 21st-century skills or 21st-century fluencies. It's a little bit unsettling that we are 13 years into the 21st century and are still discussing what 21st-century skills look like; probably educators will still be working on it for another 87 years. But there is a broad agreement that while students have access to all the information they could want, the role of schools and teachers needs to be to teach them what to do with it.  So this is where the notion of skills comes in. The upcoming Common Core standards are much more about skills than about factual knowledge. Students need to be able to find information, curate information, evaluate information, combine information from different sources, work collaboratively with others, and then produce and present their own contributions to the world's knowledge.

Toward this end, I have been working with a small group of teachers from all sites and all disciplines who are interested in experimenting with instructional strategies that can be effective in moving students toward 21st century skills. We've got teachers who are using a strategy known as "flipped learning"; using videos of themselves (among other resources) to provide direct instruction to students who can watch it any time in any place, then using classroom time for interactive activities where the teacher's assistance can be of most use. It's called "flipped" because what was traditionally done in class (direct instruction) is now done at home, and "homework" is now done in class. But it's really about teachers making the best use of scare classroom time with students. There are teachers who are having students produce electronic portfolios to showcase and share what the students have been able to produce. We've got teachers who are using online communication tools like discussion boards and chat rooms to provide extra support for students outside of the school day. This nucleus of teachers is working to explore what kinds of instructional strategies can be effective in helping students to develop the skills they need to be successful in the world of the future.

Thanks for this opportunity to speak to you, and I look forward to continuing to work with the students and teachers all around this district.

*Obviously my thinking here has been heavily influenced by Will Richardson's books, including Why School? and Personal Learning Networks.